A lot of people around our country and no doubt around the world are saying and writing about the events of this day seventeen years ago. Remembering. Honoring. I too am reflecting as well, though my thoughts probably run just a bit differently than most. Which is perhaps not unusual.
I am thinking about the spectacles more recently past. The Kavanaugh confirmation. The Manafort trial. The Papadopolous sentencing. The 2016 election. It seems to me something is rotten in the State of Denmark. Though perhaps we as a nation have not quite put our finger on where the rot really lives.
It is in my mind to say this. It is always a mistake to assume those who scream the loudest represent the majority. This is the power of lunatic fringes. They make a lot of noise and smoke. It is also a mistake to assume the majority of what you see on TV and cable news presents an accurate reflection of reality. It does not. It does represent a majority of opinion within those organizations. If that opinion is only based upon what will generate the best ratings as opposed to ideological homogeneity, which many suspect, it doesn't really matter. The results are the same. The power of the media also lies in their ability to make a lot of noise and smoke.
Neither of these things, the screaming of the enraged or the preponderance of pomposity from the self proclaimed pundits, necessarily represents anything approaching a true consensus.
I am also thinking about the days and months leading up to the 2012 election. I am thinking of the a particular instance which to me represented a moment of remarkable insight. I had chanced upon a forum on the internet where people were discussing, among other things, the imminent impeachment of Barack Obama. They certainly had done their research. They recited the many charges chapter and verse. Of course one of those issues involved questions as to his citizenship and eligibility to even be president.
I had not really given much credence or thought to that particular charge, but what I saw made me curious. So I did some research on the subject with respect to law and precedent. What I found was clear. Even if Barack Obama had been born in Kenya it wouldn't have mattered one bit. His mother was an American citizen. Because of that, no matter where he was born, Obama is also a natural born US citizen with no need to become naturalized. There are only two kinds of US citizens, natural born or naturalized.
So I jumped back into this forum. I presented the facts along with links to and excerpts from the statutes. Would you like to guess the reaction I received? If you guessed complete and absolute denial you would be right. No one even acknowledged my comments. They simply refused to listen.
Why? Because the unreality, the fantasy if you will, had become too important. It had become a part of their identity. They had become blind to any other truth but their own.
I honestly see no real difference between what I saw and experienced leading up to the 2012 election and what I see today in the wake of the 2016 election, except for one thing. Back then the media acted to shut down the lunatic fringe. By ignoring them or actively demonizing them and anything they had to say, even if some of it was true. They also actively worked to associate those who were speaking truth or who simply did not agree with that lunatic fringe and demonize them by that association. The media also acted to actively support what the Obama administration said as truth, to positively spin any misstatement, to deflect any attack, to down play any lie exposed, to defend any failure.
Today the media is playing an entirely different role. No theory or story is too wild or outrageous. That which is unsubstantiated is substantiated because it aligns with their opinion. They substantiate it by printing it or stating it as truth. They are only to happy to broadcast or print anything as true as long as it matches their opinion, as long as it promotes their aims. They have spun anything they possibly could into a negative. They have trumpeted any misstep as a catastrophe. Everything is the end of the world. Every right is in danger and people will die.
It has become clear the media has purpose, a purpose which really has very little to do with truth.
We have entered the era of supposition as fact, the era of naked bias. The era of half truths, that most insidious of all lies. The era of the retraction issued half heartedly, late, or not at all. The era of the media trying to construct the appearance of the reality they wish to bring into being.
Or perhaps we have existed in that era all along. It has only now become manifestly evident and is only becoming more so with each passing day.
No comments:
Post a Comment