Two more cents

I've heretofore laid out a sketch of my reasons why Bush won the election, my conclusion being that he won for about fifty coalescing reasons, some inherent in his incumbency and the existing state of the nation and the world, and some manufactured by Rove, by the Democrats, by Kerry himself. But the abiding problem, the 800-pound gorilla, that swayed much of the Red State public to support Bush in spite of his amazing record of bungling and failure, was the media. The network and cable-TV reporters were demonstrably terrible in telling the American public what was really going on in Iraq, in the "war on terror," in the economy--everywhere.

They were cowed and/or corrupt in 2004 and the reason I'm writing this post is this. They're at it again, now falling into line in their reporting of politics in the US and abroad. No analysis, no definitive evaluation of anything. Just headlines, mostly spouting military and administration talking-points, night after night. All media owned by huge corporations who either support Bush or benefit from his positions. And this isn't going to change between now and the next election. We're in for years of this barrage of managed information, and we may never be able to take back the truth except by revolution. I mean, REVOLUTION, in which the monster companies that dominate the sources of information that the American public receives are overtaken and are allowed to disseminate something other than the Republican party line.

Update: I'm not alone in my assessment of the cowed media, especially television reportage of the war in Iraq. Check out this authoritative piece.