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Title: There's Nothing Mainstream About the Corporate Media
Source:
Common Dreams
URL Source: http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/02/10/6968/
Published: Feb 11, 2008
Author: Harvey Wasserman
Post Date: 2008-02-11 06:23:41 by Zoroaster
Keywords: None
Views: 334
Comments: 25
February 11, 2008 Discuss this story Print This Post E-Mail This Article Published on Sunday, February 10, 2008 by CommonDreams.org There’s Nothing Mainstream About the Corporate Media by Harvey Wasserman As we stumble toward another presidential election, it’s never been more clear that our political process is being warped by a corporate stranglehold on the free flow of information. Amidst a virtual blackout of coverage of a horrific war, a global ecological crisis and an advancing economic collapse, what passes for the mass media is itself in collapse. What’s left of our democracy teeters on the brink. The culprit, in the parlance of the day, has been the “Mainstream Media,” or MSM. But that’s wrong name for it. Today’s mass media is Corporate, not Mainstream, and the distinction is critical. Calling the Corporate Media (CM) “mainstream” implies that it speaks for mid-road opinion, and it absolutely does not. There is, in fact, a discernable, tangible mainstream of opinion in this country. As brilliant analysts such as Jeff Cohen, Norman Solomon and the Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) organization have shown, the “MSM” is very far to the right of it. The mainstream of American opinion wants this country out of Iraq. The Corporate Media does not. It refuses to give serious coverage to the devastating human, spiritual and economic costs of the war, and it marginalizes those demanding it end. The mainstream of American opinion wants national health care. The CM does not. The mainstream of American opinion is deeply distrustful and in many ways hostile to the power of large corporations. Obviously, the CM is not. The mainstream of American opinion strongly questions whether our elections are being manipulated and stolen. The CM treats with contempt those who dare report on the issue. The Corporate Media takes partisan stands (often in favor of the Republican Party, but always in defense of corporate interests) by sabotaging political candidacies, especially those of candidates who challenge corporate power. This year it blacklisted the populist candidacy of John Edwards, suffocating his ability to compete for the Democratic nomination. Mainstream American opinion is no fan of George W. Bush and does not take him seriously as a credible leader. A very substantial percentage has long wanted him and Dick Cheney impeached and removed from office. The CM does not tolerate such a discussion, and utterly marginalizes Rep. Dennis Kucinich, the veteran Congressman who has dared to seriously raise the possibility. Mainstream American opinion is committed to protecting what’s left of the natural environment. The Corporate Media makes an occasional show of sharing that concern, but stops where Corporate interests might be impinged. On the other hand, it promotes failed technologies, such as nuke power, where centralized, corporate profits are huge. Never in our history has the control of the nation’s sources of information been more centralized, or more at odds with what the country as a whole believes. This divergence is not limited to the attack pack fringe of far-right bloviators who dominate the Corporate opinion print columns and talk shows. Virtually all “personal” opinion expressed on the corporate airwaves and in the syndicated big newspaper columns is significantly to the pro-corporate right of moderate American opinion. The “news” pushed by the major radio/TV networks and newspapers slants unerringly toward the interests of the five major corporations that own the bulk of them. They bury stories of vital importance while spewing endless hours and column inches at the mind-deadening likes of Paris Hilton and Brittany Spears. Their excuse is that they “give the public what it wants” and are “in business to make a profit.” But the real profit centers of the corporations that own the CM are not in providing news and information. General Electric, Westinghouse, Disney and the other media-financial-industrial behemoths have too much to lose from an accurate reporting of the true news of the world. To protect their core interests, they are bread-and-circus PR/diversion machines, not real news organizations. They resemble the old Soviet official mouthpieces Izvestia and Pravda far more than the news providers envisioned in the First Amendment, by Founders who saw balanced, aggressive reporting as the lifeblood of democracy.Nor does the corporate right never hesitate to attack. Since Vice President Spiro Agnew assaulted those who dared report the truth about the Vietnam War, the absurd myth of a “Liberal Media” has been used to intimidate and silence mainstream opinion. In fact, the term is used to apply to any outlet that harbors even the slightest expression of dissent. Even conservative newspapers or broadcasts that may be overwhelmingly pro-corporate, but which occasionally tolerate a whiff of dissent, are branded as subversive, ungodly and “out of the mainstream.” There are indeed liberal publications and radio shows in this country. But it’s no accident that they struggle financially, and for access to the airwaves. Thankfully, just as the CM solidifies its power over our mass media outlets, the internet has burst forth as an open, wildly diverse medium for mainstream opinion and actual truth. Its preservation will require what Thomas Jefferson called “eternal vigilance.” That includes restoring the Fairness Doctrine, enacted by a Republican Congress in the 1920s to guarantee balanced opinion on the emerging electronic medium of radio. It means a ban on unified corporate ownership of large fleets of radio, TV and print outlets. It means busting up the monopolies that warp public access to information and opinion. The word “mainstream” has nothing to do with the massively monopolized machine that has a chokehold on our democracy. It’s the “Corporate Media,” and there’s nothing mainstream about it.
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#1. To: Zoroaster (#0)
For you youngsters who were watching Bugs Bunny instead of following current events back then, Spiro Agnew was Nixon's VP before Gerald Ford and he was charged with tax evasion and resigned in 1973. (imagine how serious his crime against the establishment must have been for a sitting VP to be charged with that! And, "Why?" you may ask, "didn't Nixon pardon him????") Well, Agnew's real crime (which isn't in Wikipedia) was this statement: "Everything we see, read and hear is controlled by a handful of people within a half mile radius of Manhattan Island." Of course, he came dangerously close to breaking what was even then the ultimate taboo-but not until he left office did he identify that handful of folks as a clannish tribe of "non-Christians" in New York City. (wink wink) Although Wikipedia claims he was charged with tax evasion because as VP he continued to demand payments from MD contractors who bribed him as governor, we can safely assume that this is a crock of DAWGGY dew. Whoever successfully pursued criminal charges against Crooked Cock Clinton or Bloody Bi-Boy Bush? Does anyone doubt that even back then a VP had the power to send some no-neck special forces cutouts to solve problems like that? WWVPDCD? No, it was later when he made the comment below (which is in WIKI) that offers a clue as to why he was not protected by Nixon or even Gordon Liddy, who would have cheerfully cut some throats if asked to by a sitting prez or VP "for the good of the party": "In 1976, (Agnew) briefly re-entered the public spotlight and engendered controversy with anti-Zionist statements that called for the United States to withdraw its support for the state of Israel because of Israel's bad treatment of Christians, as well as what Gerald Ford publicly criticized (smooch smooch-HD) as "unsavory" "remarks about Jews"[5][6][7][8]" As you see, telling the truth was "anti-Zionist!" HAH! Try this on for fit: "He was criticized by the VP for anti-Soviet statements when he called Solzhenitsyn's GULAG ARCHIPELAGO "A splendid read!" Soundz kinda funnie, don't it? Now, WIKI goes to great lengths with anecdotal information to paint a picture of Agnew as despised by, and event a threat to Nixon, but, this type of two-step is their standard M.O. when trying to send the hounds on the wrong scent trail. Spiro Agnew was an unrepentant anti-Semite, but unlike Nixon he failed to play his cards close to his Orthodox crucifix. Nixon was already dead and buried before the tapes revealed his disdain for G_d's Chosen People. NIXON AND THE JEWS. AGAIN.
.... and he came to this conclusion how? From his advanced degree in nuclear engineering?
No, from his portfolio that is heavily invested in Rockefeller's overseas petroleum extraction (after the countries were sufficiently tenderized by US Marines). In fact it was those overseas investments that compelled Jimmy Carter to push through a windfall profits tax. (at the well head before any cracking of crude had even begun!) This cost prohibitive tax burden on domestic drilling made domestic exploration unprofitable and unable to compete with foreign oil, most of which was imported by our very own ew-gno-hoo! Carter took one more blatantly obvious step to protect King David. As the Trans-Alaska pipeline was nearing completion the five companies proposed laying a natural gas pipeline right along side the petroleum pipeline from Prudhoe Bay to Anchorage at a fraction of the cost since the tract was already surveyed, engineered, cut and graded, to supply affordable natural gas to little old pensioners in Buffalo who froze to death each winter for lack of funds for energy bills during those bitter NEW YORK arctic blasts. Carter said "NO!" and he said that if they wished to build a natural gas pipeline it would have to cross 3000 miles of Canada, making it the most expensive private enterprise proposal in history. This, after the discovery of the largest natural gas field ever discovered on Gull Island on the north slope. It was determined that this one well would flow under its own pressure for 100 years after which water could be pumped under ground and it would flow for another hundred years! Carter did this for one reason. A sudden plentiful domestic supply of natural gas would have rendered Rockefeller's overseas investments unprofitable, and that can't happen ever! In fact the pipeline across Canada proposal is in the preliminary stages of development even now, (although the plan was modified to shorten the pipe by a thousand miles and turn the pipe south around Detroit) but under no circs will the new pipe follow the existing pipeline, because in order to level the playing field for "poor King David", (Please Sir, I want some more! MORE? YOU WANT MORE?!) the plan must be handicapped (kneecapped is more like it) by crossing some really shitty, cold, mountainous Canadian permafrost to keep Rockefeller on top of the heap. Thee is so much oil and gas on the north slope that we don't need foreign product at all, but our wells stay capped and a gag order is in place according to the chaplain on the pipeline Lyndsey Williams, who had executive privileges and sat in on the meetings when these orders came down from Ol' Peanut. It's all explained in Williams' book THE ENERGY NON-CRISIS So, oldsters on fixed incomes will continue to freeze each winter to protect the status quo, and you know HOO that is. This also explains why Hugo Chavez is vilified for donating 1.5 millions gal of home heating oil to poor folks in the US. American oil companies would never dream of such a thing, and instead they raise their prices each winter to take a Megaladon bite out of our disposable incomes. And Hugo's Christian love (or Marxist manipulation) could get people talking about the other forbidden subject in the US-why American oil companies never kick back anything even when the companies have had obscenely profitable years thanks to BushCo's wars, which provide the excuse to raise prices higher than ever. One more thing: We never declared war on North Vietnam because that would have forced Rockefeller to stop moving oil out of Vietnam. During the entire war his tankers moved in and out of Haiphong harbor (enemy port) with no concern for the "Trading With The Enemy Act" which forced Prescott Bush to go underground with his dealings with Adolf and the 3rd Reich. If you review the Teapot Dome scandal and compare it with now, it's obvious that oil has corrupted our govt and corporations since the first emergency reserves were set aside in 1920. (Naval ships were being converted from coal to oil around 1916). In short little has changed. Govt is as corrupt as the Harding admin and oil companies have all the money in the world to buy wormy politicians, and the marines are now the gun goons to keep our oil (that somehow got under other countries' land) flowing. And, no amount of American blood is too high a price to protect the evil people.
I was clearly asking you how Mr. Wasserman came to the conclusion that nuclear power was a failed technology.
There are no replies to Comment # 7. End Trace Mode for Comment # 7.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/LatestSince Vice President Spiro Agnew assaulted those who dared report the truth about the Vietnam War, the absurd myth of a “Liberal Media” has been used to intimidate and silence mainstream opinion.
#4. To: HOUNDDAWG (#1)
failed technologies, such as nuke power
#6. To: nobody (#4)
... and he came to this conclusion how? From his advanced degree in nuclear engineering?
#7. To: HOUNDDAWG (#6)
Replies to Comment # 7.