It is only one quote from one of our Founding Fathers but I think it makes clear freedom of the press was recognized as critical to the success of our government as they designed, ratified and implemented it and, frankly, I am of the mind that inclusion in the First Amendment of the United States Constitution calls for more than the electorate is getting from most of main stream media.
In the context of this election cycle, I see more and more people, particularly on Twitter, sharing their disappointment with the performance of a media they depend on for accurate information and that is great and I just want to take a minute to say: Keep @ it! because, as someone once told me a long time ago, once it is said and heard it is can not be unheard and the subconscious will do its job -- with most people.
It has been my experience that once a thought is dropped into my subconscious mind it tends to float to my conscious mind in a timely manner and the choice is mine -- to pay attention or not.
Impacting minds is slow, I'll grant you that, which is why it is great that people are employing a variety of tactics to make the point that a main stream media that is blatantly bias, a main stream media that grossly misinforms and a main stream media that merely serves as free advertising for politicians is not acceptable. (Real time critiques on programming, changing the channel on the worst segments of programming and literally boycotting entire shows and/or stations are some of the examples I see.)
Unless the talking heads want to stand up and share that they've heard us and that they are trying to improve their performances ~ because it is the right thing to do ~ it is nearly impossible to document results but if you are talking back your words are in their subconscious and you will hear them, making it possible for you to discern change when it happens no matter how subtle it might be.
During the months of January and February, I jotted down some notes on some of the small changes I've see in main stream media, directly connected to what I've said to them, that may find of interest:
New Day's Alisyn Camerota, Chris Cuomo, Michaela Pereira
One of my favorite mantras that I Tweet to talking heads on a regular basis is that the habit of most programming is to misinform the electorate and then poll the electorate and then feed the results back to the electorate as "news" (the implication, of course, being that, that is not reporting), so I was thrilled to hear discussion on New Day recently that explained to the viewer that polls are not always the best indicator of what is really happening and how, directly related to the poll being reported on, 40 to 50% of the population was undecided.
Hardball's Chris Matthews
Following many calls by many people for main stream media to ask Bernie Sanders how he would pay for promises made during the nomination process, Mathews took that on in early February and he has continued to press Sanders on it.
MTP Daily's Chuck Todd
Just two days ago, after months of calls for main stream media to address the lack of congressional support for Bernie Sanders, Todd actually ask a Senator the question. (The response, BTW, was that, although he likes Bernie, he does not think he can be effective.)
No movement has or will come because of one person holding main stream media accountable on a part-time basis and I'm sure those of you who are out there working it have anecdotal stories of your own to tell, as well as direct responses from them -- all of which demonstrates that they hear us.
As noted, keep @ it! And if you are not doing it yet -- pick one favorite talking head and inform him or her that you notice when they are not doing the job they need to do if we are to have an informed electorate. (In my experience, I will say, most of them seem to favor Twitter!)
Thank
you for reading!
G., aka
Partisan Democrat
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