Bye-Bye Now

Dan Rather spoke at Fordham University School of Law in Manhattan, biting back tears, while claiming politicians had the Media under their thumb in what he dubbed the "new journalism order." Admit it Dan. You've been beaten by the alternative media. No politician in the world has the power to make Americans turn the channel the way they have, and the bloggers, the ones who fixed your little red wagon but good, aren't under anyone's thumb.

Rather, however, did praise the Katrina coverage, summing up why he's an old fogey who just doesn't get it with this overly dramatic line: "They were willing to speak truth to power." (translation: the MSM scored some political points against Bush) According to him that makes the coverage similar to the coverage of President Kennedy's assassination, although the connection is a bit lost on me, and somehow I've noticed that everyone getting all lovey-dovey with the Katrina coverage has had some questionable politics. Truth to power? How about just starting with truth, Danny? I don't think the job of the Media is to take on the government or the fat cats or some abstract concept of power. Yes, the Media should do all these things, but the idea that Watergate is the goal of all media creates a problem, the old we-know-they're-bad-now-we-just-have-to-catch-'em or "gotcha journalism" for short. That view brought us the alternative media because we don't need Dan Rather and his ilk to tell us how to think. In fact, it directly lead to Memogate because Rather was ready to believe, and still does, anything about Bush.

Rather was joined at Fordham by an obvious idiot, HBO Documentary and Family president Sheila Nevins whom added this gem, "If you made a movie about Darwin now, it would be revolutionary." No, Ms. Nevins, it would not be revolutionary. She fears hate-mail and intimidation from the religious right. Don't worry about them, they're just speaking "truth to power." (read in whiny mocking voice) People send hate-mail on documentaries made by morons that don't have any respect for views other than theirs. A fact she proved with this little comment: "The most R-rated is a body bag, not a naked body." This is exactly the kind of statement that sends me into the kind of tizzy that Garm likes to watch from a safe distance. The President of HBO Family fears the religious right and thinks that a body bag is worse than "G-String Divas," a show which infamously filmed a man paying a stripper to knee him in the groin repeatedly. Personally, I'd rather have to explain the body bag to a kid. What I can't explain is why these people think they're going to spark the revolution with their trash?

Yes, many of our numbers have fallen prey to the Media's control, but even more have realized a fact that is the overly dramatic battle cry of the alternative media:

Truth is power.