I have not ever experienced a #fakenews onslaught as today. Every mainstream media and agency seems to have lost all inhibitions and is reporting any rumor claim regarding east-Aleppo as fact....Moon of Alabama
There has been some speculation recently on SST concerning the causes of the low quality and inaccuracy of MSM reporting in the US, Britain and other countries. IMO there are two basic causes of such journalistic malpractice.
1- Corporate leadership is integrated into the world-wide informal group think network of governments, media. academia, think-tanks and mega-capitalists that I have shorthanded as the Borg. Such corporate stakeholders are easily pushed in editorial directions desired by governments and special interest groups. The tools are always the same; money for sponsorship of programs and access to supposedly key people.
2- Media people at the operational level (especially in TV) are generally not well educated. They are typically products of schooling and experience in the communications arts (including journalism). Such people are often woefully ignorant of the Humanities (history, languages, area studies, etc.) and lack any context with which to understand events on the world scene. They are easy prey for the editorial policy given them by the corporate leaders.
There are occasional moments of comedy created by the dissonance brought to the fore by confrontations with reality. Yesterday, CNN's Jake Tapper was distracted from the primary election circus long enough to show us all film done recently by a CNN reporter in government occupied Aleppo neighborhoods. Life looked quite normal. There was a lot of food in the markets. Children played in the streets. Women walked around without their faces covered. Taxis drove up and down picking up and discharging fares. Several older men were interviewed and they attributed their good conditions to the hard fighting and victories of the Syrian Army. Tapper did not know what to say and changed the subject.Sic Semper Tyrannis
Scotland Yard has launched a new investigation into News Corporation, which may have disastrous ramifications for Rupert Murdoch and his employees.Murdoch in trouble? Looks like he may have crossed the line.
British Labor politician Tom Watson, the first MP to speak out against Murdoch, is reported as saying he is not at all surprised that Murdoch is in deeper trouble than ever.
“He is solely responsible for the corporate culture that allowed this scandal to damage his global empire,” Watson said.
“I hope other jurisdictions like Russia will also begin to investigate all the activities of News Corporation around the world. The threat that thousands of people may lose their jobs is ridiculous. The company needs to clean up its act. It will survive without him. The people who work for it understand their social responsibility.”
In general, I like Jim Cramer. I find him to be educated, enlightened and very entertaining. However, the comment he made this morning on CNBC, where he said that he could not take a "Spain-like-outcome" off the table when it comes to the United States, highlights just how deeply misinformed even the most highly regarded mainstream media pundits are when it comes to basic concepts about our economy. It is really, truly, eye-opening and frightening at the same time.
That Cramer would even consider lumping the United States in the same boat as Spain, when the former is a currency issuer while the latter is not, is sheer lunacy. It's absurd. No, it's worse, it's horribly, inexcusably, ignorant.
I do not for one second pretend that any of these people would even try to comprehend MMT. Believe me, I know--I've been doing TV for 18 years, with the last 10 spent at Fox and I've tried. Oh, how I've tried to get them to see the light. But we're not talking about making some quantum leap from the current, mainstream neoliberal view to a full-blown acceptance of MMT. All we're asking is that they acknowledge a very simple distinction that should have become absolutely, crystal clear after the comical U.S. downgrade by S&P last summer. Remember that? Yes, rates went DOWN...big time! The United States is not credit sensitive as an issuer of its own currency. When will these jerks get this through their thick heads?
Look, Cramer is no Rick Santelli. If anyone could understand this, it's him. He's a Harvard educated law school grad who worked at Goldman Sachs. For him to make a straight-faced comparison between the U.S. and Spain, especially in light of what we saw after the S&P downgrade last summer, is mind-boggling to me. I am having a hard time questioning his intelligence given his pedigree education, but he's giving me every reason to do so.
When I hear things like this it makes me think that it should be easy to make tons of money as an investor betting against these fools. Their views are based on nothing more than superstition and irrationality. Hell, it would seem that under those circumstances making a fortune should be as easy as taking candy from a baby. But then I am reminded of what the great, John Maynard Keynes once said: "The market can stay irrational a lot longer than most people can remain solvent."
Truer words were never spoken.
