Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Kuros]

Two media darlings are the front-runners in a national campaign. Should we be embittered? Or is the media in touch with the people?

Considering that my favorite, Bill Richardson, was the only Presidential candidate who got less coverage than Ron Paul, count me among the embittered.

[stillnotking]

"Unreflective" is the perfect adjective here. ("Chatty" too, but hey, that's their job.) The media have the most endemic and pernicious case of confirmation bias I've ever seen, when it comes to Presidential candidates. They seize a narrative, play up anything that relates to that narrative, and ignore or downplay any competing information.

In 2004, a man who won three Purple Hearts fighting Communists in Southeast Asia spent the entire campaign battling the media narrative that he was a coward and a traitor. Bush 41, another war hero, somehow became a "wimp" in the eyes of the MSM. I could go on and on and on.

I don't mind them talking about molehills. I mind the echo-chamber effect that turns the molehills into mountains. The media should be a dampener of passions, a provider of perspective, a flattener of simplistic characterizations; these days, they're exactly the opposite.

[bacasper]

They have devolved into mere for-profit corporations which shill for the other interests of capital and no longer bear any resemblance to the guardians that a robust democracy requires.

Can the internet and alternative media fill the gap in time? We can only hope.

[Ya-ta Boy]

I voted 'too emotionally involved' to represent my complaint that they all too often are interested in their bottom line. Sensationalism is how they attract viewers, and the way I see it played out in presidential primaries is repeating negative comments another candidate has said. It appears to me that someone in the medial makes a characterization and 'everyone' else grabs onto it and perpetuates that impression--Gore was 'wooden'.

[Czarjorge]

Just like Kuros they are "Too interested in gutter politics."

Really.

[Ya-ta Boy]

There's a very good example of just how irrelevant and downright silly the media can be on the Daily Show's clip of an MSNBC reporter questioning Obama's scratching his cheek.

When I saw that tonight I started humming:
"Blow up your TV throw away your paper
Go to the country, build you a home
Plant a little garden, eat a lot of peaches
Try an find Jesus on your own"

[Pink Freud]

bacasper beat me to it.

[bacasper]

[Kuros]