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To: jeffc
The "media" need to be smacked down very, very hard.

The left-wing media establishment -- whether it's "news," entertainment (and there's less and less difference between those two branches these days) or propaganda films disguised as documentaries -- are in the habit of digging up dirt on any Republican candidate or public figure, but will ignore any dirt on any Democratic candidate. That's how Matt Drudge made a name for himself -- by picking up some dirt on Bill Clinton that had first been offered by Monica Lewinsky to the mainstream media, which ignored it.

7 posted on 02/05/2013 5:24:38 PM PST by Bryan
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To: Bryan; jeffc; manc
The "media" are the worst. Bad-mouth their selected boy-king and they will dig up anything and everything on you (legally or illegally) and spin it in the worst possible light (Sarah Palin emails?), all while ignoring anything bad by the Left. The "media" need to be smacked down very, very hard. - jeffc
The left-wing media establishment -- whether it's "news," entertainment (and there's less and less difference between those two branches these days) or propaganda films disguised as documentaries -- are in the habit of digging up dirt on any Republican candidate or public figure, but will ignore any dirt on any Democratic candidate.
To me, the fundamental thing to understand about “the media” is that it’s a fool’s errand to try to hold fictional entertainment accountable for “bias.” Granted that there is the occasional “nonfiction documentary” which is actually fiction, the linchpin of propaganda support for leftism is ”objective” journalism. Without support from “objective” journalism, the other forms of leftist propaganda would IMHO matter less than they do, perhaps almost not at all.

So to me the question is how to oppose the leftist slant in journalism. People don’t want to face up to that challenge; they prefer to say “the media” because they are afraid to challenge journalism as such. They expect to be called an opponent of objectivity. The good news is that intellectually/philosophically “objective” journalism is actually a juicy target, for three reasons:

  1. journalism is a monopoly in America. Absurd? No, it is observable and demonstrable both empirically and philosophically. Philosophically, Adam Smith famously observed that        
    "People of the same trade seldom meet together even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public or some contrivance to raise prices."
    You would be hard put to name a “trade” in which “people . . . meet together” more than journalism. The least of it is that the output of every newspaper and broadcast news organization is in the public domain, readily accessible to all of the others. But that is the least of it because the “mainstream media” journalistic organizations are all members of the Associated Press. As such, the AP newswire constitutes a virtual “meeting” of “the mainstream media” which has been in session continually since the middle of the Nineteenth Century.

  2. So unless journalism’s interests are inherently congruent with the public interest, we have every reason to assume to “the mainstream media” thereby engage in “a conspiracy against the public.” But are journalism’s interests inherently congruent with the public interest? Just ask them, and they will take offense at the very idea that that could be in question. But what are journalism’s interests? The question must be seriously addressed and, if that is done, we will see that they are indeed easily distinguishable from the public interest. The interest of journalism is, quite simply, to attract attention for fun and profit. If they do not attract attention, they will not get paid. And if they do attract attention, they gain influence and thus the satisfaction that come with being taken seriously. Who among the general public has never wished for the influence which journalists take for granted?

    The methods of journalism easily distinguish journalism’s interest from the public interest. The famous blind, deaf, and dumb monkeys see, hear, and speak no evil - but journalists wouldn’t have much to say if they emulated that. It is more true that they see, hear, and speak no good. No news is good news because good news “isn’t news.” The things which happen according to plan do not often make the news. It is rather the things that happen which are unexpected - the proverbial “man bites dog” - which makes the attention-grabbing headline. It can of course be argued that the identity of the winner of a lottery is a surprise, but if the lottery is drawn it is expected that someone is going to win. But other than the identity of the winner of a lottery, or a sports championship, positive news on a major scale is seldom seen. But a house can burn down in a matter of hours, providing an unexpected change in someone’s fortunes.

    Big changes which are bad news are the staple of journalism. They undoubtedly interest the public, precisely because the facts represented by bad news are detrimental to the public interest. The fire department of the local community is an embodiment of the public interest in preventing the loss of buildings to fire. The destruction of a building by fire becomes a “great story” for journalism while the public interest suffers for it.

  3. Furthermore journalism, colluding against the public, claims that journalism is objective even as journalists sully the reputations of those upon whom the public depends to get things done. But journalism’s testimony in favor of journalists is tendentious and self-serving in the extreme. Journalism is a mutual admiration society for generating propaganda in favor of journalists. You cannot join such an organization, knowing how it behaves, and be objective. For the simple reason that it is no different than claiming objectivity for your own self - and no one can actually know that they are objective in fact. It is possible and laudable to attempt to be objective - and even to say so - but the discipline of attempting objectivity requires you to be open about any possible reason why you might not be objective. And you cannot submit to that discipline while claiming that you actually are objective.

18 posted on 02/06/2013 6:23:58 PM PST by conservatism_IS_compassion
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