Error message

Deprecated function: Array and string offset access syntax with curly braces is deprecated in include_once() (line 20 of /home/caucusni/public_html/includes/file.phar.inc).

media

Tuesday Open Thread ~ When the Levee Breaks


~

"…much of the conversation about Hurricane Dorian—including most media coverage—ignores climate change. That's a mistake. It's akin to talking about lung cancer and being afraid to mention smoking, or talking about traffic deaths and being afraid to talk about drunken driving." ~ David Leonhardt

~

Welcome to Tuesday’s Open Thread. A few days ago there was a news article in Joe’s EB about the media's coverage of Hurricane Dorian. The concern voiced in the article was that the kind of storm-porn the media loves to feed us, negates any real discussion over how to prepare our cities in the face of these extreme storms. This type of reporting isn't new. I watched the same coverage when I was living in New York after Superstorm Sandy. What is new are the storms themselves. So why aren't we talking about them in a more relevant way?

Ain’t No Kind of Political Vision Anywhere

When a community has troubles coming down the line, when the people need some way to address those troubles… That’s when you need Vision. Not talking here about virtuous generalizations: “All people should be free,” “We need to respect nature” kind of things. Nor am I talking about ideological nor technological supposed “remedies.” Those have their place, but there’s a ton of things that are…

Specific.

Matt Taibbi's Ubiquitous Brilliance !

Matt Taibbi's everywhere this month, especially over the past few days. As some reading this may remember (going back over a decade at "the other place"), I've been a huge fan of his for a long time. I was active in Boston political media, back in the early 80's, when his father, Mike, was a leading local newscaster there; and I met him (and worked countless times with his tv station's news staff) a few times, as well.

The Weekly Watch

Coup, Coup, Cachoo

The world is engulfed with U.S. led coups. There's Venezuela, Iran, Ukraine, Nicaragua, Cuba, and too many other African and Asian nations to list. In a comment this week Joe suggested there may not be more ongoing coups today than in the past, but they've never been so blatant and obvious. There's also an on going coup against truth tellers. To paraphrase Julian, "Since lies bring us wars, perhaps truth can bring peace." Concurrently, we have a corporate coup against the ecosystem. May 5, Cinco de Mayo, is a celebration of a coup when the Mexican Army defeated the French Empire at the Battle of Puebla, on May 5, 1862 (at least temporarily). However, Mexico celebrates independence day on September 16, commemorating the Cry of Dolores, which initiated the war of Mexican independence from Spain. Stretching the theme this week, let's also look at coops and chicken coops.

coup detat.jpg

If TwitFaceGoog (TFG) worked for Democracy...

they'd undertake a massive campaign to educate users on how to tell the difference between claims and facts. They'd grace the People with the reasoning abilities to know when something is proven, disproven, or needs more information before deciding its value.

Teach people how rhetorical tricks and manipulative tactics are used on them. Teach people how trolls operate. How to check the sourcing, and whether there is more than one source.

The Weekly Watch

Ninth Dimensional Distractions

American people are routinely misinformed, misled, and deceived by the lame stream media. It is no wonder that we are rushing head long toward extinction. The international media has displayed less interest in global warming and climate change throughout the last decade. For the most part, US citizens can barely keep their heads above water as they struggle with multiple jobs...or no job. Snippets of news are all people have to inform their world views.

July 3, 2017, to July 3, 2018, MSNBC dedicated zero segments to the US’s war in Yemen, but 455 segments to Stormy Daniels. … After all, Obama backed the war on Yemen—though not nearly as aggressively as Trump has—and it’s difficult to make a coherent left-wing, anti-war criticism when the current Republican in office is simply carrying out your guy’s policy, but on steroids.

https://fair.org/home/action-alert-its-been-over-a-year-since-msnbc-has-... And it isn't just US media...even in New Zealand people get the corporate spin. We face even more serious threats to independent media due to a spate of corporate censorship. Facebook and Twitter in conjunction with CIA staffed think tanks are taking down accounts of Iranians, Russians, and others they deem inappropriate. Even Telesur English was removed from Facebook for a few days until public outcry paved the way for their return https://mronline.org/2018/08/21/what-is-behind-facebook-deleting-telesur...

censored.jpg

Pages