Mario your still my friend but I did get the dig.
Often people on this listserv make false statements to sway opinion.
I don't have any fears of the social persuasion of media companies..
I want everyone to join with me and say:
"THE MEDIA TODAY OF INFOTAINMENT AND PAY-TO-SAY IS FULL OF SHIT"
ok.
It is one thing to endorse a candidate inside your paper and another to
sway an
election with a full cover.
Besides, I picked my candidate after everyone announced and I read
everyone's plan,
the papers have picked theirs using their own tainted polls near the end
of the race.
It is funny to see all the lawn signs going up 6 days before the
election.
S
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mario Giorno
Sent: Friday, May 11, 2007 5:03 PM
To: UnivCity@list.purple.com
Subject: Re: [UC] Newspaper Endorsements ... "Pay-To Say"
Folks,
I have to share Sharrieff's fear of the social persuasion of media
companies in politics and public policymaking. If the editorial staff
and columnists at a particular newspaper offer a best choice candidate
that they endorse in their own opinion pieces, they have the power of a
mass media outlet to sway opinion, a privilege most citizens do not
have. But there is another side to this argument of the local newspapers
or indeed any newspaper endorsing a political candidate for elected
office.
First and foremost, journalists/reporters must disseminate facts to
the general public in as unbiased a way as is possible. Journalists have
an almost sacred duty to that effect and they take it as a deadly
serious responsibility. Columnists, on the other hand, are paid to be
part journalist and part problem-solver. They take the same facts that
the pure journalist finds and develop inferences and build forensic (as
in forensic debating, not the CSI type) arguments based on those facts
as their logical support. That's a far too tedious was of saying that
they develop an informed opinion. It's this informed opinion that you're
attacking in the local newpapers endorsing Michael Nutter and I have to
say that you're wasting worrying about it. In the end, it's just an
opinion. you can write an op-ed piece and send to the Inquirer, the
Daily News, the Daily Pennsylvania, etc, but that would still just be
your opinion.
When the editorial staff of a newspaper can lend their brain power
to the public to ferret out who would make the best leader or candidate
they usually do it, because they're trying to help the reader see the
legitimate reasons for choosing a candidate. They don't hold a gun to
the public's head and say vote for Nutter or I'll blow your brains out.
As one of the previous contributors to this thread pointed out that the
public can make up it's own mind, even if it's sees a biased or
opinionated piece of writing in a newspaper. Even with the media power
behind a newspaper, it's a free press with the right of free speech and
the public has the right to decide for themselves. There's no crime or
abuse taking place. We all just have to learn to live with other
people's opinions and points of view.
FWIW,
Mario Giorno
