John Kerry's wise words resonate about the horrible state of our media

[beachmom]

Prosense pointed out this video from her thread of John Kerry answering a question about how we can improve Americans' understanding of the Middle East.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FI0EpofHWN8

I watched him, and then I found this horrible video of hate in Las Vegas outside a Palin rally:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTx531t8XNo

They were not just screaming against Obama, but saying they hated all Arabs, that Arabs hated them, etc. I mean, TOTALLY ignorant. There is no doubt in my mind that this is the result of right wing talk radio, Fox News, and the chain e-mails. Since they have talked themselves into thinking the media is "liberal", they are not interested in evidence to the contrary of their views. I am not sure what you can do about it. I understand Sen. Kerry's point about being able to sue over lying, but we are too far beyond that with the internet. I think what is the most important aspect of education in this case is to make sure kids learn to be savvy about their sources.

[beachmom]

1. George Packer says that the thinking going on on the Right (wild conspiracy theories on RW blogs)

has given him deja vu:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/georgepacker/2008/10/end-of-an-era-4.html

Wading for a few minutes through the sewage of these Web sites reminds me uncannily of the time I’ve spent having political discussions in certain living rooms and coffee shops in Baghdad. The mental atmosphere is exactly the same—the wild fantasies presented as obvious truth, the patterns seen by those few with the courage and wisdom to see, the amused pity for anyone weak-minded enough to be skeptical, the logic that turns counter-evidence into evidence and every random piece of information into a worldwide conspiracy. Above all, the seething resentment, the mix of arrogance and impotent rage that burns at the heart of the paranoid style in politics.

The problem isn’t lack of education—it’s that of a self-isolating political subculture gone rancid. I heard an Iraqi engineer claim that American soldiers allowed Kuwaitis to steal hundreds of Iraqi cars as revenge for the first Gulf War. I heard a Shiite cleric argue that the Kerry campaign was behind suicide bombings. Bloggers like Andrew McCarthy, a former federal prosecutor who peddled the Ayers theory, and Ann Althouse, a law professor who pushed the plastic-device story, hold diametrically opposed views to those of Islamists and Arab nationalists. But their habits of mind are just the same.

It will only get worse if Obama wins.

All of this is why I try to watch Jim Lehrer every night. We really do need to protect ourselves from a cocoon of only our side of the story.

[ladym55]

2. Senator Kerry nailed it

It's hard to have an intelligent discussion with people who are deliberately misinformed. The cable news channels are FILLED with liars. They KNOW they are lying, but it gives them ratings and big incomes. There's Rush Limbaugh claiming that Colin Powell only endorsed Obama because Obama is black ... Sean Hannity bleating about William Ayers DAILY ... some idiot from Cincinnati screaming that Obama is the anti-Christ ... Michael Savage screaming racism. Listeners to these radio shows hear that Obama is the Manchurian Candidate ... he's a Muslim ... he'll paint the White House black ...

No wonder the McCain-Palin followers are so filled with fear and hate. They are unable to argue because all they know is talking points based on blatant lies. The McCain-Palin rally here in Akron drew a big crowd last week, but what was saddest to me were the comments following the report on the rally in the Beacon Journal. Post after post about Obama's "socialism" and how that would be bad for us. Akron is not well educated, its economic base is hurting, and these people will vote AGAINST their own economic best interest because Obama is a "socialist," according to McCain-Palin.

What did Senator Kerry say? Journalists showing due diligence to finding the truth? Can you imagine what that would be like for us as a nation? We'd be able to debate things based on evidence and reality rather than spin and lies.

[karynnj]

3. and you nailed it here

The other telling thing is that the current environment is such that Kerry, stating something that should be just common sense, had to take his time, saying he had to find a way to say it that would not result in him being you tubed to death. He did a nice job keeping the comments not twistable - each sentence having enough clarity that playing it got the message out that he intended.

In addition to the main point of how it creates this poisonous situation - he did a nice job explaining how politicians are ambushed and why the current precedent on libel and slander for a public figure is too extreme in protecting the media.

[Luftmensch067]

4. I don't know enough about this, but what about the Fairness Doctrine?

If, in a potential new political climate, we could re-establish that (or something equivalent), would that even help appreciably?

[karynnj]

5. The fairness doctrine mainly meant that

if you gave an hour to McCain, you would need to give an hour to Obama. I don't think it addressed any type of responsibility to tell the truth. I don't know how they can get back to where they once were when the TV news station's cared about their reputation for truth. Part of the problem is what Kerry spoke of at the end - individual reporters could lose jobs, if they opted not to compete getting salacious stories. In terms of reputation, a quick listen will show you callers prefacing their remarks to people like Hannity with praise for them being "good Americans". They are heroes to the people deceived for the lies they tell.

[sandnsea]

6. And they lied about the economy

A couple years ago I read an article about the importance of a transparent media in regards to a country's economy. It was about Malaysia or one of those countries, I don't remember which one. But they had a closed media so when the economy collapsed, it took everybody by surprise. I've tried to find it several times since, no luck. As bad as the social and cultural ramifications is, the economic collapse is so much worse. There have been rumblings of this out there. I don't think this would have been a shocking crisis if we hadn't had so many in the media who were desperate to defend Bush at any cost - and others who just didn't want to rock the boat.