Why do our media continue to foster the myth that our presidents are

[Veggie Meathead]

virtuous men who do not tell lies? look at the record.Ike lied about the U-2 overflights and got caught in his lie when a U-2 was shot down by the Russians.Kennedy of course lied about his dalliances with mafia molls.Johnson, Gulf of Tonkin.Nixon never told a truth. Carter was most likely an aberration. Reagan did not know a lie from a truth. Bush I made his lies come true. Clinton lied about sex and Bush II has told so many lies it is impossible to sort through the muck.

All through these presidencies, a massive courtier class has been built up in this country that thrives on telling comfortable lies to people in power and transfers these lies to the general population as though they are proven facts.

In many ways the entrenched courtier class continues even if one presidency expires and another one takes shape.The continuity of this courtier class in my opinion allows for the perpetuation of myths.

[cthrumatrix]

1. access... and the news corps want the pres. to maintain power over

the people...it's called corporatism..they own the puppet.

[EST]

2. Good diagnosis...

what's the cure?

[Veggie Meathead]

3. The cure is right here.When more people like us participate in

free and open discussions like this and break the monopoly of the paid windbags of the corporate press, we will have true and honest opinions in this country.So we just keep up what we are doing and call for more involvement from other people.

[Gynorrhagia]

4. Presidents by definition have to be weasels and con men

Think about it. You have to be nebulous on most controversial issues. If you make a clear consistent stand on all issues, you get your ass kicked, because you offend people. You have to be a two-timing flip-flopping weasel in order to offend as few people as possible.
We don't elect the most able leader. We elect the slickest manipulator. And slick manipulators are usually larger than life men of grand personality. Such men have huge appetites, and that includes women other than their wives. Sure, the best president might be a by-the-book straight arrow of impeccable morals, but the poor son of a bitch could never get elected.

[IdaBriggs]

5. Well said! And welcome to DU!!! nt

[Veggie Meathead]

6. In more open and tolerant societies like France, a scalawag is

accepted but in this land of mythical giants of impeccable Presidential sexual morality, Presidents don't get laid and their offspring are born by immaculate conception. When reality collides with myth as it must we all pay the price.Contrast the presence at Francois Mitterand's funeral of his wife and mistress with nary a wink or a tsk, tsk with Clinton's inquisition and you have the massive rift between our infantile sexual attitudes and the mature attitudes of the continentals.

[lostnfound]

7. Welcome to DU. Have you ever read Noam Chomsky?

He explains it well. A book he wrote with Edward Hermann, "Manufacturing Consent", goes into the many aspects of the media complicity in continuing convenient government myths.

A few factors include pressure from advertisers to conform, media owned by elites, need to keep good relations with the steady news-makers (especially now, when TV news mainly parrots the press releases from the government), the high cost of straying from the 'party line'.

Of course they were happy to tear Clinton down for a few lies about sex, but that did not threaten the system of lies for corporate or elite gain.

When it comes to economics and foreign policy, the media can be seen as a propaganda arm for the oligarchy.