Lately I’ve become somewhat disappointed in the mainstream media – you know, those outlets that are expected to be fair and unbiased in their reporting of the facts? Two snippets from Thom Hartmann’s newsletter this morning prove that I’m not just imagining things …
— There’s a double standard for Democrats versus Republicans saying stupid things: when Democrats do it, it fills the new cycle for a week; when Republicans do it, we get silence. Donald Trump declared in writing in court this week that, as president, he didn’t have to “support” the Constitution of the US because the word “support” doesn’t appear in the Constitution or his oath of office. This is part of his effort to remain on the 2024 ballot in Colorado, where Citizens for Ethics and Responsibility in Washington (CREW) has sued to keep him off. There are lawsuit is based on the 14th Amendment’s Section 3 that forbids people from holding or running for office when they have engaged in insurrection or given aid and comfort to insurrectionists. Not a single Republican has spoken out about this outrage, and it’s conspicuously absent from our media. If Biden had made such an assertion it would be news from coast-to-coast for a week, but nary a peep from the mainstream media on this one. The double standard at work once again.
and …
— The Trump family is doubling down on Nazi. Imagine how the press would treat the story if Hunter Biden was hosting a Holocaust-denying antisemitic speaker who claimed the “good guys lost” WWII at an event on property owned by his father. Every news network in the country would be there and the story would run nonstop. This guy even managed to kill a person while driving drunk and got off, and Eric Trump is hosting him at an event at Trump’s Miami Doral bedbug palace. He is, by the way, the fourth Holocaust-denying Nazi-loving speaker to have taken the stage at these events. But is the mainstream press covering it at all? Not that I can find. Media Matters has the whole story here: hopefully some real reporters will show up and blow this story wide open, although I’m not holding my breath. There are very, very different standards for Democrats and Republicans in today’s media, in large part because billionaires have thrown so much money into rightwing radio, TV, Internet, social media, message boards, and cable media that they can take any small thing and turn it into a weeks’ worth of outrage that often changes behavior than networks. There is nothing comparable on the left. Other than, I suppose, this newsletter and a few others like it here on Substack and in other media: we’re about as close as you will get, which is a tragedy for American democracy.
I have always been a supporter of a free press, for without that, democracy has little chance of survival, but these days the mainstream media’s biases are like a slap in the face. While I understand the need for profit, I think it’s sad that our formerly ‘trusted’ sources have become not much above the tabloids. It’s time, I think, to let them know that we’re not as stupid as they believe and take our business elsewhere if they don’t change their ways!
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I have always found the term Free Press to be amusing. Newspapers have long been owned by individuals who used them to express their own points of view through editorial control. TV news stations are much the same, with the additional pressures of pleasing advertisers. Even supposedly impartial ‘publicly owned’ organisations like the BBC have to toe the government line and present their agenda, or face cuts in funding.
Best wishes, Pete.
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What kinda story requires more than two sides? Heck I’m almost always right why do you even need a second opinion? 💕
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Well, it’s been this way for a while. It seemed (to me) to get much worse during the Clinton admin. I read a term on the blog I favored, (I only read 1 back then!) IOKIYAR (It’s OK If You’re A Republican.) Holy cow it fit during W’s admin, and it’s never changed at all since then. News media like to say the party in the majority/White House gets more/better coverage, but what I’ve seen over more than 45 adult years is that that’s true when it’s Republicans, but when it’s Dems, they still cover Republicans more and also more favorably, “to be fair.” Pat Buchanan earned his money during Nixon’s admin, for certain.
OK. So, my complaint vented, not only do we need to walk with our viewing and reading, I think it’s more important that we let them know we’re walking with our viewing and reading, because they’re not really going to notice it. If they did, they’d move more centrist to compete with MSNBC, instead of the other way around with MSNBC moving to the center, CNN moving right, FOX still off the planet somewhere. Anyway, FWIW. Now that I wrote that, it occurs to me that it may be more productive to write postcards for good candidates. (That’s been my experience.) Eventually, we’ll get enough of them elected to bring back the Fairness Doctrine, and put some teeth in regulations again.
My .02. Peace!
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😔
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On my secondary point, since my Mom (with severe Stage 7 Dementia/E-Alzhmrs) enjoys news channels on TV so much, and I DON’T 10-14 hrs/day, I have had to wear my noise-cancelling earphones a lot! Why?
Because every single American news outlet on cable tv gives ONLY the Israeli side of the conflict, rarely if ever giving the POV of 1947-48 Israel in Palestine! Yes, Hamas is an Iran-Russia backed terrorist group minority inside Palestine, but they do not represent the general Palestinian population! Period!
The entire U.S. news coverage on this conflict has gotten it all so HORRIBLY terribly wrong with their pro-Israeli coverage only! 😡
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It is harder to oppress a people who is seen. Look what happened when the gays were allowed out of the closet.
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EXACTLY!!! Hamas is NOT the Palestinians! My a.m. post scheduled to go out in … um … 20 minutes … addresses this, as U.S. members of Congress are demonizing ALL Palestinians and trying to shun refugees rather than help avert a humanitarian crisis. Interestingly, I read yesterday that some 80% of Israeli Jews blame Netanyahu for the attack by Hamas! While I condemn the attack by Hamas, I also condemn the intended retaliation against innocent civilians in Gaza by Netanyahu. And yes, my friend, the press is one-sided on this … completely biased and seemingly unaware of the difference between Hamas and the Palestinian people.
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But… I ask everyone here, if the American mega-media giants/conglomerates ‘lower their standards of fair, unbiased investigation and reporting’ in order to fatten their revenue- and profit-margins as well as the Executives’ and Shareholders’ bank accounts…
Then to do that successfully, they MUST have an audience—a growing(?) audience—to achieve fat bottom-lines and bank accounts! Who are those Americans? Who exactly is this profit-feeding goliath(s) watching, reading, listening to their subpar-to-crappy journalistic reporting? 🤔
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“Who exactly is this profit-feeding goliath(s) watching, reading, listening to their subpar-to-crappy journalistic reporting?”
Mostly the right wingers. They only want news that confirms what they already believe. They don’t care for news which challenges their beliefs.
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You’re exactly right, Neil … they only listen to that which confirms what they already believed and are unwilling to open their minds just a bit to let in any other viewpoints or ideas.
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I don’t think that the audience is of minimal concern in oligarchic capitalism, Professor. Overlords have always been of the opinion; Give them soylent green, they’ll eat soylent green.
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True. However, we average American ‘peasants‘ 😉 CAN control what our TV’s, phones, laptops, podcasts, radios, or printed papers we use and consume, because that’s a significant portion of their revenues. Just imagine what they’d experience if their audience fell by 30% — 50% or higher because rational, intelligent, reasonable, armed with good-to-great Critical-thinking & analysis skills finally all said… ENOUGH! NO MORE! And protested (via abandonment of subscriptions, etc.) at once, or say over 1-mon period.
I would hope that would get their undivided attention.
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I really like that idea and would be happy to participate by dropping my subscriptions! But … you and I both know that getting people to united behind almost any cause is damn near impossible in this country today. But yes, if we could … it would certainly cause them to sit up and take notice!
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Grrrrr, I know all too well Jill how hard, near impossible it is to unite people behind a common cause. Perfect case and point, and apologies, I am going to digress some to make my/our point…
Back in 2010–11 when the Dallas Cowboys were failing miserably getting to or staying in the earliest stages of the playoffs & wild cards, myself and Dallas Morning News sports columnist, Randy Galloway and I tried and tried to get Cowboys fan ticket-holders and season ticket-holders to STOP going to all games & AT&T Stadium. STOP buying tickets, STOP selling out the stadium game after game, season after season! Our simple battle cry?
The product on the field—players and/or coaches—were NOT equal to the high prices Jerry Jones was charging for seats, luxury boxes, concessions, all the ridiculous glitz & glamour in various “museums” around the stadium. In fact, (blinded) Cowboys fans were getting ripped off season after season for a mediocre product on the field! All of it lead by the imbecile micro-manager, Jerry Jones! Ever since Jones bought the franchise in 1989 on the coat-tails of Tom Landry, Tex Shramm, and the blockbuster trade with Hershel Walker finagled by the aforementioned LEGENDS, the Cowboys have seen NO playoff success since Troy Aikman retired. Period! But as a “business” Jones earns privately off the Cowboys’ fans $5.6-billion/year!
For us Craig Morton/Roger Staubach Cowboy fans, then with Aikman & Jimmy Johnson, this has been a 27-year debacle that has been worse than appalling! And yet, Cowboys fans today continue to bank-roll Jones’ mediocre field product and wallet to this day. 🤦♂️
Alright, done. You may return to your regularly scheduled program. 😉
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Point well made, my friend. Between us, we could offer up at least a dozen examples, but the bottom line is the same … it takes a lot to bring even momentary unity among people these days. People are … shallow. The $$$$$$$$$$$$ have won … for now. There will come a day when all the money in the world will be useless, but until that day comes, those with the most toys … win.
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Sigh. Guilty as charged. I am a paid subscriber to both The Washington Post and the New York Times. While I am frustrated with their biased reporting and still find more factual information from such as The Guardian in the UK, I do still rely on the Post and the Times to at least point me in a direction. But far too often these days I find that the information I need is buried under stories of the clown show that seems to be what sells ad copy.
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Jill, it is definitely harder to find non-profit news sources these days. Is that because more and more middle-class Americans cannot afford any longer to donate funds to deserving organizations like PBS or The Texas Tribune (in my state in Austin), because we have been losing ground the last 20-35 yrs to inflation, cost of living, higher taxes for the working-class, etc, et al, ad nauseum? 🤔
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That is part of it, no doubt, but I think the Internet and social media play a large part, too. Newspapers … remember when you would see a newspaper on almost everyone’s walkway first thing in the mornings? Nowadays people get all their news online and far too many people get their news from the likes of Twitter, Facebook, and other social media sites that were never intended to replace legitimate news sources. And then … there’s Fox, NewsMax, OANN and others who tell the people what they want them to hear, not what they need to hear.
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It’s bought and paid for, nothing ‘free’ about it
The media is in the bag with Trump …
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Right … just as they are ‘free’ to report as they see fit, they are also ‘free’ to lie to us or report only the view that sells the most copies.
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Yep. One of our recurring household conversations is the ‘whatabouterisms’ foisted on us by the press in order to appear even-handed and ‘balanced’. They keep lowering their standards so they can improve their profit margins. A true GRRRRR moment that I encounter every day. Hugs
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In striving for ‘balance’, they are actually tipping the scales in favour of the loudest voices. I agree … I grrrrrrrrrrrrowl more often than not these days and find myself hopping from one website to another trying to find the facts … just give me the facts and I’ll figure out what they mean! Hugs
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