Money. MoneyMoney. MoneyMoneyMoneyMo…
…neyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoneyMoney.
Money.
Yes, the Almighty Dollar. That’s what they’re chasing, you know. All of them. CNN, FoxNews, MSNBC, ABC, CBS, NBC, and the myriad other “news” sources, including Facebook (where the commercials now have commercials) and Twitter (sorry, “X”). Politicians, too. Doesn’t matter which party, the world revolves around money and how much they can rake in. Period.
It doesn’t matter how they get it, either. Lie, cheat, steal…
There’s an unspoken partnership between most of the media and the political elite. They both need the population fractured and afraid in order to retain power, to retain an audience, and get as many dollars as possible per advertising minute.
Money rules.
Money is power. Of course, it always has been.
I took Erin’s challenge (A Quick Challenge). Googled each of the politicians on her list, looked at the news headlines. I urge you to do the same; the result is interesting.
I did not feel happy or vindicated once I read all six headline lists. I’m angry and frustrated. But as I analyzed the headlines I saw what I think Erin intended me to see.
First, there are no positive headlines. The sources differed, but the top headlines, if they weren’t overtly critical of the subject politician, certainly weren’t positive about them.
Your feelings will depend entirely on where you fall on the political spectrum. The more extreme your views, the happier you’ll feel about the negative headlines for the other party, and the angrier you’ll be at the negative headlines for your own.
You may not, initially, recognize that they are essentially the same headlines – almost word-for-word. The negativity is what draws the emotional response, and increases viewers; negative political ads sell. They always have. They play to our fears, and we respond.
For me, since I don’t toe a party line, my anger is directed at the media outlets who are pandering to the extreme narratives. FoxNews panders to the far right, CNN to the far left. You can tell who panders to which narrative by who produces the most popular negative headlines about the other party… And if you listen to the media, we apparently have no political “center.” Talk about disenfranchising most of America…
If you only get your information from sources that feed your own narrative, you are not well informed and cannot make an informed decision. But since journalism is now measured in mouse clicks and advertising dollars, actually informing the public is relegated to the back seat; giving people the whole story so they can more readily determine the truth on a given subject is no longer a priority.
I miss Walter Cronkite…
- Uncle John
Uncle John is the black-sheep relative your family doesn't want to admit to. He's a writer, old fart, anti-extremist, dyed-in-the-wool cynic, sci-fi nerd, and practicing to be a curmudgeon. More vegan than carnivore, but very much a Constitutional "originalist"; a walking, talking contradiction in terms, and a straight, no-holds-barred talker, who will tell it like it is with no apologies. Pacific Northwest native, married for many, many years to a woman he doesn't deserve, with no kids that will acknowledge them - except for the cat, who is merely tolerant.
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Thank you for taking my challenge; you might be the only one. 🙂
However, you’re way too kind to the left!! I agree that Fox News panders to the right and CNN panders to the left. But MSNBC, ABC News, NBC, CBS, C-SPAN, Headline News Network, BBC, Washington Post and NYT are ALSO solidly left… On the right, besides Fox News, there are some 2nd string outlets like OANN (One America News Network) which is far right and NewsMax which is moderately right — but you’ll notice their absence from Google/Bing search engines because they are considered “misinformation”. They’d do the same to Fox News were it not mainstream, with longevity…) The WSJ has published some right leaning articles too. So, it doesn’t show up at the top, but it does show up sometimes. Al Jazeera is *usually* fair so you won’t see it at the top very much. You won’t see much from the New York Post. Meanwhile, those far-left 2nd string news outlets (Vox, Mother Jones, Huffpost, Daily Beast) always do seem to make it into the search results! Actually, here’s a media bias chart that I think is pretty good: https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-chart
Check out how many on each fringe side are showing up in search engine results.
I’ve got another one for ya. The left “updates” or “fact checks” everything on the internet so it sounds like you’re reading factual information when in fact the facts have been carefully curated to make anything non-DNC sound horrible.
This week, RFK Jr. is rumored to be splitting with the Democrats. Check out the recent updates to his page on Wikipedia as a result of his defection. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_F._Kennedy_Jr.
Now is that ridiculously inflammatory, or am I just reading it with bias??
Frankly, my dear, I’m not being kind to anybody. I deliberately didn’t name all the news (pseudo-news) outlets because they’re all the same, propaganda mouthpieces for one extreme or the other. And I am anti-extreme.
Your observations about search engine results falls into the same category; it only proves our information delivery system (“Journalism”) is based on mouse clicks and advertising minutes, biased to the point we can’t count on anybody giving us the whole story, which is why I continuously recommend a wide range of news sources and critical thinking (which is in very short supply in this country).
And to be brutally honest, I don’t pay any attention to RFK Jr. He’s just another politician I won’t vote for.