Why Bernie Sanders Is Absolutely Correct About the Washington Post--and Corporate Media Overall [View all]

[Uncle Joe]

(snip)

As George Seldes commented long ago, "The most stupid boast in the history of present-day journalism is that of the writer who says, 'I have never been given orders; I am free to do as I like.'" Seldes noted that reporters routinely "know from contact with the great minds of the press lords or from the simple deduction that the bosses are in big business and the news must be slanted accordingly, or from the general intangible atmosphere which prevails everywhere, what they can do and what they must never do."

(snip)

Baron, Sullivan, Cillizza and countless other employees of corporate media are well-paid while publicly maintaining their denial in the service of corporate power. So, with the virtues of the Washington Post on parade, Emperor Bezos must be decked out in the journalistic finery of his new clothes, even when the self-interest and implications of billionaire leverage over media are stark naked.

What Bernie Sanders is pointing out is not—and he never said it was—a "conspiracy." The problems are much deeper and more pernicious, having to do with the financial structures of media institutions that enable profit-driven magnates and enormous corporations to dominate the flow of news and commentary.

The Post's Baron is ill-positioned to defend his newspaper against charges of anti-Sanders bias. Such bias has been profuse, and it began well before a pivotal moment in the 2016 campaign on the eve of the high-stakes Michigan primary in early March. Then, as FAIR analyst Adam Johnson showed, "the Washington Post ran 16 negative stories on Bernie Sanders in 16 hours."

(snip)

Journalists who have staked their careers on remaining in the good graces of corporate employers are certainly inclined to say in public that billionaire owners and huge corporations don't constrain their journalistic work. And in their minds, they might be telling the truth. As George Orwell wrote, "Circus dogs jump when the trainer cracks his whip, but the really well-trained dog is the one that turns his somersault when there is no whip."


https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/08/14/why-bernie-sanders-absolutely-correct-about-washington-post-and-corporate-media