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Post by yanmacca on May 31, 2017 14:15:51 GMT
I didn't know Fred was a TV presenter.
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Post by rebcav on May 16, 2018 10:58:58 GMT
Be thankful then that the fourth Estate is being read, for whatever reason, for they maintain both the voice of the people in a free democracy and society and the third check and balance on any of the other three branches of government. The founders were very smart in the way they ordered the first ten amendments. the first made guarantees, and the second contains one means of defending those guarantees. The "Fourth Estate" has now become a "Fifth Colum" in this Republic. And I never thought I'd see the day that the Republic I love would have a "News Service" like Tass or Pravda. But that's what they've become. Respectfully Submitted, Duane
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Post by deadwoodgultch on May 16, 2018 13:24:26 GMT
Yes Duane, that and political correctness run amuck. And, it runs both ways, Yesterday Stephen King made a smart ass remark about the First Lady's Kidney operation, and someone called him insensitive. A White House staffer made a wise crack about John McCain, so f-ing what. I would much rather know where someone is coming from, what they think. It helps me make my opinion of them. We are too f-ing sensitive as a society.
And yes, to your point the "Fourth Estate" has become agenda driven more left than right, but both ways. Some of that agenda is financially driven. One of the mouths that roar, Rush Limbaugh, has made a very handsome living fighting political correctness and the Fourth Estate", but is in fact part of that "Fourth Estate."
Regards, Tom
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Post by quincannon on May 16, 2018 16:01:41 GMT
I think both of you are a little off base, although what each of you said has merit.
We have as a nation lost the ability to separate actual news from opinion/entertainment dressed up and presented to us as news. Here is what I mean. When you pick up your morning paper, most of what you are reading is news - Johnny had his bicycle stolen - is news.
Then you come to the OP-Ed pages, Opinion and Editorial, where someone who supposedly can write spews forth their opinion of current events, or newspaper owners/editors take their stand on whatever issue is on the menu.
Television, Cable News, and Internet News are divided the same way. If you tune in during the day by and large all you get is straight news about Johnny's bicycle, or the rain that flooded part of my town last night. Nothing Fake about it, just fact, but they also may be inconvenient truths reported, that some who don't want to believe, or are hiding under their desk in fear of label as fake.
There is no fake news. If it is fake, then by definition it cannot be news.
Then there are the opinion/entertainers. Starting about four PM each day the cables are filled with opinion peddlers and entertainers who spew forth those opinions in hopes that that will draw enough like thinkers that will adhere to what they say, and buy the products they sell.
One additional thing - If you are unable to say what you mean without being purposely offensive, or intentionally hurtful don't say it. By the same token if you shy away from saying something in fear of not being politically correct, or that may offend, you are not being true to yourself.
A free press is so vital to democracy that democracy cannot exist without it. Those who attack the institution are the ones that desire to take that democracy from you. You don't have to like what a free press has to say, but if you want to stay free, you had better not tamper with the institution itself. And, if you feel as I do you know that the pen is far mightier than any sword ever forged by Colt or Remington, to insure you remain free.
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Post by rebcav on May 16, 2018 18:13:40 GMT
When I was a kid (and now) I admired the Old School Journalists like Ernie Pyle, Robert Capa and Dickie Chappele. But it seems to me that somewhere around or immediately after Watergate, The Press got it in their collective heads that THEY are the "King-Makers".....And that's a dangerous thing....Especially when some members of the "Fourth Estate" have abandoned objectivity for a questionable ideology and are using their position to further said ideology.
Screw it, I'm taking my lady for drinks by the beach..... Respectively Submitted, Duane.
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Post by quincannon on May 16, 2018 18:39:46 GMT
It so happens that last night on Turner Classic Movies, "Citizen Kane" was shown. "Kane" is loosely based on William Randolph Hearst who famously said to (Frederick) Remington "Remington you provide the pictures, I'll provide the war", speaking in the hay day of yellow journalism.
If you want to revisit the Adams-Jefferson press confrontations, what you will find is that the present stuff you see on cable is mere child's play, a children's tea party.
If you think the present Tea Party or Resistance you read and hear of is bad, or religious, racial, ethnic, and political bigotry is rampant today, revisit the Know Nothing Party (whose actual name was the Native American Party) of the 1840's and 50's. If you dive deep into the Know Nothings what you will find is that today's coalition of Extreme Right Wing Evangelicals allied with those that think conservatism must by nature be homophobic, anti immigration, anti-religion (other than their own), and White centric is exactly the same as their views rejected by our country over a century and a half ago. That is not in line with conservatism, which is to conserve the best in us, while rooting out that which divides us, nor it is in line with our values as a nation, codified in our founding documents. WE are a strong nation ONLY because of our founding values, and despite the snares of those who wish to ignore them.
Somehow we have, and the press has survived it all, and the truth struggled to be heard, provided to us by a free press whose only job is to provide us with the first draft of history each morning over our coffee. Somehow they manage, by the oldest of concepts, that being, eventually if they don't get it right, their value to those that consume the news, won't consume the news from them.
I am fortified by your statement Duane. Pyle, Capa, and Chappele,reported straight news, as did Morrow, Severide, and Cronkite. Cronkite was so trusted that on the one occasion I can recall that he did venture into commentary, he, in one sentence, provided the handwriting on the wall for the Vietnam War. Johnson said - "If we have lost Cronkite, we have lost the country".
So take faith and heart in whatever does not kill you only makes you stronger. Watergate made us stronger as a nation, and this too shall pass, and we will emerge stronger still. It will not happen without a free press though.
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Post by Beth on May 16, 2018 21:49:20 GMT
One of the reasons I read so many papers across a wide spectrum of leaning is to counter "fake news" which as QC says there is no such thing. However what I find is not so much a fakeness with the news but a willingness to disregard actual facts. I have always preferred to read the news because I find that I can process the information and when necessary reread and reassess the information. I do not like the news on TV unless it is for a breaking event then I go to something like CNN which will show feeds from on the spot reporting and then switch to those actual feeds-like years ago when the Japanese tsunami hit we had the TV on CNN but every computer in the house was on different Japanese news sources. (we had friends and family in Japan at the time) I have found that when any number of news sources are reporting an event one way but a small number are either ignoring it, making light of it or declaring the information unreliable-there is cause to consider which sources might be the most reliable. BTW even in the 60's before cable and satellite, The networks would be on top of breaking news. Yesterday was the 50th anniversary of the F5 tornado that pretty much destroyed my hometown and killed 13 people just in my town. It was part of a very strong line of storms that hit several Iowa communities. The tornado happened at 4:50 PM yet we learned from family that the national news by the end of that evening's news broadcast. They had gathered the breaking news from ham radio operators. We had news reports in now by dawn the next day. If you watch this video (we look so quaint and old fashioned) You can see though most of the footage is at least a week into the clean up because the streets are plowed from the trees and debris. The North Grand the Civil Defense guy mentioned was the street I lived on We lived on the east side of the street and were lucky, everything on the west side was gone-two blocks further north and both sides of the street were just gone except for basements, rubble and broken trees. The plan the CD person was talking about for rebuilding existed before the tornado-it was an "Urban Renewal" project that the town was pitching the federal government. Downtown was not rebuilt, they put a mall in instead in part because the land was already cleared. The mall died after 20 years and THEN they rebuilt a "Main Street" community. BTW this was before FEMA but thank god for the National Guard and Red Cross.
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Post by quincannon on May 17, 2018 3:47:08 GMT
Beth: The thing that most who shout fake news the loudest do not stop to think about is that a reporter caught in the act of manufacturing a news story, might as well give up all hope of ever working for any media organization ever again.
There is one occasion I recall of a Washington Post reporter that manufactured a story out of whole cloth and she ended up winning a Pulitzer for. A few months later what she did was discovered, and the aftermath was that she could then and forever after not even get a job at the South Pole writing about penguins.
There have been several such incidents over my lifetime and all had similar outcomes.
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Post by Beth on May 17, 2018 23:56:24 GMT
I can think if a few news sources that don't seem to care if a news story is actually based in fact. You tend to see them in the check out aisle in the grocery story.
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Post by quincannon on May 18, 2018 3:29:45 GMT
You mean aliens really didn't do whatever the National Enquirer said they did for the last sixty years? That's even more shocking news than the fact there is gambling, gambling I say, going on in the back room of Rick's Cafe
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Post by Beth on May 18, 2018 19:19:08 GMT
You mean aliens really didn't do whatever the National Enquirer said they did for the last sixty years? That's even more shocking news than the fact there is gambling, gambling I say, going on in the back room of Rick's Cafe Exactly. I don't know why when people can see that tabloids are not a news source, they believe that the same thing doesn't exist online.
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Post by deadwoodgultch on May 18, 2018 22:12:54 GMT
To follow up on my politically incorrect comments!
Hillary Clinton goes on a fact-finding visit to Israel. While she is on a tour of Jerusalem she suffers a heart attack and dies. The undertaker tells the Americans accompanying her, "You can have her shipped home for $50,000, or you can bury her here, in the Holy Land for just $100". The Americans go into a corner to discuss for a few minutes. They return with their answer to the undertaker and tell him they want Hillary shipped home. The undertaker is puzzled and asks, 'Why would you spend $50,000 to ship her home, when it would be wonderful to be buried here and you would spend only $100?
Because years ago there was a burial here and they came back in three days, We just can not take that chance.!!!!!
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Post by Beth on May 19, 2018 1:56:20 GMT
Fixed that for you
Hillary Clinton Trump goes on a fact-finding visit to Israel. While she is on a tour of Jerusalem she suffers a heart attack and dies.
The undertaker tells the Americans accompanying her, "You can have her shipped home for $50,000, or you can bury her here, in the Holy Land for just $100".
The Americans go into a corner to discuss for a few minutes. They return with their answer to the undertaker and tell him they want Hillary Trump shipped home.
The undertaker is puzzled and asks, 'Why would you spend $50,000 to ship her him home, when it would be wonderful to be buried here and you would spend only $100?
Because years ago there was a burial here and they came back in three days, We just can not take that chance.!!!!!
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Post by quincannon on May 19, 2018 3:20:37 GMT
Tell you the truth Beth I don't think it makes much difference. One is just as bad as the other, although I must say that Hillary does comport herself as a lady, most of the time, which is more that can be said for the other conducting himself like a gentleman.
I would just as soon that a stake be driven in both their hearts, to keep everyone in the country from having to carry garlic with them at all times.
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Post by Beth on May 19, 2018 21:46:13 GMT
I think that joke is VERY old and you can put any politician's name in it. I am pretty sure the first time I heard it was under Reagan and had Haig's name in it.
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