I don’t like to discuss politics. My family have certain views, and some of my other extended family members have apparent views as well. From my subjective view, I see them lean to the right, but often repeating what their media they are consuming are telling them,
Not only that, we don’t talk about issues anymore. The “big picture” stuff. Stuff that politicians don’t control and bureaucrats can manipulate policy.
NOT ONE Member in my family puts their own politics in their own words. It’s often rip-and-read from whatever talking-head on cable news tells them.
This is what I also see on social media, people “sharing” content and remark with what they are instructed to do. It’s really sad.
We as Americans for over a decade are picking and choosing a side and then mock the other one, and what has been forgotten for the last decade is issues! We as Americans who were interested in politics, had a high level intelligence (meaning they were thinking on diplomatic and implicit tone). Now today it has stooped down to low level, emotional and sensational and explicitly telling people how to think, and not use original thinking.
I will not chant #MAGA like some person being directed by dictator. I think for myself and therefore I believe in a democratic society.
Put Roger Ailes’ manipulation with Joel Cheatwood’s If it bleeds it leads mantra of 7 News and politics in the last decade evolved from the National Review type of conversations to the National Inquirer, of tabloid trash of political chatter, mixed with name-calling, and flashy political news that doesn’t have substance. I also can’t stand the current rendition of HuffPo, where they really rip the right on frivolous stuff.
I have been registered as an Independent since I was eighteen, and I have voted both parties in various offices. Also I can brag that I have voted in Town Meetings around my birthday in New Hampshire because municipal elections enable citizens to have more control on their government than voting for a congressperson and outsourcing democracy and citizenry to a D.C. Office. I noticed that the people who obsess about D.C. Politics in my family are the ones who grew up when my old town was more “rural” where rural governments were non existent and focus on the next largest government body – the Federal system.
Not only that, we don’t talk about issues anymore. The “big picture” stuff. Stuff that politicians don’t control and bureaucrats can manipulate policy. But low calorie, same day news, mixed with the “happy moment caught on camera” is the norm. And as a result, we as Americans, both left, right and centrists have subjected to ourselves to lower class in less than a generation!
If you believe in holding ALL PEOPLE IN POWER accountable, you also have have investigative journalism. No not “consumer investigative journalism” like how an iPhone protector doesn’t work the way they claim. Go onto YouTube and search for some old News 8 Investigates from WFAA in Dallas, the station that pioneered enterprise journalism for TV, and was once a sister entity the prestigious Dallas Morning News.
I am afraid at times to share my issue- driven policy because I fear I would be painted by my loved ones as a liberal. I am sick and tired of fitting into a political cookie cutter anymore. I am sick and tired of “Liberal Democrat” to have same dirty tone as calling someone a c–t or a Republican that is cold hearted, or whatever stereotype.
Issues, Municipal Affairs, White collared crime… whatever happened to ball busting reporting? It’s been long gone and you can thank the demented POTUS Ronnie Regan who allowed deregulation of the media so you can entertain yourself to death with cable news copying the late Casey Kasem’s AT40 of Liberal Hipocracy instead of serious news.
I watch, FNC barely today, FBN is a joke, because it’s FNC2, and watch CNBC with my fingers to my nose, I barely stand the lefist Bloomberg TV, and I don’t watch the 6:30 news anymore, so after that, where do I turn? On Friday nights, since 1998 (with a few on and off years), I’ve tuned to my journalistic idol, Emily (the daughter of the late Andy) Rooney to geek out on the news media’s coverage of week events, Beat The Press the local WGBH show. Because BTP focuses on issues in the media when the other Sunday Morning shows, Reliable Sources and Media Buzz on CNN and FNC are so flipping polarized.
I will not chant #MAGA like some person being directed by dictator. I think for myself and therefore I believe in a democratic society.