Tag: Journalistic Garbage

Is The Media Failing Us?

I know I rant about the disservice I think the MSM is doing to the public by not reporting to passing on propaganda….few are listening instead they drink the disinformation kool-aid all to justify the waste of taxpayer money.

For now

In my considerable opinion it is failing badly…..the press that is…..

But then I am a cynic and do not think that the MSM is doing a service to the people of this country…..instead they are PR for the defense industry and as so they give only one side of any story….Ukraine is a perfect example of this disservice.

They have done their duty well…..their reporting have people so confused and indoctrinated that they will deflect when they are presented with alternative facts and information.

All that opinionated stuff aside….the question remains….is the media failing the citizens of this country?

As U.S. leaders speak more openly about their geopolitical goals, and Russian leaders warn of the risk of nuclear war, there are essential questions that journalists should be raising in their coverage of the war in Ukraine that they are not. Chief among them:

Is escalating what has clearly emerged as a proxy war between the United States and Russia hastening or prolonging the carnage in Ukraine?

And: What’s the best way to minimize the risk of a nuclear conflict?

Thus far, most American news coverage of the Russian invasion of Ukraine has reflected an unquestioned conviction that the more weapons the United States and the West send the Ukrainians the better.

It may well be that continuing and accelerating the arming of the Ukrainian military is, in fact, the best of bad options, the quickest way to peace, and doesn’t increase the likelihood of a nuclear strike. But that’s a hypothesis, which should be questioned and discussed, not blindly embraced as fact.

And in the meantime, Ukraine is being destroyed. Civilians are dying, refugees are fleeing for their lives, untold damage is being done to Ukraine’s infrastructure, and young men in arms are killing each other.

It’s time now for journalists to talk and write about at what point the goal of punishing Russia could diverge from the goal of bringing peace to the Ukrainian people as expediently as possible — and what the West should do if and when that happens.

The American media is failing us on Ukraine

I have been suspicious of the reports that were coming out of Ukraine….most are ‘unverified’ yet were reported as fact.

I am not alone….even real conservs see the crap the MSM is spreading…..

The coverage once again provided very little context regarding the underlying issues. Matters such as NATO expansion or the difficult, contentious Russia-Ukraine relationship were either ignored or treated in a way that confirmed Western and Ukrainian virtue and maximum Russian villainy. Journalists portrayed a complex situation as a stark melodrama, with all blame put on one side. Indeed, experts and pundits who even suggested that NATO’s policies had contributed to the current tensions were quickly smeared as siding with Putin, willingly circulating Russian propaganda or disinformation, or even as being outright Russian agents. Some of the architects of the new wave of smears were the same individuals who used similar tactics in the lead up to the Iraq War. Max Boot, Jennifer Rubin, and David Frum, for example, were all prominent alumni of that earlier campaign to silence dissenters, and here again they were hard at work branding critics of Washington’s Russia policy as disloyal.

The Press Fumbles Again on Ukraine

Americans need to care more about what is going on in Ukraine because there are American law makers that are calling for American troops to take a more active part in the conflict in Ukraine.

Even Pay Pal is trying to silent independent journalism by trying to close the accounts of two independent investigative journalism sites, Consortium News and Mint Press.

What are they afraid of?

Do you truly want another prolonged war?

NO?

Then pay attention and get all the facts before blindly side with war.

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News Of The Day

I admit it my interest in the news has dropped in the later part of this year……it became so damn redundant that I stopped watching network news and went to reading it……corporate media has become a tool rather than an informer…..

Apparently I am not alone in my disdain for the corporate media…..

The presidential election, pandemic, and racial reckoning were stories that drove intense interest and engagement to news outlets in 2020. To a large degree, 2021 represented the inevitable hangover. The AP reports various metrics illustrate the dwindling popularity of news content. The major takeaways:

  • Cable news networks: In 2021, weekday prime-time viewership dropped 38% at CNN, 34% at Fox News Channel, and 25% at MSNBC, according to the Nielsen company. The decline was less steep but still significant at broadcast television evening newscasts: 12% at ABC’s World News Tonight and the CBS Evening News; 14% at NBC’s Nightly News, Nielsen said.
  • News sites. The Trump era saw explosive subscriber growth for some digital news sites like the New York Times and Washington Post. Yet readers aren’t spending as much time there; Comscore said the number of unique visitors to the Post’s site was down 44% in November compared to November 2020, and down 34% at the Times.
  • What’s changed. The cable news networks built a prime-time model almost entirely focused on political combat during the Trump years, which made it difficult for them to pivot to something different, said Tom Rosenstiel, a journalism professor at the University of Maryland. “You become, to some extent, a prisoner of the audience you built,” Rosenstiel said.
  • The social numbers: Those networks remain focused on politics even as viewership interest wanes. The media monitoring company NewsWhip looked at 14 million political articles online last year and found they had an average of 924 engagements, or social media interactions. The 13.5 million articles NewsWhip has traced in 2021 had an average of 321 engagements.
  • Some pivots: To a certain extent, these outlets have turned elsewhere for revenue opportunities, said news media analyst Ken Doctor. CNN is preparing to debut a new streaming service early next year, and recently poached Fox News’ Chris Wallace to join that effort. Fox News, while doubling down on conservative commentary following perceived threats from outlets like Newsmax and OANN, directed fans to its Fox Nation streaming service. Doctor said the Times has done an effective job of diversifying beyond politics, most notably with its Wirecutter service of consumer recommendations.
  • Big in 2022: Both CNN and MSNBC face key programming decisions in the new year. CNN must replace its most popular host, Chris Cuomo, who was fired after it was revealed how he helped his brother through a political scandal. MSNBC must replace Brian Williams in its lineup and will most likely see its most popular personality, Rachel Maddow, cut back on her hour

I thought it was just me being bored and irritated with the news…..my posting has illustrated my disgust with the news and the direction of this country….I found NO redeeming quality in the year 2021.

2022 will be little difference and the news will still be sensationalism dressed up as news….it will continue to do little other than sell stupidity and ignorance to the American people and the world.

Be part of the solution not a by-stander.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–07Oct21

WE know there is so much info out in the nether regions of the internet….even some disguising themselves as the news like OAN, One American News….but have you ever asked where they get the cash to keep spread their manure as news?

Then let us look at OAN…..

The right-wing, fiercely pro-Donald Trump One America News Network is often seen as a fringe player in American media—but its inspiration, and most of its revenue, came from the country’s largest communication company, a Reuters investigation finds. Court records reveal that OAN founder Robert Herring has testified that AT&T execs inspired him to create the network in 2013. “They told us they wanted a conservative network” because they only had Fox to balance seven on the “other side,” Herring said in a 2019 deposition. “When they said that, I jumped to it and built one.”

The network, often praised by Trump, is known for supporting COVID and election conspiracy theories. YouTube suspended OAN for a week last fall for posting a fake COVID cure, and Dominion Voting Systems is suing the network for airing false claims about its machines being rigged. In 2020, a network accountant testified that around 90% of its income came from deals with AT&T-owned platforms, including DirecTV. The accountant said that without the DirecTV deal, the network’s value would be “zero,” according to court transcripts seen by Reuters. The accountant was testifying in a labor lawsuit unrelated to AT&T.

AT&T, which originally picked up the network for its U-verse platform, attempted to distance itself from OAN after the Reuters report. Company spokesman Jim Greer told the Hill that “AT&T has never had a financial interest in OAN’s success and does not ‘fund’ OAN.” He said AT&T initially refused to air OAN when it acquired DirecTV, but reached an agreement after the network sued. Greer said DirecTV, which was spun off into its own company in August, “offers a wide variety of programming, including many news channels that offer a variety of viewpoints, but it does not dictate or control programming on the channel.”

If you are an AT&T customer then you are help to fund the BS passed around as news…..it is not AT&T’s job to help spread dissension….maybe you should consider their part in the insurrection of 06 January, the spread of lies and disinformation before you sign of the dotted line.

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Is There ‘Media Bias’?

“If it bleeds it leads”

The 24 hour news cycle has given us the new mantra.

Look at today’s news….where is all that concern for Afghanistan?  MSM has a new story they can beat to death…..

So yes there is a ‘media bias’.

The mainstream media has historically tried to balance left and right in its political coverage, and present what it views as a reasonable center.

That may sound good in theory. But the old politics no longer exists and the former labels, “left” versus “right,” are outdated. Today it’s democracy versus authoritarianism, voting rights versus white supremacy.

There’s no reasonable center between these positions, no justifiable compromise. Equating them is misleading and dangerous.

You hear the mainstream media say, for example, that certain “Republican and Democratic lawmakers are emerging as troublemakers within their parties.”

These reports equate Republican lawmakers who are actively promoting Trump’s big lie that the 2020 election was stolen with Democratic lawmakers who are fighting to extend health care and other programs to help people. 

https://www.salon.com/2021/08/13/the-media-bias-no-one-talks-about-democracy-vs-authoritarianism_partner/

We as consumer of news need to stop focusing on the manure spread daily by MSM and start focusing on the nation and the direction both parties are leading it.

I have been writing about the pathetic attempt at the news by the MSM….

The Decline and Fall of the ‘Mainstream’ Media

The Media Is Pathetic!

There is so much more I have written….

The more one watches or reads the news the more one sees that it is nothing more than a ratings race…..true news can only be found by searching for it….and that is something in these days of instant gratification the people are unwilling to do…search.

Turn The Page!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–12Oct18

So much happening in the world….so much news to be had…..a devastating hurricane, a missing presumed dead journalist, a market that is sliding and endless wars……so much happening and the president, Our Dear Supreme Leader, held an TV event in the Oval Office yesterday……he had a face to face with a nose picker, Kayne West.

No joke….one babbling idiot to another….

Elvis’ 1970 White House visit with Nixon has nothing on Kanye West’s sit down with President Trump on Thursday. Ostensibly, the meeting was to be about urban revitalization, workforce training, African-American unemployment, clemencies, and Chicago crime, per CNN. But in a freewheeling, 10-minute monologue the rapper, seated across from Trump in the Oval Office and decked out in his MAGA hat, touched on a vast array of subjects, leading USA Today to muse that “Kanye West out-Kanyed himself.” Of the aforementioned MAGA cap, Kanye told Trump, “There was something about putting this hat on that made me feel like Superman.” Here are some more choice moments from West’s visit to the White House, F-bombs and all:

  • “Trump is on a hero’s journey right now,” West said, per CNN, adding, “He might not have thought he’d have a crazy motherf—er like me [as a supporter].”
  • Speaking of cars, according to the Detroit Free Press, West said, “One of the things we gotta set is Ford to have the highest design, the dopest cars, the most amazing—I don’t really say dope. I don’t say negative words and try to flip them. We just say positive, lovely, divine, universal words. So the flyest, freshest, most amazing car.”
  • Regarding his recent revelation that he was diagnosed as bipolar, CNN reports, “I actually wasn’t bipolar, I had sleep deprivation.”
  • West did talk about clemency for Larry Hoover, alleged leader of the Gangster Disciples who is serving a life sentence, Slate reports. “There’s infinite amounts of universe and there’s alternate universe,” West said. “So it’s very important for me to get Hoover out because in an alternate universe, I am him.”

Want more? Watch the video here.

“Don’t worry about the future….all we have is today”……total CRAP!  But will play well with the head bobbers that support the Supreme Leader.

Is this what America wants from its “president”?  I am guessing yes…..the media covered this but not some of his rallies….so apparently the confused babble of Kanye is more important that the issues and news of the day.

My my how far will my country sink into the muck of stupid?

Please have a good day and a better weekend…..chuq

Closing Thought–01Sep17

FOX News Down And Out!

For a couple decades the far right has got its news from FOX…..and it is still the best friend that the Radical Right has on the airways.

Its popularity escapes me……

In the UK it appears that FOX has losing its battle of the ratings…..

As of Tuesday, TV viewers in the UK can no longer get their Sean Hannity fix. Per the BBC, 21st Century Fox announced it has pulled its news feed from UK broadcaster Sky in a deal it says is no longer in the company’s “commercial interest.” The reason? No one’s watching. A company spokesperson cited Fox News’ dismal ratings directly for the move: “Fox News is focused on the US market and designed for a US audience and, accordingly, it averages only a few thousand viewers across the day in the UK.” One source told the BBC that Sky received about 2,000 Fox News viewers per day. But data from the Broadcaster’s Audience Research Board suggests that its UK audience is much higher, averaging up to 60,000 viewers daily in 2017.

There’s speculation over whether 21st Century Fox owner Rupert Murdoch’s bid to buy Sky has influenced the decision. (21st Century Fox already owns a 39% stake in the broadcaster.) As the Guardian puts it, “Fox News has become increasingly troublesome for the Murdochs as they attempt to buy Sky,” and those troubles could threaten the takeover bid. Issues related to Fox News have been the center of multiple rulings from Ofcom, the UK media regulator, and then there’s the negative press regarding the network’s sexual harassment scandal. Though 21st Century Fox denies it, critics like former Labour leader Ed Miliband view the decision as an attempt to distance the company from those controversies. Adds Labour MP Tom Watson, “Fox News has breached Ofcom’s rules over and over again, so 21st Century Fox clearly thought it was easier to pull it from the UK altogether than to clean up its act.”

I am sure that once the American Right hears about this that it will be about trying to violate the 1st amendment…..another attack on the freedom of the press.

State Run Media

Is it possible that we could be getting a state run news outlet?

Back during the campaign and shortly after he took office I wrote about the possibility of a Trump News Network…..there were several ways that he, Trump, could set up his own news network

Source: A Step Closer To Trump TV – In Saner Thought

We have a bit of a network dedicated to Trump and his views…it is a YouTube channel…..for now it is called “Trump Breaking News Network”……

Well news has come out that a company, a broadcast company, is in the move to push the Trump agenda disguised as news.

During the 2016 Presidential campaign, the Sinclair Broadcasting group cut a deal with Jared Kushner for “good” coverage of the Trump Administration, which seems to have paid off.

Politico reported last December:

Sinclair would broadcast their Trump interviews across the country without commentary, Kushner said. Kushner highlighted that Sinclair, in states like Ohio, reaches a much wider audience — around 250,000 viewers[sic]— than networks like CNN, which reach somewhere around 30,000.

With Fox News suffering several major setbacks in the past year, Sinclair Broadcasting is making moves to become the new giant of right-wing media. Many are now calling Sinclair ‘Trump TV.’

Source: ‘Classic Propaganda’: Sinclair Broadcasting Pushes Aside Fox News to Become ‘Trump TV’ | Common Dreams

Sinclair if successful will be able to push the Trump news to about 72% of the nation.  There will be mandatory stories on these local stations that carry the Trump view and of course will be pushing that the MSM is the enemy and a purveyor of fake news.

They have even hired the communications officer of the RNC as their chief political analyst…if this comes about then we are running close to having state controlled media….and I do not believe that is what the Founders had in mind…..do you?

Of course my more radical Right wing brethren will argue that the MSM is already pushing the “liberal” agenda….and I will say that I can see why they claim such….but I do not think that these main stream media outlets are always pushing fake news…I will admit that they do have a tendency to be used as a propaganda tool….but most are doing their jobs whether we like their reports or not…..

This still smells like some sort of authoritarian power grab to me.

Closing Thought–03Jul17

Where Is The News?

There are some here on the blogging world that use people like Alex Jones and Infowars as a news site…..they quote him and use him as some sort of “journalists”…..at best he is a con man and his news balances on the absurd…

Recently he and a guest went on and on about sex slaves and Mars…..

NASA says child sex slaves have not—we repeat: have not—been kidnapped and taken to Mars. NASA issued the ridiculous denial to the Daily Beast after a guest Thursday on The Alex Jones Show claimed otherwise. Robert David Steele—who Space.com notes was listed as a “CIA insider”—told Jones children are being kidnapped, forced into a 20-year mission in space, and ending up on Mars, where they are used as slave labor and killed for their blood and bone marrow. Steele claimed the children are sexually assaulted before being killed to “adrenalize their blood.” Jones chimed in, calling such a process “the original growth hormone.” He also claimed 90% of NASA missions are secret, adding, “Clearly they don’t want us looking into what is happening.”
NASA spokesperson Guy Webster explained to the Daily Beast that while there are rovers on Mars, there aren’t any people. He says he’s shocked there’s “only one stupid rumor on the Internet” he has to debunk this week. This isn’t the first outlandish conspiracy theory Jones has given credence to. The Washington Post reports Jones, who has millions of listeners nationwide, claims the Sandy Hook massacre is a hoax and promoted “Pizzagate,” which tied Hillary Clinton to a pedophile ring being run out of a pizza restaurant. During the campaign, President Trump said Jones’ “reputation is amazing” and promised not to let him down.
But that is okay for he gives the public real news while NY Times and CNN only peddle fake news…..
Damn!  At what point does sanity return?  Or will it ever?
And the war on facts goes on……society is losing its battle with ignorance.
Tomorrow will be a short day for me…..I will be spending time with family…..a bit of fun….everyone have a good evening….chuq

All This “Fake” News

A few months ago we had a raging debate about what is news and what is not…..that debate settled down but every now and then a Tweet appears and we have to have it all over again.

I banged away on the subject for awhile…..(of course there was push back…of course there were those that had to question everything that did not agree with their thoughts)……

Source: The Curious Debate Over “Fake News” – In Saner Thought

Source: The ‘Post-Truth’ Mainstream Media – In Saner Thought

And the argument continues because some will not accept that there are those that will do whatever it takes to mislead the population….and those that prefer a distorted view of the news will attack anyone that does not share their pervert sense of right and wrong.

The debate now is whether we continue down this road that leads NOWHERE or do we step back and return to a saner political climate……my guess is….NOT YET!

Red versus Blue is no longer the divide in this country…..

In Stephen Colbert’s epic performance at the 2006 White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner he ironically stated that “Reality has a well-known liberal bias.” During the George W. Bush era, comedians like Colbert and Jon Stewart tackled what Stewart referred to as “bullshit mountain.” Less clearly a partisan project, the satire of Stewart and Colbert was directly aimed at the way that concepts like truth and reality had become politically polarized.

And they had a lot of work to do. Back in 2008, we learned that the Bush administration made 935 false statements in the lead-up to the Iraq war. In a 2006 interview, Colbert explained how important it was for him in the Bush years to defend the concept of truth:

Source: The right wing war on facts: The new partisan divide that’s destroying our nation – Salon.com

There is only so much stupidity that a nation can endure…..and ours is being pushed to the limit.

Closing Thought–05Jun17

Extra!  Extra!  Read All About it!

Those damn terrorists have struck again and in England again!

The UK has had 3 attacks in 2 months.

And as typical the MSM has jumped on this with both feet….we have interviews with everyone from a victim to the pizza delivery guy that was in the neighborhood when the attack occurred.

I have been bitching about the coverage of these attacks from day one…the MSM goes straight for the sensational and the speculative and avoids any real news about the attackers or the attack.

The media is doing nothing to inform in the public….all they accomplish is to further the fear and the confusion.

Finally people are starting to see the misguided attempts at news….

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

News coverage of the Manchester terrorist attack was sadly familiar: cellphone videos of screaming victims; details of first responders’ hectic efforts; “Was it terrorism?” guesswork; speculation about the perpetrator. In this case, the horror was amplified by so many of the killed and wounded being young people.

Since the 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, covering the type of violence inspired by al-Qaeda or the Islamic State (IS) has become a staple of the news media’s repertoire. Collectively, this reporting increases the public’s sense of vulnerability: An evil is out there, unpredictable and ferocious, sure to strike again.

Source: Mainstream media outlets are dropping the ball with terrorism coverage – Salon.com

In the end the public has no idea what are the causes other than some simplistic idea of hatred…..the population remains woefully ignorant.