Ummm...Hey MSNBC....

[PatrickforB]

10. MSNBC is owned by NBC Universal which is a subsidiary of Comcast Group. CMCSA is currently trading at $41.24.

I say this because the fiduciary responsibility of all corporate officers in MSNBC is ONLY to generate shareholder profits. They are literally REQUIRED by the legal precedent of shareholder primacy set by the MI Supreme Court in 1919.

So, for over a hundred years, shareholder profits have literally been king.

Shareholder profits are held above worker and consumer interests and the earth itself.

How this 'fits' with our media is they are NOT beholden to objective reporting of truth. This is why we see so much biased reporting. The bias is not necessarily left or right politically, but it is ALWAYS designed to increase clicks or ratings, which boosts advertising revenue, which in turn keeps shareholder profits coming. Because the fiduciary responsibility of corporate officers in publicly traded companies is always ONLY to generate shareholder profits, not truth in news reporting.

Horserace coverage of the presidential election is an example. Any sane person who follows what is going on through more objective news sources such as the Guardian, NPR, or even Al Jazeera, would be absolutely convinced to vote straight blue and get all these GOP/MAGA traitors out of office. If the real news was reported objectively, the entire system would utterly repudiate MAGA and Trumpism.

I have harped many times about the doctrine of shareholder primacy and how it poisons everything it touches, and I won't belabor it, but think through why we have corporate malfeasance such as the Johnson and Johnson talc, which they left on the shelves though they KNEW it caused ovarian cancer. Think through why we have union busting, unsafe working conditions, and why companies like Amazon and Comcast are now attempting to force workers back to the office because they are uneasy at the empowerment that comes from working from home. No other reason - just the visceral desire to curtail worker power due to a fear that if workers are too empowered they will demand more and it might cause profits per share to go down a couple of cents. And finally think about how this legal doctrine is endangering the habitability of the earth itself.

This 'profits over people' doctrine poisons all it touches, including truth in news. When truth takes a backseat to profits, we have a real problem.

In terms of a solution, it is simple. One little tiny policy change requiring a stakeholder approach to corporate governance would do the trick in so many ways. If Congress legislated and then the president signed legislation requiring publicly traded corporations to hold the interests of workers, consumers (including consumers of media news) and the environment of equal weight with shareholder profits, and then it was ENFORCED, things would look a bit different.

This is why Reagan killed the Fairness Doctrine in 1987 - it was part of the long-term plan for corporations to take over our republic (Lewis Powell 'manifesto' 1971).

Changing the doctrine of shareholder primacy would essentially work as a 21st century Fairness Doctrine.

This is why we have bookbanning, and all the culture wars bullshit, people. Because it is good for profits. Money changes hands. The 'enemy' is essentially Wall Street and libertarian billionaires such as those behind the Supreme Court's current 'conservative' super-majority.

Get rid of the current legal doctrine of shareholder primacy in corporate governance and a whole bunch of seemingly intractable problems will be alleviated straightaway.