Robert R. Owens, PhD
Is This the News or a Comedy Tour?
September 22, 2009

Everyone routinely called them the Mainstream Media. Rush now calls them the State Controlled Media. I’ve called them the Mainstream Media, the Poodle Press, and the Lap-Dog Media. Whatever you’ve called them the time’s come to call them irrelevant? Out with the old and in with the new.

When news organizations consistently slant their coverage and ignore major stories because they don’t fit their template or further their agenda it’s time to re-evaluate what they are. They portray themselves as objective yet everyone can see they’re partisan publicists for a particular party and a particular radical left-wing of that party. Study after study shows the corporations once known as the Mainstream Media are perceived by the public as advocates whose left-wing agenda is self-serving and deceptive. Instead of the fourth branch of government, honest brokers working to keep the public informed they’ve degenerated into craven corporate cheerleaders for Progressivism.

Ever since Walter Cronkite denounced America’s commitment in Vietnam the corporate media have championed increasingly radical left-wing causes. They first joined the Democrat Party in all but name. Then they joined the extreme liberal wing of that Party. Now they’ve joined the Cavalcade of Czars in the statist campaign to re-make America.

It’s increasingly hard to tell the difference between the likes of Charlie Gibson and Keith Olbermann, who are supposedly journalists and John Stewart and Stephen Colbert who are self-confessed comedians. Many Americans on the left and those who merely continue to watch what daddy watched seem to have the same problem. I know several people who proudly proclaim they get their news from the Daily Show, several who voted for Colbert and anyone who doesn’t watch Gibson or Olbermann for laughs is either ready to drink the Kool-Aid or already has.

This highlights the sad state of what passes for political discourse in America today. When these same Kool-Aide drinkers take a break from discussing the weather or the game long enough to comment about something else they inevitably parrot the talking-point drivel written in corporate basements and spewed by cookie-cutter info-models through these fossil news-warehouse outlets as if these were their own ideas. It’s like watching Neo take the blue pill instead of the red one and then having him try to convince you New York is really a great place to live. I know he believes it but that doesn’t make it true. This race to irrelevancy by the corporate news organs has no better example than Charlie Gibson the anchor of ABC’s Nightly News who quipped, "I don't even know about it" concerning the latest Acorn scandal as the Corporations Formerly Known as the Mainstream Media continue to ignore a rising tide of corruption in Washington.

Whether it’s one of the largest demonstrations to ever fill Washington, a scandal spiraling out of control, or the growing shadow government, the Corporations Formerly Known as the Mainstream Media display their irrelevance by what they consider irrelevant. Look at the ratings and it becomes apparent the public knows where to find the truth as FOX News dominates cable and Rush dominates the airwaves.

Then there’s Glenn Beck. If you’re missing Glenn Beck’s daily television program you’re missing some of the most honest, hard-hitting television journalism ever produced. Despite a leftwing inspired boycott his daily ratings for the time-slot are through the roof. He’s so honest and forthright he’s become the bell-weather for journalistic freedom. Glenn is doing the heavy-lifting when it comes to exposing the corruption that’s destroying the tap-root of American democracy. His investigation of the Communist Van Jones appointed by President Obama to a cabinet-level position and his airing of the ACORN prostitution-tax sting are changing the game. He’s making a difference and every American owes him a debt of gratitude. Thank you Glenn for shining the light on the corruption that wants to live in the dark. Thanks for leading the way as a New Media does the job the Old Media has betrayed. As long Glenn is still on the air we know freedom of speech still exists in America.

When was the last time you watched one of the three broadcast networks? When was the last time you believed anything they said? When was the last time you bought the print edition of what were once great newspapers? Like some broken-down vaudeville hack whose twitter joke starts out, “Who’s on first” the Corporations Once Known as the Mainstream Media will collapse under the weight of their own irrelevance if they don’t get bailed-out by the corrupt government they support.