Posted on 04/26/2006 4:23:11 AM PDT by rellimpank
Memo to Mr. and Mrs. Media: No matter how many times you report that the American middle class is getting "squeezed," you're just flat-out wrong.
This past Sunday's Parade magazine featured the latest attempt by the mainstream media to deny the self-evident truth that the American economy right now is booming. Before dissecting Parade's story, it's worth reviewing the real statistics. All the traditional measurements are not just solid, but spectacular: Unemployment is at a low, low 4.7 percent; the average inflation rate has been under 4 percent for years now; interest rates that seem high today (prime rate on a 10-year T-bond right around 5 percent) are, by historical standards, incredibly low. The economy is producing jobs lickety-split and, just yesterday, the latest consumer confidence report showed that measure of public financial optimism to be at its highest rate in four years.
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
There's a bright side?
The article captures the reality well. The economy is booming, and most people are living in luxury compared to 50 years ago, due to technological advances and improvements in productivity.
Most people believe, however, that lots of nasty stuff is happening to the "other guy" because they are constantly bombarded by "doom and gloom" from the main stream media that is trying to destroy the Republican administration.
Absolutely. Not even close. But people will take things for granted very quickly.
I find it strange that, having identified the problem, you leave out the real money pits: the EPA, the ADA, the micromanaging of fuel blends, $185,000 fighter aircraft canopies, the CWA and the other dozen vegetable soup laws that cost us trillions...
And produce zero.
If you can make a canopy that promotes laminar air flow around the cockpit, stays strong and in the correct shape at Mach 2+ heating levels, take 9 G turns, and survive a hit from a bird for less money, I suggest you contact the aircraft firms immediately. You have a patentable idea.
All of which helps explain why, with the national economy booming to an incredible degree, President George W. Bush seems to receive no credit for the good news: Americans don't realize just how good things are.
It's especially hard for them to realize it when the mainstream media keeps using pretzel-twisted logic and misleading headlines to convince them that their livelihoods are frighteningly imperiled. But the truth is that the American Dream isn't merely alive and well, it's actually not even a dream. Instead, the beautiful dream is reality right here and now -- no matter what the headline writers say.
. . . Memo to Mr. and Mrs. Media: No matter how many times you report that the American middle class is getting "squeezed," you're just flat-out wrong.
Journalists claim that journalism is not partisan but objective. The conceit that journalism is nonpartisan depends not only on the perception that journalism is accurate, but also on the conceit that the lead story and all the other stories on the front page select themselves. They do not; editors decide what is the lead story, what is on the front page, and what is in the rest of the paper. And, within the artificial reality within the paper, whatever they decide not to report might just as well never have happened.Editors select the stories, but they do have guidelines which explain their selections: "If it bleeds, it leads," and "'Man Bites Dog,' not 'Dog Bites Man.'" They brandish those rules as the ironclad defense against charges of political tendentiousness in story selection. And those rules do have validity; it is easy to understand why the attention of potential customers would be attracted by sensational or unusual stories, and thus why those stories would predominate in journalism.
But to say that those rules have commercial utility for journalism is merely to say that the particular private interest known as journalism is served by the publication of bad news. Therefore journalism is served by the existence of bad news. It follows as the night the day that journalism is a special interest. A special interest which, like any special interest, puts up a facade of public spirited disinterestedness. But in fact there is no claim which is more partisan than the claim to be above politics.
Journalism's affinity for bad news inherently suggests that the institutions and people upon which we-the-people depend are unreliable. Within the artificial reality of journalism, things couldn't be worse. And that is not an objective or neutral attitude, but in fact a radically anticonservative attitude.
There is a saying that "You might not be interested in war, but war is interested in you." Well, that applies to journalists and partisanship. If there were such a thing as a journalist who wasn't interested in politics, politics would still be interested in journalism. Journalists have a powerful incentive to claim independence from political parties, but they simply lack the motive to seperate themselves from the tendency which inheres in journalism.
Politicians, OTOH, have plenty of incentive to associate themselves with the tendency of journalism. The less principled the politician, the more closely s/he will adhere to the radical tendency of journalism. In fact, the idea around which liberalism coheres is that NOTHING actually matters but PR.
Not to mention being perfect optically!
Media bias bump.
Some of the people we know in the $30-99K/year range (near the top), spend every dime they get as soon as they get it. They buy a large screen TV, an SUV, a 3+Ghz computer, whatever. When an unexpected bill hits them they're caught unprepared. Yes, they're living paycheck to paycheck. But it's because they've chosen a lifestyle at the upper bound of their means.
Note to Mr. and Mrs. Media: Refusal to acknowledge blessings does not mean they don't exist.
"Life is about choices. If a person CHOOSES to live in one of those places they should be aware of the circumstances just as a person choosing to live in the mountains knows it is going to be cold in the winter."
Umm... perhaps I live in Chicago because it's where I work. I'd love to live somewhere like Champaign Urbana, where the cost of living is better; however, I'd have to spend six hours a day in the car, driving back and forth between home and Chicago. (Some people are actually forced to do this so that their families can live in safe neighborhoods and their children can go to safe schools. Not the best quality of life move, but if having to live in South Central is the only other option, then I guess one does what one has to).
"A good part of the cost associated with urban life is the direct result of high unemployment and crime which drains the budgets, lowers the quality of life, raises insurance for property owners and makes their cost of doing business go up which they pass on to tennants."
Actually, I work in the suburbs and would prefer actually having an apartment there. I wish I did live in the city, because the nightlife is better (less families with urban assault vehicles and snotty thirteen-year-olds and more single twenty-somethings), but I work in the far North suburbs of Chicago (too far a commute to be worth it). However, all the apartments in my price range are either closets or are in dangerous areas.
Moreover, most married couples with families don't CHOOSE to live in the city for the reasons you just described. However, even if they move to the suburbs, the places that have "affordable housing" are full of druggies and gang bangers and have horrible, rundown schools. So they're either forced to live there or to go into severe debt trying to find housing somewhere else.
"Urban areas tend to be run by liberals who get ballot box power from indigents, losers and leeches who prey on the system and it's contributors. In return the political structure tends to nuture the ones who support them at the expense of those who want to be productive. "
It's the government's fault, but not because of poor people in the projects. The reason that one cannot find a nice apartment in NYC is because of rent control. Ditto with CA. These laws actually help out rich people (Park Avenue Coops anyone??).
As for the government's role, I don't think that the government should be redistributing wealth, but I do believe that people who pay taxes have a right to demand that their neighborhoods are safe and that their children get a decent public education which allows them to compete with kids from wealthier suburbs for college spots. (Now it's a twot- tiered system. Transcripts from certain public HS are worth more than others in the eyes of college admissions officers).
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