Damn good op-ed: media portrayed Bush as fictitious character

[ringmastery]

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/28/opinion/28KRUG.html?hp

Some news organizations, including The New York Times, are currently engaged in self-criticism over the run-up to the Iraq war. They are asking, as they should, why poorly documented claims of a dire threat received prominent, uncritical coverage, while contrary evidence was either ignored or played down.

But it's not just Iraq, and it's not just The Times. Many journalists seem to be having regrets about the broader context in which Iraq coverage was embedded: a climate in which the press wasn't willing to report negative information about George Bush.

People who get their news by skimming the front page, or by watching TV, must be feeling confused by the sudden change in Mr. Bush's character. For more than two years after 9/11, he was a straight shooter, all moral clarity and righteousness.

But now those people hear about a president who won't tell a straight story about why he took us to war in Iraq or how that war is going, who can't admit to and learn from mistakes, and who won't hold himself or anyone else accountable. What happened?

The answer, of course, is that the straight shooter never existed. He was a fictitious character that the press, for various reasons, presented as reality.

[laura888]

1. Good point. And I'm curious as to why the media...

...has changed its tune.

Has anyone heard good reasons as to why this is happening now?

[nosmokes]

2. caught in their own trap

and it just can't be denied any longer?

why now is an interesting question.

[FizzFuzz]

6. I'm wondering if the change is because of the torture photos?

Media is image driven. The people driving the industry probably are as image dependent as most people, maybe more so.

Nothing pierces the fog like a sensationalistic photo; add titillation and you've really hit pay dirt.

[LunaC]

4. Personal conjecture

I suspect that some people (like us) have been jumping up and down, waving our hands and screaming about the B.S. perpetrated by the Mayberry Machiavellis for several years while the failure to find WMD's has more recently caused many Sheeple to stir from their stupor long enough to wonder "WTF?" The media whores are just following the general trend and trying to save face with their belated mea culpas.

[progdonkey]

5. blogosphere

I think that the presence of all of this online, independent media is what should actually take credit for the change in the public's perceptions. As people started learning more through independent media, they of course paid attention to less of the establishment media (or, when watching, took any reports with a grain of salt). The establishment is now trying to take back its former viewers with more critical reports on Bush; this is order to both protect its bottom line, and try to re-assert itself as the credible news source.

[dumpster_baby]

7. Ab-so-friggin-lute-ly! And just imagine when broadband gets real cheap!

Imagine $15 broadband and cheap $200 computers in 5 years from now. When that happens, people will be able to download independent, politically oriented movies. Some of them will no doubt be movies that compare the lifestyles and politics of the USA to the truly liberal countries of Europe. And when AMericans see how far to the right we have come over the last 30 years, you will see some real change.

Before the internet, I was a real media and news junkie (even wrote some TV news scripts during an extended internship). I used to read dozens of newspapers and magazines per month. Not anymore. I spend most of my reading time reading blogs and forums. I do read mainstream media articles, but usually as they are filtered through the blogs and forums. It is a COMPLETELY different dynamics. The Net is now the front porch of America. We get grassroots political opinion along with the news.

But right now it is only a minority of Americans who are getting what we are getting. So, spread the word.....

[agincourt]

3. I can't think of a leader,

in recent history inflated to be bigger than he is than shrub. The substance isn't there. The only one who might compare is Reagen, and he was substantially shrewder than bush. He wouldn't last a minute in an america that hadn't went stupid.