Can't the press drop pretenses & call people who lie liars?

It's long been a sore point with me that the press will not call chosen people on obvious lies. They've gotten away with it so long, I don't think it will change any time soon.

libel and slander are still things that can land you in court, and it's the editor's job, not the journalist's (for better or worse,) to make sure no one says something that gets the newspaper (for instance) sued or out of wide circulation.

this response is meant to be from a practical angle. if it was really up to me, i'd argue for a law that gave journalists a little more power to report news- but i'm not sure if it would make things any better. a lot of times when they do come out and say it, the world continues along its destructive path as if nothing was said at all. there must be something that can be said which would have more effect on events than "senator blahblahblah is a big fat liar," but if i knew what it was, i'd start my own paper.

tinygiraffe


Many A2Kers would help you start a paper with reporting, opinion, poetry, music and film reviews, cartoons, animal care, computer fixes, science, religion, A2K celebrity doings, recipes, and general bitching.

BBB

well it was a rhetorical "if"

still, if they're that interested, they should consider organizing and putting a website together- whether it's official "a2k" or not. they've already got an impressive forum.

To me, what calls the news media into question is, they repeat patently false stories, uncritically, seemingly endlessly, when they usually know better. Which makes it propaganda instead of news.

it makes it emotional programming, which goes a little further than propaganda. there certainly is a fair bit of propaganda in it.

i love your sig by the way.

Already done. In 1964. NY Times vs. Sullivan.

i bow to your complete neutralizing of my point. touche!

Oh, my. Actually it's one of the few things I really remember from Law School. Been trying to get that outta my head for years now.