Saw the Daily Show clips about Talking Points on the replay

[WillyBrandt]

Brilliant--FINALLY somebody exposes this!

[Eric J in MN]

1. Please explain (nt)

nt

[Lydia Leftcoast]

2. Oh, it WAS brilliant

Stewart played clip after clip of Republicanite talking heads saying that Kerry is "out of the mainstream."

Then he played clip after clip of many of the same talking heads saying that Kerry and Edwards are "the first and fourth most liberal members of the Senate."

He prefaced these clips by asking how conventional wisdom is created, and added remarks at the end about how you didn't have to think if you heard enough of these remarks.

[KharmaTrain]

3. A Classic Bit...Cuts Through The Bullshit

This is one you need to send to your fence leaning friends. It's the Blast Fax in action.

Every day Rove, Gillespie, Ailes and other wingut spinners come out with the major "talking points" of the day and fax 'em out...or email them...to their "mouthpieces" of the day. This is so the people on the various talk shows stay "on message".

This is one of the legacies of Lee Atwater...and has been perfected to Goerbell/Orwellian proportions by this regime. It's where everyone literally drinks the same kool aid before appearing before a camera.

The Democrats do their own talking points...but not in anywhere near the coordinated and malicious way as the Repugnicans do. This is proof positive of saying a lie loud enough and people believe it. This is how Gore was tarred with "liar" and "invented the internet".

It's great Stewart has been exposing this (he did it with Ridge/Asskroft recently) and others appear to be spreading. Olbermann has mentioned the Fax Blast several times and Aaron Brown has allueded to it as well.

It's a well-oiled machine and you can follow it during the day...from the callers and guests on Washington Journal or watching the spin of the hyenas on Faux or CNN then appears in the news columns and op-eds followed up by a good two hour chewing by Rush and then onto every other hate radio show. Finally by evening, the lie has been amplified and shaped throughout the day so that what was "reported" in the morning becomes assumed as fact by O'Reilly or Hannity at night and their viewers believe it as well. Damn effective and gonna be hard to dismantle.

[maggrwaggr]

4. an excellent synopsis.

It's the thing that probably pisses me off more than anything else.

That the media is complicit in this bullshit.

It's taking Jon Stewart, Michael Moore, and the movie "Outfoxed" to reveal it.

When EVERYBODY working in the media KNOWS that this is what goes on.

THIS is the news story the news "media" should be reporting, and they fucking don't.

ARGH.

Time to just start shutting them down somehow. Cut their power lines, whatever.

[KharmaTrain]

5. They ARE The Story...That's The Problem

I've been posting for quite a while about the media manipulation and games on many levels that are tied in with politics. It's great to see some in the media finally speaking out.

I remember Olberman responding to an email here well over a year ago about how difficult it was to air certain stories, but if there was an audience, he would air those critical of this regime and others would follow. He's been true to his word and appears others are doing the same.

The way to change is to re-empower media so that many people and voices can own and operate. I'd suggest as one of the year one priorities of a new Democratic administration is the revisiting of the Telcom Dereg Bill of '96 that allowed the large conglomerates to corner most the television, radio and cable channels.

[blueblitzkrieg]

6. I love Jon Stewart!

and I hate the "liberal media" that let's these right-wing pinheads regurgitate their talking points over and over and over again unchallenged. :grr: