Replies

Thanks for a most interesting string. Yesterday, a senior officer of the state ACLU admitted to me that content broadcast on the public airwaves is not, in fact, Constitutionally protected. This isn't news to anyone familiar with the relevant history, but it is a major concession in the context of left-wing activism.

For more on media bias and its historical roots, I could not do better than to recommend Thomas Frank's The Conquest of Cool. This remarkable work of cultural history documents the historical relationships among the entertainment, journalism, and advertising industries and radical politics from the 1950s onward. It is a damning indictment of media culture, the Rosetta Stone of media bias. Frank's status as a major lib only enhances its credibility.

a senior officer of the state ACLU admitted to me that content broadcast on the public airwaves is not, in fact, Constitutionally protected. This isn't news to anyone familiar with the relevant history, but it is a major concession in the context of left-wing activism.

It runs counter not only to the interests of PBS but of Rush Limbaugh. My only defense for Rush is the fact that his program is actually, provably, philosophical - whereas "objective" journalism projects a perspective which is actually, provably, sopistry.
That is so because - mock braggadocio aside - Rush does not argue from a claim of virtue, but journalism claims the virtue of objectivity (is that in any wise distinguishable from wisdom?) and assigns to those who are sympatico with journalism's perspective the classical virtue of moderation (a.k.a. "centrism") and the American virtues of liberalism and progressivism. Said differently, Rush takes intelectual challenges seriously, and "liberals" use power to dismiss intellectual challenges by suppressing public curiosity about them to the extent of their considerable PR power.

For more on media bias and its historical roots, I could not do better than to recommend Thomas Frank's The Conquest of Cool. This remarkable work of cultural history documents the historical relationships among the entertainment, journalism, and advertising industries and radical politics from the 1950s onward. It is a damning indictment of media culture, the Rosetta Stone of media bias. Frank's status as a major lib only enhances its credibility.

Your billing of it sounds wonderful, but in following the link you provide I found my eyes glazing over. I just dismiss the "counterculture" as an expression of the culture of journalism. Nothing more than a bunch of "dissenters" on TV railing against "the establishment" - when they were on TV precisely because the actual establishment - Big Journalism - wanted them (and not you or me) there.
Establishment "dissent." You buy that, I've got some dry water to sell you.