Biased Media: Resistance to an Illiberal, Anti-Democratic America

calling out the media

Resistance to an Illiberal, Anti-Democratic America=

Resistance to an MSM PROPAGANDA MACHINE!

NBC Is Building A Trump Normalization Machine

"After running a proto-fascist campaign, President-elect Donald Trump will bring his hate, misogyny, and bigotry to the White House at the end of the month. And when he does, NBC will have a machine ready to normalize him." (by John Whitehouse, Media Matters, January 4, 2017)

A uniquely powerful key to Trump's elevation to the Presidency and the damage he will do is the ability of the media to avoid the enabling role it played during the primaries and the campaign. The media has to give the public informed, critical substance on policy, not highlight every twitter remark as if the media were reduced to tabloids. So long as the news organizations act primarily as entertainment (to compete for viewer or reader ratings), the public will not get the appropriate crucial coverage of, for example, global warming, nor the appropriate analytical coverage of why the 99.99% have been losing ground (including the implications of changes in the personal income laws favoring the wealthy or changes in overall economy to a service economy or changes in technology requiring fewer industrial production jobs).

"What it really shows is just how craven,
self-serving and self-involved our media are."
by Neal Gabler, March 25, 2016, Moyers and Company

No question that consolidation in media ownership and sensitivity to advertiser influence are part of the long term decline of a substantive, critical journalism and a commitment to investigative journalism (meaning more than “fact checking”). However, Trump has used his celebrity status and media tabloid-like coverage to his advantage ($1.9 billion free media coverage) and, even more significantly, he has used the uncritical reportage to NORMALIZE HIS ILLIBERAL BEHAVIOR AND POLICY PROPOSALS.

"But when Trump lies, the Wall Street Journal—the second largest paper by circulation in the country—will not call it a lie, according to the its editor-in-chief Gerard Baker."

"Each time, by the time the truth came out, the news cycle had moved on — letting the lie stand in millions of people’s minds." (by Laurel Raymond, Think Progress, January 2, 2017)

Outside of the tabloids and highly partisan media, e.g. Hearst or Murdoch, journalists have generally regarded their work as in the Jeffersonian public interest. JOURNALISTS IN THAT TRADITION MUST STAND AGAINST uncritical reportage –  they should be extremely wary of equal time on two sides, (e.g. climate change), and they must debunk and contextualize fake news, call out lies/false claims in the strongest possible terms! 

Leonard Pitts, Jr.

"Baker’s is a mindset that has become all too common. With the obvious exception of certain partisan news outlets, some reporters, fearful of being tagged for “bias” on contentious issues, seek to safeguard themselves by ritually quoting a source from Side A and another from Side B while avoiding even painfully obvious conclusions. They call this “fair and balanced.” It’s actually gutless and dumb." Media Must Take A Moral Stand, by Leonard Pitts, Jr., Miami Herald, January 4, 2017

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/leonard-pitts-jr/article124444124.html#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/leonard-pitts-jr/article124444124.html#storylink=cpy

We are learning unwittingly how 
MEDIA CAN DESCEND INTO PROPAGANDA.

One key to resistance is

• for the majority public to become actively engaged in criticizing when media journalism fails its promise
• for the majority public to SUPPORT MEDIA JOURNALISM THAT RECLAIMS A STANDARD THAT CAN NOT NORMALIZE THE ILLIBERAL, ANTI-DEMOCRATIC, PROTO-FASCIST ELEMENTS OF THE NEW PRESIDENCY AND CONGRESS