How on earth do we combat the right wing control of the media?
Submitted by CarolNYC on April 3, 2006 - 8:17pm.
I just finished reading David Brock's "Republican Noise Machine" and boy has it gotten me distressed and depressed.
This right wing control of the media is a major, major hurdle and, to be honest, I just don't see how we clear it.
The Republican right wing has three major advantages that I see and I just don't know how we get past them....
1) They have a LOT of money and are willing to spend it to further their ideological agenda
2) The have no scruples, no ethics, no morals, no qualms about lying or fabricating stories and even no qualms about admitting that they do this
3) They have like a 35 year head start on whatever we might try to do now...No foolin' they've been working this media thing since the early 70's. It didn't happen overnight....
How do we combat that? I don't know...
While I do not think that they are idiots, I agree that Begala and Carville are not now what they used to be mainly because they openly have sold out to Hillary Clinton for 2008. I saw them announce their support her for President in 2008 in their C-SPAN 2 Book TV interview for their book "Take It Back."
Being that they have sold out to Hillary for 2008, that would put into question some of the things that they would do and say if they were to challenge Limbaugh because they would probably try to protect Hillary first at almost any cost. That is why I said someone like "a Begala" or "a Carville," someone who has as good of a reputation now that they used to have!
But someone has to credibly do it!
These two "owl out the tree" guys did plenty of damage when they spread that meme. That cuts into possible fundraising efforts for backers who have never seen a candidate and thus, must rely on other's opinions. Grrrrrrr! I'm trying to think of people I might trust with this duty of representing our side of the story fairly. It's hard work. Speaking of work....I'd better do some.
You have not converted a man because you have silenced him.--J. V. Marley
I'd be very surprised if they did NOT support Hillary, since they worked for Bill.
Having said that, though, I was very disappointed that they dismissed Clark the way they did during the campaign.
Stan Davis
Lakewood, CO
BE THE CHANGE you wish to see in the world.
If not us, WHO? If not now, WHEN?
We have to support all the groups and invididuals working to get truth out.
There's the developing IWT (Independent World Television) - which has recently changed it's name to The Real News and needs our support:
There's all the independent blogger/journalists who need our support to keep growing. The Corporate press is having a harder and harder time ignoring them and as more of us support (send $$) them and spread their sites, the more power they'll garner. This includes everyone from Buzzflash, to TPM, kos, etc.
There's orgs like Media Channel
http://mediachannel.org/
FreePress.net
http://freepress.net/
(You can sign up for email updates from both of the above sites.)
And here's a link to a whole list of links to alt media sites:
http://www.linkcrusader.com/media.htm
It's too late to worry about Corporate Press. ALL major media outlets are owned by 6 or 7 corporations who profit from Repub policies/thuggery/war. We need to develop and support our own media and that's exactly what thousands upon thousands of people and orgs are doing. I can't stress enough how important it is for us to support them.
I have chosen Media Channel, Free Press and BradBlog as my pet alt media sources that I donate to each month. Find your favs and help them!
Oh! and don't forget Media Matters! Sign up for their email updates and use their easy "action" alerts to write and call the Corporate press talking heads when they spew lies! Even a short note saying we're out here, we know what you're doing, and we're not buying it, so how about some truth and facts!
Once in a while you get shown the light, In the strangest of places if you look at it right. - Hunter/Garcia
One thing...Sometimes the way these folks work is so subtle...
I just happened to be going through some old papers this morning and found the transcript from the Forbes on Fox Panel Discussion that Wes appeared on last October. Steve Forbes and Wes and a couple of others were discussing Iraq and Iran and Asman was the host. Forbes was going on about how much progress we were making in Iraq, claiming "We're winning this thing!" and how it's a FACT that Iran can't be talked to....Of course, our General was taking a bit of a different view of things.
What struck...and disturbed...me was how Asman equated both Clark and Forbes as former presidential candidates...as if somehow THAT was what gave them their "expertise" on the topic and then one of the "journalists" on the panel re-enforced that view, saying that the rest of the panel was kind of intimidated by that expertise because they were just journalists and just knew what guys like Clark adn Forbes told them.
Now, I don't know, maybe Steve Forbes has some kind of expertise in this area but I hope it doesn't come only from the fact that he ran for President a number of years ago....And I KNOW that General Clark's expertise doesn't come from the simple fact that he ran for President a couple of years ago....Yet, although Asman did introduce Wes as former Democratic presidential candidate and NATO Supreme Allied Commander at the top of the show, nothing else was said about his credentials or experience or the reasons why he may have some insight into the current situation. Nope, he and Forbes were elevated (and equal), knowledgeable commentators on the topic because they had been Presidential candidates...thereby kind of just dismissing everything else Clark has done, everything else that might make his comments carry a little more weight...Subtle but there....
And yes, Media Matters, very important. David Brock is an important part of this fight. I can't recommend his book enough...Everyone really should read it.
More later...gotta work.
Look at Rush Limbaugh's arrogance below after he acknowledged his listening base of 25 to 30 million people to a caller:
"There's no excuse for not listening to this program unless you've bought into the phony criticism of this program and me by critics who themselves don't listen to it, but we don't need to go there."
This guy is an arrogant egomaniac and he needs to be called on to publicly debate the trash that he is saying to help break up some of that base of 25 to 30 million people and to help to make sure that base of listeners does not keep on growing!
http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_040406/content/america_s_anchorman.guest.html
Don't Jump to Conclusions on DeLay
April 4, 2006
CALLER: All right. Well, as I was listening earlier, and agreeing with Glenn, and I've had to calm down listening to Roger and all the others, but it's all about perception, Rush. You have 25 to 30 million listeners on a daily basis?
RUSH: Yes.
CALLER: There are still those out there that work that can't listen to you for whatever reasons, although they should.
RUSH: They're just not trying hard enough.
CALLER: Right. Well, that may be, but then maybe there's limits as to what they can listen to when they're in the office or whatever may be the case.
RUSH: That's no excuse. We make the program available on podcast for people. There's no excuse for not listening to this program unless you've bought into the phony criticism of this program and me by critics who themselves don't listen to it, but we don't need to go there. I'm sidetracking you. What is your point about the numbers that don't show?...
We can start to seriously deal with the media problem by:
1) Organizing direct and paid media response teams in all 50 states to Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, FOX News, and other extreme right wing media sources like them. Jam up their phone lines and hit them back hard with credible answers to what they are telling people. Do not let them negatively define the Democratic Party and Democratic candidates now like how they did to John Kerry in 2004! That will also help local Democratic candidates in all 50 states as well.
2) Start a huge nationwide grassroots movement to get FOX News to make transcripts of ALL of their programs like CNN and MSNBC do so that Bill O'Reilly, Brit Hume, Neil Cavuto, and others like them will all have tangible paper trails to follow them! That will make it much easier to show people that Fox News is mainly a Neocon GOP front designed to push Bush's main agenda, give Bush as much of a free pass that they can with his problems and low poll numbers, and run a smear campaign against the Democratic Party and Democratic candidates!
3) I would also very strongly suggest putting up someone credible who is well known and who is overall acceptable to both the left and middle (such as a Paul Begala or a James Carville) to publicly call on Rush Limbaugh to a series of public debates on neutral grounds with a real moderator and equal time controls (like the Presidential debates).
The more that Limbaugh refuses to debate, the more attention that a Begala or a Carville could get speaking on college campuses and in town hall meetings all over the country to smoke him out and get a lot of media attention in the process. They could even bring in a podium with Limbaugh's name on it and then have the media focus on it being empty the whole time that they are speaking!
If Limbaugh agrees to debate, then he will clearly lose on the issues and that will diminish his influence as well as the influence of his clones like Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, and others like them.
That is a win-win situation for us and will help to take away the free pass that they strongly influence impressionable people to keep on giving to Bush and to other top Neocons who are in trouble as well as their ability to paint and negatively define their political enemies!
If Rush Limbaugh and company are not being successful at defining us in the media and influencing people to give Bush as much of a free pass on his problems as possible, then what else is keeping Bush's political head above water as opposed to sinking like an anchor as it should and why are so many Neocon GOP candidates still running overall competitive races in the polls now for the most part when Bush's poll numbers are so low?