|
I would tear this argument apart. Just so people will take the time to read this, let's cut Rago down:.....(1) Mainstream media (MSM) is journalism but blogs are opinion "right now." The reality is that "analysis" (actually opinion from "experts") has displaced actual journalism to an alarming degree in the MSM. On something like FOX, it is 24 hours of topics introduced and then opined about. These guests basically speak off the "talking points memos" circulating around Washington that day. Objective journalism has mostly been killed these days by MSM serving up shout TV to the masses Rago appears to disdain. People turn to the internet and places like Rawstory to get hard journalism............ (2) Rago suggests that the "mob behavior" and "mediocrity of the masses" are incapable of selecting from the content on the internet. Most blogs, says Rago, are "boring" and promote "intellectual disingenuousness" that is hostage to the "party line." Again, we're supposed to separate that charge from Bill O'Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, and Sean Hannity? Are we also supposed to believe that the American "masses" blindly flock to internet sites like mosquitos to street lights. That would mean a pretty heterogeneous level of success in the online blog world, with the average Myspace blog getting as much traffic as a site like TruthOut or Rawstory. In fact, navigation of the internet requires the human mind to select at any time one point of interest out of millions, whereas the MSM basically holds the channel surfer to one of only a few options for information, all of which are subject to the "analysis" and "talking points" meant to make political hay that day, Left or Right............. Rago's pedantic stab at George Will style editorialism and the foundation of his argument against the validity of internet discourse is intellectually pathetic and disingenuous. |