PrintJuly 17, 2010
The Media are Not Exempt
Recent headlines have proclaimed that many members of the big business community and Wall Street are now filled with buyer's remorse after having supported Barack Obama in 2008 with obscene sums of money. The true nature of his socialist/Marxist upbringing has come to the fore in not only his near universal appointment of far-left advisors but in the pursuit of policies that are clearly anti-capitalist and designed to destroy the free market.
Much of the brunt of higher taxes, regulations and loss of liberty necessary to achieve these radical ends will fall upon this myopic assemblage who refused to comprehend Barack Obama's history and background, but were instead mesmerized by his ability to read a teleprompter, his ethnic heritage and in not being George Bush.
The other major enabler of President Obama is the mainstream media. When will they collectively come to their senses and begin to realize that this new and transformed America as envisioned by this President and his radical cohorts will be one that they too will have to live in? That they and their progeny will not be exempt from confiscatory taxes, onerous regulations, stagnant job creation, and a dramatically eroded and rationed health care system.
This march to the media's present role of being in league with the Obama administration is the culmination of the good versus evil bias of modern journalism. The contemporary process of determining who were the righteous and who the villains were began over 45 years ago.
In the 1960's a social revolution took place against historical and societal norms. An era of peace and prosperity unprecedented in the history of mankind was underway in the United States, allowing a new generation, who had never experienced hardship on a massive scale, to focus on hedonistic pursuits, self-aggrandizement and a search for meaning in their lives.
This movement was promptly seized by the true-believers of the Left as a recruiting tool; Leftists proclaimed to the gullible that the United States was an unjust, repressive tool of capitalism. The siren song of a classless society wherein all are treated fairly and there are no absolutes found eager ears. The protests against the Vietnam War and then the very necessary civil rights movement, which achieved so much, were hijacked by many of the post-depression generation into a call to overthrow all of society's foundational standards.
The protests surrounding the Vietnam War and then Watergate, that most infamous of scandals, not only gave rise to the resignation of a President but accelerated the virulent polarization of politics and the beginning of the end of the impartial mainstream media.
As a consequence of the media's perception of their role in ending the Vietnam War and Watergate, the press began to look upon themselves not as neutral reporters of the news but rather as a crusaders out to right the wrongs, as they perceived them, of the United States. Journalism, as taught in university and promoted by those who had been active in the 1960's, came to be viewed not as an independent watchdog of government regardless of who was in charge but rather as a vehicle for social and economic change.
As further incentive, the journalists who successfully assumed the role of "societal avenger" were feted by their fellow scribes, became celebrities and coincidently achieved great wealth. This, in addition to any so-called noble calling to transform the United States, became a vital part of the metamorphoses of journalism from news gathering to news manipulation and the naïve promotion of a radical leftist ideology.
Over the intervening years and into the present, the far-Left effectively promoted: 1) the false and unfounded libel of a desire by conservatives to turn the United States into a theocracy and, 2) guilt for the nation's past and one's success. These tactics became the basis for many of the gullible in the media to promote the policies of the Progressives without understanding what in fact the end game was.
It became more important and fashionable for a majority in the media to protect their lifestyles against the "right-wing horde" descending upon them and to assuage their guilt rather than comprehend what was happening around them, or the controlling agenda they unwittingly supported.
Thus the coverage of news stories concerning conservative issues or politicians became notable for vitriol and deliberate slanting or omission of facts. Polls, commissioned by the media and easily manipulated, were substituted for news and real reporting. Every personal failure of a Republican politician was amplified into a national outcry. All civility and traditional objectivity was rejected when discussing the (predeterminedly) evil conservatives.
By comparison those politicians who said the right things relative to morals and lifestyles and used the magic phrase of "social justice" were treated in an opposite fashion -- except when a story, thanks to the alternate media, became too big to ignore.
This 45 year evolution of the mainstream media culminated in the election of Barack Obama, who on the surface fulfilled all the requirements of an ideal presidential candidate for the chattering class. He was one of them -- Ivy League educated, well spoken, attractive, and capable of saying all the right things designed to appeal to the myopic worldview of the New York-Washington media axis. But above all he was African-American, an opportunity to wash away the collective guilt so imbedded in the psyche of the press.
Barack Obama also knew that he had those tangible and intangible factors and he used them to manipulate the press. The mainstream media willingly became, in phrase often attributed to Lenin, useful idiots. Obama's background and radicalism were ignored and all effort was exerted to tamp down negative stories to make certain he was elected.
Yet after a year and a half of the Obama administration, the very members of the media that so prostituted themselves are being treated with outright disdain by their Idol, and they will be among those to suffer the most under his policies:
1) The Health Care Reform Bill is not about health care, but a thinly veiled attempt to ultimately control the behavior of the citizenry and redistribute wealth. Once government controls access to and the cost of medical treatments, it can dictate what behavior is acceptable under the guise of controlling expenditures. Thus the very personal behavior many in the media deem so central to their lives could be effectively outlawed by this or future administrations or Congress
2) The socialist economic policies of this government and the resultant collision with national bankruptcy will cause the standard of living for the members of the media and their progeny to dramatically decrease, along with the country at large. If unchecked the Obama administration will succeed in moving a step closer to accomplishing a major goal (one the media chose to ignore during the campaign): reduce all to one economic class through income redistribution.
3) The present administration intends to proceed on its plan to have Washington D.C. control all aspects of the economy through regulations, bailouts and bureaucracy. How long will it be before the mainstream media, either through seeking bailouts or tax breaks, agree to have new standards and regulations imposed on them? Thus succumbing to the control of the government and becoming de facto state organs.
4) Indirectly this administration, by its hubris and radical policies and the media by its sycophantic allegiance to Barack Obama, has enabled the alternative media to expand by leaps and bounds; thus threatening the very existence of the mainstream media and the well-paying jobs of those who with their eyes closed pledged their fealty to Barack Obama.
If the (once) mainstream media is to become relevant again it must recognize and acknowledge what damage it has done to itself. It must look past skin color and ideology and begin reporting honestly on where this government is leading the United State and all of its citizens. The members of the media must begin to understand that they are not exempt from the potential catastrophe descending upon the United States.
