If Anybody Doubts Who The MSM Is Supporting

[griffi94]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080727/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_winning_the_war;_ylt=Ajjxov4ckxbPGZ_z1zl70Das0NUE

funny how they could have probly ran this last week.

[NMDemDist2]

1. huh? n/t

[Arctic Dave]

2. The reason the insurgency won't over throw the government

is because the government is the insurgency. We have turned Iraq into the worlds largest prison complex. Those we didn't incarcerate, we paid to not kill us. Now the repugs can save * legacy. Call it victory, get eff out, then try to polish the turd we call the Afghan occupation.

[Political Heretic]

3. The MSM doesn't operate as a unified collective, and doesn't "support" anyone

The "MSM" isn't a single entity. It is a collection of thousands and thousands of people. Among that collection are players with different interests. Individual journalists, Editors, owners, stakeholders, etc.

It is certainly possible to suggest that the corporate media's presentation of information is in some ways biased to reflect positively on their interests or promote their interests. But what happens even more is that the selection of what news is presented is where the real bias makes itself plain. This is where you see the real effect of corporate owned media. Programming directors, editors and owners have control over what will be decreed "newsworthy" and what will not (a la the New York Times slogan, "All the News that's fit to Print." This is where you really see the interests of the ruling elite played out - in what news they don't report, or in the way they edit what they do report to serve their interests. This happens.

But what a lot of people are calling evidence of the MSM's favoritism of one candidate over the other is really nothing of the sort. When pundits and journalists are hounding the guy in the lead and passing on the perceived underdog, this isn't because every journalist in America has a hidden corporate agenda to promote conservatives -- its because they are for-profit driven reporters. What people seem to keep forgetting is that the biggest influencing factor on corporate media companies is not political ideology, its money.

Journalists and pundits are in the ratings game. Make no mistake about it. They are not doing you a public service. They are there to make money. A blowout election already in July is their absolute worst nightmare. People lose interest, its boring, people tune out, ratings go down, their pockets don't get lined. But, if it's a nail biter, if they can sensationalize it, if they can create faux controversy and drama, then ratings go up up up!

Try to remember that corporate media at the "management level" selects what news will be presented and how it will be presented based on its prevailing ideology, which economically may perhaps be seen to be more conservative, but socially is more liberal - simply because both stances are perceived to be best for profit.

Corporate media at the "worker" level - the reporter, journalist, pundit level - is driven by ratings or readership - and thus they report the topics that have been selected for reporting by management in a way that will most sensationalize the information.

It's not a bunch of guys sitting in some back room twisting their mustaches discussing how to be "evil" today. It is simply the reality that every action a corporate entity takes is motivated by the bottom line.

[Joe Holmes]

4. Perfectly said, Heretic.

Spot-on analysis.

[Lefty-Taylor]

5. You know, Pol Heretic, what you say is mostly correct. But I must take exception to your tone.

The OP was simply saying that the MSM is, in fact, biased toward the conventional corporate base, represented by McCain. Your response is on target -- in that the MSM is money-driven -- but you seem pedantic in your reaction.

Yes, of course, different reporters may have different approaches. But the OP is right. In general, the Corporate Media (including many reporters) is biased against any candidate who challenges its collective control, made real by the Clinton-signed Telecommunications Act of 1996. Editors, producers AND reporters all killed Howard Dean because they were threatened by his anti-corporate media stances.

(Also watch your grammar. Please take no offense but I've noticed before in the seven years I've been on board here -- with few posts -- that your important messages often get diluted by silly mistakes.)

For what it's worth, I think many reporters and bigger media dogs are driven by corporate agendas -- both for what you eloquently point out BUT ALSO because of their ideological souls.

[Political Heretic]

7. Several things

First - grammar. You should look at my profile and my join date. Next, I'm at work. It's a given that my grammar won't be perfect, and since I'm writing in an informal setting and not writing to be published right now, you can take it or leave it and I will be fine with that. You would (hopefully) notice more attention to form and grammar in my blog posts, as they are intended to be written pieces not off the top of my head informal communication.

Second, you say that the corporate media is biased against any candidate who challenges its collective control. That seems reasonable, given corporate media's basic directive to maximize profit. But show me one thing about Barack Obama that in any way represents a threat to their control. Barack Obama does not have anti-corporate stances. And of course, neither does John McCain.

I disagree with you that many reporters are driven by corporate agendas, if by that you mean a clear political agenda with conscious consideration of the best interests of their corporate masters. I agree with Noam Chomsky here, in response to certain questions about his basic propaganda model, when he points out that journalists don't have to do anything conscious to perpetuate and be part of the same propaganda cycle of the agenda-setting media -- they already accept and buy into basic ideologies before they are ever hired. People who don't aren't offered mainstream positions in high profile positions.

There are exceptions of course. Anyone with the good fortune to capture a devoted audience and generate ratings may be afforded the privilege of getting a high profile position and more freedom to speak his or her mind - for as long as those ratings last. In that regard, the media is sometimes willing to sell someone the rope to hang itself with.

And finally - pedantic. Thank you. I am very concerned with details. I don't think you really were taking issue with my tone as much as my "style." When you said tone, I was trying to find some place in my post where I had attacked or insulted the OP or anyone else. But it isn't there. The issue seems to be more with style (or lack thereof :))

[cliffordu]

10. One of Charlie Bukowski's last pieces went something like:

as the
spirit
wanes
the
form
appears




I just love it when people shit on good work by picking away at grammatical flaws, or, in my case constant fucking swearing.

Great piece, by the way.

[cliffordu]

6. That's exactly right - and NONE of the big names

have thier own research staffs anymore. I recall an article about MSNBC gutting it's NEWS research staff to hire the idjits that make the prison specials they run all weekend.


Tweety has stated flatly that they are given talking points every day and that's what they have to run with.

Democracy ended when news divisions were folded into the entertainment divisions on the networks.

[Political Heretic]

8. "Democracy ended when news divisions were folded into the entertainment divisions on the networks."

Yes.

[host]

9. Just as both parties operate "as one", so does the MSM....

How else does the complicity and cooperation that this took to do....to keep "unknown" during three Calif. gubernatorial contests.... a shutdown in the expected inquisitveness of the press, as well as of the famous RNC oppostion research, even as the competing candidate, in the 2003 recall vote, was being accused of having similar family ties:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_Davis
"...Early life and political career..

...It was not documented, until July 20, 2008, and never previoulsy disclosed by Davis, that his grandfather was WWII Nazi agent, William Rhodes Davis, an American working to supply oil from Mexico for Hitler's Germany, and to aid the 1940 presidential election campaign of republican candidte, Wendell Wilkie. William Rhodes Davis died about August 1, 1941, a year before the birth of Gray Davis, reportedly "removed" by British spymaster Sir William Stephenson, aka "Intrepid".<7>"

Gray Davis did not keep this info "off the map", all by himself.... he must have had plenty of help...

[Political Heretic]

11. Both parties don't operate "as one" and neither does the MSM

...and people who dismiss the differences between the parties because of their similarities (which they do have, and it is unfortunate) is guilty of absurd reductionism.

[Supersedeas]

12. and the buckets and buckets of money paid to enemies to temporarily keep them quiet...will not be

televised.