Corporate Whore Media using Katrina to play the American people

[Atman]

The Five days of Outrage have turned into just another whitewashing for BushCo. Everything is happy happy now. No one died but a few unfortunates. BushCo will start a redevelopment company which will do to NO what they did for Manhattan...namely, steal money from the government for rebuilding projects for their cronies and people who don't otherwise need the money.

NOTHING is happening to BushCo. Nothing will happen to BushCo. The press has made sure of that. Happy happy Bush Bush, coming it to save the day now. Watch him be wonderful and strong! Thank god the crisis is over and Bush saved us again.

The five days of outrage were as much a sham as BushCo. The reporters on the ground were outraged, I have no doubt. But now that it has all settled down and the corporate board is looking back, they seem to have passed along Rove's memo..."lay off the Bush-blaming. It's those idiot democrats down there, not Bush's unqualified crony FEMA buddy."

Don't fall for this "the press has got it's backbone back" crap. All they remember are the little envelopes of white powder BushCo sent them LAST time they went snooping.

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[RepublicanElephant]

1. sad but true...

...i find myself watching c-span more and more.

you still have to listen to a lot of right-wing nuts, but you also get more liberal/progressive viewpoints than all the other networks combined.

[rodeodance]

2. yes, I have heard this tone last few days. The media thinks their job

is done!!

[bryant69]

3. Nice hopeful post

You sound like a right winger, actually. This bizarre idea that the media is completely unified behind one idea (in their case it's "Destroy Bush," in your case it's "Protect Bush.") But the mentality is the same - they are unified against us and they cannot be reasoned with.

I have to say that doesn't make sense to me. The Media is made up of dozens of organizations and thousands of individuals - some of them are going to be on the Administrations side - but that doesn't mean they all are going to be.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[TallahasseeGrannie]

4. Doesn't make sense to me, either.

I've been watching all the media, reading... this isn't going to go away.

I know it is hard to believe when we've seen the arrogance we have seen and it is so easy to predict they will just gloss right over it.

But I just don't think so.

And I agree with your post that the media is not unified. There are glimmers of hope here and there.

But maybe I'm way too cheerful for a Monday morning.

[WCGreen]

13. not with the guys poll numbers running so low...

The MEdia smells blood in the water...

Amd they are doing what they do best...

Gotcha Journalism....

It's easy, it plays well with the masses...

And, It's relatively cheap....

[Atman]

5. Your simplistic analysis sounds right wing

Where did I say that the media is completely unified behind one idea? You apparently want to frame what I said as some sort of conspiracy theory, wherein the heads of the networks have gotten together to decide what to broadcast. I am not making that case at all. I am saying the very same shit is happening as had happened in so many times in the past; the moment a story heats up that is not favorable to Bush, "the blame game" starts, we get all excited that the media is getting fangs finally, then within days, everything is fine, Bush is a hero again, and the media moves on to trivialities and distractions.

Can you deny that has happened now, and if you do, on what basis? At this point, BUSH should be before hearings. Democrats should be demanding answers. Yet, NOTHING is happening, at least anything the public can see. Instead, the media is all about "looking forward to the future" and "not playing the blame game," coincidentally (not) two of the key Rove talking points.

Don't be a Pollyanna. This isn't about a bunch of suits sitting around a table deciding what to tell us. It is more insidious than that. This is about a bunch of individual suits looking at their bottom lines, at who can do what for them, at how much money they'll make if they support B (Bush) rather than A (America).

Everything doesn't have to be a conspiracy, you know. Sometimes people just do evil shit because it is in their collective best interest.

[bryant69]

6. I'm not a pollyana

I don't deny there are problems in the media - but I don't want to deny that there are positive trends as well. It's no more realistic to ignore all the postiive trends than it is to ignore all the negative trends.

Also you have a very naive view of how government works if you think two weeks after Katrina anybody should be in hearings.

Unless you are talking about other issues (Iraq and so on).

[Atman]

8. I'm talking big picture

Other issues, sure. ALL the issues with Bush. How the most agregious assualts on our constitution and laws go unchallenged once Rove sends the goons out to the Sunday talk shows. How this Katrina bit is nothing more to BushCo than an annoyance to be stage managed. This is about how the media's complacency and desire to protect its bottom line is costing all of us.

I am certainly not naive of how government works. Here is what I know...when they want something to happen -- an unqualified crony getting appointed to the highest legal position in the land, for instance -- everyone can snap-to in a heartbeat.

They can rush in in the wee hours to save Terri Schiavo.

They can stay up all night to strongarm, bribe and cajole reps to vote for fraudulent Medicare.

They've shown us their priorities. And the media goes right along with it every time. And they are this time, because enough Americans are willing to say "you have a naive view of how government works." I don't think I'm naive at all. In fact, just the opposite. I've discovered all to well how government works. With an envelope of white powder, a few threats from the BFEE, and viola, everything is good for BushCo.

[Skwmom]

11. Keep looking at the big picture. If more people would do that,

they might get a clue as to what is actually going on.

Insert Clinton for Bush and ask yourself what the media coverage would have been like these past 4 1/2 years. Without a doubt they would still be reporting on the gay prostitute posing as a reporter in the Whithouse Press Corps.

[papau]

7. The FEMA needed local permission BULL is blown away by their own rules

The FEMA needed local permission BULL is blown away by their own rules

The December 2004 National Response Plan (NRP), the federal Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) most recent plan for coordinated federal response to disasters http://mediamatters.org/rd?http://www.dhs.gov/interweb/assetlibrary/NRP_FullText.pdf , confirms the Red Cross' status as a "primary agency" http://mediamatters.org/items/200509090002#establishes
that will, under the oversight of FEMA and DHS, coordinate "federal mass care resources" to affected areas. Moreover, in a "catastrophic event," such as what befell New Orleans, the NRP directs FEMA http://mediamatters.org/items/200509090002#directs
to act on its own authority to quickly provide assistance and conduct emergency operations, bypassing state and local authorities if necessary.

And our uniform media responce is to put "some blame" on local and State officials, and on those workers that fled NO rather than stay at Hospitals or on the police watch as their homes were washed away?

When Knight-Rider, Fox, and the Bush Administration are not singing the same tune, let me know.

Sorry Bryant - I like your blog - but here you are pissing into the wind as you try to defend our media.

[bryant69]

10. I just see some positives signs along with the negative ones

And if your standard of proof is that Fox News needs to start slamming into the Bush- well that's a bar I don't think we are going to clear.

[papau]

14. LOL - OK - but how about Knight-Rider?

:-)

[bryant69]

15. I don't know if you are referring to anything in specific

I don't want to make it seem like I believe the media is perfect - I just have seen signs of life during this hurricane disaster that make me think they are less in Bush Corner than they have been before - look at how they have been pillorying McClellen in the gaggles.

On the other hand I am confident that there are still media people who are behind the Bush administration 100% and are still publishing articles in his defense.

[papau]

16. Here is the Knight-Rider's contribution to idea we had to wait for local

approval to do anything:

News articles published on September 11 by the Knight Ridder news service and the Palm Beach Daily News reported as fact that Louisiana state officials, including Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, blocked the American Red Cross from bringing relief to survivors of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.

The Palm Beach Daily News reported: "The workers were told they would not be allowed to set up aid stations because the Louisiana Department of Homeland Security wanted people to leave the battered city, and officials feared that feeding and aid stations would discourage them from leaving."

In the Sept. 1 portion of a Katrina timeline (registration required) titled "Lessons from the Tragedy," Knight Ridder reported:

At times, state officials also seemed to stand in the way of relief measures. ... The Red Cross begged to be allowed to distribute aid at the convention center, but was apparently blocked by Louisiana officials. National director Marty Evans made a personal plea to Blanco, the governor. But state officials said to wait for better conditions.

[Skwmom]

9. The media is OWNED by mega corporations who are making

billions with the help of Bush and Co. If the control of the media didn't reap any benefits, after the 2000 election the Carlye group wouldn't have started buying up local stations in states where the election results were very close (e.g., OHIO). Furthermore, they wouldn't have put Powell's son in charge of the FCC to further gut the ownership rules.

Look at the current state of the media. It's not only the news that has been dumbed down - a lot of the people delivering the news could hardly qualify as the "brightest tools in the shed." When you have idiots that are being paid big $$$$$$ by their corporate owners, how difficult do you think it is to make these people tow the line? (Especially when greed is also a factor.) Have you forgotten about the NBC reporter who was called on the carpet in 2000 for reporting too favorably on Gore?

Hmmmm....let me think. What other organization employees a bunch of incompetent idiots, paying them far more then they would ever receive in the real world (and elevating them to positions which based on their own abilities - or lack thereof - they would never achieve)?

It's pretty bad when someone is accused of being a right-winger because of a post about the media.

[bryant69]

12. I didn't accuse him of being a right winger

I accused him of arguing like a right winger - and I strongly apoligize if it sounded like I was calling him a right winger.

Instead, I've noted the depressing tendency for us to act like "Free Republic - Left" on occasion. Just as given to rumor and innuendo and just as angry when challenged on our facts. Much of that is just that the Hurricane has inflamed our passions, but it is a frusterating tendancy to me.

When someone argues paints the media as unified around protecting Bush I take that the same way I take the same way I take a right wing poster saying the media is unified around attacking Bush.