The media's behavior

[MSgt213]

Thhs is outstanding please read the rest at the link.

'Balance' and the tipping point
Sunday, March 27, 2005
A lot of people see the Schiavo case as a kind of tipping point in the Culture War, though exactly what kind depends on the perspective. My old friend Danny Westneat at the Seattle Times sees it as the demise of the conservative movement. Tristero goes even farther, declaring it the point at which we jumped the shark into full-fledged fascism.

Even the normally reserved editorial pages of the Los Angeles Times (which called it a "constitutional coup d'etat") and the New York Times were alarmed by the behavior of Republicans in this matter:

President Bush and his Congressional allies have begun to enunciate a new principle: the rules of government are worth respecting only if they produce the result we want. It may be a formula for short-term political success, but it is no way to preserve and protect a great republic.


Most of the well-earned opprobrium has been directed at the politicians in this fiasco. But just as worthy for its behavior has been the nation's supposedly "mainstream" media -- because its handling of the Schiavo case has revealed, irrevocably, the utter bankruptcy of what it nowadays calls "balance."

As much as right-wing politicians have leapt into the breach to exploit Terri Schiavo for their own purposes, it's the media who have driven the story incessantly.

Feeding frenzies are typically the product of two common traits of editors and producers: a pack mentality, and a craven impulse to provide the public with stories they think will drive up their respective shares of the audience. The former often leads them to misjudge the latter, as in the Schiavo case: It's clear that the public's disgust with the politicians' behavior is primarily over their grotesque invasion of an agonizing private family matter, and on that score, the media's behavior is even more reprehensible.

http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2005/03/balance-and-tipping-point.html

[Tux]

1. Maybe

People will see Republicians as greedy bastards. They're behavior is like that of a 2 yo that couldn't have a cookie.

[MSgt213]

3. There are some that will never see that because they are never shown that

side. The way the media has been portraying this hold thing with Terri you could be led to believe there are thousands of protesters down in FL outside the hospice right now. But have you ever seen an over head shot or any shot through the media that gives you a perspective on how big the so called crowd is? The only shots I have seen are of lone reporters and a lot of what appears to be barricades and side shots of what looks like a crowd.

[necso]

2. Very nice piece. /nt

[Spazito]

4. Excellent piece and right on point

Thanks for posting this.

[BlueEyedSon]

5. kick vote etc

[marions ghost]

6. I'm trying to understand this...

"demise of the conservative movement"--I suppose the unholy alliance could fracture. I'd like to think it's the Tipping Point...
are people really that worked up? Nobody I know is--they dismiss it as the usual media feeding frenzy. Beyond disgusted.

[necso]

10. Some people would like to believe this "demise" thing.

Personally, I think that "jumped the shark into full-fledged fascism" is more likely than "demise of the (neo)conservative movement".

And I think that the most likely outcome is more pandering to fundie extremists. Exactly what this will amount to in terms of policy (than otherwise might be) is hard to say. But probably nothing good is to be expected.

But then again, I rarely expect anything good these days, and you might wish to filter my opinion based upon this knowledge of my expectations -- and of my pervasive cynicism.

And just so my context is clear. -- Being a fundie is not about which church or religion you belong to. Being a fundie is about being hate-filled and intolerant, and about using "religion" as a cover for trying to impose a hate-filled, intolerant and reactionary* agenda on other people -- by means of law, or of legal interpretation -- or extra-legally if all else fails.

*: Used in the sense of a counter-reaction to events in the world around them, and not necessarily in the sense of attempting to retreat in time to some previous (and generally mythical) golden time.

[Nothing Without Hope]

7. All true and well said. But I see the media decision-makers and the

politicians not as separate but as two strands in the whole along with others like the oil companies and other corporate parasites. That's part of what fascism is - it takes its name from fasces, if I remember correctly, a bundle of thin, week units that together becomes a strong, unbreakable club. The nazi-collaborator Media and the usurping government cartel and their corporate cronies are so much in each others' pockets, it's misleading in some ways to speak of them as truly separate entities making their own decisions. Money, power, fear and greed - it binds them all together. And together they are strong.

Without the collaborationist Media, the usurping cartel would not be occupying Washington and we would not be Iraq. The endless propaganda is right out of Orwell's 1984. Ignorance is strength. War is peace.

Here's a repost of a great cartoon that captures the behavior of the collaborationist Media in the Schiavo travesty:



(This cartoon was first posted in this DU thread: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=3333084)

[Window]

8. Concise and to the point.

Thanks for sharing.

[Tace]

9. Most Excellent -- Very Lucid

[AuntiBush]

11. You have the 1 right word for all of them - Frenzies!

Yes, they're going down like a huge ship of fools. Problem is, they're taking all of us down with them.