Tuesday, March 15, 2016

My REMOVED reply to the Rolling Stone article "How the 'New York Times' Sandbagged Bernie Sanders":

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Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. Here it is 12 years later, and Bernie, even with the advantages of social media, and virtually the same Medicare for All, free preschool to college, anti-NAFTA, anti-Iraq War platform that Dennis Kucinich offered the country in 2003-2004 (when there was still a chance to just not start that war), is suffering the same treatment at the heavy hands of the New York Times.

From an interview with the Toledo City Paper in February 2004 ("Fighting for recognition, finding an audience"):

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TCP: Why do you think you’ve been marginalized by mainstream media?

DK: I don’t ask The New York Times for permission to run for public office. The things I talk about relate to people’s practical aspirations — jobs, health care, education, retirement and peace. Big media monopolies generally aren’t interested in seeing these things as part of the debate. I’ve also been very vocal in advocating media reform to break up media monopolies so, naturally, I run the risk of being ignored or misrepresented.

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It is enough to make one feel like losing hope, but it is really just further motivation to keep fighting harder for what is right.

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Not sure what was objectionable in that, but all I can guess is that Rolling Stone/US Weekly might be sensitive to discussions of breaking up "big media monopolies".

Reminds me of Grandpa's Golden Rule: "He who has the gold makes the rule."

The same can be said to be true of freedom of the press: "He who owns the press has the freedom."

For more on the fear that some people in power have of all the rest, see this amazing piece from José María Luis Mora (Mexico, 1831): http://spanishprontotranslationblog.blogspot.com/2013/08/discourse-on-freedom-of-thought-speech.html