"The media" - specifically journalism - is in thrall to the idea of their own importance. In thrall to the idea that is, that not only is the pen mightier than the sword, the sword and everything else is irrelevant compared to the glories of PR. I think that is the only way to explain the media's antipathy towards the military, the police, and business. Everything which we rely on in the real world is, inside the virtual reality of his newspaper, seen by the journalist as a mere pretender.The conceit of the journalist is that only the journalist keeps anyone honest.
Descarte's famous dictum, cognito ergo sum - "I think therefore I am" - has been called the lunatic fringe of philosophy because it suggests that nothing else but "I" can be proven to exist. But how is that different from a philosophy which denies that reality even exists if it doesn't show up in the newspapers?
It’s the demography, stupid
The New Criterion ^ | Jan 2, 2006 | Mark Steyn
Yes. Journalists function to sustain an artificial reality in which journalists alone keep society honest and functional.In that "reality" the Constitution as written is irrelevant.
- In that "reality" soldiers and police are threats and it is journalists who keep us safe.
- In that "reality" oil companies are mere exploiters who pollute and try to charge too much, and it is journalists who assure that gasoline is available at a reasonable price.
- In that "reality" Republicans are fat cats and Senators Corzine, Kennedy, Rockefeller, and Kerry look out for the little guy.
- In that "reality" Republicans are racists and Robert KKK Byrd is a man of all the people.
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”Theodore Roosevelt quotes (American 26th US President (1901-09), 1858-1919)
Rush talks about the arrogant condescension of liberalism; I like to justify the label "arrogant" by reference to the nexus of political liberalism to journalism:
- journalism claims the virtue of objectivity -
but anyone who claims superior virtue is arrogant.
- journalism makes its money by attracting attention, and it attracts attention by promoting itself and deprecating:
- the people who protect the republic (military),
- the people who protect the rule of law (police and conservative judges) and
- the people who limit prices by producing the goods and services we need or want.
- political liberalism is simply the cynical adoption of the arrogant, hypercritical attitude of journalism as a political position for the purpose of sailing down the propaganda wind of commercial mass-market "objective" journalism. To be objective, journalism would have to actively dissociate itself from the type of arrogant, hypercritical liberal position which journalism's bread and butter. Naturally that never happens.
Rush Limbaugh LIVE Thread - Thursday January 12th Rush Limbaugh.com ^