Posted on 09/14/2001 7:02:19 AM PDT by conservatism_IS_compassion
The framers of our Constitution gave carte blance protection to “speech” and “the press”. They did not grant that anyone was then in possession of complete and unalloyed truth, and it was impossible that they should be able to a priori institutionalize the truth of a future such human paragon even if she/he/it were to arrive.
At the time of the framing, the 1830s advent of mass marketing was in the distant future. Since that era, journalism has positioned itself as the embodiment of nonpartisan truth-telling, and used its enormous propaganda power to make the burden of proof of any “bias” essentially infinite. If somehow you nail them dead to rights in consistent tendentiousness, they will merely shrug and change the subject. And the press is protected by the First Amendment. That is where conservatives have always been stuck.
And make no mistake, conservatives are right to think that journalism is their opponent. Examples abound so that any conservative must scratch his/her head and ask “Why?” Why do those whose job it is to tell the truth tell it so tendentiously, and even lie? The answer is bound and gagged, and lying on your doorstep in plain sight. The money in the business of journalism is in entertainment, not truth. It is that imperative to entertain which produces the perspective of journalism.
And that journalism does indeed have a perspective is demonstrated every day in what it considers a good news story, and what is no news story at all. Part of that perspective is that news must be new--fresh today--as if the events of every new day were of equal importance with the events of all other days. So journalism is superficial. Journalism is negative as well, because the bad news is best suited to keep the audience from daring to ignore the news. Those two characteristics predominate in the perspective of journalism.
But how is that related to political bias? Since superficiality and negativity are anthema to conservatives there is inherent conflict between journalism and conservatism.. By contrast, and whatever pious intentions the journalist might have, political liberalism simply aligns itself with whatever journalism deems a “good story.” Journalists would have to work to create differences between journalism and liberalism, and simply lack any motive to do so. Indeed, the echo chamber of political “liberalism” aids the journalist--and since liberalism consistently exacerbates the issues it addresses, successful liberal politicians make plenty of bad news to report.
The First Amendment which protects the expression of opinion must also be understood to protect claims by people of infallibility--and to forbid claims of infallibility to be made by the government. What, after all, is the point of elections if the government is infallible? Clearly the free criticism of the government is at the heart of freedom of speech and press. Freedom, that is, of communication.
By formatting the bands and standardizing the bandwiths the government actually created broadcasting as we know it. The FCC regulates broadcasting--licensing a handful of priveledged people to broadcast at different frequency bands in particular locations. That is something not contemplated in the First Amendment, and which should never pass constitutional muster if applied to the literal press. Not only so, but the FCC requires application for renewal on the basis that a licensee broadcaster is “operating in the public interest as a public trustee.” That is a breathtaking departure from the First Amendment.
No one questions the political power of broadcasting; the broadcasters themselves obviously sell that viewpoint when they are taking money for political advertising. What does it mean, therefore, when the government (FCC) creates a political venue which transcends the literal press? And what does it mean when the government excludes you and me--and almost everyone else--from that venue in favor of a few priviledged licensees? And what does it mean when the government maintains the right to pull the license of anyone it does allow to participate in that venue? It means a government far outside its First Amendment limits. When it comes to broadcasting and the FCC, clearly the First Amendment has nothing to do with the case.
The problem of journalism’s control of the venue of argument would be ameliorated if we could get them into court. In front of SCOTUS they would not be permitted to use their mighty megaphones. And to get to court all it takes is the filing of a civil suit. A lawsuit must be filed against broadcast journalism, naming not only the broadcast licensees, but the FCC.
We saw the tendency of broadcast journalism in the past election, when the delay in calling any given State for Bush was out of all proportion to the delay in calling a state for Gore, the margin of victory being similar--and, most notoriously, the state of Florida was wrongly called for Gore in time to suppress legal voting in the Central Time Zone portion of the state, to the detriment of Bush and very nearly turning the election. That was electioneering over the regulated airwaves on election day, quite on a par with the impact that illegal electioneering inside a polling place would have. It was an enormous tort.
And it is on that basis that someone should sue the socks off the FCC and all of broadcast journalism.
Journalism has a simbiotic relation with liberal Democrat politicians, journalists and liberal politicians are interchangable parts. Print journalism is only part of the press (which also includes books and magazines and, it should be argued, the internet), and broadcast journalism is no part of the press at all. Liberals never take issue with the perspective of journalism, so liberal politicians and journalists are interchangable parts. The FCC compromises my ability to compete in the marketplace of ideas by giving preferential access addresses to broadcasters, thus advantaging its licensees over me. And broadcast journalism, with the imprimatur of the government, casts a long shadow over elections. Its role in our political life is illegitimate.
The First Amendment, far from guaranteeing that journalism will be the truth, protects your right to speak and print your fallible opinion. Appeal to the First Amendment is appeal to the right to be, by the government or anyone else’s lights, wrong. A claim of objectivity has nothing to do with the case; we all think our own opinions are right.
When the Constitution was written communication from one end of the country to the othe could take weeks. Our republic is designed to work admirably if most of the electorate is not up to date on every cause celebre. Leave aside traffic and weather, and broadcast journalism essentially never tells you anything that you need to know on a real-time basis.
journalism is a 'finished' entertainment package. These people have a license to make or destroy whomever they choose. They made Dan Quayle out to be a imbecile. They made John Edwards out to be a saint, to a lot of dems. They evey try to repackage John 'flip flop' Kerry almost succeeded.
Interesting comparison of John "Breck Girl" Edwards and Dan ("you're no John Kennedy") Quayle.
Of course you are right that the journalism savaged Quayle, and promoted Edwards.
compared, because of trying to run for VP first time, new in a way to political forum. Just came to my mind thought, and decided to put it out there.
Journalism promotes the idea that it is "the press" - and therefore journalism is objective and defines the public interest. But although newspapers are part of the press, that does not justify the absurd conclusion journalism promotes. Journalism would attack with vociferous abandon any member of any other interest who made such an absurd claim. See, for example, the uproar over GM chairman Charles Wilson's 1953 statement that "What's good for the country is good for General Motors."Over the course of the 20th century, life expectancy increased by 30 years; annual deaths from major killer diseases such as tuberculosis, polio, typhoid, whooping cough and pneumonia fell from 700 to fewer than 50 per 100,000 of the population; agricultural workers fell from 41 to 2.5 percent of the workforce; household auto ownership rose from one to 91 percent; household electrification rose from 8 to 99 percent; controlling for inflation, household assets rose from $6 trillion to $41 trillion between 1945 and 1998. These are but a few of the wonderful things that have occurred during the 20th century.
All of which, and more, illustrates the point that an American secretary today would be ill-served to trade circumstances with the life of the fabulously wealthy Queen Victoria (1819-1901). And yet which generated more headlines in the 20th Century - the unprecedented blessings of the 20th Century, or World War II? Mass-market journalism is the business of profiting from bad news.As compared to General Motors - which merely profits by manufacturing "a wonderful invention - it gets you where you are going, and keep you warm, dry, and broke" - journalism profits from the four horsemen of conquest, war, want, and death. And, in more than one instance, lies or hypertendentious partial truths.
The First Amendment does not give rights to ABC News - nor even to The New York Times. The First Amendment codifies some of the rights of the people - including, but not limited to, the Sulzbergers who control the Times. Journalism is more of a special interest than General Motors ever was.
Caring vs. uncaring
TownHall ^ | May 10, 2006 | Walter E. Williams
Since liberals operate under the premise that nothing matters except PR, whatever makes a good story for journalism is what liberals will promote. Consequently journalism runs the Democratic Party."I understand the reporters have a job to do," the president said. "I talk to them every day. I don't like what they write, but they don't like what I say," he added, half jokingly.
The problem, simply stated, is that journalists presume to be in charge of the government, and they go into high dudgeon whenever Republican officials defend the upwardly aspiring, downwardly fearing middle class.Republicans exist to defend the conservative practical class against the attacks of the liberal criticizing class lead by journalism.
Come Again?
The Washington Post ^ | 5/15/2006 | Howard Kurtz
It is natural to claim objectivity if you can get away with it. Conservatives would do so if they dominated journalism. But to claim objectivity is to undercut you own argument, since if your argument depend on the assumption of your objectivity - and your objectivity cannot be proven - your argument is rotten at its core.And your objectivity - or journalism's - can never be proven because nobody can state the whole truth. And half the truth can be a very big lie. Thus it is impossible to prove objectivity. Journalism's "objectivity" is especially difficult to prove because of the rules which make journalism commercially successful:
Journalism promotes the bad news from Iraq because it sells newspapers. Far from making the bad news from Iraq representative and unbiased, that fact makes journalism tendentious in a predictably anticonservative way.
- "Man Bites Dog" rather than "Dog Bites Man" makes journalism unrepresentative.
- If it bleeeds it leads (and the unspoken, if it's good, it will appear in an ad or not at all) makes journalism negative.
- There's nothing more worthless than yesterday's newspaper makes journalism superficial.
The interests of journalism define liberalism, because liberal politicians act on the belief that NOTHING actually matters except PR. It is scarcely to be marveled at that a political philosophy based on superficiality, negativity, and unrepresentativeness cannot stand up to polonged and focused logical critique.
Some say the business is in subscriptions and some say it is in advertising. For broadcast journalism, since there are no subscriptions but patrons, it is an art.
If you just stop and think about it, why would you not assume that journalists would be arrogant until proved otherwise? And why would you not assume that politicians pander to journalists to get PR, until proved otherwise? IMHO accepting the truth of those two questions is the beginning of political understanding.If anyone dares to insinuate that they or their company, industry, or institution should be associated with the public interest, journalism will disabuse them of that notion in a hurry. Journalism - which calls itself "the press" for no other purpose - reserves that role to itself.
Journalism declares itself to be objective. Yet if challenged on the issue of the the negativity of its coverage (of Iraq, for example) journalism replies that "that's the nature of the news. Bad news sells." And of course that is true, bad news does sell. So bad news helps make journalism profitable - and there could scarcely be a better definition of a special interest than that.
"Arrogant" doesn't cover it. Proclaiming yourself the embodiment of the public interest when in fact you are the quintessential special interest is chutzpah to the max.
On face value, broadcast journalism is paid for by commercials - but in a very real sense you are correct. The patrons of broadcast journalism are those who promote the fatuous conceit that broadcast journalism is valuable to constitutional governance. It is not.Our laws are made by elected officials who do not need the counsel of the likes of Dan Rather and Mary Mapes on what will get them reelected. Our officials are elected by an electorate which does not need to get marching orders from journalists on a less-than-24-hour deadline since they cast their ballots on the performance of the incumbents over a period of years.
People who promote the idea that broadcast journalism is in the public interest, when in fact it is a special interest, are the "patrons" of whom you speak.
Ping to MarkWar's interesting #19 ("TO 19" button below).
The SCOTUS ruled on this very issue about 35 years ago, in Red Lion Broadcasting v. FCC, upholding the constitutionality of FCC regulation of broadcast journalism.
OTOH one might argue, as I do, that journalists are not priests nor any sort of officials at all. Journalists are merely people like you and me, with no credentials which the government is obligated to respect. People who exercise rights that you and I have but ordinarily do not exercise. Say rather, which we ordinarily exercise only humbly via FR, rather than arrogantly.Journalists call themselves "the press" as if non-fiction or even fictional books were less protected than the particular genre of topical nonfiction known as journalism. And as if the First Amendment covered broadcast journalists whose business could not exist without government censorship of radio transmission which competed with the licensed broadcasters. It is arrogant to argue from a claim of your own virtue, and journalists arrogantly claim the virtue of objectivity.
Journalists claim the status of a priesthood of power - the power of public relations. They maintain that power by maintaining their circulation and their ratings, and they maintain their circulation and ratings by "If it bleeds it leads" negativity and by second-guessing criticism of those who provide the goods and services upon which we depend.
In short, journalism preens itself as the definition of the public interest by promoting the idea that anyone who is not a journalist or a credulous believer of the perspective of journalism is evil. Journalism is in fact nothing but the prototypical special interest. An interest which promotes
- If we depend on the military, then the military must be losing in Iraq (even if its oppostition there holds no territory and is capable only of harassing the Iraqi public and our troops.
- If we trust the food in the supermarket, then Alar used to optimize the appearance of apples must be harmful to public health.
- If we depend on our pickup trucks, they must be firebombs just waiting to go off.
- If we depend on gasoline, the oil companies must be greedy.
- If we depend on white men, they must be racist sexist biggot homophobes.
- If we depend on the police, they must be either unable to apprehend evildoers or brutal thugs - if not both.
- If we depend on Christian principles (which alone explain why slavery was abolished worldwide to the extent that it has been), Christians must be self righteous and domineering.
- If we depend on FR and bloggers to give us informed opinion, bloggers and FR posters must be tendentious partisans who unfairly target virtuous journalists and liberal politicians.
- And if we depend on an intelligent and public-spirited electorate, the electorate must be a bunch of mind-numbed robots who will fall for anything.
liberalismtyranny as it promotes itself.Is the New York Times About to be Indicted?
Armavirumque ^ | May 25, 2006 | James Piereson
BTTT
The absolute then implies that:
All Republicans are ...
All Democrats are ...
All Whites are ...
All Catholics are ...
All Blacks are ...
All Americans are ...
Or even (if you object to the use of racial, religious or political labels).
All lawyers are ...
All teachers are ...
All doctors are ...
I claim no priesthood...I leave that to my pastor.
The biggest growth in the newspaper business in the last 10 years has been among the niche papers like mine, a business publication. We have grown 240% in the last two years. My growth is based almost entirely on the fact that do not behave in the manner you describe in the above post.
The IS a vital need for government to be open and accessible, if for no other reason than government spends our money, the taxpayers. Journalism has uncovered a tremendous amount of corruption, greed and malfeasance.
I too have my own crusades, but I watch local government, and to a lesser extent, state government. There are more of us than there are the major news channels and the major networks. Thousands of people are still getting much of their news from local sources, the daily paper, the weekly paper, the 6 p.m. news. But when the local government suddenly gets the $1 million fire truck before the appropriation goes through, then I believe it is my duty to call them on it.
This is not to suggest that we are all saints either. I screw up, although I loath to admit it. It does happen. I also try to offer corrections in the same spirit as the original article.
As for criticism, it swings both ways. I get as many positives and negatives usually. I have learned to listen to both, but ultimately the final judgment on the story is mine, because my name is on the story. What I cannot do is take the John Kerry approach and waffle with public opinion. I am not afraid to change my views because of new information or new arguments, but I am also not afraid to stand by my convictions.
Your comments are true. The claim of impartial, unbiased truthtelling has as much weight as we give it. Is it really anything more than a marketing claim?
The poor are the very lifeblood of the left, attracting activists, support among the intelligentsia, and -- perhaps most important -- allowing the left to indulge in self-congratulation as people who "care." But, if they really cared, they would want to know what the facts are and what the actual consequences of their various nostrums are.c_I_c:
As Rush has been pointing out, it is no joke that the Democrats are so desperate to have more poor people to boast of their "compassion" for that they are determined to import them from Mexico - or anywhere else - by the tens of millions.Thomas Sowell
People who truly cared would want to know what the actual consequences of minimum wage laws are -- on which there is evidence from around the world that it creates unemployment. . . .c_I_c:Most of the people in the bottom 20 percent are not full-time, year-around workers . . . There are, in fact, more heads of household who are full-time, year-around workers in the top 5 percent than in the bottom 20 percent.
. . But why risk a heady vision over mere facts?
Liberals are motivated to nurture the idea of their own superiority much more than they are motivated by any actual desire to help people stop being poor. IOW, they cultivate their own "self-esteem" in the same way that they assay to cultivate the "self-esteem" of schoolkids. All show, no go.People wonder why "the MSM" is populated exclusively with liberals; it is in fact obvious. Journalism makes its money by superficiality ("there's nothing more worthless than yesterday's newspaper") and negativity ("If it bleeds, it leads"). And that is a perfect description of the liberal. All show, no go.
The idea around which liberalism coheres is that NOTHING actually matters except PR.
Preserving a Vision: Part II (Thomas Sowell)
Townhall.com ^ | 5/31/06 | Thomas Sowell
I consider you a FRiend. You take my critique of your profession seriously, which means that you have a certain level of humility, and less arrogance than too many of us have. Thank you for responding to my post. As Lincoln put it, "If a man's fight begins within himself, then he is worth something."Although the temptations I describe exist at all levels of journalism, it is primarily the mass-market journalist that I have reference to in my critique. Mass marketing is impersonal, thinks of we-the-people as "the masses," and is therefore inherently arrogant.
You OTOH are in the trenches where you actually know real people that you are writing to, rather than working in a bubble where you only meet people who consider themselves insiders. You are in principle subject to competition from anyone who chooses to go in your business; no licenses and no huge capital plant required. When people rail against "the MSM," they are really talking about network broadcast journalism and the big mass-market newspapers with which broadcast journalists operate in symbiotic relationship.
It is a mutual admiration society of self-flatterers. IMHO. And I make no doubt that they are far outweighed in numbers, if not unfortunately in influence, by the grassroots type of journalism which you practice.
Newspapers also play that game, but to a much lesser extent. The number of positions in newspapers is shrinking. The First paper at which I worked had a staff of 25 reporters when I started. They now cover the same area with four
Anyone who supports the launching of a war should be clear-sighted enough to know that, when the troops go in, a few of them will kill civilians, bomb schools, torture prisoners. It happens in every war in human history, even the good ones.
. . . In the run-up to March 2003, there were respectable cases to be made for and against the Iraq war. Nothing that happened at Haditha alters either argument. . . . if you're one of the ever swelling numbers of molting hawks among the media, the political class and the American people for whom Haditha is the final straw, that's not a sign of your belated moral integrity but of your fundamental unseriousness.
Journalism promotes itself as the arbiter of what is important, but in practice journalism defines itself by the rules which make for profit for itself:What could be more "fundmentally unserious" than that?
- If it bleeds, it leads.
- "Man Bites Dog," not "Dog Bites Man"
- Always make your deadline; there's nothing more worthless than yesterday's newspaper.
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