Click here for link to audio file of this week's show.
Media Reform has been been a main theme of Tell Somebody from day one. Corporate influence has been tainting media much as it has been tainting political campaigns for a long time already, and the recent Citizens United v FEC decision promises to dramatically increase the effect, even as politicians and journalists alike claim immunity to the disease which obviously infects them. With a sputtering economy, even community radio stations are tempted to sell themselves cheap for crumbs.
On the February 16, 2010 edition of Tell Somebody, I spoke to Professor Robert McChesney about the new book he co-authored with John Nichols, The Death and Life of American Journalism - The Media Revolution That Will Begin the World Again. On February 26th, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges wrote a review of the book where he mostly seemed to agree with the McChesney-Nichols diagnosis of the problems with journalism, but ridiculed their recommended fix that includes government subsidies to support journalism, writing that "As Utopian fantasies go, this is pretty good...It assumes, incorrectly, that people still value and want traditional news. They do not."
Hedges ended his critique of the McChesney and Nichols book thusly:
"They grasp the terrible consequences of a culture disconnected from a world of verifiable fact. They admirably look for solutions to save us from a world where opinions and facts are interchangeable, where lies become true. I applaud their effort, but I fear it is too late."
Martin Luther King Jr. famously reminded us that there is indeed such a thing as "too late",
'Over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: "Too late."' , he said (in a speech widely heard on community radio but virtually censored by the mainstream).
What I know of Hedges from reading a few reviews and hearing a few interviews and speeches on community radio has made me an admirer.
I fear that Hedges might be right, that it is already too late, and that it is a "utopian fantasy" to hope to fix what he and Nichols and McChesney apparently agree is wrong with journalism.
(I can't quite get Sarah Palin's recent tea party question, "how's that hopey changey thing goin fer ya?" out of my head as I write this next..)
But still I can't help but hope that some of McChesney's and Nichols' suggestions might be discussed and some form of them implemented. Hope springs eternal, though even at at the community radio station where I host a public affairs show, half the stakeholders apparently view news and public affairs as an inconvenient distraction, have no knowlege, much less understanding, of what has been said on those shows, and seem to be, albeit perhaps not entirely consciously, falling in love with Ayn Rand even as Alan Greenspan appears finally (too late?) to have fallen out.
All this puts me in mind of the film "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" where they are caught between a cliff and a hard place in South America, about to jump off the cliff to avoid being killed by soldiers or police. (I'm going from 1970's original run memory here, so I hope I've got it right)
Sundance fearfully and hesitantly confesses to Butch that he is reluctant to jump off the cliff into the river far, far, below because he can't swim, and seems surprised and offended when Butch breaks out laughing. When he inquires as to what's so damned funny, Butch replies that it doesn't matter if he can swim, because the fall will probably kill them.
I wish we were in a better situation vis a vis journalism and all the vital things it is currently not covering, but what choice do we have but to take the leap, survive the fall, and, (sorry Sarah) hope we can swim?
The March 9, 2010 edition of Tell Somebody features John Nichols speaking on Media Reform in Kansas City in October, 2008. Link to the audio here.
Tom Klammer
http://www.tellsomebody.us/
mail@tellsomebody.us
Media Reform has been been a main theme of Tell Somebody from day one. Corporate influence has been tainting media much as it has been tainting political campaigns for a long time already, and the recent Citizens United v FEC decision promises to dramatically increase the effect, even as politicians and journalists alike claim immunity to the disease which obviously infects them. With a sputtering economy, even community radio stations are tempted to sell themselves cheap for crumbs.
On the February 16, 2010 edition of Tell Somebody, I spoke to Professor Robert McChesney about the new book he co-authored with John Nichols, The Death and Life of American Journalism - The Media Revolution That Will Begin the World Again. On February 26th, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges wrote a review of the book where he mostly seemed to agree with the McChesney-Nichols diagnosis of the problems with journalism, but ridiculed their recommended fix that includes government subsidies to support journalism, writing that "As Utopian fantasies go, this is pretty good...It assumes, incorrectly, that people still value and want traditional news. They do not."
Hedges ended his critique of the McChesney and Nichols book thusly:
"They grasp the terrible consequences of a culture disconnected from a world of verifiable fact. They admirably look for solutions to save us from a world where opinions and facts are interchangeable, where lies become true. I applaud their effort, but I fear it is too late."
Martin Luther King Jr. famously reminded us that there is indeed such a thing as "too late",
'Over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: "Too late."' , he said (in a speech widely heard on community radio but virtually censored by the mainstream).
What I know of Hedges from reading a few reviews and hearing a few interviews and speeches on community radio has made me an admirer.
I fear that Hedges might be right, that it is already too late, and that it is a "utopian fantasy" to hope to fix what he and Nichols and McChesney apparently agree is wrong with journalism.
(I can't quite get Sarah Palin's recent tea party question, "how's that hopey changey thing goin fer ya?" out of my head as I write this next..)
But still I can't help but hope that some of McChesney's and Nichols' suggestions might be discussed and some form of them implemented. Hope springs eternal, though even at at the community radio station where I host a public affairs show, half the stakeholders apparently view news and public affairs as an inconvenient distraction, have no knowlege, much less understanding, of what has been said on those shows, and seem to be, albeit perhaps not entirely consciously, falling in love with Ayn Rand even as Alan Greenspan appears finally (too late?) to have fallen out.
All this puts me in mind of the film "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" where they are caught between a cliff and a hard place in South America, about to jump off the cliff to avoid being killed by soldiers or police. (I'm going from 1970's original run memory here, so I hope I've got it right)
Sundance fearfully and hesitantly confesses to Butch that he is reluctant to jump off the cliff into the river far, far, below because he can't swim, and seems surprised and offended when Butch breaks out laughing. When he inquires as to what's so damned funny, Butch replies that it doesn't matter if he can swim, because the fall will probably kill them.
I wish we were in a better situation vis a vis journalism and all the vital things it is currently not covering, but what choice do we have but to take the leap, survive the fall, and, (sorry Sarah) hope we can swim?
The March 9, 2010 edition of Tell Somebody features John Nichols speaking on Media Reform in Kansas City in October, 2008. Link to the audio here.
Tom Klammer
http://www.tellsomebody.us/
mail@tellsomebody.us
