Reply #105: I agree in general, especially about the TV station

[Tactical Progressive]

I don't understand what is taking so long with that. It boggles. This should have been done before the 2002 election. There have been people screaming about it for five years now.

I don't think radio stations are that big of a deal, but it certainly couldn't hurt, and there should at least be an alternative to the right wing's FM hate machine in major markets.

Two other things come to mind, though. One is everyday rank and file Dems speaking out in normal conversation in the same uncertain terms that Republicans are all too willing to spew in any public setting they're involved in, for instance talking about the right wing's 'moral' values of greed, racism and lies. About right wing traitors letting America get attacked in 2001 and lying to start wars. Dems need to start speaking out unabashedly and unequivocally in day-to-day conversation.


The other is, and I don't know quite how to put this... progressive media won't make much of a difference either. The right wing hate machine isn't a one-way street; there has to be a receptive audience for communication. The right wing has learned to tap into the ugly side of people that is already there. It isn't concocted, or learned, or inculcated or tricked into them. It is there ready to be unleashed, and it is being so. These people aren't going to be educated back to civility or decency no matter how many progressive channels there are unless all of them are, and that isn't going to happen.

You see, TV programming, radio programming, outspoken personal argumentation isn't going to change people who already have the ability to be honest and decent, and just don't want to for anything on this earth. When there were only the major television outlets to propagate a reasonably progressive view of the world, the selfish, bigotted mindset was kept in a state of suppression, just barely. That world is never coming back. Evil has its outlets now, promoted from Ailes and ClearChannel, unsuppressed and now even largely supported by mainstream media. The lid is off. The ugliness is activated and it has the one thing evil yearns for - like-minded monsters to make your worst instincts acceptable and protected. All the countervailing viewpoints of decency and honor mean nothing when they can get even one avenue of community with fellow Fascists.

I want honest TV just so I have something to relate to, and maybe pick up some marginals, but don't kid yourself for a second that the fifty-million Fascists in this country have somehow been brainwashed or misinformed into their beliefs and can be turned around with good TV and radio programming. They've been released and given sanctuary and they won't ever be going back into their cages. They don't want to be good. They want to be what they've been being.