
Time to Change the Game
One of the standard laments of conservatives has been and remains the unconscionable bias of the mainstream media. The bulk of so-called mainstream media outlets are so thoroughly in the tank for Obama, and indeed any leftist cause, that it has become impossible to discern between them and the party they shamelessly favor in their reporting. The Benghazi story offers abundant evidence of this trend, but the truth is that the media has been skewed heavily in favor of the left for the whole of my life. What some will have noted is that the character of the bias has changed, having become more thoroughly unabashed. I believe this owes to the success of talk radio in the 1990s, led by Rush Limbaugh, but also by “new media” of which I suppose I must now admit I am a part. The mainstream media is too inflexible to roll with the punches, and instead have become the televised and print versions of a leftist talk radio. For years, they tried with virtually no success to compete in that format, and having failed, they’ve simply decided to make television and newspapers resemble talk radio. Expert at manipulating imagery like all true propagandists, they’ve simply turned the nightly news into a thirty minute screed for leftists views.
Naturally, the problem is that they still claim the mantle of “objective journalism,” all while carrying out purely partisan scripting and editing. Rather than complain about them, however, we have an option. We can’t expect them to “play fair,” whatever that means, but we have it in us to make them mostly irrelevant. If we want to defeat the left, we will need to vanquish their media as credible sources of information. Each of you has it in your power to take part in that effort.
Every one of you is a reporter. With the advent of social media, like Twitter and Facebook, there isn’t one of you who doesn’t have a story to tell, and there isn’t one of you who doesn’t have something to add to the discussion. Tell it. Add it. Do it relentlessly. Whether you write a small blog like this one, post a points you’d like to make on Facebook, send out emails, or “tweet” your opinion one-hundred-forty characters at a time, get to it. The lame-stream media doesn’t want to talk about Benghazi? Fine. You talk about Benghazi, but do it frequently and relentlessly. Throw in remarks where appropriate, and don’t be afraid to share. You’d be surprised what sort of an effect that will have, not only on the political discourse in the country, but also on a media that wishes to be relevant most of all. They want to shape stories, but more, they try to shape what is the story. Your staunch refusal to move on to other issues and stories will put an end to their migrations away from topics they’d rather see finished.
You might argue that you’re just one small voice in an endless sea of voices, but believe me, the power of one voice in the right moment and context cannot be overestimated. Sometimes, it’s just the weight of one more voice pushing against the dam that will make it burst. Sure, at the moment the media is using the storm on the East coast to drive the discussion away from Benghazi, and any number of issues, including the stunted economic growth numbers, but nothing says you must participate in their cover-ups. To the contrary, you can have an impact simply by talking about the stories that you see as important, and if enough of you do, the media will rush back to you, because what they dare not permit is that they would become irrelevant in the water-cooler talk of the day. It’s up to you. Sure, the media can try to bury stories, but they can only bury them if nobody is talking about them. You have the power to change that. You do. If sunshine is the best disinfectant, then what we need is a good deal more of it.
While some might argue that we’d have been better off never knowing the full scale of the depravity of Bill Clinton, what would we remember about him if not for Drudge? He’s now one of the biggest voices in the sea. What is the legacy of Andrew Breitbart? The real message is that you can be “media” too, as the concept of “mainstream media” loses all meaning. There is no reason Obama should get away with it, whatever is happening with hurricane Sandy. We can follow more than one story at a time, and we’re able to shape the messaging. Speaking to the occupant of the oval office, the father of the Benghazi hero Tyrone Woods proclaimed:
“It’s better to die a hero than live a coward.”-Charles Woods
With the loss he’s suffered in mind, having the courage to speak out as he has, what do we have to fear? Engage. Get the message out there, whatever your particular message may be, and do so fearlessly. It’s our country, and it’s time we take it back from the media. We decide what will be discussed and when, and we shouldn’t permit the so-called “mainstream media” to tell us otherwise.