OMNI MAINSTREAM,
CORPORATE-CONTROLLED, MEDIA NEWSLETTER #1.
Books by John Nichols and Robert McChesney. Sept. 27, 2013. Compiled by Dick Bennett for a Culture of Peace and Justice.
It is “necessary to reach a radical recognition of the scope
of the crisis, to understand that a discussion of a ‘broken system’ must
identify the points of rupture:
special-interest influence on our politics, to be sure; but also the
collapse of a journalism sufficient to name and shame the influence peddlers;
the abandonment of basic premises of democracy by partisans who are willing to
win at any cost; and the rise of a consulting class that makes ‘win at any
cost’ politics possible by shaping a money-and-media election complex every
bit as dismissive of the popular will as the military-industrial complex is.” Dollarocracy pp. xiv-xv.
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Contents #1 Nichols and McChesney
Dollarocracy (2013)
Death and Life of American Journalism (2010)
How the American Media Sell Wars, Spin
Elections, and Destroy Democracy (2005)
Our Media, Not Theirs (2002)
It’s the Media, Stupid (2000)
And by McChesney
Rich Media, Poor Democracy
Digital Disconnect
Related Books
Dick Bennett, Control of
Information in the U.S. and
Control of the Media in the U.S.
Dollarocracy
Special interests dominate Washington
·
(Reuters)
“We’ve found through our experience that timid supplications for justice will not solve the problem,” declared the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1967 as he announced the civil rights movement’s pivot toward the economic justice message of the Poor People’s Campaign. “We’ve got to massively confront the power structure.”
About the Author
Robert W. McChesney
Robert McChesney is
Gutgsell Endowed Professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Illinois
John Nichols
John Nichols, a
pioneering political blogger, has written the Beat since 1999. His posts have
been circulated...
With those words, King spoke a language every bit as American as
his “I Have a Dream” message of four years earlier. There are times for
optimism and hope, and there are times for acknowledgment of an overwhelming
challenge and the radical demand that it be addressed. Often they merge, and in
these moments, great movements fundamentally redirect the nation. Tom Paine
knew that. So did Frederick Douglass, and Jane Addams, and A. Philip Randolph.
There is a rich American tradition of recognizing that some crises cannot be
answered by tinkering at the edges of the problem. At such times, the people
have responded with a boldness that ushered in new political parties or a New
Deal, new understandings of the rights of citizens and the responsibilities of
governments. And they have amended the Constitution, not once or twice but
twenty-seven times.
After the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United ruling, we began what would
become a three-year survey of the state of American democracy, using the 2010
and 2012 election cycles as touchstones but focusing on a range of electoral,
governmental and journalistic measures of democratic decay. The experience
forced us to recognize the futility of timid supplications in pursuit of
reforming politics and the media. We did this not as critics of the reform
impulse, but as co-founders of a media reform organization who have maintained
a long-term faith in the power of organizing and the potential of electoral
politics to achieve consequential change. We retain that faith, along with a
deep understanding of the value of continual prodding at the local, state and
national levels. But we concluded that mild reforms are no longer sufficient to
address a political crisis as far-reaching as any the nation has known.
The United
States
Tens of millions of Americans recognize the crisis. Congress is
held in ridiculously low esteem. Almost two-thirds of the public say their
government is controlled by a handful of powerful interests. At the same time,
confidence in the media as a check on abuses of power is collapsing almost as
quickly as the circulation figures of daily newspapers.
Yet when the evidence of the decay of democracy is pieced
together, as it is in our new book Dollarocracy, the picture is even more
troubling than most observers and activists imagine. To wit:
§ The 2012 elections were the most expensive in the Republic’s
history, with spending of roughly $10 billion. They did not cost $6 billion, as
was broadly reported last November. That figure was based on a sound study of
federal election spending, but it did not account for the massive infusion of
cash into local and state contests, as well as judicial and referendum votes,
by the same wealthy donors, corporations and interest groups that fund national
campaigns. The full picture shows that the worst fears of good-government
groups have already been realized.
§ The biggest fantasy promulgated by pundits after the 2012 election
was that President Obama’s victory showed that grassroots activism can still
beat big money. In fact, Obama and his supporters raised and spent roughly $1.1
billion, while Mitt Romney and his supporters raised and spent roughly $1.2
billion. Yes, Obama’s campaign collected more small individual contributions
than Romney’s. But the Democrat’s campaign also collected more large
contributions than did the Republican’s. Romney’s relatively slight money
advantage came from the higher level of spending on his behalf by interests
like the Super PACs. Bottom line: in 2012, big money beat big money.
§ Big money—especially big corporate money—gets what it pays for.
It’s easy to blame the absolutist demands of the Tea Party movement (which
itself benefits from special-interest funding) or right-wing talkers like Rush
Limbaugh for gridlock in Washington
§ The interests that pushed campaign spending to record levels in
2010 and 2012 are only getting started. That’s the overwhelming conclusion
arising from our interviews with elected officials, candidates, campaign
managers, consultants and directors of so-called “independent” organizations.
Spending on federal races doubled between 2000 and 2012. It will no doubt
double again far more rapidly—and keeping track of it will become far more
difficult, as wealthy donors and corporate interests increasingly rely on the
subterfuges of “dark money.” As this spending increases, the influence of small
donors will decline because, as the Center for Responsive Politics notes,
“small donors make good press, big donors get you re-elected.” That’s why, even
after his relatively disappointing 2012 season, billionaire donor Sheldon
Adelson was greeted by Republicans in Washington
·
last »
- See
more at:
http://www.thenation.com/article/176140/dollarocracy#sthash.hdzMxxSV.dpuf
Also by the Author
His next appointee for FCC chair could determine whether robber
barons consolidate their domination of the public discourse.
These new political monsters have let loose an avalanche of
scorched-earth, negative campaign ads—and enriched TV stations in the process.
Our Media, Not Theirs: The Democratic
Struggle Against Corporate Media.
Robert W. McChesney and
John Nichols.
2002.
With
a foreword by Noam Chomsky, Barbara Ehrenreich, and Ralph Nader.
Our Media, Not Theirs! The
Democratic Struggle Against Corporate Media examines how the current media system in the United States
Our Media, Not Theirs! contains proposals for making our media
system more responsive to the needs of the citizenry and less dominated by
corporate greed. The authors look at how political parties, grassroots
movements and popular performers in other democratic nations increasingly have
made media reform a political priority. The authors provide an analysis of the
burgeoning media reform activities in the United States
REVIEWS
"An astute analysis
offering compassionate solutions. I loved the book. It speaks for me."
—Patti Smith
"McChesney and
Nichols both critically assess our current media system and, even better, help
us to imagine something different, mapping the transition from a period of
individual frustration with corporate media toward one of collective action for
their reform." —Janine Jackson
It's the Media, Stupid. Robert W. McChesney and John Nichols. 1998.
Updated and expanded under the title Our
Media, Not Theirs. "John Nichols and Bob McChesney are right to
argue that for our democracy to be renewed, issues of media ownership, monopoly
and diversity must be on the agenda. Media cannot merely reflect the narrow
corporate interests of a handful of powerful media moguls. For democracy to
function, media must reflect the diversity of views, viewers and values of the
whole of society." —Hon. Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Jr.
BY ROBERT MCCHESNEY
·
By Robert W. McChesney
Digital Disconnect
How Capitalism Is Turning the Internet Against Democracy. ROBERT W. MCCHESNEY
"Once again, McChesney stands at
the crossroads of media dysfunction and the denial of democracy, illuminating
the complex issues involved and identifying a path forward to try to repair the
damage. Here's hoping the rest of us have the good sense to listen this
time."
—Eric Alterman, professor of English and journalism,Brooklyn
College
"McChesney penetrates to the heart of the issue: Change the System/Change the Internet. Both/And—not Either/Or. Indispensable reading as we lay groundwork for the coming great movement to reclaimAmerica
—Gar Alperovitz, author of What Then Must We Do? Straight Talk About the Next American Revolution, and professor of political economy,University
of Maryland
"A provocative and far-reaching account of how capitalism has shaped the Internet in theUnited
States
—Kirkus Reviews
—Eric Alterman, professor of English and journalism,
"McChesney penetrates to the heart of the issue: Change the System/Change the Internet. Both/And—not Either/Or. Indispensable reading as we lay groundwork for the coming great movement to reclaim
—Gar Alperovitz, author of What Then Must We Do? Straight Talk About the Next American Revolution, and professor of political economy,
"A provocative and far-reaching account of how capitalism has shaped the Internet in the
—Kirkus Reviews
A PARADIGM-SHIFTING ANALYSIS OF THE
RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE INTERNET AND THE ECONOMY FROM THE CELEBRATED SCHOLAR AND AWARD-WINNING
AUTHOR
Robert McChesney is one of the nation’s most important analysts of
the media.
—Howard Zinn
Celebrants and skeptics alike have produced valuable analyses of
the Internet’s effect on us and our world, oscillating between utopian bliss
and dystopian hell. But according to Robert W. McChesney, arguments on both
sides fail to address the relationship between economic power and the Internet.
McChesney’s award-winning Rich Media, Poor Democracy skewered
the assumption that a society drenched in commercial information is a
democratic one. In Digital Disconnect, McChesney
returns to this provocative thesis in light of the advances of the digital age.
He argues that the sharp decline in the enforcement of antitrust violations,
the increase in patents on digital technology and proprietary systems and
massive indirect subsidies and other policies have made the Internet a place of
numbing commercialism. A
handful of monopolies now dominate the political economy, from Google, which
garners a 97 percent share of the mobile search market, to Microsoft, whose
operating system is used by over 90 percent of the world’s computers.
Capitalism’s colonization of the Internet has spurred the collapse
of credible journalism and made the internet an unparalleled apparatus for
government and corporate surveillance and a disturbingly antidemocratic force.
In Digital Disconnect, Robert McChesney
offers a groundbreaking critique of the Internet, urging us to reclaim the
democratizing potential of the digital revolution while we still can.
Robert W. McChesney is the Gutgsell endowed Professor in the Department of
Communication at the University
of Illinois Champaign ,
Illinois
Pub Date: Spring 2013
Format: hardcover
Trim: 6 1/8 x 9 1/4, 320 pages
ISBN: 978-1-59558
Format: hardcover
Trim: 6 1/8 x 9 1/4, 320 pages
ISBN: 978-1-59558
RELATED ESSAYS AND BOOKS
See Index to OMNI’s newsletters
Control
of Information in the United
States
James R. Bennett
An essential reference book to the most important and relevant
publications on the control of information in the United States, it includes
books and articles on every aspect of this highly topical subject--from
philosophical theory to the freedom of the press. It is the first bibliography
to deal exclusively with this area and will be of interest to all those
concerned with research in journalism, law, communications, and general American
history.
:James R. Bennett. Meckler/Greenwood Press. 1987.
2943 entries.
Pages: 616
Control of the Media in the United States
An Annotated Bibliography
The selections of Parts One and Two
describe a corporate state ominously separate from and dominant over the
democratic political process that should direct it, while selections in Part
Three suggest how the state might still be guided toward equity and justice for
all the people through more diverse, equal education and media.
END US ECONOMIC INEQUALITY/CORPORATE
MEDIA CONTROL OF INFORMATION IN THE US
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