Folks, figuring out the media isn't that difficult

[Sagan]

They want this election to be a horse race. They will script things as aggressively as possible to keep things as even as possible right up to the end. They are PRAYING for another Florida-esque fiasco.

Why? Because they made a FORTUNE off of the 2000 election in viewership increase due to the controversy.

So when Chimpy's ahead, they'll pick at him a little bit and vice versa for Kerry. They aren't news organizations, they are profit centers. Remember that.

And turn them off.

[emulatorloo]

1. Horserace = ratings, + scared to be perceived as "liberal"

so they bend over backwards to be "fair" to the bushbots spinners.

[realFedUp]

2. sharks and whores....

easy to cover.

[K-W]

3. That is only a small small part of it.

Looking at the media from a simple news profit standpoint misses whole story. A large amount of the media in this country runs with very low profits or at a loss. The owners of media outlets are more than aware that the true value of news media isnt profit, it is information control. Look at the massive right wing media establishement, including Fox News. They do not make decisions based on profit, they make decisions based on politics. The rest of the media is motivated to some extent by profit, particularly CNN and MSNBC, network news is fairly ensconced. But there are other larger factors in how the news media covers politics.

I defer to David Brock's "Republican Noise Machine" for a detailed account of what has happened to the media.

They view it as a horse race partly for ratings, but to a large part so they cant be accused of taking sides, particularly a liberal side.

[displacedtexan]

4. Absolutely. It's the Greek theatre's rules for dramatic conflict.

We also had to put up with this in 2000: you can not have a protagonist and an antagonist OF UNEQUAL STATURE.

If everyone in 2000 had admitted how weak Bush* was, there would have been no conflict.

Today's media has figured out how to get ratings and subscriptions based on archetypal stock theatre characters.

[el_gato]

5. It is not the profit motive so much as the thought control

Remember huge corporations own these media outlets and they make money from other sources.

[rman]

6. A much bigger fortune is made by the corporations who own the media

That's why.

It isn't so much the media who manipulate the people.

It is the big corporations who use the media to manipulate the people.