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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JohnM who wrote (9905)	1/27/2006 12:03:45 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541519

Broadcaster says serious news at risk palmbeachdailynews.com By JAN SJOSTROM Daily News Arts Editor Thursday, January 26, 2006 The anchorman whose boss once characterized him as ice compared with his successor's fire was anything but chilly in the impassioned speech he delivered Tuesday at The Society of the Four Arts. "Truth no longer matters in the context of politics and, sadly, in the context of cable news," said Aaron Brown, whose four-year period as anchor of CNN's NewsNight ended in November, when network executives gave his job to Anderson Cooper in a bid to push the show's ratings closer to front-runner Fox News. Brown said he tried to give viewers a balanced diet of light and serious news with NewsNight. "But I always knew when I got to the Brussels sprouts, I was on thin ice," he said. When NewsNight spent four hours covering the arrest of actor Robert Blake for the murder of his wife, Brown received thousands of e-mails criticizing the amount of time the show spent on the story. Nevertheless, that show, which aired in April 2002, received the highest ratings of any program since NewsNight's coverage of the November 2001 crash of American Airlines flight 587. "Television is the most perfect democracy," Brown said. "You sit there with your remote control and vote." The remotes click to another channel when serious news airs, but when the media covers the scandals surrounding Laci Peterson, the Runaway Bride or Michael Jackson, "there are no clicks then," the journalist said. With the departure from the screen of the "titans" — Tom Brokaw, Peter Jennings and Dan Rather — who "resisted the temptations of their bosses to go for the ratings grab, it will be years before an anchorman or anchorwoman will have the clout to fight these battles," he said. Brown has spent most of his 30-year career in television news. He's covered everything from the Columbine High School murders to the aftermath of the space shuttle Columbia disaster. But viewers may remember best his on-the-spot coverage of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. He's shocked "by how unkind our world has become," he said. E-mail and talk radio appear to have given people the license to say anything, regardless of how cruel or false it may be, he said. He cited the example of an e-mail faulting what the sender considered to be NewsNight's inadequate coverage of an anti-war protest in Washington, D.C. The note ended with, "I hope the violence visited on the people of Iraq will someday be visited on your children." Those on the opposite side of the political spectrum are no more tolerant, Brown said. "Any criticism of the administration is regarded as hatred of the president and hatred of the country itself," he said. Important issues, such as the prosecution of the war in Iraq at home and abroad, are being clouded over by "mud-wrestling" that skirts substance, he said. Consider what he called "the swift-boating of John Murtha," the Democratic congressman whose war record was smeared when he called for an exit strategy in Iraq. "Cable didn't search for the truth, but engaged in mock debates pitting those making the charges against Murtha's defenders," he said. Many Americans on the left and the right aren't interested in the truth, but simply want news that confirms their viewpoints, he said. "You'd think that it's no more complex than good vs. evil," he said. Journalists have fallen short in presenting important news in ways that allow viewers to see how it matters in their lives. But viewers must take up the battle as well, he said. "It's not enough to say you want serious news. You have to watch it. It isn't enough to say you want serious debate. You have to engage in it."

To: JohnM who wrote (9905)	1/27/2006 2:32:09 AM
From: KLP	Respond to of 541519

I thought it might be a good balance. One source used "progressive info" and the other was from a conservative (although IMO) not a stupidly so conservative.

To: JohnM who wrote (9905)	1/27/2006 9:08:12 AM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 541519

Here's an interesting new book from a former member of the Reagan White House... amazon.com Impostor : How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy (Hardcover) by Bruce Bartlett Availability: This title will be released on February 28, 2006. You may order it now and we will ship it to you when it arrives. Ships from and sold by Amazon.com. Editorial Reviews From Publishers Weekly: Liberal commentators gripe so frequently about the current administration that it's become easy to tune them out, but when Bartlett, a former member of the Reagan White House, says George W. Bush has betrayed the conservative movement, his conservative credentials command attention. Bartlett's attack boils down to one key premise: Bush is a shallow opportunist who has cast aside the principles of the "Reagan Revolution" for short-term political gains that may wind up hurting the American economy as badly as, if not worse than, Nixon's did. As part of a simple, point-by-point critique of Bush's "finger-in-the-wind" approach to economic leadership, Bartlett singles out the Medicare prescription drug bill of 2003— "the worst piece of legislation ever enacted"—as a particularly egregious example of the increases in government spending that will, he says, make tax hikes inevitable. Bush has further weakened the Republican Party by failing to establish a successor who can run in the next election, Bartlett says. If the Reaganites want to restore the party's tradition of fiscal conservatism and small government, he worries, let alone keep the Democrats out of the White House, they will have their work cut out for them. (Feb.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Review “Bruce Bartlett is no impostor. He’s the real thing – a reality-based conservative who searches for supportable truths and then speaks them loudly and clearly. How refreshing, and old fashioned, and courageous. May his lot increase.” —Ron Suskind, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Price of Loyalty “Bruce Bartlett has long been one of Washington’s most searching, thoughtful, and uncompromisingly candid economic analysts. That’s a view shared not only by those who agree with him, but also by people like me, who differ with him about 80 percent of the time. This book is a perfect reflection of Bruce’s gifts: he cares far more about being honest and consistent than about following anyone’s party line. It will shape our political discussion into 2008.” —E. J. Dionne Jr., author of Stand Up Fight Back and Why Americans Hate Politics “While I don't agree with Bruce Bartlett very often, he is always worth paying attention to. Bartlett's loyalty is to his conservative ideas, not to the Republican Party. That loyalty has not come cheaply. Bartlett lost his job in order to write this book. The least you can do is read it.” —Jonathan Chait, senior editor at The New Republic and columnist for the Los Angeles Times