Do You Think the Commercial Media Is Corrupt? Unfair? Biased? [View all]

[MineralMan]

You're probably right, but they're free to be so. They're free to write and broadcast the news in whatever way they please, whether you like it or not. The Constitution ensures that freedom in the First Amendment.

Today, someone on DU complained that the NBC News had a headline on the TV that said, "Democrats in Disarray." That prompted a call for us to "control the media." No doubt that headline is somewhat exaggerated, but guess what: The Democratic Party is in disarray. That headline is justified, based just on the debacle that took place at the Iowa caucuses and the confusion that has resulted from that. If that's not "disarray," I don't know what is.

Of course we don't like seeing headlines like that. But "controlling the media" is not possible. They will report as they see fit.

Instead, we need not to give the media reasons to say our party is in disarray. We need to do a better job with things like elections and the like.

The only way we can control the media is to be the media. But we don't own any media outlets. We don't invest in the media. We don't have a TV network to deliver news the way we want it to be seen.

Every day, many tens of millions of people in the US watch broadcast television news. The four broadcast networks, ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC broadcast the news in the morning, in the late afternoon, and at bedtime. Those broadcast news programs have a vastly larger audience than cable news. I watch MSNBC, just like you do. But, I also watch the CBS affiliate's local and national news every morning over coffee. Then, at dinner time, I watch my local ABC affiliate's local and national news. On weekends, I watch the NBC equivalents. I watch all three. I do not watch anything on the Fox network.

So do those tens of millions of voters. So many more watch those broadcast news programs than cable news that it's not even close. If you're not watching those programs, you aren't seeing what most people are seeing. It might make you feel superior somehow, but it's not a great idea to ignore what people are seeing.

Is that broadcast network news biased? Sometimes. Is it corrupt? Maybe by the need to sell advertising. Is it unfair? Usually not, really. It covers what is happening out there, whether you like that or not. And it is watched. It is an influence on how our population thinks and votes.

So, headlines like "Democrats in Disarray" are unpleasant to see, but they're accurate and they're newsworthy. We are in disarray. We're fighting among ourselves, often cutting our own throats over small matters. Meanwhile, the Republicans are marching in lockstep with Trump. The news covers it all. The news isn't going to ignore Trump's awful celebration of the Senate's failure to remove him from office. The media did not acquit him, but they will sure report the fact that the Senate did. You don't like it? Well, that's unfortunate, but it happened.

Do you want control over the media? Then become the media. Start a new network that reports the news as you'd like it to be seen. Sell ads to pay for the fantastically enormous costs of operating a nationwide television network. Invest in it. Watch it. But, you can't control the news networks that already exist. You just can't. And most voters are watching those networks.

Don't want to see headlines like, "Democrats in Disarray?" Then don't screw up in Iowa so badly that nobody trusts the results, if you're the Democratic Party. Because the media that exists is going to report on that across all of the news networks. If you don't own them, you cannot control them.