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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:51:51 GMT
MAINSTREAM MEDIA = CORPORATE MEDIA = STATUS QUO = CONSERVATIVE SLANT = WALL STREET = INTERESTS OF THE 1%
If you think U.S. news has a liberal bias, this assumption-shattering film from Noam Chomsky, Edward Herman, and Justin Lewis will have you thinking again. Making the common-sense case that mainstream news media are more committed to their bottom-line interests as large corporations than to left-wing advocacy, they dissect how news content gets shaped within a narrow, and ultimately conservative, institutional frame that marginalizes the progressive perspectives of a broad cross-section of the American public. The film, made before the rise of Fox News, has become only more relevant with time.
"If you want to understand the way a system works, you look at its institutional structure. How it is organized, how it is controlled, how it is funded." - Noam Chomsky
"The Mainstream media really represent elite interests, and what the propaganda model tries to do is stipulate a set of institutional variables, reflecting this elite power, that very powerfully influence the media." - Edward Herman
KEEP THE FOLLOWING STUDY IN MIND WHEN YOU HEAR CONSERVATIVES and CONSERVATIVE OPERATIVES RANT ABOUT THE LIBERAL MEDIA AND LIBERAL BIAS IN THE MEDIA:
This thread will prove with facts and figures that the media is not Liberally biased but is in fact Conservatively owned and biased.
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:52:24 GMT
Noam Chomsky - The Myth of the Liberal Media
ARE WE BEING SHAFTED BY CORPORATE MEDIA? SOLD OUT FOR $$$$?
This is a MUST WATCH!
Noam Chomsky - The 5 Filters of the Mass Media Machine
Published on Mar 2, 2017
According to American linguist and political activist, Noam Chomsky, media operate through 5 filters: ownership, advertising, the media elite, flak and the common enemy.
Follow #MediaTheorised, an online project by Al Jazeera English’s media analysis show The Listening Post
Facebook: /AJListeningPost
Twitter: @ajlisteningpost
Narrated by Amy Goodman, Executive Producer of Democracy Now!
Designed and animated by Pierangelo Pirak
Noam Chomsky - Manufacturing Consent
Published on Oct 15, 2015
Summary of Chomsky's analyses on how the corporate media functions. Excerpt from the documentary "Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media" (1992).
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:52:50 GMT
6 Corporations That Control Your Perception | Think Tank' Who Owns The Media? |
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:53:21 GMT
Forbes reported last year:
Billionaires have long exerted influence on the news simply by owning U.S. media outlets.
Some billionaires, like Rupert Murdoch and Michael Bloomberg are longtime media moguls who made their fortunes in the news business. Others, like Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, bought publications as a side investment after building a substantial fortune in another industry. Billionaires own part or all of several of America’s influential national newspapers, including The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, in addition to magazines, local papers and online publications.
Several other billionaires, including Comcast CEO Brian Roberts and Liberty Media Chairman John Malone, own or control cable TV networks that are powerful but not primarily news focused.
Here’s a look at some of the billionaires who own news media in the United States:
Michael Bloomberg – Bloomberg LP and Bloomberg Media
Michael Bloomberg, the richest billionaire in the media business, returned to his eponymous media company in September 2014, eight months after stepping down as mayor of New York City. One notable sign of his influence on the publication: Michael Bloomberg doesn’t appear on Bloomberg’s Billionaires Index. FORBES pegs his net worth at $45.7 billion. Bloomberg cofounded his financial data company in 1981 with Charles Zegar and Thomas Secunda, both of whom are now billionaires as well thanks to their minority equity stakes in Bloomberg LP. The company expanded into business news coverage and has more than 2,000 reporters around the world. In 2009, Bloomberg LP bought Business Week magazine from McGraw Hill for a reported $5 million plus assumption of debt.
Rupert Murdoch – News Corp
Rupert Murdoch, former CEO of 21st Century Fox , the parent of powerhouse cable TV channel Fox News, may well be the world’s most powerful media tycoon. He is executive co-chairman of 21st Century Fox with his son Lachlan and is also chairman of News Corp, which owns The Wall Street Journal and other publications. Altogether, his family controls 120 newspapers across five countries. Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal also owns 1e of News Corp, after cutting down his holdings from 6% in early 2015.
Donald and Samuel “Si” Newhouse – Advance Publications
Donald Newhouse and his brother Samuel “Si” Newhouse inherited Advance Publications, a privately-held media company that controls a plethora of newspapers, magazine, cable TV and entertainment assets, from their father. Advance owns newspapers in 25 cities and towns across America and is the country’s largest privately-held newspaper chain. Conde Nast, a unit of Advance Publications, publishes magazines including Wired, Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and Vogue. Si stepped down as chairman of Conde Nast in 2015.
Cox Family – Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Cox Enterprises , owned by the billionaire Cox family, counts The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and a number of other daily papers among its many media investments. James Cox, the company founder and grandfather of current chairman Jim Kennedy, bought his first newspaper, the Dayton Ohio Evening News, in 1898. The Cox Media Group Division today owns the Journal-Constitution and six other daily newspapers, more than a dozen non-daily publications, 14 broadcast television stations, one local cable channel and 59 radio stations.
***
John Henry – The Boston Globe
Billionaire Red Sox owner John Henry purchased the Boston Globe in October 2013 for $70 million. Henry agreed to purchase the Globe just days after Bezos acquired the Washington Post. The Globe was previously owned by the New York Times for twenty years. At the time of his purchase, Henry said he didn’t plan to influence the paper’s sports coverage.
Sheldon Adelson – The Las Vegas Review-Journal
In December 2014, Las Vegas casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson secretly bought the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The newspaper’s own reporting outed the billionaire buyer, who reportedly arranged the $140 million deal through his son-in-law. Since then, there have been reports of Adelson influencing coverage of himself at a newspaper that in the past was often critical of the billionaire.
Joe Mansueto – Inc. and Fast Company magazines
Morningstar CEO Joe Mansueto made his $2.3 billion fortune at the investment and research firm he founded in 1984. One month after taking Morningstar public in 2005, Mansueto bought Inc. and Fast Company magazine from G&J USA. In a statement at the time, he wrote, “I wasn’t looking to buy a magazine. Or two, for that matter….I bought them because I’m passionate about their missions. Their past, present, and future contributions.”
Mortimer Zuckerman – US News & World Report, New York Daily News
Real estate billionaire Mortimer Zuckerman is the owner of both US News & World Report and the New York Daily News. Zuckerman serves as chairman and editor-in-chief of U.S. News & World Report, which he bought in 1984. In the years since, US News & World Report has made a name for itself with its lucrative rankings, including Best Colleges, Best Graduate School and Best Hospitals lists. Zuckerman bought the Daily News out of bankruptcy in 1993 and unsuccessfully tried to sell the tabloid newspaper for six months in 2015.
Barbey family – Village Voice
In October 2015, investor Peter Barbey bought the Village Voice, a New York City alternative weekly, through his investment company Black Walnut Holdings LLC for an undisclosed price. Barbey is a member of the billionaire Barbey family, which made its fortune in textiles and manufacturing. In 1989, John Barbey started the Reading Globe and Mitten Manufacturing Company in Pennsylvania. His son J.E. Barbey took the company, which was then known as Vanity Fair Silk Mills, public in 1951 and the family still owns nearly 20% of the company. The family has also owned a local Pennsylvania paper, The Reading Eagle, for generations.
Stanley Hubbard – Hubbard Broadcasting
Media mogul Stanley Hubbard is CEO of Hubbard Broadcasting, which has 13 TV stations, including a number of ABC and NBC news affiliates in the Midwest, and 48 radio stations. In August, Hubbard bought a stake in PodcastOne, a one-stop shop app for podcasts, through Hubbard Broadcasting. Media runs in Hubbard’s family; his father started Minnesota’s first commercial TV station in 1923.
Patrick Soon-Shiong – Tribune Publishing Co.
On May 23, Tribune Publishing Co. announced that L.A. doctor and pharmaceutical billionaire Patrick Soon-Shiong’s Nant Capital was investing $70.5 million into the media company, making Soon-Shiong the second-largest shareholder. He is now the vice chairman of the media company, which owns papers like The Los Angeles Times and The Chicago Tribune. In an interview with CNBC, Soon-Shiong described his investment as an “opportunity to actually transform this newspaper world into this next generation.” In 2014, Tribune Publishing Co. was spun out of Tribune Company , which changed its name to Tribune Media Co. Tribune Co. had previously been owned by billionaire real estate investor Sam Zell, who took control of Tribune Co. in 2007. Less than a year later, the company went bankrupt. Four years later, Tribune Co. emerged from bankruptcy after being bought by Oaktree Capital Management, Angelo, Gordon & Co and JPMorgan Chase.
***
Warren Buffett – regional daily papers
Warren Buffett, as CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, has invested in a number of small newspapers and owns about 70 dailies today. In 2012, Berkshire Hathaway acquired 63 daily newspapers and weeklies in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Alabama from Media General for $142 million.
Viktor Vekselberg – Gawker
Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselberg’s investment arm, Columbus Nova Technology Partners, bought a minority stake in Gawker in January 2016 for an undisclosed amount. The online media company took outside funding for the first time in anticipation of legal fees incurred by a lawsuit brought by wrestler Hulk Hogan, according to a leaked memo from Gawker founder Nick Denton. Hogan sued Gawker after it published a sex tape. In March a jury awarded Hogan $140 million in damages. Gawker aims to appeal the ruling.
Even the New York Times notes:
[There is] an aggressive bid by the very wealthy to control the American news media at a time when it is in a financially weakened state, struggling to maintain its footing on the electronic frontier’s unstable terrain.
***
Billionaires do not become billionaires by being passive about their own interests. In other instances, once wealthy individuals are involved, those interests can appear to take over.
***
And long before Mr. Murdoch, there was one William Randolph Hearst, who defined what it meant to be a media mogul.
Noam Chomsky points out that big status quo-loving corporations own the media, cater to other big status quo-loving advertisers, and filter out stories which question the status quo. Extreme media consolidation has made the problem worse than ever before. And see this.
Thing have only gotten worse since this chart was prepared in 2004:
And Matt Stoller points out that monopolization is the problem behind “fake news”.
Is it any wonder that the mainstream corporate media reflects the views of the oligarchs, and not average Americans?
www.blacklistednews.com/Why_Mainstream_Media_Represents_the_View_of_Billionaires_%E2%80%A6_Instead_of_Average_Americans/59186/0/38/38/Y/M.html
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:53:53 GMT
Not much has changed since this article was written. While some hosts come and go conservatives fully control the radio airwaves. There is no such thing as liberal or progressive talk on radio. You would need to go to the internet to find liberal talk and even then it is sparse but it seems to be growing and have a loyal base audience.Right-Wing Radio Monopoly and the Myth of the Liberal Media
aristotle.com/blog/2014/09/right-wing-radio-monopoly-and-the-myth-of-the-liberal-media/
Tuesday, September 16th, 2014 Aristotle Blog, Campaign Guide
Originally posted on CompleteCampaigns.com and written by William S. Bike
When it comes to national talk radio, conservatives are king…
–Philadelphia Daily News, May 8, 2002*
Conservative political commentators are not just the majority on talk radio–they monopolize it. It’s easy to rattle off a list of celebrity conservative radio commentators: Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, G. Gordon Liddy, Neal Boortz, Mike Gallagher, Matt Drudge, Bob Dornan, Michael Reagan, Oliver North, Michael Medved, Bob Grant, Ken Hamblin, Pat Buchanan, Sean Hannity, Michael Savage–and the list goes on.
However, it is virtually impossible to name progressive or Democratic talk show hosts with the listenership, celebrity, and entertainment value of any of the above-mentioned conservatives.
Limbaugh alone is on 600 stations and has a listenership of about 20 million. O’Reilly is on 205, and is estimated to have as many as 15 million.*
The spectrum of opinion on national political commercial talk radio shows ranges from extreme right wing to very extreme right wing–there is virtually nothing else, wrote Edward Monks in the Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard in 2002.****
Since then, a few progressives have managed to make it onto the airwaves, via Air America and a few other outlets. Occasionally, an Ed Schultz or a Randi Rhodes will make it onto the evening cable news talk shows. But their celebrity still pales next to the likes of Limbaugh, O’Reilly, et. al.
In an America in which voters, despite the results of the 2006 elections, are split almost evenly between conservatives and liberals or Republicans and Democrats, a large part of the reason that the Conservative ideology has so many adherents is its articulation in the media–particularly on talk radio. Before the repeal of the federally mandated Fairness Doctrine allowed conservative ideology to be articulated so prolifically on talk radio, virtually without opposition since the 1980s until the rise of Air America and a few other progressives, the Democratic Party was the majority party, and the progressive ideology was the predominant one. That no longer is the case.
Conservative talk radio is a rapid-response media machine, allowing conservative and Republican leaders to strongly influence, if not dictate, what is considered news.** Progressives and Democrats only in the last few years have developed their own rapid response through blogs and organizations like MoveOn.com.
By ceding talk radio to the overwhelming dominance of the conservatives, Democrats and progressives ceded their majority status, and America’s best platform for articulating and disseminating ideas and philosophy, to their opponents.
The 2006 election results showed that Democrats and progressives finally learned their lessons. Blogs, activist organizations, and the few progressives on radio do make a difference. Yet, with the continued overwhelming dominance of conservatives and Republicans on talk radio, it still is vital that progressives and Democrats develop radio hosts as entertaining as the above-mentioned conservatives.
The perception that media are liberal
Creation of perception that the media are liberal was a policy planned by conservatives to increase their voice while stifling that of the progressive opposition. No less a conservative pundit and policymaker than William Kristol said, I admit it, the liberal media were never that powerful, and the whole thing was often used as an excuse by conservatives for conservative failures.***
It is not just conservative pundits who are less than fair and impartial, reports webpan.com. The mass media as a whole are seriously biased–the conservative way.**
F.A.I.R (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting) has documented that conservative or right-leaning think tanks received more than 50 percent of media citations during a Democratic presidential administration in 1998 and 1999, while left-wing and progressive think tanks overall received less than 13 percent.**
Political opinions expressed on talk radio are approaching the level of uniformity that would normally be achieved only in a totalitarian society…, Monks writes. Yet the almost complete right-wing Republican domination of political talk radio in this country has been accomplished without guns or gulags.****
Unable to fact the fact that a majority of the population simply does not want theocracy, social darwinism, and corporate supremacy, writes webpan.com, conservatives had to find a scapegoat, or invent one if needed. Thus the liberal media myth was born. The liberal media myth is a propaganda tool employed by conservative radio hosts, columnists, and pundits as a convenient excuse why after 20 years their ideology has filed to convince the public at large, and as a memetic inoculation of the public against the evidence that the media bias is in fact a conservative one.
Not only does the liberal media claim have no basis in fact, webpan.com continues, it also does not make sense considering the issue of media ownership and influence of advertisers. Most media outlets are owned by a handful of conservative corporations and individuals, and funded by usually economically conservative advertisers…This pro-corporate conservative bias of the media is well-documented and shows itself in consistent under-reporting or ignoring of any information that would lead people to question the fundamental status quo.**
Thus, the media is not liberal. It is right-wing, and nowhere moreso than in talk radio. The progressive counter-voice must grow if America is to have the balanced dialogue needed to inform people of what they must know to run a democracy.
Opportunity for progressives
Some progressives believe that since radio stations are owned by corporations whose own ideology leans toward the conservative, that progressives would not be allowed to broadcast.
But radio industry expert Tom Taylor, editor of the trade publication M Street Daily, says that simply is not the case. Radio stations would do whatever works, Taylor said. If they found a whole lineup of liberals, moderates, Methodists, Seventh-Day Adventists, or Elizabethan poets that got the ratings, they’d do it.*
Radio corporations act out of concern for the bottom line–and huge amounts of money are at stake, said the Philadelphia Daily News.*
Some also believe that because progressives like Jerry Brown and Mario Cuomo have failed on the radio, that others are doomed to do so as well.
The problem with Brown and Cuomo, however, is that they are politicians, not entertainers. Talk show hosts not only have to inform, but entertain, said Brent Baker, vice president of the Media Research Center.*
No less an expert than Bill O’Reilly himself said, If you had a firebrand left-winger, I think that person would succeed.*
O’Reilly’s prediction may be coming true. Progressive talker Ed Schultz has been on the radio only since 2004, but now is heard on more than 100 affiliate stations, including nine of the top ten markets. Not O’Reilly-Limbaugh numbers, but not exactly college radio, either.
The times, indeed, may finally be a-changing.
*Right-wingers rule the radio waves, Philadelphia Daily News, May 8, 2002.
** The Myth of the Liberal Media, www.webpan.com/dsinclair/myths.html.
*** The New Yorker, May 22, 1995.
aristotle.com/blog/2014/09/right-wing-radio-monopoly-and-the-myth-of-the-liberal-media/
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:54:26 GMT
Something that cannot be overlooked is the unholy alliance between corporations and the CIA, especially with media corporations. Using subversive techniques once aimed at communists, and with all the money they ever need to succeed, the CIA/Overclass undemocratically controls our government, our media, and even a growing part of academia via the CIA and corporate propaganda mills and lobbyists. These institutions in turn allow the Overclass aka the 1% to control the supposedly "free" market.Domestic Recruitment
The CIA had no trouble recruiting elites who sought a more exciting life. Between 1948 and 1959, more than 40,000 American individuals and companies acted as sources for the U.S. intelligence community. 7 Let’s look at each area of recruitment, and see how they enabled the CIA to conduct its crimes:
Big Business
The CIA co-opted big business right from the start, beginning with the most famous billionaire of the time: Howard Hughes. Hughes had inherited his father’s million-dollar tool and die company at age 19. Anxious to expand his fortune, he made a conscientious decision "to go where the money is" — namely, government. With a few well-placed bribes, Hughes secured defense contracts to build military planes. The result was the Hughes Aircraft company. By 1940, he had also acquired a controlling interest in Trans World Airlines. His government connections and international airline soon caught the attention of the CIA, and the two began a lifelong relationship. Hughes, whom the CIA dubbed "The Stockbroker," became the agency’s largest contractor. Not only did he let the CIA use his business firms as fronts, but he also funded countless CIA operations. Perhaps the most notorious was Operation Jennifer, an allegedly failed attempt to recover nuclear codes from a sunken Soviet submarine. Hughes’ right-hand security man, Robert Maheu, was a CIA agent who at one time represented the CIA in negotiations with the Mafia to assassinate Fidel Castro.
The CIA’s contacts with big business quickly spread. The agency showed a preference for international companies, public relations firms, media companies, law offices, banks, financiers and stockbrokers. The CIA didn’t limit its activities to recruiting businessmen; sometimes the CIA bought or created entire companies outright. One benefit of co-opting big business was that the CIA was able to create a secret source of funds other than from government. With stock portfolios multiplying their profits, it’s impossible now to say how flush the CIA really is. If Congress ever cut off funds for a mission, the business fraternity could easily replace them, either by donations or even setting up profitable businesses in the target country. In fact, this is precisely what happened during the Iran/Contra scandal.
By allying itself with the business community, the CIA received the funds and ability it needed to remove itself from democratic control.
The Media
Journalism is a perfect cover for CIA agents. People talk freely to journalists, and few think suspiciously of a journalist aggressively searching for information. Journalists also have power, influence and clout. Not surprisingly, the CIA began a mission in the late 1940s to recruit American journalists on a wide scale, a mission it dubbed Operation MOCKINGBIRD. The agency wanted these journalists not only to relay any sensitive information they discovered, but also to write anti-communist, pro-capitalist propaganda when needed.
The instigators of MOCKINGBIRD were Frank Wisner, Allan Dulles, Richard Helms and Philip Graham. Graham was the husband of Katherine Graham, today’s publisher of the Washington Post. In fact, it was the Post’s ties to the CIA that allowed it to grow so quickly after the war, both in readership and influence. 8
MOCKINGBIRD was extraordinarily successful. In no time, the agency had recruited at least 25 media organizations to disseminate CIA propaganda. At least 400 journalists would eventually join the CIA payroll, according to the CIA’s testimony before a stunned Church Committee in 1975. (The committee felt the true number was considerably higher.) The names of those recruited reads like a Who's Who of journalism:
Philip and Katharine Graham (Publishers, Washington Post)
William Paley (President, CBS)
Henry Luce (Publisher, Time and Life magazine)
Arthur Hays Sulzberger (Publisher, N.Y. Times)
Jerry O'Leary (Washington Star)
Hal Hendrix (Pulitzer Prize winner, Miami News)
Barry Bingham Sr., (Louisville Courier-Journal)
James Copley (Copley News Services)
Joseph Harrison (Editor, Christian Science Monitor)
C.D. Jackson (Fortune)
Walter Pincus (Reporter, Washington Post)
ABC
NBC
Associated Press
United Press International
Reuters
Hearst Newspapers
Scripps-Howard
Newsweek magazine
Mutual Broadcasting System
Miami Herald
Old Saturday Evening Post
New York Herald-Tribune
Perhaps no newspaper is more important to the CIA than the Washington Post, one of the nation’s most right-wing dailies. Its location in the nation’s capitol enables the paper to maintain valuable personal contacts with leading intelligence, political and business figures. Unlike other newspapers, the Post operates its own bureaus around the world, rather than relying on AP wire services. Owner Philip Graham was a military intelligence officer in World War II, and later became close friends with CIA figures like Frank Wisner, Allen Dulles, Desmond FitzGerald and Richard Helms. He inherited the Post by marrying Katherine Graham, whose father owned it.
After Philip’s suicide in 1963, Katharine Graham took over the Post. Seduced by her husband’s world of government and espionage, she expanded her newspaper’s relationship with the CIA. In a 1988 speech before CIA officials at Langley, Virginia, she stated:
“We live in a dirty and dangerous world. There are some things that the general public does not need to know and shouldn’t. I believe democracy flourishes when the government can take legitimate steps to keep its secrets and when the press can decide whether to print what it knows.”
This quote has since become a classic among CIA critics for its belittlement of democracy and its admission that there is a political agenda behind the Post’s headlines.
Ben Bradlee was the Washington Post’s managing editor during most of the Cold War. He worked in the U.S. Paris embassy from 1951 to 1953, where he followed orders by the CIA station chief to place propaganda in the European press. 9 Most Americans incorrectly believe that Bradlee personifies the liberal slant of the Post, given his role in publishing the Pentagon Papers and the Watergate investigations. But neither of these two incidents are what they seem. The Post merely published the Pentagon Papers after The New York Times already had, because it wanted to appear competitive. As for Watergate, we’ll examine the CIA’s reasons for wanting to bring down Nixon in a moment. Someone once asked Bradlee: "Does it irk you when The Washington Post is made out to be a bastion of slanted liberal thinkers instead of champion journalists just because of Watergate?" Bradlee responded: "Damn right it does!" 10
It would be impossible to elaborate in this short space even the most important examples of the CIA/media alliance. Sig Mickelson was a CIA asset the entire time he was president of CBS News from 1954 to 1961. Later he went on to become president of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty, two major outlets of CIA propaganda.
The CIA also secretly bought or created its own media companies. It owned 40 percent of the Rome Daily American at a time when communists were threatening to win the Italian elections. Worse, the CIA has bought many domestic media companies. A prime example is Capital Cities, created in 1954 by CIA businessman William Casey (who would later become Reagan’s CIA director). Another founder was Lowell Thomas, a close friend and business contact with CIA Director Allen Dulles. Another founder was CIA businessman Thomas Dewey. By 1985, Capital Cities had grown so powerful that it was able to buy an entire TV network: ABC.
For those who believe in "separation of press and state," the very idea that the CIA has secret propaganda outlets throughout the media is appalling. The reason why America was so oblivious to CIA crimes in the 40s and 50s was because the media willingly complied with the agency. Even today, when the immorality of the CIA should be an open-and-shut case, "debate" about the issue rages in the media. Here is but one example:
In 1996, The San Jose Mercury News published an investigative report suggesting that the CIA had sold crack in Los Angeles to fund the Contra war in Central America. A month later, three of the CIA’s most important media allies — The Washington Post, The New York Times and The Los Angeles Times — immediately leveled their guns at the Mercury report and blasted away in an attempt to discredit it. Who wrote the Post article? Walter Pincus, longtime CIA journalist. The dangers here are obvious.
www.Takeoverworld.info/overclass.html
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:55:14 GMT
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:55:45 GMT
Debunking the myth of the ‘liberal media’BY CHUCK TRYON www.newsobserver.com/opinion/op-ed/article170317567.html
AUGUST 30, 2017 10:54 AM,
UPDATED JULY 18, 2018 07:44 AM
Sen. Jeff Flake took aim at President Trump while speaking on the Senate floor on Jan. 17. “Mr. President it is a testament to the condition of our democracy that our own president uses words infamously spoken by Joseph Stalin to describe his enemies.
By McClatchy
As a scholar of political media, I was intrigued by a recent News & Observer column by Justin Haskins, a researcher at The Heartland Institute discussing media bias. However, Haskins again pushed the tired argument that the news media is dominated by a liberal bias.
This argument has been around for decades, and the evidence for it has been built on misleading evidence and faulty logic. The idea of a “liberal media” is, in fact, a myth, one that has enabled the rise of a right-wing media infrastructure that helped to sow doubts and misinformation during the last election. The liberal media myth must be debunked once and for all. These are some of the common claims about the news media and why they don’t hold up under serious scrutiny:
The political affiliation of journalists doesn’t guarantee biased reporting. Haskins cherry-picks data from an Indiana University study that shows that only 7.1 percent of journalists identify as Republican, down from 25.7 percent in 1971. But the majority of journalists – 50.2 percent – identify as independents.
These numbers also do not take into account media executives and other decision-makers who influence what stories get told. And more crucially, journalists’ political affiliations may not always inform how they cover stories. In fact, such decisions are often made by executives such as Roger Ailes, the former CEO of Fox News, or Andrew Lack, chairman of NBC News and MSNBC. These decisions may be made based on a variety of concerns: Ailes’ conservative political beliefs were well documented, while Lack has made programming choices largely based on the need to attract advertisers.
Trump may have garnered more negative political coverage than his rivals, but he also received far more coverage. In fact, during the 2016 election, a Harvard Kennedy School study revealed that Hillary Clinton received overwhelmingly negative coverage, much of it focusing on her email scandal. In general, Trump received 15 percent more coverage than Clinton. Trump’s TV advantage was magnified during the Republican primaries when he received five times more coverage than his biggest rivals – a whopping 234 minutes versus 56 minutes for Jeb Bush.
Meanwhile Sen. Ted Cruz received a scant seven minutes, according to Andrew Tyndall, publisher of the Tyndall Report. Arguably, this was the biggest failure of the news media during the 2016 election. News cameras were drawn to Trump like flies to a bug light, unable to escape his powerful pull.
Trump in Raleigh on eve of election: 'Do not let this opportunity slip away'
Republican candidate Donald Trump speaks at a rally at Raleigh, N.C.'s Dorton Arena Monday afternoon, Nov. 7, 2016 on the eve of the presidential election.
It’s easy to cherry-pick silly negative stories. Haskins rightfully condemns CNN stories that mocked President Trump for getting an extra scoop of ice cream (whether true or not). But Haskins ignores the hundreds of equally silly and trivial Fox News stories, such as those which mocked Barack Obama for wearing a tan suit. Meanwhile, primetime Fox News hosts spent years fabricating evidence that President Obama was a Muslim or that he was not born in the United States, stories that were far more pernicious in reinforcing the illusion that Obama was a dangerous outsider.
The news media is not a monolithic body. Claims of media bias – on both sides of the political aisle – often rest on the assumption that the news media (often shortened to just “media”) follows a singular logic. In fact, local, state and national media organizations often face very different challenges in delivering news coverage that will satisfy the needs of their audiences. And the interests of journalists, producers, advertisers and executives are often in conflict.
There really is a well-financed right-wing news infrastructure. Fox News is just the tip of the iceberg. The conservative Sinclair Media Group has bought up hundreds of network affiliates across the country and requires them to carry “must-run” segments during local news broadcasts that push a conservative agenda. In addition, articles published on Steve Bannon’s Breitbart website circulated widely on cable news and in other formats.
These perceptions of liberal media bias are false. However, they have steadily eroded trust in the news media. According to Pew Research Center, 85 percent of Republicans say they don’t rust the news media. This makes a functioning democracy virtually impossible. The myth of a liberal media enabled President Trump to campaign against the “fake news,” eroding respect for the news media’s role as the “fourth estate,” the body tasked with questioning the powerful and protecting the interests of the public.
Chuck Tryon is a professor of English at Fayetteville State University and the author of the book “Political TV.”
www.newsobserver.com/opinion/op-ed/article170317567.html
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:56:20 GMT
News is Propaganda - Open Your Eyes
The Sinclair Broadcast Group’s biased programming may soon be available in 72 percent of U.S. households. That’s bad news for local media.
What is Sinclair Broadcast Group?
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:56:47 GMT
How Sinclair Broadcasting puts a partisan tilt on trusted local news
PBS NewsHour
Published on Oct 11, 2017
The country’s largest owner of local TV stations, the Sinclair Broadcast Group, which reaches over a third of homes across the nation, wants to get even bigger by merging with the Tribune Media Company. But Sinclair is raising concerns among media watchers because of its practice of combining news with partisan political opinion. William Brangham reports.
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:57:19 GMT
Trump takes aim at FCC over Sinclair-Tribune deal
CNBC Television
Published on Jul 25, 2018
CNBC's Julia Boorstin reports on President Trump's tweet about the Federal Communications Committee voicing concerns over the merger between Sinclair and Tribune.
Reason’s Behind Failed Sinclair-Tribune Merger
Brigida Santos discusses the latest in the failed Tribune-Sinclair deal and why it soured, and why Tribune is now suing Sinclair for breach of contract and demanding at least $1 billion in damages.
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:57:51 GMT
The largest television station operator in the United States by number of stations, and largest by total coverage IS CONSERVATIVE.
mediabiasfactcheck.com/sinclair-broadcast-group/ mediabiasfactcheck.com/sinclair-broadcast-group/These media sources are moderately to strongly biased toward conservative causes through story selection and/or political affiliation. They may utilize strong loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes), publish misleading reports and omit reporting of information that may damage conservative causes. Some sources in this category may be untrustworthy. See all Right Bias sources.
Factual Reporting: MIXED
World Press Freedom Rank: USA 43/180
Notes: Sinclair Broadcast Group is a publicly traded American telecommunications company that is controlled by the family of company founder Julian Sinclair Smith. The company is the largest television station operator in the United States by number of stations, and largest by total coverage; owning or operating a total of 193 stations across the country (233 after all currently proposed sales are approved) in over 100 markets (covering 40% of American households), many of which are located in the South and Midwest.
Sinclair has been scrutinized by multiple media outlets for consistently favoring conservative politics. They are considered a rival to right biased Fox News for the conservative audience. The Seattle Times has written a piece documenting Sinclair’s right wing bias. Further, according to the Center for Responsive Politics (Open Secrets) the Sinclair Broadcast Group has donated $1,143,508 or 80% to Republican candidates since 1994.
In March 2018, Sinclair ordered its stations to produce promos with an “anchor-delivered journalistic responsibility message” dictated by the company. A sample of the mandated script is below:
Hi, I’m(A) ____________, and I’m (B) _________________…
(B) Our greatest responsibility is to serve our Northwest communities. We are extremely proud of the quality, balanced journalism that KOMO News produces.
(A) But we’re concerned about the troubling trend of irresponsible, one sided news stories plaguing our country. The sharing of biased and false news has become all too common on social media.
(B) More alarming, some media outlets publish these same fake stories… stories that just aren’t true, without checking facts first.
(A) Unfortunately, some members of the media use their platforms to push their own personal bias and agenda to control ‘exactly what people think’…This is extremely dangerous to a democracy.
(B) At KOMO it’s our responsibility to pursue and report the truth. We understand Truth is neither politically ‘left nor right.’ Our commitment to factual reporting is the foundation of our credibility, now more than ever.
(A) But we are human and sometimes our reporting might fall short. If you believe our coverage is unfair please reach out to us by going to KOMOnews.com and clicking on CONTENT CONCERNS. We value your comments. We will respond back to you.
(B) We work very hard to seek the truth and strive to be fair, balanced and factual… We consider it our honor, our privilege to responsibly deliver the news every day.
(A) Thank you for watching and we appreciate your feedback.
The wording of the mandated script was criticized by some station news staff and outside pundits for its discussion of “fake news” with some critics arguing that the message used similar language and rhetoric to that of Donald Trump. Trump responded to the promos on April 2, 2018, defending the company as being “far superior to CNN and even more Fake NBC, which is a total joke.”
Overall, we rate Sinclair Broadcast Group Right Biased based on political affiliation with the Republican Party and the direction of network news programming. We also rate them Mixed for factual reporting due to airing news shows with poor fact check records. (D. Van Zandt 4/2/2018)
Source: sbgi.net/
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:59:00 GMT
Old article but more true today than ever. There aren't even 10 radio stations in ALL of America that broadcast Liberal talk. Mainstream media is corporate media and corporate media is conservative media. Right-Wing Radio Monopoly and the Myth of the Liberal MediaTuesday, September 16th, 2014 Aristotle Blog, Campaign Guide
Originally posted on CompleteCampaigns.com and written by William S. Bike
When it comes to national talk radio, conservatives are king…
–Philadelphia Daily News, May 8, 2002*
Conservative political commentators are not just the majority on talk radio–they monopolize it. It’s easy to rattle off a list of celebrity conservative radio commentators: Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, G. Gordon Liddy, Neal Boortz, Mike Gallagher, Matt Drudge, Bob Dornan, Michael Reagan, Oliver North, Michael Medved, Bob Grant, Ken Hamblin, Pat Buchanan, Sean Hannity, Michael Savage–and the list goes on.
However, it is virtually impossible to name progressive or Democratic talk show hosts with the listenership, celebrity, and entertainment value of any of the above-mentioned conservatives.
Limbaugh alone is on 600 stations and has a listenership of about 20 million. O’Reilly is on 205, and is estimated to have as many as 15 million.*
The spectrum of opinion on national political commercial talk radio shows ranges from extreme right wing to very extreme right wing–there is virtually nothing else, wrote Edward Monks in the Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard in 2002.****
Since then, a few progressives have managed to make it onto the airwaves, via Air America and a few other outlets. Occasionally, an Ed Schultz or a Randi Rhodes will make it onto the evening cable news talk shows. But their celebrity still pales next to the likes of Limbaugh, O’Reilly, et. al.
In an America in which voters, despite the results of the 2006 elections, are split almost evenly between conservatives and liberals or Republicans and Democrats, a large part of the reason that the Conservative ideology has so many adherents is its articulation in the media–particularly on talk radio. Before the repeal of the federally mandated Fairness Doctrine allowed conservative ideology to be articulated so prolifically on talk radio, virtually without opposition since the 1980s until the rise of Air America and a few other progressives, the Democratic Party was the majority party, and the progressive ideology was the predominant one. That no longer is the case.
Conservative talk radio is a rapid-response media machine, allowing conservative and Republican leaders to strongly influence, if not dictate, what is considered news.** Progressives and Democrats only in the last few years have developed their own rapid response through blogs and organizations like MoveOn.com.
By ceding talk radio to the overwhelming dominance of the conservatives, Democrats and progressives ceded their majority status, and America’s best platform for articulating and disseminating ideas and philosophy, to their opponents.
The 2006 election results showed that Democrats and progressives finally learned their lessons. Blogs, activist organizations, and the few progressives on radio do make a difference. Yet, with the continued overwhelming dominance of conservatives and Republicans on talk radio, it still is vital that progressives and Democrats develop radio hosts as entertaining as the above-mentioned conservatives.
The perception that media are liberal
Creation of perception that the media are liberal was a policy planned by conservatives to increase their voice while stifling that of the progressive opposition. No less a conservative pundit and policymaker than William Kristol said, I admit it, the liberal media were never that powerful, and the whole thing was often used as an excuse by conservatives for conservative failures.***
It is not just conservative pundits who are less than fair and impartial, reports webpan.com. The mass media as a whole are seriously biased–the conservative way.**
F.A.I.R (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting) has documented that conservative or right-leaning think tanks received more than 50 percent of media citations during a Democratic presidential administration in 1998 and 1999, while left-wing and progressive think tanks overall received less than 13 percent.**
Political opinions expressed on talk radio are approaching the level of uniformity that would normally be achieved only in a totalitarian society…, Monks writes. Yet the almost complete right-wing Republican domination of political talk radio in this country has been accomplished without guns or gulags.****
Unable to face the fact that a majority of the population simply does not want theocracy, social darwinism, and corporate supremacy, writes webpan.com, conservatives had to find a scapegoat, or invent one if needed. Thus the liberal media myth was born. The liberal media myth is a propaganda tool employed by conservative radio hosts, columnists, and pundits as a convenient excuse why after 20 years their ideology has failed to convince the public at large, and as a memetic inoculation of the public against the evidence that the media bias is in fact a conservative one.
Not only does the liberal media claim have no basis in fact, webpan.com continues, it also does not make sense considering the issue of media ownership and influence of advertisers. Most media outlets are owned by a handful of conservative corporations and individuals, and funded by usually economically conservative advertisers…This pro-corporate conservative bias of the media is well-documented and shows itself in consistent under-reporting or ignoring of any information that would lead people to question the fundamental status quo.**
Thus, the media is not liberal. It is right-wing, and nowhere moreso than in talk radio. The progressive counter-voice must grow if America is to have the balanced dialogue needed to inform people of what they must know to run a democracy.
more: aristotle.com/blog/2014/09/right-wing-radio-monopoly-and-the-myth-of-the-liberal-media/
*Right-wingers rule the radio waves, Philadelphia Daily News, May 8, 2002.
** The Myth of the Liberal Media, www.webpan.com/dsinclair/myths.html.
*** The New Yorker, May 22, 1995.
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 15:59:48 GMT
Right Bias
mediabiasfactcheck.com/right/
These media sources are moderately to strongly biased toward conservative causes through story selection and/or political affiliation. They may utilize strong loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes), publish misleading reports and omit reporting of information that may damage conservative causes. Some sources in this category may be untrustworthy.
Right-Center Bias
mediabiasfactcheck.com/right-center/
These media sources are slightly to moderately conservative in bias. They often publish factual information that utilizes loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes) to favor conservative causes. These sources are generally trustworthy for information, but may require further investigation.
Conspiracy-Pseudoscience
mediabiasfactcheck.com/conspiracy/
Sources in the Conspiracy-Pseudoscience category may publish unverifiable information that is not always supported by evidence. These sources may be untrustworthy for credible/verifiable information, therefore fact checking and further investigation is recommended on a per article basis when obtaining information from these sources.
Questionable Sources
mediabiasfactcheck.com/fake-news/
A questionable source exhibits one or more of the following: extreme bias, consistent promotion of propaganda/conspiracies, poor or no sourcing to credible information, a complete lack of transparency and/or is fake news. Fake News is the deliberate attempt to publish hoaxes and/or disinformation for the purpose of profit or influence (Learn More). Sources listed in the Questionable Category may be very untrustworthy and should be fact checked on a per article basis. Please note sources on this list are not considered fake news unless specifically written in the reasoning section for that source.
Satire
mediabiasfactcheck.com/satire/
These sources exclusively use humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people’s stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues. Primarily these sources are clear that they are satire and do not attempt to deceive.
Left Bias
mediabiasfactcheck.com/left/
These media sources are moderately to strongly biased toward liberal causes through story selection and/or political affiliation. They may utilize strong loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes), publish misleading reports and omit reporting of information that may damage liberal causes. Some sources in this category may be untrustworthy.
Left-Center Bias
mediabiasfactcheck.com/leftcenter/
These media sources have a slight to moderate liberal bias. They often publish factual information that utilizes loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes) to favor liberal causes. These sources are generally trustworthy for information, but may require further investigation.Least Biasedmediabiasfactcheck.com/center/
These sources have minimal bias and use very few loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes). The reporting is factual and usually sourced. These are the most credible media sources.
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 8, 2020 16:00:25 GMT
Media Reform Information Center
Links and Resources on Media Reformwww.corporations.org/media/In 1983, 50 corporations controlled the vast majority of all news media in the U.S. At the time, Ben Bagdikian was called "alarmist" for pointing this out in his book, The Media Monopoly. In his 4th edition, published in 1992, he wrote "in the U.S., fewer than two dozen of these extraordinary creatures own and operate 90% of the mass media" -- controlling almost all of America's newspapers, magazines, TV and radio stations, books, records, movies, videos, wire services and photo agencies. He predicted then that eventually this number would fall to about half a dozen companies. This was greeted with skepticism at the time. When the 6th edition of The Media Monopoly was published in 2000, the number had fallen to six. Since then, there have been more mergers and the scope has expanded to include new media like the Internet market.
In 2004, Bagdikian's revised and expanded book, The New Media Monopoly, shows that only 5 huge corporations -- Time Warner, Disney, Murdoch's News Corporation, Bertelsmann of Germany, and Viacom (formerly CBS) -- now control most of the media industry in the U.S. General Electric's NBC is a close sixth.
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