Dan Rather: The News Americans Need

[babylonsister]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/07/AR2009080703183.html

The News Americans Need

By Dan Rather
Sunday, August 9, 2009


You don't have to care about media companies or reporters to care about the state of the news, because if it's in trouble -- and it surely is -- this country is in trouble. That's why, while speaking recently at the Aspen Institute, I called upon President Obama to form a commission to address the perilous state of America's news media.

Some might scoff at the notion that a president and a country occupied by two wars and a recession should add the woes of the news media to an already crowded plate. But the way the news is delivered, and the quality of the information the American public receives about what's going on here and abroad, has and will continue to have a profound effect on these very issues and on the overall quality of government by, for and of the people.

I am not calling for any sort of government bailout for media companies. Nor am I encouraging any form of government control over them. I want the president to convene a nonpartisan, blue-ribbon commission to assess the state of the news as an institution and an industry and to make recommendations for improving and stabilizing both.

Why bring the president into it? Because this is the only way I could think of to generate the sort of attention this subject deserves. Academia and think tanks generate study after study, yet their findings don't reach the people who need to be reached.

We need a real and broad public discussion of the role news is meant to play in our democratic system of government and a better public understanding of the American news infrastructure's fragile condition. We need to know how things got this way and what we need to change.

snip//

We need news that breeds understanding, not contempt; news that fosters a healthy skepticism of the workings of power rather than a paralyzing cynicism. We need the basic information that a self-governing people requires. The old news model is crumbling, while the Internet, for all its immense promise, is not yet ready to rise in its place -- and won't be until it can provide the nuts-and-bolts reporting that most people so take for granted that it escapes their notice.

This is a crisis that, with no exaggeration, threatens our democratic republic at its core. But you won't hear about it on your evening news, unless the message can be delivered in a way that corporate media have little choice but to report -- such as, say, the findings of a presidential commission.

[Chemisse]

1. It is a huge problem and it would be great to see a fix

But wouldn't having Obama involved just make it seem like a partisan attempt to restore the 'liberal media'?

Maybe if he appointed a bipartisan commission.

[Maccagirl]

2. Exactly-every time the subject of "fairness" is brought up

the RW screams "censorship' and "librul". Obama cannot solve the problem of people wanting to watch or read the news that supports their worldview. This started in earnest in the Reagan era and until the $$$ is taken out of the media we are stuck in this quagmire.

[depakid]

3. The country needs de-consolidation and re-regulation

not some toothless commission.

[Raspberry]

4. Dan Rather will always be remembered for one thing

"Fake, but accurate."

I wish he would just go away.

[babylonsister]

5. Do you work for cbs? Sounds like you do. Are you a corporate shill?

Do you know that his voice of honesty was silenced? Did you know this? Apparently someone thinks he has a valid argument.

Dan Rather Gets Discovery-CBS LAWSUIT-Moves Forward

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x2649271

[jotsy]

6. Actually Ms. Sister, believe I saw them lips on a rabid righty's website somewhere.

I thought I'd go looking for this Diana wench who called the SEIU, supposedly from my home state. Didn't find that nimrod but got an eyeful of such a load of garbage along the way.

Case in point: Some chicky named Laura Bell has sent an anonymous letter to every member of government, she says she speaks for "millions" of Americans, yet the number of members in this group is less than 500. Now simple math suggests that even if she's counting all 50 states, using theirs as an average, that's a whopping 25,000, a few zeros short, ain't it? They would all be so laughable if they weren't so instinctively vicious and inflammatory. It was pretty depressing really, to learn so many narrow, frightened and programmable minds within such close proximity, makes me feel like a need a shower.

[sabrina 1]

7. Dan Rather will always be remembered

as one of last of the best journalists this country has seen. He was always fearless in digging up facts no matter how far around the globe he had to travel to do so and airc, was generally accurate in his reporting.

His story on AWOL Bush was correct in every way. Bush's defenders chose to forge a document in a desperated attempt to cover up the true story of the country's worst and most cowardly president.

Other than that forgery, something which only the forgerers are responsible for, (and aside from the fact that the information was confirmed by the woman who typed it) the story was a shocking revelation of the facts surrounding a man who never should have president of the US.

CBS is being sued now by Dan Rather and I hope he drags every one of those who set out to deceive the public and cover for a criminal in the WH, into this case and places them under oath.

Mostly, I hope he drags the cowardly, freeper lawyer who has been hiding ever since the whole thing happened, out into the open and compels him, under oath, to tell the truth.

Dan Rather was never the story, Karl Rove made him the story and it worked only because of the betrayal of CBS of both Rather and the American public. I hope they have to pay out millions although I know Dan Rather doesn't care about that.

He's right that something needs to be done about what we call 'news media'.

[rhett o rick]

8. What a strange thing for a liberal to say. His presence is very intimidating to the assholes

that screwed him, and US. I hope he keeps in the headlines and keeps the pressure on the bastards.

Why do you want him to "just go away"?

[The Doctor.]

9. Ignorance doesn't fly well around here. You apparently don't understand

How he was set up.

Everything you could possibly need to research the issue;

http://www.journalism.org/node/105

Feel free to ask questions. Only ignorant people don't ask.

[Raster]

13. This person won't be asking questions. "Her" problem is not ignorance.

Just another disinformation troll doing their Sunday morning drive-bys.

[Raster]

11. I wish you would just go away, and I'm sure it won't be long.

Do you really think anyone believes your deliberate disinformation bullshit?

Don't look now, ms. troll, but Dan Rather is about to have his *DAYS* in court. Evidence will be presented that will (1) demonstrate that there was a concerted effort on the part of CBS news upper management to hang Rather out to dry, for reporting a story on ol' AWOL Dubya that was in essence completely correct. Rather will be able to (2) demonstrate that the reich-wing blogosphere was deliberately and maliciously fed lies in order to hang Rather out to dry.

In short: Go fuck yourself. Go back to whatever GOP-fronted sleaze factory you came from. Now. Be gone. You have no power here.
:kick:

[lib_wit_it]

12. Unacceptable to those of you who demand Fake *and* inaccurate, and get it from Faux Noise.

[madamesilverspurs]

10. There were damned good reasons

for the regulations that governed media ownership. With the demise and/or neutering of those regulations, our mainstream media has become part and parcel of the military/industrial complex that Eisenhower warned against. When those who own the "news" also own the factories that produce high-profit weapons there is a vested interest in maintaining demand for their products. Our mainstream media has capitulated to the concept that "there's no money to be made in peace." For that reason, to my thinking, the media owners are behind every effort to regulate (read 'gain control of') the internet.

Like the insurance companies that have everything to lose if we succeed with reforming health care, media owners have good reason to be concerned about the internet. I'm among those who believe that the only silver lining on the very black cloud of Florida 2000 was the explosive growth of the blogosphere, a result that MSM failed to anticipate. If we ever get back to any semblance of integrity in MSM journalism the credit for that will go to citizen based cyperjournalists.


To see who owns what, go here: http://www.freepress.net/ownership/chart/main

[Mr. Sparkle]

14. Great article by Dan. He has hit the nail on the head there in a very subtle way.

It was in the 80's where to media began to lose its independence and because just another arm of a corporation. There are very few media outlets these days that remain independent.

The success of the blogs came from the corporate take over of the media, when there was no place left for those who did not follow the right or the far right line.