Mainstream Media Goes Over the Top

[babylonsister]

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/11147

Mainstream Media Goes Over the Top
by Bill Hare | Nov 21 2007


If ever there was a reason why voters should disregard the mainstream media and not let them influence, much less decide their 2008 presidential votes it was supplied in the November 18 edition of America’s paper of record, the New York Times.

In that Sunday edition two columns by Pulitzer Prize winners were so mind-numbing in their collective absurdities that I have never felt more confident in my life in being a blogger who has constantly referred to the mainstream journalists alongside television commentators, particularly at Fox Fixed News, as “media snake oil.”

For those who may have been otherwise detached or away, important elements of the mainstream media have launched a full court press to confer the 2008 Democratic Party presidential nomination on Hillary Clinton.

In these multi-candidate forums staged for television audiences classified as debates the conventional wisdom among these sources is that Clinton is far outclassing her opposition and appears intent on conveying the message that the other candidates might just as well go away now rather than exhaust themselves for nothing.

snip//

Now the mainstream media has another target, Barack Obama, someone that makes their numbers nervous because he too comes from outside the good old reliable Beltway that gives us good old reliable leadership that currently has the dollar at all-time lows and will soon reach a $10 trillion debt, to name just two obvious points as starters.

Since Obama possessed the audacity to say he would talk to even unpopular foreign leaders, the New World Order collectively cringed, and most notably its currently designated poster girl Hillary Clinton.

snip//

Forget the packaged nonsense being disseminated by the corporate mainstream media. If you are going to view and listen to these candidate exchanges then make up your own minds based on what you have seen and heard.

[tom_paine]

1. K & R. But, honestly, what you are asking is difficult for anyone and everyone

Like asking fish to completely ignore the water which surrounds them and in which they move 24/7.

Asking fish to ignore changes in temperature and pH that they have been adjusting and responding to all their live.

In this way, the MSM, which was the ONLY thing all of us knew for all of our livesw up until recently, IS the water we have been swimming in daily.

What you are saying is right and true, babylonsister, but it runs into smack dab into the primate psychological reality that holds us all in it's poopthrowing grip.

And even though what the writer of the article is saying is true, good luck with getting people to see it or do anything about it!

[Uncle Joe]

5. I totally agree, tom_paine, only the analogy

I use in referring to them is the Matrix, see movie for details.

I believe the Internet is the best hope of waking the people up to what's going on and as such I expect more attacks against it from the media and the likes of Karl Rove as he did in a recent speech to the Heritage Foundation attacking Internet anonymity. I believe they want to do to bloggers, what they've done to the corporate media owned journalists, make them beholden to their bosses, particularly regarding political opinion. They have the money and the one way megaphones on their side to attack the messengers, what they lack are the truth and facts to attack the messages and they know it.

I also believe this was the primary motivation for them, when they went after Al Gore in the manner they did, where the truth and facts literally meant nothing to them. They didn't want a strong Internet advocate in the White House in order to make it easier for them to find ways to neutralize the growing power and influence from the Internet.

Thanks to babylonsister for the thread.

Kicked and recommended.

[TreasonousBastard]

2. Yet another idiotic rant devoid of pertinent facts or...

rational thought, thereby making us lok bad to anyone in the middle looking for such rational thought before making a decision.

Whilst the Times may bave much to answer for, dooming it to the pits of journalistic hell for the occasional columns of two of its opinion writers seems as over the top as it's being accused of being.

So where do we go to look at things with our own jaundiced eyes? Surprise, surprise, most of the links on our own sites are to said nasty old media. As much there is a problem with media consolidation, we haven't managed to come up with much of a reliable alternative.

(And, just how long are some of these windbags going to use the Dean scream as their Exhibit A of media bias?)

[babylonsister]

3. Did you forget where you're reading this? It's a

goddamn opinion piece, in editorials/articles. And I see you voiced yours without any links. So? If articles and opinions weren't posted, DU would be without any content, unless you count on those trustworthy polls.

[TreasonousBastard]

7. Uneducated opinions and silly articles I can...

do without.

Is DU now the left's equivalent of NewsMax? Except that NewsMax tends to stay on point, even if that point is pretty dull.

I'm getting tired of reading about whose fault it is...

It's the Democrats' fault

It's the Republicans' fault.

It's the Press's fault.

It's the corporation's fault.

(Anybody else at fault here? And just what is it thety are at fault for?)

All the Democratic candidates suck, but most don't suck quite as much as most of the Republicans.

(Except Kucinich, of course, because he's some kind of savior. And Gore, even though he's not running. But I betcha if either one had one chance in hell of ever actually being President, he'd be soundly horsewhipped around here.)

Mindless yakking, spewing out blame without either making a real case or proposing realistic alternatives or solutions.

And yes, I do it myself, but don't mind being called on it because I should know better.

[pberq]

4. Ah yes, the supposed middle

Taking a page right out of the DLC playbook, we must be oh so concerned about those Americans in the "middle".

I recall a column Michael Moore wrote during the last Republican Convention where he went and interviewed a bunch of the rank-and-file Republicans. He asked them questions that concern all of us who are not part of the super-rich - health care, education, etc.

What was the response? They mostly came down as progressives. So this myth of the "middle", in my opinion, is just a way of fooling people into voting for the corporate candidates, against their own interests.

[TreasonousBastard]

8. Why does that prove the "middle" is a myth? Fact of the....

matter is that there does ha
Has Moore, or anyone else, come up with a way to get these progressive Republicans to come over to the dark side? Not even to reregister as Democrats, but just accept some progressive solutions to common problems?

Or does everyone prefer to just bitch and moan about how hopeless and stupid they are?

It's not easy to bring them over to our side, and requires some serious selling, but several sure ways to keep them away are to insult them and not give them solid reasons to cross the divide.

In my district, about half the voters are independant and have no declared party affiliation. Most do lean one way or another, but they have deliberately left themselves open for suggestions. This is the "middle" who are looking for an excuse to actually support a program, platform or candidate, and who we should be attracting, not pushing aside.

I don't recommend DU as a source to these people any more. They get turned off by the infighting and invective here. Smirking Chimp and a few others have gone the same way lately, and barely preach to the choir any more, much less sell our side to the uncommitted.

[Uncle Joe]

6. It's not just where we get our information that threatens them, it's

our ability to communicate in mass, our opinions for the whole world to see, regarding the information they are supplying us with out going through their corporate owned filter.

[weeve]

9. Ha ... not ONE WORD

... on John Edwards, who truly is the Howard Dean of this election cycle. Big $$$ Media trying (yet again) to make this a two person race, forcing out the most electable progressive of the bunch.

Big Media is ... doing their best to make this a TWO PERSON race. Primarily because John Edwards is the biggest threat to their interests .. their profit.

They know he is the MOST electable ( in the South, Mid-West, and elsewhere )... so want to make sure that he doesn't get the nomination ( like Howard Dean ... see how they wield their media power ).

Obama's pro-nuclear. Not good. He embraces homophobe preachers. Also not good. A bit too corporate friendly. He or Hillary as the nominee will lose us votes. Racists/sexists don't cross over. Fact.

This is not the time to gamble on our weakest candidates when a potential 8-1 conservative Supreme Court for decades to come is in the offing, should we lose the White House.

Now is the time to get behind John Edwards in a BIG way. Don't let the trolls (here and elsewhere) and Big Media dictate who our nominee should be. Check out their policies yourself. And realize that the big $$$ folk are going to try to buy this election out from under you. Audience plants, corporate media pals (Murdoch, etc.), their internet armies ... you name it.

It can definitely be intimidating, but let's organize, deploy our ground troops, and hopefully TAKE OUR COUNTRY BACK !!

VOTE John Edwards !!

[OneBlueSky]

10. I stopped watching these "debates" long ago . . .

not only because they don't even approach the real, critical issues facing the nation and the planet, they're also superficial, at best, in what they DO "discuss" . . .

since I can't learn anything of importance from these little sideshows, I choose not to waste my time trying . . . when they start talking seriously about things like the war, the pending economic crash, global warming, universal healthcare and, most especially, BushCo crimes, let me know . . .