Moving On

One More Train Wreck
At the risk of driving CorduroyPlanet into a ditch beside the Information Superhighway, and becoming a Train Wreck myself...I have one more thought on the subject of Train Wrecks...Big Media Division.

This morning I was listening to Armstrong and Getty, the Sacramento based Radio Talk Show. I'm a regular listener, and frequently start my day chortling away at their funny mix of comedy, culture, and political observation. They don't hit you over the head with the Politics, rather they mine that rich vein for the hypocrisy...all the better to highlight the hilarity therein.

The Set-Up
Tuesday, Americans in twelve states went to the polls, to choose in Primary Elections, who would run in November for various State and Federal Offices. Most of the Political Coverage on TV has been trumpeting the "Anti-Incumbent Ferver" supposedly sweeping the country. Armstrong and Getty addressed the subject by playing clips from the Cable TV's Comedy Central show, "The Daily Show" with Jon Stewart. Stewart's hilarious take on the Primaries and more pointedly, his take on Big Media's Anti-Incumbent Narrative can be viewed here. The bit begins about a minute into the show and runs about five minutes. Can't watch at work, or prefer to listen? You can hear Armstrong and Getty's show here. Stewart's bit begins around 30 minutes into the podcast.

Hitting the high points for those who are too busy to watch the clip, Stewart's bit began with clips of many Talking Heads referencing the Anti-Incumbent mood of the Electorate. Stewart then lowered the boom on the media citing these results:

In 84 Major Races with Incumbents...82 Incumbents won. Of the two who didn't win, one was forced into a Runoff Election. There was ONE incumbent who lost, Nevada's Republican Governor, who began losing his re-election bid almost from the first day of his term.

While serving his first term, Governor Gibbons was accused first of "using State Resources to pursue an extramarital affair", then sued for sexual harassment, then accused of "impeding an ongoing criminal investigation", and finally endured a bitter divorce battle. This in a state of Fiercely Independent Westerners who voted 53% for Barack Obama in 2008.

My take home from Stewart's bit was this: Big Media was more concerned with maintaining their Anti-Incumbent Voter Narrative! Radio funnymen, Armstrong and Getty this morning said that among all of Big Media's News Outlets, only the Daily Show reported that 82 of the 84 Incumbents did not lose their re-election bids! Stewart did a fine and funny job of skewering Big Media for it!

So, in 2010's America it's come to this...Given today's media landscape, if you want Hard News you need to watch a Talk Show on a Cable TV Comedy Network, or listen to a Comedy Talk Radio Program! The Daily Show actually won two Peabody Awards for TV Journalism for their coverage of the 2000 and 2004 Elections!

Is it any wonder that Big Media continues to run off the rails?

Big Media's slavish flogging of their precious narrative instead of just reporting the facts is exactly why Big Media is an ongoing Train Wreck! Americans won't pay to be lied to! They've been voting with their feet for a number of years...witness the cratering of Newspaper Circulation, and Network TV Viewership, as well as the crashing stock prices of former Blue Chip Media Companies. Even the New York Times, "America's Newspaper of Record" is selling off assets before they become worthless!

Is it just a coincidence that the sources I cite here are "New Media" sources? No, it is The Story!

I want to know what is really going on in my country, my neighborhood, and around the world. Sadly, like millions of other former customers of the Legacy Media, I've had to search out Alternative Sources to get the News every day.

"Alternative Media" or "New Media" is already well on it's way to becoming the new "Mainstream Media"

In the Marketplace the "Consumer is King." Media who report the facts will prevail...unless reckless bureaucrats decide that Big Media is "Too Big To Fail"

Should that come to pass...well, that is a whole different story.