Billionaire-Owned Observer Whines About Democratization of Media in 2016’s Worst Op-ed

[eridani]

http://fair.org/home/billionaire-owned-observer-whines-about-democratization-of-media-in-2016s-worst-op-ed/

The diatribe, “The Cause of This Nightmare Election? Media Greed and Shameless Traffic Worship,” poses as media criticism but is little more than petulant establishment gatekeeping. Let’s begin with the thesis, or what passes for one, which is that the democratization of media has created a “sub-prime market” for the media. A superficially catchy hook but one that, upon further examination, makes little sense:

I am talking, of course, about our media system. A system in which tens of thousands of reporters—bloggers—chasing online traffic bonuses produce sensational, inflammatory and outright dangerous “news” at the expense of the public they are supposed to be serving. A system in which speculative, high-valence news—whether it starts as a tweet or a rumor—is packaged, dissected, repacked and passed along from outlet to outlet until a thinking person can hardly follow what is real and what is fake.

Those damned “bloggers” (gasp!) are “chasing online traffic.” This is opposed to sometime in the past when ratings, newspaper sales and the ad revenue they generated didn’t matter. But never mind that; this new breed of vague “media system” has created a monster:

But he lumps Sanders in with Trump in a misreading of media coverage so off-base as to be hallucinatory. Over the same time period, Sanders got just ten minutes of coverage—less than 5 percent of Trump’s coverage, 10 percent of Clinton’s coverage and even a fifth as much as the 56 minutes given to Joe Biden and his protracted decision not to run for president.

Holiday’s piece is written by media elites for media elites, the type of thing that gets passed around in journalistic circles because it angrily expresses what so many of them truly believe: Candidates must win the Washington Post and New York Times primaries to be taken seriously by voters in actual primaries. The whole premise—that some scruple-free, vaguely defined gutter “media” helped propelled Sanders in a supra-democratic fraud—ignores the fact that nearly every major media outlet, from the Times and the Post to NBC and CNN, has either marginalized or openly warned against Sanders.

[PatrickforO]

1. Bernie may have a rough day in SC tomorrow, and

maybe a not-so-good super Tuesday. Beyond that, his numbers look better as we go. I'm confident he can get to the convention with a virtual tie in delegates actually voted by the people.

This way, when the criminal indictment comes for Clinton, the party will have to advance Sanders. Because it will.

[iAZZZo]

2. thank you member eridani

paraphrasing msm/cm: 'i have never heard of senator bernie sanders'

scott pelley (former CBS News Chief White House correspondent) featured hillary clinton in the national network news this past week; an 'interview'

nothing similar for bernie...... 'fairness and equal time" doctrine hatcheted under reagan and reinforced under bill clinton

"But he lumps Sanders in with Trump in a misreading of media coverage so off-base as to be hallucinatory. Over the same time period, Sanders got just ten minutes of coverage—less than 5 percent of Trump’s coverage, 10 percent of Clinton’s coverage and even a fifth as much as the 56 minutes given to Joe Biden and his protracted decision not to run for president." (emphasis added)

[SidDithers]

3. LOL...

There's an anti-DNC op-ed from The Observer, with 235 recs, on the front page of GD: P right now.

Sid