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PARTISAN POLITICS

Rush Limbaugh and MSNBC Squashing Debate?

Partisan news outlets don't want criticism of their own side

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by PolitixMayday

Staff Writer t

Image: AP

Rush Limbaugh and MSNBC have more in common than either would like to admit. They both willingly supress criticism of their preferred political party in an effort to help them win elections, writes the Guardian's Glenn Greenwald. And the problem of press-suppressed criticism is worsening as the permanent political cycle lengthens.

Greenwald has previously written on the subject of the "permanent campaign," noting that for a typical 48-month presidential term, the press spends 18 of those covering campaigns. That allows the sitting president to quietly push an agenda without much scrutiny. This weakens the media's role as an informer of government activities, even when they claim they'll be more critical.

What both Limbaugh and MSNBC highlight, Greenwald notes, is that all political discussion must first go through a partisan lens focused on "the evils of the other party" while espousing the benefits of their own.

So while progressivists, or conservatives, say they'll be more aggressive with their own party, as previously highlighted, the impulse to defeat the other side will always subsume the desire to critique how one's own party wields power.

Via the Guardian
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Do you think news stations have it in them to be critical of their own party?

55 Comments (view in Forum)

  • Tralee
    !
    "Do you think news stations have it in them to be critical of their own party?" LOL - if they were professionals, perhaps, but since the MSM has morphed into the 3rd arm of the DNC, they are just shills for them. Who cares what they say? It's just the standard misinformation and disinformation and outright lies that are now standard fare from the MSM. No wonder we have low information voters, they see these shows regurgitate the party line and lies over and over and pretty much not being the sharpest knives in the drawer to begin with, just go with it, believing all the junk they are told, then the poor sheep go into the voting booth and vote against the man who supposedly is going to ban contraception (LOL - yeah right) do away with Green Cards (NOT) and of course the newest meme of the progressive party, going to give all their rich friends a huge tax break and make the middle class pay a ton more. Poor useful idiots believe it all and then vote.
  • Zazziness
    !
    Folks didn't think Romney was going to give the wealthy a huge tax break and tax the middle class because of progressive media. They thought that because his campaign web site said that was part of his economic plan.
  • Dan_Tien
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    Excellent example of the subject in question: unreserved criticism of the side that you dislike without any mention of the frothy feces served up by the people that you agree with.
  • marine1
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    unfortunately,nowhere in the constitution does it require freedom of the truthfull press and if I'm not mistaken, I believe that Jefferson had reservations about a politiclly bias press.

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  • Pack7
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    @Denizen_Kate
    They are not part of the so called Main Stream Media that has been force feeding the American public for over 50 years. I refer to ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN. There is not a more hateful bunch of people anywhere than on MSNBC. That red faced bozo Schultz and the ghoulish faced O'Donnell are the two biggest democrat hate Mongers on TV. I don't listen to any of the people you mention. I don't need to.
  • Hireman
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    @Denizen_Kate They are definitely not Democrats. But you are listing the one channel that supports the right. The rest are either left-leaning or overboard-left.
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  • Zazziness
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    @CanisCanemEdit I think it's the other way around, since Bill Maher saw how the right wing shock jocks were profiting and he thought he'd get him some of that. I don't care for either, really.
  • PNWest
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    The right wing has a near monopoly on the public airwaves right now and as a result of this we have seen the rise of the uneducated mass of Rush Limbaugh listening Tea Baggers who have nearly destroyed the GOP. We need to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine. That way both side will have equal time to present their arguments and the extremism of the right will be tempered by the logic of the left.
  • artjeb
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    The right wing has a near monopoly on the public airwaves ?? Why was it only FOX was the only one being accoused of the only one being a lying news media ? All the others got a free pas by the liberals
  • Keyjo
    !
    "In 1985, under FCC Chairman Mark S. Fowler, a communications attorney who had served on Ronald Reagan's presidential campaign staff in 1976 and 1980, the FCC released a report stating that the doctrine hurt the public interest and violated free speech rights guaranteed by the First Amendment.
    In August 1987, under FCC Chairman Dennis R. Patrick, the FCC abolished the doctrine by a 4-0 vote, in the Syracuse Peace Council decision, which was upheld by a panel of the Appeals Court for the D.C. Circuit in February 1989.[13] The FCC suggested in Syracuse Peace Council that because of the many media voices in the marketplace, the doctrine be deemed unconstitutional, stating that:
    “ The intrusion by government into the content of programming occasioned by the enforcement of [the Fairness Doctrine] restricts the journalistic freedom of broadcasters ...[and] actually inhibits the presentation of controversial issues of public importance to the detriment of the public and the degradation of the editorial prerogative of broadcast journalists.”
    At the 4-0 vote, Chairman Patrick said,
    “ We seek to extend to the electronic press the same First Amendment guarantees that the print media have enjoyed since our country's inception.[14]”
    The FCC vote was opposed by members of Congress who said the FCC had tried to "flout the will of Congress" and the decision was "wrongheaded, misguided and illogical.".[15] The decision drew political fire and tangling, where cooperation with Congress was at issue.[16] In June 1987, Congress attempted to preempt the FCC decision and codify the Fairness Doctrine,[17] but the legislation was vetoed by President Ronald Reagan. Another attempt to revive the doctrine in 1991 was stopped when President George H.W. Bush threatened another veto.[18]
    Fowler said in February 2009 that his work toward revoking the Fairness Doctrine under the Reagan Administration had been a matter of principle (his belief that the Doctrine impinged upon the First Amendment), not partisanship. Fowler described the White House staff raising concerns, at a time before the prominence of conservative talk radio and during the preeminence of the Big Three television networks and PBS in political discourse, that repealing the policy would be politically unwise. He described the staff's position as saying to Reagan:
    “ The only thing that really protects you from the savageness of the three networks—every day they would savage Ronald Reagan—is the Fairness Doctrine, and Fowler is proposing to repeal it!"

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fairness_Doctrin...

    The Republicans have only themselves to blame.
  • Denizen_Kate
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    The Fairness Doctrine was enacted back in 1949, when there were only three broadcast channels in metropolitan areas and sometimes fewer in rural areas. The doctrine was created to ensure that, as a public service, important political and social issues were given significant air time, and both sides of issues were presented. Back then, it was prohibitively expensive and difficult to get broadcast time, and the Fairness Doctrine was needed. Now, anyone with a smart phone can spew opinion-as-information free of charge with a world wide reach, so I don't think the Fairness Doctrine would be helpful anymore.
  • MarkJM
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    The reason the "Fairness Doctrine" was shot down because of the availability of information as well as this little thing called the First Amendment. Oh btw, the majority of television news is Liberal while Conservative Talk Radio is mainly on the AM airwaves (some FM waves). Last I checked today, more people watch TV than listen to the radio. Additionally, with the internet, people have a choice as to what news they would prefer to tune into. Of course, it would be nice if those over-paid talking heads would just take a backseat and actual News were broadcast for once.
  • Comment removed for Engagement Etiquette violation. Replies may also be deleted.
  • Dan_Tien
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    I would like to see at least one network devoted to non-political news (weather, traffic, price of butter...) and then the rest could be left up to the All Propaganda networks.
  • Republican5001
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    @Vance1 I didn't watch the RNC or Fox News because I already agree with them and the republican ideology. I usually watch my enemies to determine their next move.
  • Cheenoguy
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    Fox "news" and the Republican Party are openly willing to screw 98% of the country for the sake of 2%. That is anti-Americans.
    I wish they were radically socialist. Instead they are slightly liberal.

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  • martydotcom
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    They are in business to make money. The talking heads MSNBC, Rush, Fox or Beck et al nothing more than hucksters sell a line their audience wants to hear. They're not squashing debate, they just.advertisers buy time becase a audience tunes in
  • DARSB
    !
    Poor Glenn. He bases his conclusion on a Pew study that doesn't really say what he says it does. In its analysis of the positive/negative nature of stories about the President and Mr Romney in the later days of the campaign, Pew sums up the numbers, "However, most of the difference during that period could be accounted for by the horse-race stories, which generally showed Obama with small leads in important state and national polls. If those horse-race stories were removed from the sample, the coverage of the two candidates became quite similar-15% of the remaining campaign stories about Obama were positive, 32% were negative and 53% were mixed. For Romney it was 14% positive, 32% negative and 55% mixed." http://goo.gl/rAKd0
  • bsking
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    what was the purpose of that little paragraph to insinuate that the media is just too busy covering the campaign can be objective and do its job in questioning the government? that's ridiculous.
    MSNBC.. NBC... ABC.. CBS... NPR... CNN... HLN... current.... not to mention all the local affiliates... were all busy actively campaigning for Obama . that's why they can't do their job questioning the government
  • PoliticalSpice
    !
    Yes, i do. I've watched both fox and msnbc. I've seen both criticize candidates of ther own party, though i find fox less critical of their own and more dishonest, i feel both examine their own candidates. Fox is very critical of moderal repubs, and msnbc tends to be critical of the more conservative dems.
  • Buzzfriendly
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    No they don't but here is the problem. Rush Limbaugh is not news he is a talk radio broadcaster MSNBC is supposed to be a "news" outlet. Rush's venue is an appropriate place for opinion but not news, MSNBC is an appropriate place for news but not opinion.
  • harold
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    I've said several times here that the teabagger neocons would have to be dispensed with before any good would happen.
    Now I'll add that neocon teabagger blowhards and biased news outlets such as Fox and MSNBC need to be exiled as well. It would be unAmerican to force them off the air, but we should agree that reasonable people do not watch them.
    But that's not enough either. We also need to recognize all the special interests that are trying to take advantage of the fiscal crisis to try and skew things their way.
    Be alert, but not afraid.
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