"Their objective was not simply to tame the press but to transform it...."

[buycitgo]

......to "tranform it into an unwitting mouthpiece of the government; it was one of Gergen's guiding assumptions that the administration simply could not govern effectively unless it could "get the right story out" through the "filter" of the press."

sound familiar?

well, that story begins with Reagan, at least in terms of our current political miasma. of course, it started back as far as the first PR guy for the first shaman, back around the time they started trying to explain why things needed to be the way they needed to be. gotta keep the hunter/gatherers hunting and gathering, right?

point is, the "minions" who are really running things have really learned their lessons exceptionally well

the Thanksgiving mediagasm is all one needs to be reassured there no longer exists any sort of meaningful filter, and it's so very obvious that, rather than learning their lesson of abjectivity back in May, the press has become even MORE craven, groveling even more obsequiously, if possible, than before.

the one disagreement I have with the heading quote is that the press has clearly crossed the line (with very few feebly voiced exceptions) from "unwitting mouthpiece" to Pravda-like, self-designated apparatchiks.

Do we have any recourse?

Is our side of the spectrum content to allow the likes of freepsters, crazed Xtian Reconstructionists, and fat rich blowhards take off with the last vestiges of our democracy, just 'cause they seem to be more MOtivated?

what's a poor, disenfranchised leftwimp to do?

I know, start by getting out from behind the box and DO something.

good idea, but now it's time for a nap.......

EDIT
got the quote here:

David Gergen, former White House director of communications, confirmed shortly after leaving the administration in January 1984 that President Reagan and most of his advisers had come to believe that the basic goal of their approach to the news media-"to correct the imbalance of power with the press so that the White House will once again achieve a 'margin of safety' "- had finally been attained.

Most expansive of all was Michael Deaver, the first-term deputy chief of staff and a virtual surrogate son to the Reagans. Deaver wrote in his memoirs that up until the Iran-contra scandal broke, "Ronald Reagan enjoyed the most generous treatment by the press of any President in the postwar era. He knew it, and liked the distinction."
How Reagan managed to elude critical news coverage for so long baffled many political observers, not least news executives and journalists themselves.

"I don't know how to explain why he hasn't been as vulnerable to the onslaught of the American press as some previous Presidents; it is a hard subject for me," said ABC News executive vice president David Burke. Agreeing with Ben Bradlee about the extraordinary kindness of Reagan's press coverage, he continued, "I wonder why. It isn't because he intimidates us. It isn't that he blows us away with logic. So what the hell is it?"

Burke, a former top aide to Senator Edward Kennedy, finally settled on a variation of the Great Communicator theory, long favored by journalists and White House aides alike for explaining Reagan's positive public image. The key, in this view, was Reagan himself. His personal gifts-an amiable personality, sincere manner, perfect vocal delivery and photogenic persona-made him the television era equivalent of the Pied Piper of Hamelin; he played a tune so gay and skipped ahead so cheerily that others could not help but trust and follow him.

To attack such a man ~ was unthinkable. "You just can't get the stomach to go after the guy," explained Burke. "It's not a popularity thing, it's not that we're afraid of getting the public mad at us. I think it is a perception that the press has in general of Reagan, that he is a decent man. He is not driven by insecurities, by venality, by conspiracies and back-room tactics."

Tom Brokaw, anchor and managing editor of the NBC Nightly News, also felt that Reagan got "a more positive press than he deserves," a feat for which Brokaw credited the White House staff as well as the President.

"In part it goes back to who he is," said Brokaw, "and his strong belief in who he is. He's not trying to reinvent himself every day as Jimmy Carter was.... Ronald Reagan reminds me of a lot of CEOs I know who run big companies and spend most of their time on their favorite charitable events or lunch with their pals and kind of have a broad-based philosophy of how they want their companies run. Reagan's got that kind of broad-based philosophy about how he wants the government run, and he's got all these killers who are willing and able to do that for him."

The "killers" primarily responsible for generating positive press coverage of Reagan were Michael Deaver and David Gergen, and if they did not exactly get away with murder, they came pretty close. Deaver, Gergen and their colleagues effectively rewrote the rules of presidential image-making. On the basis of a sophisticated analysis of the American news media-how it worked, which buttons to push when, what techniques had and had not worked for previous administrations-they introduced a new model for packaging the nation's top politician and using the press to sell him to the American public.


http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Ronald_Reagan/On_Bended_Knee.html

clearly, they've gotten a lot better today than they were fifteen-twenty years ago, and I also think the public has gotten even more apathetic than they were then. how else could a vicious cretin like Boo-sh, Reagan without the brains/charisma, have gotten as far (sunk as low?) as he has? People just barely pay attention.

remember, well into the 2000 selection campaign a goodly percentage of the drones didn't even realize that there was more than ONE George Bush.

[Lorien]

1. I saw Bill Moyer's "NOW" tonight

and one of his guests was saying that one of the reasons the media behaves as it does these days is that it hates getting calls and letters complaining about content, so they stick with the safe stuff; Micheal Jackson, Laci Peterson, etc. Nobody complains about those stories like they do about, say, a mini-series about Reagan that they haven't seen. Repugs know how to push buttons because they are used to PUSHING them in the first place; they write letters and make calls. We just bitch amongst ourselves and wait for someone else to say something. While we are bust argueing over why things are as they are (and why we shouldn't bother trying to change them, because, you know, we can't :eyes:) and why our politicians are so impure, the other side is taking action and kicking our collective asses. THAT'S the unlearned lesson here.

As far as Reagan is concerned; I didn't get the 'Charisma and charm" thing back then (He seemed like a corrupt, mean spirited, bumbling transparent fool to me) but the media sure kept polishing the myth then, just as they do today. They need to be held accountable, and that means that you and I-not somebody somewhere-must demand accountability from them.

[buycitgo]

2. we're riding the same pony, Jen

I've loathed that senile prick (my dad died of Alzheimer's, so I feel some slight justification) ever since he became "policitical." he was a font of ill-hidden bile from the moment he began running for governor, but his handlers took him and shaped him into the Dorian Gray that he remains today, hidden from view, wasting away, while his poor, tricyclic-addled Xray of a Sinatra pump coasts on his sacred memory.

gag me with a bottle of orange hair dye.

just shows the power of media, and why THEY're the ones to blame, ahead of the pugs, who, like a scorpion, just do what they do, reflexively, instinctively, unTHINKingly, and even ahead of those too lazy to lift their fingers off the remote, and take five minutes to find out in which direction the world is really turning

[Lorien]

3. The question is

How do we- the activists from the left- get the slumbering American public to wake up?

I write letter after letter, make phone calls, sign petitions, I even have copied excellent short articles and placed them on windsheilds in mall parking lots. But I feel very alone in my endevors. I visit the "Activism and Events" forum here on DU, and never does a thread there gain as many posts as half the threads in the lounge! They all just gather dust. It's very disappointing, and leaves me with little hope. Still, I won't give up.

[buycitgo]

4. same here........

it does get depressing, and I'm sure there's much literature on the psychology of the oppressed/depressed, involving 'reinforcement' of powerlessness, loss of affect, spiralling into yet deeper sense of same.

I know it happens with me.

then I just have to.........dance!

happening less and less often, tho'.....the dance part.

the worst of it is: the frickin MEdia, yes?

how can they live with themselves......I'm surprised all the male "journalists" (and some of the women...reading this, Ann?) aren't wearing beards--don't see how they can look at themselves in the morning with a razor, and put it in the right place.

[buycitgo]

5. "But I feel very alone in my endeavors. I visit the 'Activism and Events'"

key point......transferring the energy required to punch keys into pounding pavement, is what it boils down to.

energy

energy

and then more energy

which, of course, exists in inverse ratio to amount of depression felt.

unfortunately, as I said, the pugs seem to have more energy than the average dem.....something to do with energy levels of socio/psychopathology?

I know my mom was bipolar, and she could stay up for DAYS when she was really on. Never stopped, even to breathe, it seemed. remember those Brooks Brothers Rioters? most of them looked like one of my favorite Bosch paintings (Tormenting of Jesus Carrying the Cross, or something like that......will go find it)

point is, they seem to be possessed of boundless energy, as well as a never ending supply of easily programmed goonbuffoons, ready and willing to do their ubermasters' bidding.

speaking of which, a scary image rises: on CSPAN yesterday, one of the authors of "Bush's Brain" said that he's seen the crowds of "young George Will lookalikes" who "ALL want to be the next Karl Rove." that brought me up real short. almost made me lose my appetite. almost

[NJCher]

7. it's about time and money

unfortunately, as I said, the pugs seem to have more energy than the average dem.....something to do with energy levels of socio/psychopathology?

I've never thought they had more energy. I just think they're getting paid. There are tons of people in their ranks who get paid for doing the political organizing and action work.

Look at their rallies. Nobody ever shows up, save but maybe 10 pitiful souls. The rest of their work is all being done by paid flaks, many of whom are from rightwing "think tanks."

Who's paying them? Same people who paid for the Clinton witch hunt.




Cher

[Vitruvius]

6. Bu$h & Rove BRIBED the corporate media --

before the the 2000 campaign, Rove went to the major media companies and promised that a Bu$h administration would eliminate the Federal restrictions on media mergers.

Rupert Murdoch, Jack Welch, and the other media monopolists LIKED that. And they fawned over AWOL Bu$h and lied about Gore. All for the bottom line.

Bu$h-Rove also bribed The Washington Post -- thru their Kaplan educational subsidiary, which makes the tests mandated by the Bu$h administration. The Bu$h administration has put less-than-nothing into actual education, but they've put a mint into testing -- i.e. into the pockets of The Washington Post. Which has repaid the favor.

Bu$h & co. are incompetent at everything but bribery & corruption. But that is sufficient. For the moment.