|
President Chavez knows all about the twisted news that Fox News provides to American viewers, because it is virtually identical to the majority (yes, majority) of corporate-owned news twisters here in Venezuela. As in the U.S., almost 90 percent of the Venezuelan media is owned by a few big corporations who bank-roll and promote anti-Chavez views, even to the point of broadcasting programs calling for Chavez's illegal ouster and even assassination.
The corporate-owned media in Venezuela supported the coup against the democratically elected Chavez in 2002, broadcast false reports about his opposition-drafted phoney "letter of resignation" during the coup, and have continued to push for his demise ever since. They have not been shut down, even though most of them should be. They are using the public air waves here to undermine democratic elections and put the life of the president in danger. Sound familiar? It should, because virtually all the corporate-owned media, not only Fox, is doing the same thing in the U.S.
There is nothing "free" about the press in either Venezuela or the United States. Big corporations have put the free press out of business. In the epoch of the drafting and passage of the U.S. Constitution, there were thousands of small, independently owned newspapers. Now, 6 or 7 corporations own 90% of our media and their right wing views are broadcast and cabled into millions of American homes every day, spewing the latest Neo-conservation, frequently racist, Republican line. Why else are all the TV and cable shows still over-flowing with the same Republicans who were spot-lighted during the 8 years of the Bush administration. You would never know the Republicans lost the 2006 and 2008 elections by looking at our media.
President Reagan abolished the fairness doctrine in media in the 1980's, the law that required the media to present opposing views. President Clinton contributed to the demise of a free press by abolishing the laws that prohibited the concentration of media ownership into a few, big corporate hands.
Right now in Venezuela, President Chavez's government is fighting back against the corporate right wingers by demanding that media comply with Venezuela's communications laws and not publish twisted stories that promote violence and sedition. The democratically elected Obama government needs to do the same thing -- by re-instating the fairness doctrine and the rules against concentration of ownership in a few corporate hands.
The Chavez government is encouraging the establishment of local, community radio and TV stations, as well as working to provide universal, free access to the internet for everyone in the country. The U.S. needs to do the same. Chavez is providing free computers to thousands of Venezuelan students, from the elementary grades to the university level, and has recently launched a satellite which will eventually provide free internet access nation-wide. And this is the man who the U.S. press calls an anti-democratic dictator! This is just another right-wing, corporate lie, fed to millions of unsuspecting Americans including, apparently, a few on DU.
We Americans need to wake up to the fact that our "free press" has been devoured by the same corporate sharks who want to deny us universal health care, unionization, and a truly independent Congress. These sharks own all our presses and most of our elected officials to boot.
We have to take our press and our government back from the hands of those anti-democratic forces that are shredding our Constitution and putting their private profits ahead of the well being of the majority of Americans. We desperately need a democrat like Chavez to lead the fight to restore our American democracy. It is past time to put human needs before corporate profits in this country.
|
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
