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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
Donf
Published Letters: 12 Editor's Choice: 2
I can agree about Six Feet Under but the best of the bunch was Hill Street Blues. The gentle theme, playing against the shots of cops in action was a perfect setup for the mix of humanity and violence that followed.
I also think the old -- ancient? -- opening to the U. S. Steel Hour was a stunner.
I was greatly relieved to see the negative reactions here to Dobbs. If he did somehow get himself elected, I really would move to Warsaw and open a Texas barbecue joint.
Dobbs is a one-trick-pony, and the pony's lame.
It's all too easy to say, "Let the dinosaur mainstream media die, because the Internet will save us all..." especially on a Web site like this one.
But the unfortunate fact is that here, we're the choir preaching to each other.
Those of us reading here live in an information-rich world, and I suspect that most of us have the intelligence and wit to tell the difference between the crapola and the chocolate.
But there aren't that many of us.
According to a 2007 report from the Pew Research Center For the People and the Press -- as reliable a source as can be found for subjects like this -- 71% of the American public still regularly get their news from local TV, 54% from a local daily paper, 46% from network evening newscasts, and only 25% from Internet sources like Google, Yahoo, etc.
You can read the report summary for yourself, here:
http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=319
I think the conclusion is inescapable that Copps is right on target. Mainstream media still have enormous power, and it behooves us all to continue to do everything we can to halt -- and even reverse -- consolidation.
At least with broadcast media, it runs much deeper than that.
The broadcast spectrum belongs to us all. It is part of the commons of this nation, and in fact, that idea was, in part, behind the Communications Act of 1934 which formed the FCC in the first place.
Broadcasters are still licensed to operate in the "...public interest, convenience or necessity," and it is within the power of the FCC -- if not the will -- to deny a license to any broadcaster which fails to do so.
Unfortunately, the FCC has abdicated that responsibility, and we-the-people have failed in our duty to force that body to do its job, just as we've failed the nation in so many other ways.
I grew up in and around broadcasting -- shot my first roll of news film in 1962. Edward R. Murrow was my personal hero. I was working for a TV station in Dallas in November, 1963. Left TV disillusioned in 1971 for academe, and moved into advertising two years later because I figured if I was going to be a prostitute, it was better to be a high-priced one than a street hooker. Sold my first freelance article in 1972, and have been a freelance word-pusher on and off since then, with real jobs in media production here and there when I needed the money.
And one thing I've learned from all that experience is that people get the media -- TV, radio, print, Internet -- that they deserve and demand, and absolutely nothing more.
But they are still our airwaves -- yours and mine. That includes not only radio and TV stations, but the satellite links and microwave relays used by cable companies, and if we've lost control of them through sloth and apathy, we can take them back from Clear Channel and NewsCorp and CNN and Time-Warner if we only have the collective will to do it.
Unfortunately, another thing I learned is that the majority of Americans just aren't interested in ideas and progress and knowledge any more. They just want to be entertained, and are more excited by a 42-inch flat screen TV than by the possibility that they could actually find out what was really going on if they demanded it.
Even so, I remain unwilling to just say, "Let 'em have the mainstream media and sink under the weight of their own lust for power and money."
No. They're my media, and I want my share of them back.
Anyway, somebody's got to keep tilting at windmills.
You're kidding, of course.
It's impossible to embarrass this administration.
You cannot receive an explanation of Hedgehog until you furnish proof to Homeland Security that you are a British National.
There is no explanation for Hugo.
Or, for that matter, for Jude Law.
and I've got to tell you that the thought of those two little girls running around the White House after nearly eight years of the present occupants, makes my heart soar.
I just hope they'll air the place out thoroughly before the Obamas move in. It's about time we had a decent family living there again.
Keith, if Obama doesn't appoint you Secretary of Transportation, he's asleep at the switch.
Well done, guy. Now, when are you going to fix health care?
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Once seen as a lunatic fringe, reactionary anti-women groups are courting respectability
Salon headlines in your mailbox
