Did media miss real Colbert story? A great column from Doug Elfman

[wndycty]

This is a very good piece from this morning's Chicago Sun-Times

Did media miss real Colbert story?

May 7, 2006

BY DOUG ELFMAN Television Critic

-snip-
How's this for a newsworthy lead? It was perhaps the first time in Bush's tenure that the president was forced to sit and listen to any American cite the litany of criminal and corruption allegations that have piled up against his administration. And mouth-tense Bush and first lady Laura Bush fled as soon as possible afterward.

From whom were they fleeing? A star comedian pretending to be a Fox News-like blowhard doing a sort of performance art that America hasn't witnessed nationally since the days of Andy Kaufman. Even if Colbert's bit had been reported as a train wreck, that would have sufficed. Instead, shocking lines like the following were barely covered by any traditional organ except industry magazine Editor & Publisher: "I stand by" Bush, Colbert cracked, "because he stands for things. Not only for things, he stands on things. Things like aircraft carriers and rubble, and recently flooded city squares. And that sends a strong message that no matter what happens to America, she will always rebound with the most powerfully staged photo ops in the world."

For TV reporters in particular to quote that gruesome line would be an agreement with Colbert, that they helped Bush mix politics with corruption from the ashes of 9/11 ("aircraft carriers and rubble"), and failed to see through Bush's politicization of the drowning of an American city after a hurricane ("recently flooded city squares").

But ignoring a newsworthy keynote speech -- at an event the press corps itself set up -- doesn't go unnoticed anymore. Internet stables for liberals, like the behemoth dailykos.com, began rumbling as soon as the correspondents' dinner was reported in the mainstream press, with scant word of Colbert's combustive address.

This is trouble for the media. It has been losing customers to bloggers and Web sites for years. This won't help. The media's implosion of silence could be one of the final reasons many liberals use to not turn on TV news. It's not like they feel a vested interest in the industry anyway, since it has been bought and parceled by conservatives.
-snip-

http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-elfman07.html

[CJCRANE]

1. Colbert even topped

George Galloway for speaking truth to power.

On edit: Great article BTW.

[Lefty48197]

2. the most powerfully staged photo ops in the world

LMAO. They're right. The mainstream news media has died.

[Spazito]

3. Excellent commentary!

The corporate media is, indeed, in trouble, imo. They are becoming more and more irrelevant and they know it hence their desperation in pathetically attempting to defend their exclusion of any coverage of Colbert by saying he wasn't 'funny'. If they truly believed that, should they not, if they were honest brokers, still have covered it at the same time they covered bush's performance instead of using the 'not funny' excuse about Colbert only AFTER their biases had been exposed?

[pretzel4gore]

7. there are actual individual men doing this

the 'media' sounds like a benign billboard sign or something, but the Colbert affair brings to mind that the men who are determining what's covered in the news are, to put it bluntly, thieves and criminals and possibly even collaborators of the worst enemy the nation has ever had. Who are these men? Too bad 'mediawhoresonline.com' had to go under - we need to list all the guys who thought treason is just a lil ole word easily ignored (haha)

[Spazito]

9. Here is a list, somewhat outdated, of who owns it all

This list is from 1997 and I suspect the holdings of these 9 have increased exponentially since then:


How quickly has the global media system emerged? The two largest media firms in the world, Time Warner and Disney, generated around 15 percent of their income outside of the United States in 1990. By 1997, that figure was in the 30 percent-35 percent range. Both firms expect to do a majority of their business abroad at some point in the next decade.

The global media system is now dominated by a first tier of nine giant firms. The five largest are Time Warner (1997 sales: $24 billion), Disney ($22 billion), Bertelsmann ($15 billion), Viacom ($13 billion), and Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation ($11 billion). Besides needing global scope to compete, the rules of thumb for global media giants are twofold: First, get bigger so you dominate markets and your competition can't buy you out. Firms like Disney and Time Warner have almost tripled in size this decade.

snip

The first tier is rounded out by TCI, the largest U.S. cable company that also has U.S. and global media holdings in scores of ventures too numerous to mention. The other three first-tier global media firms are all part of much larger industrial corporate powerhouses: General Electric (1997 sales: $80 billion), owner of NBC; Sony (1997 sales: $48 billion), owner of Columbia & TriStar Pictures and major recording interests; and Seagram (1997 sales: $14 billion), owner of Universal film and music interests. The media holdings of these last four firms do between $6 billion and $9 billion in business per year. While they are not as diverse as the media holdings of the first five global media giants, these four firms have global distribution and production in the areas where they compete. And firms like Sony and GE have the resources to make deals to get a lot bigger very quickly if they so desire.

http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1406

[pretzel4gore]

13. gitmo will hold them all

that's the good news-the mediawhore commanders are few in number and $25 million bounties should have them all in custody within a month or 2....

[Spazito]

14. Nah, their becoming irrelevant is worse than Gitmo to them, lol n/t

[tblue37]

24. I always wondered why MediaWhoresOnline went under.

Do you know why they closed down operations?

[pretzel4gore]

26. there was a thread recently touching on it....

i believe it was that the 2 guys behind MWO were getting worn out with the site - it was one of the busiest on the net. This sounds good, but, back in 01, 02 and early 03 etc it did expose our heroes to the 'relentless' attention of the busheviks, who could sic the killing machine on anyone. In a nutshell, it seems that it became easier and 'prudent' to walk away from MWO for our heroes career and lifestyle sakes(?)
iow i don't know...lol
btw i'd like to know why the michaelmoore.com forum suddenly was kicked to the curb-the freepers were attacking it, and it must have been an immense hassle, but it was a true community of good people etc :(
up in Canada, we lost Frank Magazine and its forum too last year- the nazipoohs seem to have been bystanders at that loss, but, notice the pattern?

[npincus]

4. K & R

[NYCGirl]

5. Maybe not the first time. Remember Coretta King's funeral?

Rev. Lowery was certainly eloquent about telling the truth.

[GreenPartyVoter]

28. My first thought, too.

[zann725]

6. To critics of Colbert's "tone" of humor that night, I repeat Jon Stewart's

comment on "Cross-Fire" last year, when he similarly (unexpectedly) "roasted" them. I still remember Carlson's shocked statement in an attempt to silence Stewart's 'truthiness.' As Tucker stuttered: "But I thought you were supposed to be funny?"...Stewart swiftly replied: "I'm NO one's monkey."

That's what essentially what Colbert did (a toned-down version of) last week at Reporters' dinner. He was "no one's monkey." As Stewart mused the following night on his show: 'They hired Stephen, then were shocked he did the same thing he does nightly on his show?'

How true. He did what he always does WELL, and was greatly appreciated by it...judging from all the "kudo" emails his site's been receiving world-wide.

[tblue37]

25. "Truthiness" is what the bad guys, BushCo et al., do.

It is the appearance of truth, without the substance of truth. Stewart and Colbert committed TRUTH, not truthiness.

I wonder why people get it so turned around. It seems that everyone is getting it backwards (as I mentioned in my post above). The term does us no good if it is misused like this.

[Evergreen Emerald]

8. This actually is the bigger story: the media cannot hide the truth

No longer do we sit mindlessly in front of the TV and, in lemming-like-stepford-wives fashion, nod in agreement and take what they feed us as gospel.

That is until congress' attempt to control the internet succeeds. After all the corporations control the WWW.

[UpInArms]

32. I quit when I realized that not one media outlet ever outed the

"Brooks Brothers" rioters - that they were DeLay's and Abramoff's henchmen and that 5 of them were subsequently hired by the *Co administration.

Peter Jennings sat there night after night saying "the American public is being patient" whilst they stole our democracy.

Never again will I give the media an ounce of credibility - their lies and omissions have cost us too much.

[Evergreen Emerald]

33. I completely agree

And I think that is the worst betrayal of all for our country, that the free-press caved to pressure from the administration (either threats or bribes). They are no longer free and can no longer be trusted. And you are right. Their airing of propaganda and cover for the administration has allowed the current downfall of our Republic.

And I do not believe it is simply a bunch of corporate guys covering for Bush because he butters their bread. It is bigger and deeper and dare I say a-vast-right-wing-conspiracy (couched in the biggest lie: liberal media).

[fearthem]

10. EXCELLENT MUST READ! BRAVO!!!

[otohara]

11. The Gift That Keeps on Giving

by ignoring Colbert - the stupid MSM only brought wrath upon themselves. You gotta wonder who is making the decissions?

[undercoverduer]

12. Yes, had this gotten significant coverage immediately following the dinner

It would have passsed and would not still be in the news.

[ovidsen]

19. The elephant in the room

You are absolutely correct!

By ignoring it, they didn't make it go away. They just made it grow into their worst nightmare.

[Clark2008]

15. It would seem that some enterprising executive needs to

smell the irrelevancy of the corporate media and decide that, hey, they might get more ratings with a REAL news show. I don't agree with Doug Elfman's opinion that CNN is the most fair - CNN International is - but it's a rare news show, even on CNN, where liberals out-number or out-speak conservatives.

Of course, there is always Keith Olbermann who blends oddball with the politically ridiculous for the best "mainstream" news hour on television today - and, by all accounts, he's nearly consistantly the top-rated show on MSNBC, despite the fact that MSNBC rarely promotes him like they do Tweety, Raspy Rita Meter Maid and (sans) Bowtie Boy (and, when they DO promote him, the promote his as "silly," rarely giving credit to the REAL hardball interviews he conducts).

I think MSNBC would have a real coup for ratings if they'd actually promote Keith as the truth-teller he is, instead of giving that monikor to faux Dem-turned-Bush-lover Chris Matthews. I'll take Keith's snark over Tweety's spittle anyday.

[young_at_heart]

16. We used to watch CNN.........no more!

When Turner owned the station we could count on real news. After he left it became a clone of Fox and their vanilla pudding talking heads had nothing but aimless chatter. Only brain-dead people would watch now!

[tomreedtoon]

17. Don't even bring Andy Kauffman into the discussion!

Kauffman was a non-sequitur comedian. His jokes were fanciful flights that had nothing to do with reailty. And in fact, non-sequitur humor is usually a way of hiding from reality. (For example, Ellen DeGeneris did much more non-sequitur stuff in her early career, I suspect because she was actively trying to deny her sexual orientation. Once she came out and became comfortable with herself, her humor became more reality-based.)

Kauffman was never a political comedian, either. Combine that with his non-sequitur attitude, and this is what you'd get: as the deck chairs were being arranged on the Titanic or the Hindenburg, and as people were dying around him, Kauffman would comment on the color of the drapes.

And for those Kauffman fans out there who still think it's a put-on, Andy Kauffman is Dead. So is Elvis. Get over it.

[AtomicKitten]

18. The media didn't miss anything, they ignored it.

[jenmito]

20. This morning on "This Week with George Stephanopoulos"...

they played a clip of Colbert in their "Funnies" segment. Could you believe (I could) that the clip they chose was from The Colbert Report where he talks about Patrick Kennedy's accident?! As a matter of fact, 2 of the 3 clips were about Kennedy.

[jenmito]

21. I went to the Freeper site to see what THEY had to say...

They were talking about this article and the author, saying both he and Colbert "suck." But you just know their level of intelligence when one freeper writes:

To: doesnt suffer fools gladly

I agree. I have no trouble listening to Pres. Bush. As far as I am concerned, he speaks English articulately. This writer is just flapping his gums. I wish the moderator would put up a "Barf Alert" to these kind of liberal rampages.

48 posted on 05/07/2006 11:30:04 AM PDT by conservative blonde (Conservative Blonde)
< Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies >

[depakid]

22. one of the final reasons many liberals use to not turn on TV news

Actually, the best reason to avoid TV "news" is to keep from being misinformed.

[Inland]

23. "From whom were they fleeing?" I think King G. was punishing the press.

If Bush and Laura left as soon as they could, it wasn't to flee criticism. As a megalomaniac, Bush really thinks that his presence is a gift, and he decided to show his displeasure by removing the from the WH press court the favor of being in the company of His August Self. Of course, the WH press corps feels the same way, and must have been suitably crushed, and there were probably whispers that King George was angry and that Colbert must not be mentioned.

[guidod]

27. I wouldn't doubt the media

was the real target of Colbert. If bu*h got sliced up with them, great.

[JerseygirlCT]

29. What about Mrs. King's funeral?

Same reaction from Bush there. Same thing: captive as an audience, actually having to listen to some of his wrongs.

But no less satisfying to watch.

[Cha]

30. This is Grreat!

Thankfully there are people like DOUG ELFMAN out there who are writing in the papers about it so readers can go to the NET!

He wrote Colbert is a "star comedian"!

Seems to be a bit deluded about cnn, though.

[tex-wyo-dem]

31. Excellent article!

Colbert's performance was not so much aimed at * as the very people who are responsible for the event...I'm not at all surprised they are ignoring...they are just hoping it will quickly go away.

CNN, MSNBC (Olbermann exception), FOX, CBS, NBC, etc. have become irrelevant...they are playing the part of the colusiem (sp?) of the Roman empire...distract the masses while the government screws the people it is supposed to serve. I don't even bother withthem anymore...might as well turn on E!...you'll get the same relevancy of info.

[welshTerrier2]

34. the day the music died ...

the following will attempt to explain why i think the Colbert performance was so important ...

start with the premise that bush's handlers have lied and manipulated almost every news item eminating from the White House ... the whole thing is an act and a tapdance ... the whole thing is very carefully scripted ... we all understand and expect this to be the way things are done ... nothing new there ...

but the difference with bush is that "he believes he is wearing clothes" ... he walks nude in the streets and thinks he is attired in his finest finery ... this is a very dangerous business ... it's bad enough there's no truth-telling; it's far worse that bush himself believes the script ...

what Colbert did was not just speak truth to power ... he didn't just say a bunch of really harsh things on national tv ... he didn't just "not be funny"; frankly, i didn't find it at all funny and that was 100% fine with me ... and he didn't just lambast bush ...

what was important was that Colbert shattered bush's fascade ... not the fascade built for the American people but the fascade that was used to help bush deceive himself ... it's easy to tapdance when you can actually hear the music ... as the shards of glass of bush's sterile chamber shattered and fell to the ground, the tapdance music died ... it's much harder to stick to the mission once you learn it's all been just one big lie ...

[Tactical Progressive]

35. Fascade

That's good!

[bamacrat]

36. I think its sad that satirical news shows are more accurate...

and truthful than "real" news shows.