Posted on 02/14/2014 1:59:21 AM PST by lowbridge
According to Reporters Without Borders, America dropped 13 spots on the World Press Freedom Index 2014, designed to rank 180 countries in terms of the freedoms journalists enjoy and the regulations placed on them by government authorities.
The Index, published Feb. 11, shows that America now ranks number 46, below countries like South Africa and France. The Index has been published annually since 2002, but the 2014 ranking for America marks one of the most significant declines ever reported.
According to Christophe Deloire, the Reporters Without Borders Secretary General, the World Freedom Index is based on seven criteria: the level of abuses, the extent of pluralism, media independence, the environment and self-censorship, the legislative framework, transparency and infrastructure.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Our press is free to say whatever the administration says they can.
The worst thing that it is an unbiased rating. French press is not that forgiving for their dear leader.
Press freedom has been voluntarily surrendered as journalists became willing tools of the socialist state.
Well the French are not blessed with the chosen one.
Obama is an inept wannabe socialist comparing to full-communist Hollande.
At least in avowed communist countries, the state bears the expense of operating its supportive media.
The media is less free in America because it CHOOSES TO BE MINISTERS OF THE CULT.
Of course, you are entirely correct. But perhaps when they were writing this article they mistakenly replaced the word “truth” with “freedom”. :o)
This is not directed at Obama, it is directed at the CIA and the military.
I want to show you something... It’s my shocked face...
HWUUUAAAHHHH!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srw3RdiIlrQ
It probably is here too.
Excellent point.
The method for evaluating the JWB World Press Freedom Index relies upon a questionnaire distributed to journalists. http://rsf.org/index/qEN.html
Many of the questions are pretty subjective. A journalist in country with reasonably good press freedom is thus able to score his country as worse than a journalist in a country with pretty bad press freedom.
Otherwise, how did Canada (#18), which has pretty much the same press freedom as US except for a “Queen Censor” at the “Human Rights” Commission, score higher than US?
Well, JWB is pretty explicit that the treatment of Snowden and Manning enter into the ranking. Personally, I think Snowden is likely a hero and Manning is a mentally disturbed ex-soldier, but neither their treatment nor their revelations have much at all to do with press freedom per se. To other aspects of liberty, their revelations are profound; but press freedom, not much.
Still, slipping to #46, which drops the US out of the free countries into the mostly free countries, is disturbing. I don’t think it’s that bad, but the trend is awful. Especially since the same trend applies in the more objective indices of economic freedom published by Fraser Institute and Heritage Foundation, which also place the US in the “mostly free” category. However, we’re still #1 in prison population and incarceration rates, so there’s that.
The problem in the US is not press freedom per se.
The MSM has much more freedom than it exercises, and has become flabby. The problem is that the mainstream media have a hive mentality that aligns with the Democrat Party. Its members generally do not want to criticize a Democrat-controlled government. Even if they did, most feel like they cannot be too critical of the powers-that-be in order to maintain “access” and remain relevant.
There is no censorship in the USA. And you cant say there is because you are not allowed.
For 2011, US-based Freedom House ranked the US #17 in Press Freedom. http://www.freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/FOTP%202011%20Final%20Full%20Report.pdf
I think its methodology is better than the France-based Journalists Without Borders. However, Freedom House gets about 65% of its funding from the US government.
Objective consideration of its recent spying on journalists and whistleblowers argues that future rankings should drop. And, if there is any truth at all in the conspiracy theories about Breitbart and the Rolling Stone guy, well ... no matter what, North Korea will still be at the bottom of the list.
The press have collectively made their choice. They could have done their jobs with some vigor, integrity and impartiality, which would have protected them and us. Instead, they’ve chosen to throw their lot in with the tyrant in hopes that they’ll get eaten last. Fortunately, we have more lampposts than we have journ-o-lists.
The press are willing accomplices to liberal censorship. They are morons.
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