Tolstoy and Media Bias

As Alex Luxenberg quoted in his media bias presentation, Leo Tolstoy once said, "The most difficult subjects can be explained to the most slow-witted man if he has not formed any idea of them already; but the simplest thing cannot be made clear to the most intelligent man if he is firmly persuaded that he knows already, without a shadow of doubt, what is laid before him." 

Since Alex made this quote in reference to the 2008 financial crisis, it reminded me of when I was watching the documentary Inside Job, which is about the 2008 crisis. I was watching the film assuming everything to be true since I had no real knowledge of the financial world or what caused the crisis, and my dad came into the room and watched for a little bit with me and kept complaining that the things they were saying were completely biased, and sometimes even untrue. It was my lack of knowledge about the financial world that allowed me to believe everything they said in the film, and not see the bias which was there.

Was Obama Really Born in Hawaii?

YES! Presidential hopeful Donald Trump is for some reason still hooked on the idea that President Obama was not born in Hawaii and is therefore not eligible to be President.  As many people have claimed including the State of Hawaii, that Obama's birth certificate which was presented was valid but this is not enough for "The Donald." He has researchers in Hawaii who claim to have found some stuff which we wouldn't believe.  On The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Jon mocked this absurd stunt, but what disturbed me the most was, as Jon reported, that his focus on this has not hurt him in the polls.  Is there something to this theory, do people actually believe Trump?  Until the information, which "we wouldn't believe" is released I don't see it helping Trump or hurting Obama in any significant way.

Was WikiLeaks to Blame for the Upheaval in the Mid-East?

In a lecture on the current state of affairs in the Middle East David Sanger the NY Times Chief Washington Correspondent, made a claim, that one of the reasons for the chaos which began in Tunisia, was started because of information about the lifestyles of the leaders which was leaked on WikiLeaks, and it was the embarrassment of the entire world knowing this which led to the revolution.  Is it really possible that WikiLeaks was actually able to on a somewhat direct level cause so much change?  We will see, as time goes on what, if any, other significant events unfold in response to the information exposed by WikiLeaks.

How Do we Learn the Issues?

During Wednesday's class activity, when discussing the different strategies for a Presidential campaign, something hit me.  I wasn't sure what the best way to publicize one's politics.  When discussing new media, my group focused on a youtube page, a facebook page, a twitter account, and a personal website.  It seemed that we used the facebook, and twitter accounts, more for personal things than the expression of political ideas.  We used youtube and the personal website to express the more political side of the candidate.  I began to think, are the youtube page and website really the best ways to promote the political side of a candidate?  I assume that a candidate's politics are about as important as their image, and if this is true, shouldn't there be equal promotion of the candidate's political image and their personal image?  If this is true, then shouldn't they be broadcast on the same venues?  A possible explanation for the different types of media being used for different aspects of a campaign, is the people being targeted with each type of media.  It could be that the politicians feel that those who use facebook and twitter are more focused on the personal image of the candidate, and those who look at the youtube page, and the personal website are more concerned with the politics of the candidate.

I Guess Bad is the New Good

On my blog, there appeared an ad for a media group, McCleskey Media, who I guess produce political ads.  On the main page, there are slides of the different advertising awards they won for different political ads.  I figured, if these ads are so good maybe I should check them out.  I clicked on the "Our Work" tab on the top of the page, and of the first seven ads I picked to watch six, were negative ads.  I'm guessing I didn't pick the only six negative ads on the page.  If these are the ads which are winning awards and elections, I guess going negative is the way to go. Do I think negative ads are better or worse than "content-free" ads, I'm honestly not sure, which by itself says something.  It should be obvious that negative ads are worse than anything positive but, they the "content-free" ads are so useless that it may actually be a tossup between the two.

What do TV Ads Do?

What is the real point of a political TV ad?  When it comes to products or services, the main purpose of an ad is to create brand recognition.  Is that true too by politics?  Is the point of TV ads for politicians just to get their name out there so people recognize it, and not to explain the ideas which the politician stands for?  If this were true then the popular "content-free" ads should be the perfect ads, because they are simple and they give the politician a recognizable, positive image to the politician.  If this were true then, in my humble opinion, negative ads would not be as popular.  I think the reason negative ads are so popular in politics and unpopular in any other sort of market, is because the aim of political advertising is different than regular advertising.  I think the point of political advertising is to create the believe in the minds of the viewers that the candidate featured in the ad, is the best person for the job.  It is not like when one is shopping and you decide to buy the brand you know.  People go to vote with the intent to vote for a certain candidate, so the aim of political ads is to create the belief that this candidate is the best, or in the case of a negative ad, the worst person for the job.  I think this is why there is so much negative advertising in politics and so little in regular market advertising.

You Gotta Watch What You Say Around Those Smart Kids

The spokesman for the State Department, Phillip Crowley, resigned on Sunday after remarks he made to a group of students at MIT.  He publicly criticized the treatment of PFC Manning, who was responsible for the leak of secret documents to Wikileaks.  After having been the administration's spokesman on the Wikileaks issue, Crowley comes out against his treatment by the DoD.  Interestingly enough, he did not recant his statement at any point.  I guess it makes sense that after his resignation there is no reason to try and hide his feelings, but why not recant and try and save his job?  It seemed that he was on his way out anyway, having been distant from Secretary of State Clinton, and having had a new deputy, who, many believed was soon to replace Crowley.  I guess that happened sooner than expected.  It was clear from another statement that he did not disagree with the imprisonment of PFC Manning, but only with his treatment.  I think it might be possible that since he saw himself as on the way out, he may have wanted to go out with a bang, but thats just my opinion and is based on no evidence.

The lesson seems to be, that when in a powerful position, one always needs to watch what they say.

The Freeness of Freedom of the Press

In our class discussion on Monday about New York Times v. US,  we discussed Justice Black's strict interpretation of the Constitution, meaning that when the First Amendment says "Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press" means literally no law, and the President act above that.  This idea of strict reading vs lose reading of the document is an argument which comes up often in other places.  The debate is centered around questions such as, do we read the Constitution today as it was read then?  Do we read it with the mindset of attempting to understand what the framers meant by it?  Do we read it as a document which was meant to be kept and read the same way as a when it was written or is it a living document which changes with the times?  These are questions which have been the basis for Constitutional debate for the last 200 years, and I don't really think I'm qualified to answer them for anyone else, but if I were a Supreme Court Justice and I needed to decide how I was going to read the Constitution, I would read it as it was written.  My reasoning for this is, that when there have been things in the Constitution which needed changes due to social changes, Amendments were made, and if the potential for Amendments is possible, then who am I to decide that the Constitution means something other than what it explicitly says.

FCC Censorship

Today's discussion about censorship of the media during war time reminded me of an episode of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, an NBC show from 2006-2007, about a late-night sketch comedy show.  There was an issue where the network was being fined by the FCC for carrying coverage of a soldier swearing on air, after an RPG exploded nearby.  The network executives felt that this fine was unfair because it was not something they could control and it was unexpected, and most importantly, thats what happens in war.

It brings up an important point which now exists with embedded reporters, which is, how much of the real war do we really wanna see?  It seemed that in this case, although fictional, the FCC didn't want the people to see the "real war" and everything it entails, only the clean version.  It also reminds me of, I believe, the only footage of the first plane hitting the WTC, where the firefighter who was on a training exercise swore when he saw what happened.  In that case, networks aired the video with a disclaimer about the expletive, while in the case in Studio 60, it was live and therefore there was no chance for a disclaimer, but should the FCC have fined them? It comes down to the issue of how much of war, is the government and media really willing to show us?

Could it be that We're Taking About the Issues, Already?

In a New York Times article today the title, "On the Stump, Gingrich Puts Focus on Faith," seems to imply that probable 2012 Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, could already be discussing the issues which he plans on making a major part of his campaign.  As we discussed earlier and I discussed in an earlier post, usually this early in the race there is little or no focus on issues but rather the focus tends to be on who is running not what is being run on.  Sadly the article really focuses on how Gingrich's personal views seem to to not fit so well with his parties views and the words that come out of his mouth.  I guess we'll have to wait a while for the real issues stories to come out.

Does the "President" Know His Stuff?

One would think that after 7 seasons and 8 years in the White House, actor Martin Sheen, who played President Josiah Bartlet on NBC's The West Wing, would know how things work around the White House.  In an interview in Washington this President's Day Weekend, Sheen was quoted as saying "You always know if he's home if the flag is up. If the flag isn't up, he's not home."  The problem is, thats not quite true.  Sorry Jed, you should probably learn your facts before you speak to the press.  I guess TV doesn't teach us everything we need to know about the White House.

http://www.politico.com/click/stories/1102/factchecking_president_bartlet.html

Somebody's Running Somebody's Not

As we discussed yesterday in class, when it comes to reporting on the 2012 elections, many races have begun.  What is being covered is not the issues which the candidates who are running care about, but rather what is being reported on the NY Times Politics Page is who is running and who is not running and how they made their announcement.

On another note, I find it interesting that Senator John Thune announced that he is not running on his Facebook page.  Not via a press release, not via a televised or radio address, but rather on his Facebook page.  Is there something wrong with this, or is Facebook taking on a larger and larger role in the political world.

"When drama fills the headlines, reason deserts the pundits"

In an article on foreignpolicy.com, under the picture the caption was "When drama fills the headlines, reason deserts the pundits." It seems kinda funny to me that a media outlet is admitting to the fact that when something very dramatic happens, there's no way of knowing whats actually happening, but rather we see some crazy things coming out of everyone's mouth, even supposed experts.

Governmental Social Networking

Social networks such as facebook and youtube, have become large parts of many Americans lives, and the government has figured they should jump on the bandwagon.  With the growth of these sites the government has seen these sites as a new way to reach out to Americans.  With the use of these sites as well as wh.gov, the White House can now get its message out to many more Americans than it was previously able to reach.  To be honest, before I discovered the WH's pages on youtube and facebook, the only way i knew about anything that happened in government was though watching or reading the news which obviously has its own slant.  Now I can find out what my government is doing straight from the source.  It is amazing the number of different ways the government now has of engaging the people online.  There are 9 different websites on the WH facebook page which serve to connect the people to their government.  I say the more the merrier, and I'm happy to say that with the help of these sites I am more informed on the happenings of my government.

http://www.facebook.com/WhiteHouse
http://www.youtube.com/whitehouse
http://www.whitehouse.gov/

Obama's Fireside Chats

As we discussed today, in the mid 1800s the White House had its own paper through which it expressed its views.  As times change, the mode through the President expresses his views to the people changes.  FDR had his fireside chats, and apparently President Obama has a weekly address which is available on whitehouse.gov.  What I find interesting in comparing the mode Jackson used in the 1830s, what FDR did in the 1930s and 40s, and what Obama does today, is that until I looked on the White House website to look for something interesting to blog about, I didn't know that these Obama weekly addresses were happening.  As far as I knew, the only time Obama addressed the public is when its on the major news networks.  Whats interesting about this, is that since it isn't picked up by the major news outlets, there is very little commented on what the President says in these weeks addresses, which makes them completely unimportant, especially compared to the official newspapers in Jackson's times and the fireside chats in FDR's times.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/weekly-address
In case you wanna see this address by the President.