The Progressives feel threatened because Fox Cable News, Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin and a few other Conservative Talk Radio host, along with a handful of newspapers and magazines are out pacing sales compared to the rest of the Main Stream Media that they control. That has to be the boldest lie written yet. Joseph Goebbels the propaganda minister of Germany's National Socialist Party once said, "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it".
The Progressives not only have the rest of the media; CNN, MSNBC, ABC, NBC, CBS almost all other printed propaganda magazines and fish wraps, but they also have us paying for it with our taxes for NPR!
NYDaily News
NYDaily News
Republicans wrote the political dictionary: It's proof Democrats don't control the media
Joshua Greenman
Friday, February 4th 2011, 4:00 AM
t's hard to know where to begin in dismantling the Republican canard that Democrats control the media. Fox News is the most popular 24-hour news network by a whoosh and a cachung. Rush Limbaugh is the most powerful radio host, and lots of little Limbaughs line up behind him. Sarah Palin is the biggest media-political crossover star. And in an increasingly fragmented Internet, the Drudge Report continues to drives more political traffic than any other website. In italics and bold, to boot.
I don't begrudge conservatives this success. It speaks to message discipline and to feeding tasty food to a hungry audience. An audience that is right of center, which left-wingers far too often fail to acknowledge.
But on top of all this real-world evidence of right-wing media primacy is even more compelling evidence that there's no such thing as a Dominant Liberal Media Elite: You can't control the conversation if you don't control the language.
The New York Times doesn't decide what words we use, nor does CNN or NPR. Our political vocabulary comes from the mouths of crafty conservatives, and that's the ultimate proof that they steer the conversation.
Obamacare. Pity the poor congressional and White House staffers who spent hours coming up with the bromidic name "Affordable Care Act" only to see the 2,300 page bill (which Republicans complained Obama played far too passive a role in shaping) get labeled, for all eternity, "Obamacare." This of course, is an update of the equally elegant Hillarycare. It's interesting to note that both were used, from the get go, as slurs, unlike, say, "Reaganomics." (Compare this to, say, "No Child Left Behind," which has never for a second been called Bushducation - though that would have been pretty catchy.)
Using the supposedly massive megaphone of the Liberal Media, Democrats, who were sensitive - hypersensitive, in my mind - to the Obamacare implication, tried to replace it with a blander formulation emphasizing insurance regulation.
Resistance was futile; Obamacare is punchy. It's descriptive. It works.
Pro-life. The history here is too complex to recount, but suffice to say that in a debate pitting the rights of women to have abortion, on the one hand, against the rights of unborn children to be carried to term, on the other, two madeup terms have defined the opposing sides: pro-choice and pro-life. The one the Republicans coined, and which now stands on terminologically equal footing with the Democrats' chosen term, is far superior; as sure as rock beats scissors, life beats choice.
Democrat Party. Liberals may moan and complain and repeatedly correct those who drop the "ic," but that makes them sound petty. Nobody understands why "Democrat Party" is a slur, but everyone knows that it is. That's the beauty of the Republicans continuing to use their devious little dig.
Apology tour. In 2009, President Obama visited lots of countries. On this trip, he said lots of things, the vast majority of which were explicitly intended to robustly advance American interests. P.S.: He also admitted that the United States has made some mistakes throughout its history, most recently during the two terms of George W. Bush's presidency. What was it? It was an apology tour.
Mainstream media. Try to follow the logic here: It's a bad thing to be considered outside of the political mainstream. There's certainly nothing wrong with mainstream religion, mainstream values or mainstream business. But somehow, the "mainstream media" is a slur, said with a sneer, because it's perceived to be controlled by the left. Oh, and it's not just "mainstream," which suggests playing to the broad swath of the American public; it's simultaneously "elite."
And to heap irony on top of illogic, right-wing voices malign the mainstream media from their powerful perches in the mainstream media.
Once the negative connotation stuck, it then became the "MSM" - which sounds more like an STD or an enemy Borg. To Limbaugh, it became the "drive-by media" - which is reckless and, I guess, shoots to kill. To Palin, it became "lamestream."
How'd they do it? It's brazen and amazing. Call it brazamazing, though I doubt that will stick.
Democrats have had their share of diction victories; "trickle-down economics" became part of the lexicon. So did "birthers." So did "teabaggers," a totally unfair distortion of a movement that deserves at least a modicum of respect.
But these are minor and mostly meaningless. It's a Republican language. The rest of us, we're just speaking it.
jgreenman@nydailynews.com
Joshua Greenman
Friday, February 4th 2011, 4:00 AM
t's hard to know where to begin in dismantling the Republican canard that Democrats control the media. Fox News is the most popular 24-hour news network by a whoosh and a cachung. Rush Limbaugh is the most powerful radio host, and lots of little Limbaughs line up behind him. Sarah Palin is the biggest media-political crossover star. And in an increasingly fragmented Internet, the Drudge Report continues to drives more political traffic than any other website. In italics and bold, to boot.
I don't begrudge conservatives this success. It speaks to message discipline and to feeding tasty food to a hungry audience. An audience that is right of center, which left-wingers far too often fail to acknowledge.
But on top of all this real-world evidence of right-wing media primacy is even more compelling evidence that there's no such thing as a Dominant Liberal Media Elite: You can't control the conversation if you don't control the language.
The New York Times doesn't decide what words we use, nor does CNN or NPR. Our political vocabulary comes from the mouths of crafty conservatives, and that's the ultimate proof that they steer the conversation.
Obamacare. Pity the poor congressional and White House staffers who spent hours coming up with the bromidic name "Affordable Care Act" only to see the 2,300 page bill (which Republicans complained Obama played far too passive a role in shaping) get labeled, for all eternity, "Obamacare." This of course, is an update of the equally elegant Hillarycare. It's interesting to note that both were used, from the get go, as slurs, unlike, say, "Reaganomics." (Compare this to, say, "No Child Left Behind," which has never for a second been called Bushducation - though that would have been pretty catchy.)
Using the supposedly massive megaphone of the Liberal Media, Democrats, who were sensitive - hypersensitive, in my mind - to the Obamacare implication, tried to replace it with a blander formulation emphasizing insurance regulation.
Resistance was futile; Obamacare is punchy. It's descriptive. It works.
Pro-life. The history here is too complex to recount, but suffice to say that in a debate pitting the rights of women to have abortion, on the one hand, against the rights of unborn children to be carried to term, on the other, two madeup terms have defined the opposing sides: pro-choice and pro-life. The one the Republicans coined, and which now stands on terminologically equal footing with the Democrats' chosen term, is far superior; as sure as rock beats scissors, life beats choice.
Democrat Party. Liberals may moan and complain and repeatedly correct those who drop the "ic," but that makes them sound petty. Nobody understands why "Democrat Party" is a slur, but everyone knows that it is. That's the beauty of the Republicans continuing to use their devious little dig.
Apology tour. In 2009, President Obama visited lots of countries. On this trip, he said lots of things, the vast majority of which were explicitly intended to robustly advance American interests. P.S.: He also admitted that the United States has made some mistakes throughout its history, most recently during the two terms of George W. Bush's presidency. What was it? It was an apology tour.
Mainstream media. Try to follow the logic here: It's a bad thing to be considered outside of the political mainstream. There's certainly nothing wrong with mainstream religion, mainstream values or mainstream business. But somehow, the "mainstream media" is a slur, said with a sneer, because it's perceived to be controlled by the left. Oh, and it's not just "mainstream," which suggests playing to the broad swath of the American public; it's simultaneously "elite."
And to heap irony on top of illogic, right-wing voices malign the mainstream media from their powerful perches in the mainstream media.
Once the negative connotation stuck, it then became the "MSM" - which sounds more like an STD or an enemy Borg. To Limbaugh, it became the "drive-by media" - which is reckless and, I guess, shoots to kill. To Palin, it became "lamestream."
How'd they do it? It's brazen and amazing. Call it brazamazing, though I doubt that will stick.
Democrats have had their share of diction victories; "trickle-down economics" became part of the lexicon. So did "birthers." So did "teabaggers," a totally unfair distortion of a movement that deserves at least a modicum of respect.
But these are minor and mostly meaningless. It's a Republican language. The rest of us, we're just speaking it.
jgreenman@nydailynews.com
http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2011/02/04/2011-02-04_republicans_wrote_the_political_dictionary_its_proof_democrats_dont_control_the_.html
*Oh and by the way. I'm continuing to enjoy how the Liberals are using every opportunity to attack the Conservative Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin. I haven't seen this type of fear for a Conservative politician since President Ronald R. Reagan.
*Oh and by the way. I'm continuing to enjoy how the Liberals are using every opportunity to attack the Conservative Governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin. I haven't seen this type of fear for a Conservative politician since President Ronald R. Reagan.
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