The Extreme That Is Our Nation's Press and Media

As an American, you should be alarmed and outraged about the state of journalism today. As Randi Rhodes so succinctly puts it, "The news has been canceled."

The truth of the matter is that the news, privately held as it is, has one goal: profit. This is why we see more tabloid stories and less news today. It's why our political debates break down into social issues and the media drives the narrative more than the voters do.

Let's look at an article today from the AP:

With little more than two months remaining in the White House campaign, polls show a close race between McCain and his Democratic rival, Barack Obama. Each man draws natural strength from his party members, leaving independents as the focus of much of the campaign.

A daily Gallup tracking poll released on Monday showed the candidates basically tied with independents, 31 percent for McCain to 29 percent for Obama. It said 36 percent of those surveyed described themselves as independents.

Whoa, whoa, whoa! Yesterday's Gallup poll actually showed Obama ahead 49%-43%. Today, it is 50%-42%!!!!!!

But, the AP chooses to deceive you into thinking it's a tie McCain lead by telling you the numbers among Independents. It's inaccurate, and why would you repeatedly give Gallup numbers and then suddenly, give a small sub-section? (Hint: The media needs the race to be close so they make more money. If it's a landslide, people won't tune in for election news.)

Continuing...

A CBS survey had it 43-37 for Obama, a slight advantage given the margin of error.

A 6-point lead is not exactly a close race. That's a significant lead in this day and age. Notice the accentuation on how close it is to the margin of error, so we can conveniencly just ignore it.

McCain's aides disputed a claim that vice presidential running mate Sarah Palin had once been a member of a third party — and accused Democratic rival Obama's camp of spreading false information.

Actually, it's all over the news. Oh wait, just the blogs. Why? Because the AIP is a radical group that will hurt the McCain/Palin. Was she a member? Yes. Who says so? MEMBERS. What's more? Her husband has been a member for 10 years!

Obama spokesman Bill Burton said that as far as he'd seen, "the only person talking about her being in the Alaska Independence Party is the head of the Alaska Independence Party."

Exactly.