This is an astute analysis; an excerpt:
The American right wing is achieving its long-term goal of becoming the nation's thought police. They are realizing this goal through the timeless practices of extremists...which are intimidation, slander and harassment. In the past several months, conservative outbursts have ruined the careers of journalists, most of whom were of the political center, but who were indiscreet enough to say something that ran counter to the right's version of political correctness....
[Discusses cases of CNN's Octavia Nasr, Helen Thomas, David Weigel formerly of the Washington Post, Eason Jordan formerly of CNN, etc.]
Why is the screaming right so effective? Is it merely the volume? No, it is more complicated than that. Here is my explanation:
First, the Background:
1. In their daily lives the vast majority of Americans are apolitical. They really don't care about left or right politics because it doesn't seem to have much to do with their local lives. They are, however, the consumer audience for which the media outlets compete.
2. While inherently apolitical, this audience does not live in an apolitical media environment. In my opinion, there is no "objective media," much less a "liberal" one. The majority of the media outlets are one of two kinds. They are either: a) overtly conservative because they are owned by right-wing ideologues who are interested in inserting their ultra-conservative worldview into the heads of their audience (the Murdoch/Fox News bunch), or, b) they are "politically neutral" media operations (often owned by bigger businesses like Westinghouse and Disney) whose foremost interest is making a profit (CNN and its ilk)....
3. Since the end of World War II, leftist ideas have been demonized almost out of existence in the US. And, since 9/11, the "commies" have been transformed into Muslims. These simplistic stereotypes set the parameters for correct and patriotic thinking in this country, and they are delivered to you at different levels of intensity by both the conservative and "neutral" media systems. No matter how apolitical one might be in one's daily local life, these notions are in the media air, so to speak. You take them in almost by osmosis. They mess with your mind without you realizing it.
The Foreground:
1. This situation gives the political right a very big head start when it comes to shaping public opinion and then policing the "neutral" corporate media to make sure it does not step out of line. The right is very good at this because their leaders and spokespeople tend to be bullies and authoritarians....The liberal centrists tend to be accommodating rather than resistant to right-wing bullying.
2. The "neutral" media that is primarily concerned with the bottom line, their owners and bureaucratic operators, readily sacrifice the principles underpinning a free press if they are seen as hurting the company image....
3. So, you put together a for-profit, largely unprincipled, "neutral" media with an aggressive political right run by loud-mouthed thugs, throw in a liberal political class that has very little backbone, and you get the present day situation.
The preceding analysis also brings to mind Stephen Walt's sound advice, no doubt borne of bitter experience, about how to handle the right-wing slime-and-smear machine, a machine we know a bit about (though not as much as Measheimer & Walt, to be sure!). Indeed, one aspect of this whole discussion that certainly resonates here (based on my experience in years past, when I did more political blogging), is the really creepy propensity of the right-wing crazies--from the Straussians to the religious extremists (see the "Final Update") to the genuinely disturbed--to resort, almost immediately, to irrelevant character assassination, slander, and actual personal attacks (i.e., attacks on the person unrelated to the position being attacked--so not mere harmless epithets like "idiot" or "jerk" as a way of expressing disagreement, nor conclusions about intelligence or competence based on evidence, as discussed here). The astonishing need some of these people have to invent misdeeds, make false allegations, and attack any aspect of the target's life, no matter how remote from the subject at hand, used to astonish me, but it seems an increasingly popular tactic of the right-wing zealots, both in cyberspace and in real life.
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