PBS Frontline: AMERICA'S GREAT DIVIDE, From Obama To Trump, Pt. 1, 2

[appalachiablue]

Premier Jan. 13, 2020. *FULL FILM* Part 1 of 2. (1 hr., 55 mins).

An investigation into America’s increasingly bitter, divided and toxic politics.

Part One of the documentary traces how Barack Obama’s promise of unity collapsed as increasing racial, cultural and political divisions laid the groundwork for the rise of Donald Trump.

Support your local PBS station here: http://www.pbs.org/donate

[erronis]

1. So much looking forward to watching these two hours. Thanks for posting!

[appalachiablue]

4. For Part 2: see post #3

[TheCowsCameHome]

2. Excellent series. Frontline does a great job.

I watched it earlier this week.

Trump has wreaked havoc on us.

[appalachiablue]

3. PART 2, FULL FILM

Part 2, (1 hr., 54 mins).

[JHB]

5. I can't catch the whole thing tonight, but after the first 20 minutes there's something bothering me

Maybe there's more background later on, but by starting with the 2008 campaign it erases 15 (or more) years of foundation-building, of the deliberate fostering of that divide.

Gingrich and Coulter provide commentary as if they weren't the bomb-throwing hard-right partisans they built their careers on.

Steve Schmidt, David Frum, and Charlie Sykes -- men who made their livelihoods in Republican messaging and conservative media -- comment as if they hadn't spent their careers stoking the very same resentments that Trump took full advantage of. And they did it so that Republicans could take advantage of them and get enough votes to hold power and enact their own preferred agenda.

By all means, please provide "spoilers" for the rest of it. Will we hear about Norm Orenstein and Thomas Mann -- pre-Trump -- identifying the Republicans as willfully widening that divide? Are any of the bad actors before Trump going to be revealed as bad actors?

Or will it bend over backward to be "nonpartisan", which just rewards those acting in bad faith.

[appalachiablue]

6. So far I've scanned the two parts and notice there's heavy

use of the 'divide' viewed through the lense of TV media figures, political operatives and strategists. Lots of Bannon but no Grover Norquist, Karl Rove or think tank shapers like the Kochs and Mercers that I saw. And missing are earlier years of influence by Glen Beck types or Bill Moyers for that matter.

In Part 2, be prepared for more Meghan Kelly, Breitbart and Both Sides. No mention of consolidated MSM.

I would like to have seen fewer pundits and paid operatives and more of the public, activists and indy writers.

[betsuni]

8. +1

[BootinUp]

7. im gonna have to watch it in smaller pieces

my blood pressure prefers, did 18 minutes, lol. Show is excellent so far.

[panfluteman]

9. The Great Paradox is that notwithstanding America's "Great Divide",

There is a remarkable degree of voter consensus on most of the key issues - then why can't anything get done, why can't any bills get passed? It seems like yes, there are bad actors out there who are out to stoke hatred, discord and division, like Donald Trump and Steve Bannon. And they will always attract the attention of the media, who are out to sensationalize anything to get a story. Or, to play the devil's advocate here - is the corporate controlled mainstream media out to stoke hatred and division because that's what the billionaires and the corporations want - an American people divided, to be more easily exploited?