Letters to the Editor
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@raj, psyberdawg
Although it is more long term, our best chance may be with the younger generation. Many I talk to including my three sons see through the fog as do their friends and they learn about the world through the Internet not the M$M. The Repugs, neocons, wingnuts, fundamentalists, may have done us a real favor by going so extreme in war and politics that even the half-blind can begin to recognize the problem. The blind are probably a hopeless case.
Granted monopoly global capitalism is a monster that may eat us all. The most we can do is scream there’s the monster; our children may be able to start kicking, biting, and finally attacking but only if we have succeeded in teaching values that honor the wonders of life and dangers of selfishness. A good start would be to make what poster jgoh said earlier, “I believe in both freedom of religion and freedom from religion,” our first mantra.
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NPR is guilty too
I don't have time to read all the comments, so I'm not sure if anyone else has mentioned this, but NPR, generally my favorite source of news and one that's characterized far and wide as being decidedly liberal, was also way too reverent of Karl Rove in reporting on his departure. Cokie Roberts for one was blatantly licking his boots. She is the ultimate insider, and instead of providing insight on Washington, which is supposed to be her job, she just spools out the party line as Glenn criticizes the entire Washington media establishment for doing. Amid listing Rove's accomplishments, she mentioned that "the Democrats DEMONIZED him" emphasizing that word in a tone that suggested there was no reason to demonize him; that he hadn't done anything to merit the kind of scorn that most decent, ethical, sincere people hold him in. And besides her commentary, the straight news reports on NPR lauded him and made him seem like a genius and hero, without mentioning the dirty tricks and character assassination that have been well documented as his stock in trade. When even the most allegedly "liberal" news outlets don't report the whole story on a vicious, amoral asshole like Rove, what hope do we have of Americans at large ever realizing how fucking screwed up our political system is?
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Bklyn260...
"They shall know him by his fruit" ...and, in fact, many already do, even if they don't know who he is.
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Bob Somerby has it
He has it more than others, anyway. It's not "corporate masters," though the culture of the newsroom has sure changed since I was hanging around in one. It isn't simply that they've mysteriously "gone right," though many have. It's the infatuation with the story line. Clinton had been hit right between the eyes with the Gennifer Flowers thing. Why didn't he fall? He was a miraculously good campaigner, and George H.W. wasn't. "Message: I care." No, you don't, George.
But the relentless story line was that Clinton was a backwoods Lothario, completely without morals, and ravenous in his sexual appetites. A figure out of Faulkner or Robert Penn Warren. So scandal after scandal was nourished, yet none of them were real. They were the sorts of things that happened in novels about policians from Dogpatch. They were so numerous that it's a wonder he didn't step down -- they said he had made money off of Whitewater, but he hadn't. They said he had killed Vince Foster. They said his wife was a lesbian. He sold tainted blood, killed 80 people in Arkansas, dealt cocaine at Mena, and sold our secrets to China just to watch us die. This is a completely fictional character, not Bill Clinton.
The media didn't repeat any of the scurrilous stories, but they were silent first about where they were created -- in the dankest of right-wing dungeons -- and also about the fact that none of them made much sense. The reporters had changed, and the watermark was the OJ trial, or maybe before that, the skater with the crowbar, what was her name? We used to have, actually, a reasonably liberal segment of the press. It was gone by 1992. There's the tepid press, the scared press, the pwned press, and mostly the yellow press. Compare the Washington Post during Watergate to the Washington Post during Monicagate.
So, Somerby's advice is, watch out for the storyline. It's usually a lie. And never, never repeat a Republican, or a yellow, or a tabloid story line about a Democrat. Even if it's true, shut up. If it isn't, and it usually isn't, don't repeat it, throw it back in their teeth.
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@ Ché
I think it is a little too facile to claim that what Borger and her Media Mavens do within the corporate media structure is "just business" (ie: to suit their advertisers) -- which is close to what Glenn has to say about it.
Which is why I don't make that argument. They do what they do because they work for right-wing bosses. What I argue, and I think, Glenn argues, is that the bosses don't have to explicitly tell them, "I want you to skew the news through a Republican prism," which would fit the definition of a 'conspiracy.' Instead, the bosses' 'agenda' is made clear to their employees through numerous clues sprinkled throughout the work environment, and, unless they don't care about advancing too far or too fast, the employees will serve the agenda. Big Business is about profit uber alles. If run in a completely amoral and apolitical way, I would argue, it is, by nature, more aligned with the ideology of the Right. True, progressive owners can steer a company Left -- 'greener' products and practices, living wages, etc. -- but if they take their hands off the rudder, the corporate ship will tack Right, to maximize profits.
Roger Ailes (Fox News' boss), if given roughly equally 'talented' on-camera personalities, is going to hire the one who demonstrates the most ideologically simpatico values. Gloria Borger has a long and odoriferous history of spewing the CW/Republican line du jour, so she was a natural fit for Fox.
Like you say about Olbermann, he is popular with a sought-after demographic, and seen, for the moment, at least, as not too threatening to the conservative agenda. So he works out for MSNBC -- he brings in profits, but doesn't drive anyone to boycott the network the rest of the time when he's not on. If he started hurting profits, though, he'd be gone. And if (God willing!) he became even more popular/profitable, you can bet they'd cautiously add more like him.