When French voters resoundingly elected a centrist president rather than a right-leaning antiglobalist this month, one reason may have been the nation’s news media.
As a French newspaper editor commented: “We don’t have a Fox News in France.”
The United States certainly does have one. Pretty soon, it may have the equivalent of two.
Sinclair Broadcast Group has struck a deal with Tribune Media to buy dozens of local TV stations.
And what Fox News is for cable, Sinclair could become for broadcast: programming with a soupcon — or more — of conservative spin.
Already, Sinclair is the largest owner of local TV stations in the nation. If the $3.9 billion deal gets regulatory approval, Sinclair would have 7 of every 10 Americans in its potential audience.
In response to Jish’s blog on the main page
Wilbur Ross should’a stayed home. He doesn’t get how authoritarian Saudi Arabia is. Holding a sign up, even if it supports the King, is gonna get you in jail. In Saudi Arabia capital crimes are dealt with by the sword. Just before noon prayer on Fridays. And Wilbur, raving about pretty girls is dangerous territory in that country. When our officials go over seas doesn’t someone tell them about local customs? Or do they just dispense with what they’re told as fluff?
To me, it is seriously disturbing when Americans act like idiots in countries outside America. I have traveled a lot and have seen this characteristic frequently among my countrymen.
What I find amusing beyond all get out is many of the folks here who complained about Obama and Hillary derangement syndromes seem to be infected with derangement syndromes of their own. They just can’t let the Bernie hate drop. They have no sense of irony either.
I have a feeling that if TPM and computers existed in the early 70’s, people here would still have a McGovern derangement thing going on. Some people here have carped and bemoaned about third party voter’s “moral responsibility” to vote, presumably for someone other than their own conscience. Ironic much?
It’s a civic duty, morality has nothing to do with it. I get that you’re angry about Trump and how Hillary got a raw deal. Seriously, I believe she wuz robbed too! But get the hell over your Bernie derangement syndromes. Bernie went on a four city tour to campaign for Quist in Montana. He drew huge crowds. He encouraged his supporters to vote for Hillary and campaigned with her. Still, you gotta hate.
I also wanted Hillary to win. Then again, I’m not going to continuously throw rocks at people for supporting the wrong candidate or voting their conscience. We have had minor parties on the ballot for ages. Anyone recall reading about Henry Clay blaming his loss to Andrew Jackson on Anti-Masonic Party candidate William Wirt? Wirt did a lot better than Jill Stein’s 1.3%, he received 7.8 percent of the vote in 1832. I’ve never heard or read of any conservatives bitch about Gary Johnson stealing the popular vote away from Trump by getting triple the amount of votes Stein received. They seem to accept the fact that minor parties are woven into the fabric of our democracy. Yes, I used to bitch about Nader for quite a few years helping Bush win. Then I grew up. As with Hillary, the media played a bigger role Gore’s loss by favoring Bush. There were subtle jabs they made about Gore being “wooden” and so on. Maureen said he was “practically lactating” in the NYT. It’s the job of the heavily favored major party candidates with the big ad money and their respective political machinery to make third parties a non factor. Most third party candidates are not even included in the main debates. I’d also add that those who just stayed home hurt Hillary more than third party voters. As much as I dislike progressives who throw their votes away for third parties, at least they vote. I’d rather have a progressive vote for a third party than cross over and vote Republican or just stay home. Grow the hell up and quit blaming Bernie.
That’s because the program isn’t working! Nothing changes! We pump money into it and the people in the program stay dependent. Sad. How are they going to learn to fend for themselves if we keep enabling them? We can’t keep rewarding the elderly for their frailty and dementia or they will stay that way forever.
No, but their families can. Look at who reside in nursing homes and where they go when the money is shut off. They are dumped back into the homes of their 50 something children who are struggling to pay for health insurance and college tuition. We can have a debate whether home care is better than institutional care but that isn’t this debate.
I see four years of continuing resolutions. How will it go down?
The Freedumb Caucus is going to expect the Tuesday Group to flesh out this draconian draft. Tuesday will put in a lot of CYA provisions, which Freedumb will call poison pills. They will retreat to their phone banks to raise money to primary the “traitorous” Tuesdayers.
Pelosi and Hoyer’s team will pull together a sane budget, which Speaker Ryan will fumble.
At the last second some moderate GOP backbencher will sketch out a CR on the back of a cocktail napkin. Everyone exvept the Free dummies signs off on it.
Yes, the families can fight back – and they will because they can’t afford the several thousand a month to pay for skilled nursing and they are unable to care for the elderly at home. That may be the only way to prevent this debacle – when the supporters see that this might happen to them.
It only matters if they can make the connection between who they voted for and what’s happening to them personally. Most Republicans don’t ever do that.
