I'm puzzled that DUers are happy when MSM runs positive stories about Obama.

[snagglepuss]

IMO its concerning that Obama is getting a thumbs up from MSM. I think his getting a rave review in Time Magazine is a cause for concern not celebration as is the ABCnews report about the stimulas.

I have been asleep or is this not the same media who propped up Bush? Do they not have the same corporate agenda and the same financial interests they want to protect?

Eliot Spitzer who isn't at all enamoured with the stimulus is a better judge than ABCNews.

Spizter: "the money, put in perspective —Arne Duncan, our Secretary of Education, has $4 billion to redo all of K-through-12, and everybody’s saying, “Isn’t this great? Four billion dollars.” Goldman Sachs got $12.9.

Eight billion dollars for high-speed rail. Entire high-speed rail stimulus effort, $8 billion. Goldman Sachs got $12.9 .

So what are the priorities, in terms of infrastructure investment, job creation, building the foundation of an economy that will permit us to be competitive so that real Americans can get jobs, not just investment bankers and lawyers?"

From interview with Amy Goodman

http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/4/eliot_spitzer_geithner_bernanke_complicit_in


edit to insert link

[Boudica the Lyoness]

1. I dread the day when Obama

gets the thumbs up from Dick Cheney and that crowd. The MSM are arse kissers and they generally support the president even if he's a motherfucker like Bush.

[snagglepuss]

2. They have no need to engage in arse-kissing other than positive

reinforcement. Their motto seems to be "do good by us and we'll return the favour."

[Boudica the Lyoness]

24. I kind of think how

they treated Bush was arse kissing. Why didn't they stand up and say anything when Bush Co were letting stupid American's believe Iraq was responsible foe 9/11? Bush scared them into thinking it was unpatriotic to question that war and they towed the line...and kissed his arse and/or his ring..you choose.

[snagglepuss]

29. They weren't scared of Bush, they were complicit. Bush served their interests.

"The very news stories that you are fed by the mainstream media are manipulated to mirror the public relations campaigns of companies that operate nuclear plants, sprawling theme parks that gobble up wetlands, defense contractors, oil companies and even Saudi Princes. Remember the old "Outer Limits" TV shows where the announcer says "We control everything you see and hear, the vertical, the horizontal," etc? The corporate controlled news media controls all you see and hear."


http://www.whoownsthenews.com/

[notesdev]

12. Like the Gingrich thumbs-up on Afghanistan? n/t

[HughMoran]

3. Yes, they should be required to run only negative stories

I don't know about you, but I hate positive news - it makes me feel that there's not hope. I can really relate to your "concern".

[snagglepuss]

5. I prefer postitive stories from people like Amy Goodman, Eliot Spitzer,

anyone or anything but huge corporate media conglomerates. If they are happy with Obama's agenda it's because it isn't threatening the status quo.

[sandnsea]

4. Because preventing a global financial collapse

is exactly the same as putting money into education innovation. That's not the entire education budget.

[snagglepuss]

7. Not according to Spitzer. The transcript from the Goodman is worth the read.

[sandnsea]

20. His comments aren't about the stimulus

They're about Wall Street and the bail-out. He's right about his analysis of the problem, he couldn't be more wrong in his complaints about the solution. The financial sector has to stabilize before it starts to loan.

You want to talk about the media, answer me this. Why have they not harped every single day on the Countrywide settlement that requires them to write down mortgages 15%, give 5-10 year interest only loans at 3.5%, or if the borrower can afford it, write fixed rates at the teaser rate of the loan. How many other mortgage companies have similar law suit settlements that we haven't heard about?

Why isn't there information every single day on the stimulus small business loan money?

Why do we have to spend more money promoting the weatherization program when the media should already be doing that?

On Friday a pundit suggested we repair schools. Stunning. That's part of the stimulus too. Seen anything about that in the media?

The media is not on Obama's side, I don't know where you get that idea.

[snagglepuss]

22. Where did the idea? I got it from DU.

My contention is that DUer's should not be at all thrilled when MSM approves of Obama (see links). Its irrational given that MSM is not objective or credible. Furthermore MSM is only concerned with its corporate interests so if it approves of Obama it means Obama hasn't threatened the status quo.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=433&topic_id=40701


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x410410


edit to correct error with links

[sandnsea]

25. OMG!! Two positive stories

posted with SHOCK and DISMAY considering what usually comes out of the media is trash.

You're freaking out over TWO stories??

:crazy:

Go donate your time to a food kitchen or something. You're wasting it here.

[snagglepuss]

28. Go ahead drink the koolaid. This isn't about the number of stories its about

Duers estastic when MSM confers approval and apparently you as well.

[sandnsea]

31. Those happened to be interesting stories

The story about Obama's approach to the military was very interesting. Didn't you think so? And it's nice to get a little bit of info out about the stimulus, I just made reference to wishing the media would do their job and report on it, and then you go and show me one of the few times that they did.

So what's the problem? I don't get it.

[snagglepuss]

36. The most interesting and most concerning aspect of the highly laudatory

Time's story is it ran two days after Obama delivered his speech outlining a position that has been well received by the RW. Why didn't Times run such a piece two or three months ago? As it stands it looks like Obama is being rewarded.

[sendero]

33. Preventing a global collapse..

... what utter and complete nonsense. Keep drinking the kool aid, and by the way, that collapse could come at ANY TIME, NOTHING WAS FIXED.

[NNN0LHI]

6. Why who did you vote for last year?

[snagglepuss]

9. What does that have to do with MSM approval of Obama?

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

8. So, should we feel like the freepers do instead? -nt

[snagglepuss]

13. The question is why validate their opinion? MSM is not to be trusted at all.

They are not in any way concerned with objective reporting, they are in business to promote their corporate agenda. Much effort by many people on the Left went into discrediting MSM during the last 8 years.

Bush may be gone but MSM remains dangerous. Why give them any credibility? It's irrational to denounce them but then bask in their approval.

[treestar]

10. On what planet do you reside?

The M$M has positive stories about any Democrat? :rofl:

[snagglepuss]

11. Someone hasnt been paying attention.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=433&topic_id=40701



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x410410

[HamdenRice]

14. Goldman had to pay the $12.9 billion back with interest (actually preferred dividends)

I'm amazed that people continue to confuse loans with expenditures.

[snagglepuss]

15. The 12.9 billion GS is just a drop in the bailout bucket. I believe the point

Spitzer makes is that not enough stimulus money is going into educationa and job creation. The question remains as to why DUers should regard any MSM reports as valid and not self-serving?

[demosincebirth]

16. I think its great. I like the way Obama is handling his job.

[Motown_Johnny]

17. My priority is to keep an (R) out of the White House for as long as possible

if the MSM wants to help keep a (D) in power I am all for it.

[Hydra]

18. Lots of DU'ers are still sitting on the happy bubble

Personally, I turn on the news occasionally and have to keep saying "Did I really just hear that?"

I wonder, if the MSM declared that there would be agreen sky tomorrow, how many people would talk about how nice a change it is from the previous blue as they walked their dogs the next day.

[HughMoran]

19. This thread is too much fun to let die

:popcorn:

[jpak]

21. More (stupid) anti-Obama horseshit: Good Obama stories Bad - Bad Obama stories Good

:puke:

[snagglepuss]

23. So since when did MSM become a credible news source?

[mullard12ax7]

26. How's 3rd-grade going?

Next year you might start learning about "context".

[omega minimo]

27. Take your broadbrush and go back to GD: P

[snagglepuss]

30. What broadbrush? This is about actual responses to

MSM stories about Obama, responses that in no way question MSM's motivation, suddenly MSM is credible.

[omega minimo]

35. You are overgeneralizing and that particular conceit is the domain of GD: P

[EFerrari]

32. Yes, this is the same media that propped up Bush and they have the same agenda.

[Nikki Stone1]

34. 5 reasons that the Corporate Media Coverage is Pro War

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/

Note: McClatchy and several other large news sources are exceptions which have reported well on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

There are five reasons that the mainstream media is worthless.

1. Self-Censorship by Journalists

Initially, there is tremendous self-censorship by journalists.

For example, several months after 9/11, famed news anchor Dan Rather told the BBC that American reporters were practicing "a form of self-censorship":

There was a time in South Africa that people would put flaming tires around peoples' necks if they dissented. And in some ways the fear is that you will be necklaced here, you will have a flaming tire of lack of patriotism put around your neck. Now it is that fear that keeps journalists from asking the toughest of the tough questions.... And again, I am humbled to say, I do not except myself from this criticism.

What we are talking about here - whether one wants to recognise it or not, or call it by its proper name or not - is a form of self-censorship.

Keith Olbermann agreed that there is self-censorship in the American media, and that:

You can rock the boat, but you can never say that the entire ocean is in trouble .... You cannot say: By the way, there's something wrong with our .... system.

As former Washington Post columnist Dan Froomkin wrote in 2006:

Mainstream-media political journalism is in danger of becoming increasingly irrelevant, but not because of the Internet, or even Comedy Central. The threat comes from inside. It comes from journalists being afraid to do what journalists were put on this green earth to do. . . .

There’s the intense pressure to maintain access to insider sources, even as those sources become ridiculously unrevealing and oversensitive. There’s the fear of being labeled partisan if one’s bullshit-calling isn’t meted out in precisely equal increments along the political spectrum.

If mainstream-media political journalists don’t start calling bullshit more often, then we do risk losing our primacy — if not to the comedians then to the bloggers.

I still believe that no one is fundamentally more capable of first-rate bullshit-calling than a well-informed beat reporter - whatever their beat. We just need to get the editors, or the corporate culture, or the self-censorship – or whatever it is – out of the way.

2. Censorship by Higher-Ups

If journalists do want to speak out about an issue, they also are subject to tremendous pressure by their editors or producers to kill the story.

The Pulitzer prize-winning reporter who uncovered the Iraq prison torture scandal and the Mai Lai massacre in Vietnam, Seymour Hersh, said:

"All of the institutions we thought would protect us -- particularly the press, but also the military, the bureaucracy, the Congress -- they have failed. The courts . . . the jury's not in yet on the courts. So all the things that we expect would normally carry us through didn't. The biggest failure, I would argue, is the press, because that's the most glaring....

Q: What can be done to fix the (media) situation?

You'd have to fire or execute ninety percent of the editors and executives. You'd actually have to start promoting people from the newsrooms to be editors who you didn't think you could control. And they're not going to do that."

In fact many journalists are warning that the true story is not being reported. See this announcement and this talk.

And a series of interviews with award-winning journalists also documents censorship of certain stories by media editors and owners (and see these samples).

There are many reasons for censorship by media higher-ups.

One is money.

The media has a strong monetary interest to avoid controversial topics in general. It has always been true that advertisers discourage stories which challenge corporate power. Indeed, a 2003 survey reveals that 35% of reporters and news executives themselves admitted that journalists avoid newsworthy stories if “the story would be embarrassing or damaging to the financial interests of a news organization’s owners or parent company.”

In addition, the government has allowed tremendous consolidation in ownership of the airwaves during the past decade.

Dan Rather has slammed media consolidation:

Likening media consolidation to that of the banking industry, Rather claimed that “roughly 80 percent” of the media is controlled by no more than six, and possibly as few as four, corporations.

This is documented by the following must-see charts prepared by:

* Media Channel

* The Nation

* Free Press

And check out this list of interlocking directorates of big media companies from Fairness and Accuracy in Media, and this resource from the Columbia Journalism Review to research a particular company.

This image gives a sense of the decline in diversity in media ownership over the last couple of decades:..........