Viewpoint: Has Katrina saved US media? (BBC-- Must read!)

[theHandpuppet]

Viewpoint: Has Katrina saved US media?
By Matt Wells
BBC News, Los Angeles

As President Bush scurries back to the Gulf Coast, it is clear that this is the greatest challenge to politics-as-usual in America since the fall of Richard Nixon in the 1970s.

But unlike Watergate, "Katrinagate" was public service journalism ruthlessly exposing the truth on a live and continuous basis.

Instead of secretive "Deep Throat" meetings in car-parks, cameras captured the immediate reality of what was happening at the New Orleans Convention Center, making a mockery of the stalling and excuses being put forward by those in power.

MORE at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4214516.stm

[Ravenseye]

1. This is Compassionate Conservatism

I don't trust the media to not turn back to giving Bush a bow...What we need to do is to focus on what the Media is showing us as an example of George Bush's compassionate Conservatism. This is what republicanism does folks. It lets people die in favor of tax cuts and wars to benefit big corporations and oil companies.

[flakey_foont]

2. great article!

Thanks for posting

[JimmyJazz]

3. Thanks!

:thumbsup:

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. See also comment on the piece here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4640022

[BooScout]

5. The BBC presumes....

...that most Americans have a brain and can understand the reporting on their tv screens. I am under no such illusions. Many people (roughly half) in this country are either too damned stupid or too damned stubborn to believe what they are seeing (even on FOX News). By now I am too damned jaded to believe that many in this country will ever get a clue.

[ClintonTyree]

7. I'll wager........

that 60% of Americans can't name 3 of Bush's cabinet members. Same with Justices on the Supreme Court. I'll bet the same number couldn't name their state senators and congressmen.
I'm a little older than most here, 54, but I can remember a time in this country when just about everyone KNEW who was running the government. They were involved, THEY CARED! Now, people just go about their lives in a constant ignorant funk, not knowing or caring who, or in the case of Corporate America, what, is leading them and to where. It's disgraceful, it really is.

[Prodemsouth]

8. Thank You. I don't put too much stock in British commentary

and analysis of USA current events. For the most part it is usually wrong. Its based on assumptions about the UK and then applied to the USA. The Media has a long way to go before we can even ask the question "is their spine back". Plus the elimination of the Fairness Doctrine, the growth of cable news has allowed for more political spin and for pundits to gain heavy influence in American News. The Media is still very much corporate America.

[Bumblebee]

6. Great article and implications for Texas are also intriguing

"Tens of thousands of voters whose lives have been so devastated will cast their mid-term ballots in Texas next year - the president's adopted home state."


Hope they do register and vote!

[chimpymustgo]

9. Lying liars

I like this response:

"Now how about telling the truth, retroactively as well as prospectively, as you see it, catch us citizens up on what else you have known the governments are lying about?"
Hank Roberts, Berkeley, CA, USA

[crispini]

10. This quote made the hair stand up on my arms:

"Tens of thousands of voters whose lives have been so devastated will cast their mid-term ballots in Texas next year - the president's adopted home state."

Texas = blue state, anyone?

[OneGrassRoot]

11. about the media...........

aside from the switch we saw from media this past week, mainly because many of those reporters were witnessing the horror and negligence, don't you think they smell blood?

I mean, I can't imagine they will go back to business as usual....they are all acknowledging how the blogosphere is huge, they certainly are seeing/hearing the outcry from the American public about the events of the past week, so surely, surely they will at least try to get more investigative journalism into the mix rather than spouting Repub talking points. There are too many things brewing that are potentially explosive for this administration.

[BooScout]

13. Normally I would agree with you....

...but nothing has been normal in this country for 5 years now. I no longer have ANY faith in the media. Time and time again they have turned their backs on reporting the truth in this country. I can't imagine their attention span being captured by anything for very long anymore. I honest to god have no hope left for this country.

[blondeatlast]

12. I think that on-the-scene reporters have had a quiet rage

over how stifled they have been by vain anchors with lame questions and contemptible greedheaditors serving corporate masters and I think we are seeing the results now.

Perhaps they recognize that if they don't emerge from journalism schoold in perfect suits with perfect teeth they don't have a chance to rise above; maybe it's simply they can't see an impossible situation without an honest human reaction.

Whatever--in this case, the benefit of the doubt is granted, IMHO.

Contrast the US press's (I'm willing to restore that honorable term to them now) reaction to the authorities with their reaction post 9-11.

The contrast between overseas newspaper reporting and US reporting is striking, but the on-the-scene reports have been quite extraordinary.