Two in 24 hours requires formal recognition. Both MSNBC and CNN chose to feature charlatans on global warming when they had full opportunity to broadcast some science.
I get my hair and make up done, we drive across the city, I do the interview, Anderson is lovely, the whole thing takes three hours …. and they don’t air the interview. Instead, they give more airtime to Santorum, so he can to continue to spread disinformation.
— Prof. Katharine Hayhoe (@KHayhoe) November 28, 2018
Well, @MSNBC @Morning_Joe had asked me to appear on this morning's show but no studio was available that early in State College PA and they couldn't do skype. Climate change denier Rothman is the one who appeared instead. ? https://t.co/0h846iBL5d
— Michael E. Mann (@MichaelEMann) November 28, 2018
This is beyond Nero fiddling while Rome burns. This is pouring gasoline on the flames.
Here is a partial explanation from, I suspect, a jackal.
Higher profile folks get put on first, but it's a shame when they miss out on the best sources of information. Selection criteria really needs a review.
— Rick Schumann (@DracoTavern) November 28, 2018
I’m not sure what the best way is to inform the cable networks of their malevolence, but use whatever channels you’ve got.
MattF
The media treatment of scientific subjects is generally horrific. One of the reasons I still read the NYT is that it has a long tradition of reporting science well– compared, e.g., with the WaPo or pretty much any other news outlet.
Villago Delenda Est
The motherfucking Village needs to be destroyed.
There, I said it.
cain
The only tool you have is to turn the damn thing off. The more we all do this, the better it will be. Even better, start going to places that actually don’t pull this shit. Has Al-Jazeera done better here?
Kraux Pas
@Villago Delenda Est:
…again.
So, by all means, let’s continue to raise the profile of charlatans while letting knowledgeable people languish in obscurity. Sounds like a management-level decision.
Frankensteinbeck
There aren’t any. They pride themselves on their malevolence and see our disapproval as proof of their virtue. Only internal changes in their social group, going out of business, or a sufficiently heinous betrayal by Republicans will work. They are so keyed to give Republicans the benefit of the doubt that it’s iffy any betrayal would be enough, but they have reacted at least a little to Trump’s horribleness.
NotMax
It’s surpassed infotainment. It’s now infotaintment.
The tinfoil-clad inner cynic wants to say the mindset is “We get a ratings bump when there’s a giant storm or other disaster, so why should we be interested in reporting on mitigating those? Bring ’em on.”
AThornton
Americans are pig ignorant re: Science and the owners of mass media are determined to keep it that way.
Nicole
Go after the show sponsors, I think. It seems to be one of the few effective methods, because it hurts the bottom line.
Frankensteinbeck
@AThornton:
I really don’t think it’s that, at least for most of them. FOX, certainly. But in general, I think the people who package and deliver the news are pig ignorant, and are not comfortable with actual expertise.
Spanky
Michael Mann isn’t fucking high-profile enough for these goobers?
Fuckem.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@NotMax: As he points out the MSM peddles misery and fear, so of course MSM prefer denailist because they muddle the waters and that increases the terror. Cl imitate change can’t be understood so we can’t fix it, scary, scary.
sdhays
Why are they even inviting Santorum on to talk about this shit anyway? His expertise is in god-bothering, being sanctimonious, grifting, and losing. Those are the topics he should be invited on to talk about. If that’s not the topic of discussion, he should be forced to stay home and Google himself.
piratedan
the part that bothers me the most about climate change is that they treat it unlike every other science issue that they cover, Mars landings… you get NASA or other relevant space agency types on the line, Military matters, you get someone in a uniform, only when it comes to climate change do you get some fucking asshat like Rick Santorum on to give an opinion… hell, just ask a cameraman, he’s probably cheaper to put on the air and most likely better informed.
Snarki, child of Loki
Santorum IS an expert on free-flowing liquid shit.
Snarki, child of Loki
Total Solar Eclipse 2017, through “HartLandt Amerika”: isn’t it amazing how science can predict the exact path of totality, and the timing within a second?1??
Oh, but those eggheads don’t know anything about global stuff like “climate”.
C’mon Giant Asteroid.
sdhays
@sdhays: I’d like them to have a segment on the Bible and have one dumbass fundamentalist who has Bible verses memorized on one side and a Trump-level ignoramous on the other who can claim things like “Jesus said that tacos are a sacred food and demanded taco carts on every corner. It’s there in the Bible!”
Teach that controversy, assholes.
rikyrah
We see you, Rafael.
rikyrah
Update about SpyGirl:
Alleged Russian operative Mariia Butina is negotiating a plea deal with prosecutors in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office. https://t.co/qAFcJJYw7s
— Jim Roberts (@nycjim) November 28, 2018
TenguPhule
At the border, some want to know when the military will retrieve its barbed wire
Our national land border with a friendly neighbor is being defined now by razor wire. And I doubt its going away any time soon.
MattF
@rikyrah: The good news is that Cruz is so despised by his Senate colleagues that they might ignore him just out of spite.
TenguPhule
@rikyrah:
She’s been doing that for awhile now.
She must have realized by now that Putin will want her silenced.
trollhattan
@Nicole:
This.
TenguPhule
@Frankensteinbeck:
And in practice, how does this effectively differ from actual malice?
sdhays
@MattF: Also, if it was that easy, they would have already done it. Not much time left to ram through legislation that hasn’t even been drafted yet, not even considering the imminent Shutdownmas.
prostratedragon
As if the issue couldn’t be made high enough profile to draw some views. (Are there really that many millions who would drop what they’re doing to gaze enraptured upon Rick Santorum?)
Mike in NC
@TenguPhule: For years the wingnuts have wanted the border to be a No Man’s Land with minefields, towers with searchlights and machine guns, barbed wire, etc. Think of the Berlin Wall stretching for 2000 miles. Our tax dollars at work.
TenguPhule
Treason Barbie Doubles Down.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@TenguPhule:
It will when a Dem is in the WH. I hope
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@TenguPhule:
In theory the ignorant can be educated, but then, this is the age of Trump who things ignorance is a virtue. And let us note Trump had a show for years on MSNBC.
TenguPhule
Warning, FTFNYT link. The American Casualties of Trump’s Trade War
balconesfault
They should NOT put a politician/pundit – denier on the air without sharing the screen with an informed scientist/expert who is ready to rebut the chaff that they’ll inevitably spin, with the appropriate on-screen facial responses.
If the denial politician/pundit refuses this setup – don’t give them airtime.
The hosts – even the good ones – are never well enough equipped to shoot down the bullshit in real time. And the mediocre/lousy hosts just get rolled.
jl
@TenguPhule: ” And in practice, how does this effectively differ from actual malice? ”
In an era when news and analysis is provided by a few gigantic giga-corporations that you can count on the fingers of one hand, the only agency is endless search for profit. The fossil fuel industry, big banks, big pharma, food processors, health insurance and corporate hospital chains can dump billions of dollars down the greedy throat of the media companies for BS propaganda and social engineering disguised as ads.
That is really all you need to know.
I think the tweet from the video production person is full of shit. Funny now those last minute glitches almost always, almost always, work to put GOP liars, hack political operatives presenting themselves as consultants and political scientists, and corporate friendly hacks on the air. they can pre-record and do telephone interviews if they want, It is a choice not a mysterious stream of last minute glitches that just happen, year after year, to throw everything the same way.
I have to wonder whether the fact that almost all of the TV news actor frauds on TV are lazy smarmy butt-ignorant corporate hack dopes, who prefer to talk with lazy smarmy corporate hack dopes, plays a role. Well, it must play a role, the only question is how much.
The Moar You Know
@rikyrah: They already used it, for the “tax cuts” that aren’t. They can only do that once per year, under their own rules.
Christ he is a fucking moron.
balconesfault
@The Moar You Know: Chances that McConnell wouldn’t scrap Senate Rules in a second with a simple majority vote if he thought it wouldn’t limit GOP power as a minority in the future?
None.
That’s the only reason the legislative filibuster has survived.
But Cruz doesn’t play long-game the way McConnell does.
clay
If I had a cable news show, I would invite Rick Santorum on to discuss climate change. And my first question would be, “Thanks for joining us Senator… what scientific qualifications or knowledge to you have to discuss this issue?” And then when he says none, I’d say, “Well, thanks for wasting our time, Senator.” And then cut off his mike and camera feed.
That’s what I’d do.
trollhattan
@balconesfault:
As John Oliver so aptly demonstrated. every denier “scientist” needs to be aired alongside 99 legit scientists so as to hammer home the fact the denier is among a miniscule minority, whether because of economic interests or simple incompetence. 1:1 discussions always lend unwarranted credence to the denier and as the Gish gallop aptly demonstrates, gives them the arsonist’s asymmetrical warfare advantages.
I know that’s too complicated for network bookers.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@The Moar You Know:
Jesus fucking Christ. I know they’re Republicans, but it never ceases to amaze me how brazen and corrupt they are. They just got drubbed in an election because they tried doing these things and they’re going to try again before the new Congress is sworn in! The sheer arrogance to disregard the will of the voters! These pieces of shit.
Gaffa
Once again, in reference to my comments just last thread, this isn’t deliberate malice as much as it is exactly what modern “journalism” schools teach in the United States — the point is not to actually have a discussion, let alone select against deliberately propagandist commentators, the point is just to “provide a platform” for “sides” to talk. You’re not taught to check the C.V. of the people you call up to opine on anything; you just go down your list of people who are willing to talk about everything, and what do you know, there’s Santorum, willing to chat with you again. You certainly aren’t taught to interject reality into a Gish Gallop; you’re supposed to just let the audience decide without actually pointing out when the thumbs are on the scales of truth. Unsurprisingly, in a culture of learned stenography, propagandists are royalty.
The actual philosophical view is called the View from Nowhere, which was misappropriated from Thomas Nagel’s philosophy pretty quickly all the way back in the 1980s to mutate and simmer in the memetic backwaters of journalism schools the same way that Ayn Rand is the fountainhead of a million toxic modern conservative misjudgments of reality. I’m not studied up enough to talk at length about Nagel, but it appears to me that his View from Nowhere was meant to be taken both as an observation and a warning about extremes (as much philosophy can be). Adapted by nitwits in schools around the nation, it meant to them that a properly trained reporter is someone who refuses to take any side, ever — they must strive to remove all human content from their own reporting, as if any observer can truly be neutral.
I have literally been in a newsroom of a professional newspaper when the editor-in-chief fired one of their top salaried reporters for “putting themselves in the story.” It happened just about three feet to my left as I was chatting with the awesome payroll lady about good spicy food. It seems our ex-reporter was reporting on a horrible school bus accident — no deliberate violence, thank goodness, but old brakes wore out, and a bus tumbled off a rise on a hill, and dozens of young elementary school children were crushed to death. :( Our reporter opened their story with: “In a horrible accident…”. And were fired for it. Because “horrible” is showing a point of view, insisting that perhaps one should naturally believe that a random school bus accident in which over 12 kids die can be something else but horrible. That was the excuse the editor was using, that was the response they kept coming back to as the dumbstruck reporter (as well as me and my friend) just watched this Kafka-esque insanity with opened mouth horror of our own. The reporter was fired, and reading about this incident in trade chat Internet forums just made me even more sad: the vast majority of reporters and editors commenting on it agreed with my editor.
We are coming up on three or four generations of U.S.-trained “reporters” who have internalized that proper journalism means you do nothing but blankly report what other people say to you, which is one reason that the GOP propaganda machine works as well as it does. Yes, there are highlights and exceptions in the field — there always have been, and always will be. Thank you to the Washington Post, and Pro Publica, and Joy, and Dr. Maddow, and all the others who still practice journalism as its meant to be, despite their flaws (because none of us are perfect, except for Kate Bush). But situations like my examples, or this thread, aren’t coming around just because there’s a deliberate bias in the corporate exec rooms of the owners of the large media stations — I’m sure there is some, but I’m also sure that outside of a few particularly vile outliers (such as Roger Ailes), most of the Captains of Industry are far too busy enjoying being Masters of the World to actually give a fuck what’s being shown on their channels.
No, this is happening because we have generations of would-be journalists who have been trained to never ask questions, to remove their humanity from their stories, and to treat press releases as news events. And that’s a huge part of the problem.
Maybe I’ll get into how the sea change of journalism schools happened roughly the same time the Right Wing Meme Machine decided to make U.S. higher education a for-profit value-extraction investment one night when I have time here.
NotMax
@clay
Howzabout letting him blather on and during that slowly open the jacket to reveal an I’m With Stupid shirt. It is, after all, a visual medium.
;)
Central Planning
@Villago Delenda Est: “Ad destruendum opus motherfucking Pagus” (at least according to Gooe Translate)
Kelly
I abandoned TV news 15 years ago due preference for generic bloviators over subject matter experts. All news has been that way for longer than that. Iraq 2 was the last straw plus the I discovered intertubes allow gives actual subject matter experts a platform. Of course it also allows complete BS a platform but places like Balloon Juice sort the wheat from the chaff. I really value the links here.
Steeplejack
@TenguPhule:
“Relevant” is doing some heavy lifting there.
jl
This was cute. My only quibble is that I very seriously doubt that Trump picked Powell in any meaningful sense. Powell is not a Trumpster, in fact, he is a very competent moderate, a Yellen mini-me, and probably we should refer to him as Yellen-Powell. So far he done almost exactly as Yellen would have done. Also important to note that the Fed interest rate increases have been much more gradual and careful than in previous expansions. One can argue about whether the Yellen-Powell mix of inflation and real interest rate is the best policy, but given that, the Fed has been very technically expert in its management. Fed interest rate increases will be far down on the list of causes for the coming end of the current expansion, no matter how much Trump whines about them. The real problem is that the current expansion is too weak to support the historically average level of interest rates. The incompetence and corruption of federal (that is, GOP Congress and now WH) macroeconomic fiscal mis-management is not the Fed’s fault.
Anyway, I’ve long believed that some long departed competent economic official (Cohn?) snuck Powell past Trump on the basis that he looks like a central casting central banker.
@jdawsey1
Trump was fixated on Janet Yellen being too short to run the Federal Reserve, per several current and former advisers. He instead picked Jerome Powell — who has repeatedly disappointed him with interest rates decisions.
https://twitter.com/jdawsey1/status/1067597551338225666
Found via Krugman’s twitter.
jl
@Gaffa: But I don’t even see that the corporate media provides a platform for both sides to talk. There is a very consistent and pronounced slant towards views that will keep the current corrupt big corporate crony-capitalist gravy train running. No matter how many lives are wrecked, people are killed, or planets habitable by humans are destroyed.
NotMax
@jl
Short piece including that yesterday at TPM, including a(nother) puke-inducing quote from Dolt 45.
TenguPhule
Trump threatens penalties on foreign cars after GM plans U.S. layoffs
Japan and South Korea are going to throw down and go to the mattresses on this. This Trade War is spiraling into USA vs literally every other country on Earth.
We are in deep derp shit here.
jl
@NotMax: Trump does have a very big gut. Might compensate for the very small brain.
Hope no one tells Trump that Taft has a very big gut and a very big brain, or we’ll seem some mean tweets about that.
Gaffa
@jl: Oh, there’s definitely a bias, but (based on my partially-insider view, albeit one from down the hallway, across the access ramp, and watching from a mirror shakily balanced on the gradenza) the bias is more learned than deliberately active. Yes, there’s an active interest to not shake the apple cart from the owners of the major media machines, but the training of their “journalists” is such that they rarely have to actually actively interfere with the day-to-day running of things. J-Schools are taught so much about how journalism is innately “liberal” that the default response for many graduates is to get as many “conservative” talking heads on the air to balance out the innate “liberalness” of just being on the media.
Which is a patently bogus belief, but that’s where we are. Yes, I’m certain there are guidelines in many news rooms that tend towards GOP talking points. But outside of obvious propaganda mills like FOX or Sinclair, far more often the malice I’ve seen just comes from reporters or producers who literally have never learned how to balance a story based on their own research.
Raoul
Legacy media, and I mean that from the NYT to CNN and most similar, are abject failures in the 21st century.
They have lost the persuit of truth as the objective of journalism. We as a species are screwed if the value of clicks, eyeballs, and ads exceeds the value of inquiry, facts and understanding.
jl
@Gaffa: I think any journalism school peddling BS about innate this or that is incompetent or corrupt.
I think there are many very good reporters who do very good reporting. The problem is at the top, the corporatebosses, the armies of useless producers who do nothing, from what I have read, but obsess over drama and capturing gullible eyeballs who will buy anything, and fraudulent news actors (and actresses, though I am not up-to-date on whether that word is still used), who follow the money, whether they can admit it to themselves or not.
trollhattan
Fireable offence? For some reason I thought that was what editors were for–to smooth out the edges of what reporters file and lend consistency to the paper’s voice. Disturbing that it would be considered a gaff at all, that it was fatal to their job is mindboggling, but makes me wonder whether it was a “last straw” festering with time. The editor sounds like a real peach btw.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
Kill your television
MattF
OT. Magnus Carlsen wins chess championship.
trollhattan
@TenguPhule:
Ross and Kudlow assure all that these are necessary steps and that we’re winning the trade war and that all is not just well, but going better than we could have ever imagined in our tiny heads. Feel better?
catclub
@jl: I would have said that Yellen was substantially more dovish on raising interest rates than Powell,
{although Powell is still similar to Yellen on the topic}
but Trump picked Powell in order to kick out Yellen, who was appointed by Obama. If it works out badly, it is an own goal. He should have left Yellen in if he wants dovish on raising interest rates.
jl
The problem of money corrupting the news from the business end has been there for a long time. I remember reading that cigarette company advertisers made a stink about showing too many pictures of Churchill to news reel companies during WWII and TV afterwards, because he smoked cigars.
But competition between more independent companies, and greater independence of decision making served as a buffer. Many media companies were mainly news companies, and if they couldn’t get people reading or watching based on good news, they were in trouble. Now, nearly every media company providing news is a dinky low-margin division, a sort of loss-leader, that is useful for promos, and the very myopic and very immediate bottom line is just as important to the mega-corporate bosses, and the current TV season and current summer blockbusters. And if this bland corrupt corporate propaganda news division sucks, what are the choices? Another bland corrupt corporate news division that sucks in almost exactly the same way.
trollhattan
@catclub: Anybody with Obama cooties must go. That’s how much thought Trump put into canning Yellen.
NotMax
@catclub
Trump’s Razor* sez: Yellen has lady parts, real bankers have guy parts.
*h/t to J. Marshall
catclub
On the Media covered Fox news collaborating with Pruitt on his interviews. conferring on what questions to ask, also on introductions, talking points to hit.
The rest of the media will still treat Fox like a news organization. Nobody else seems to care.
jl
@catclub: Possible, but I think Powell has explicitly followed same basic algorithm that Yellen laid out. For the simple reason that Powell and Yellen both have the same basic philosophy of macroeconomic management. Main knock against Powell is that he had far less practical experience when he took the job than Yellen, and that may be playing a role.
Chyron HR
@MattF:
Is the the one who sings “Anthem” or the one who sings “One Night in Bangkok”?
Kelly
@catclub: Years ago I was neighbor to a local poly sci professor. He was on local TV news around election time. I once complimented him on how smoothly answered every question. He told me the anchor asked him to provide the questions. Actually a sensible way to interview a subject matter expert, not so good for a political actor.
trollhattan
@catclub:
Love “On the Media.” Should be required listening.
Bill Arnold
@jl:
Has anybody been thoroughly tracking these incidents (including any glitches/etc that skew against hacks), and more specifically climate-change related?)
Cheryl Rofer, have you been tracking? These two smell a bit like enemy action but more data would be … helpful. (At least need a 3d time, per Fleming/Goldfinger. :-)
E.g. Fox News had an obvious habit of labeling Rs mired in scandals as Ds in the oughts (perhaps more recently too): Fox has mislabeled Republican scandals before, more picts (2009)
jl
@Bill Arnold: There are some groups that do track appearances on the major corporate news outlets, in terms of party ID, ideology, positions on issues, provenance of their expertise. I don’t know where or how to access their data bases, though, if they are public.
Another Scott
@catclub: Yellen actually took the Fed’s “dual mandate” (maximum employment and price stability) seriously. Unlike just about any other Fed Chair I can think of. But even she raised rates faster than I would have (were I benevolent despot – see, e.g., Where the jobless rate is 2.3%, here’s what happened to wages). I haven’t heard Powell make noises about the importance of maximum employment (but honestly I haven’t heard much from him at all, other than he generally seems to think that raising rates in this economy is a good thing).
Getting rid of her was a very bad move by Donnie. He just doesn’t know how bad yet.
:-(
Cheers,
Scott.
Butter Emails!!!
@balconesfault:
Let me fix this for you.
Butter Emails!!!
@balconesfault:
Let me fix that for you.
Dan B
@Bill Arnold: I’ve got some connections who may know if any group is tracking data on MSM media bias at a granular climate change level. I’m busy until at least 10 EST though.
I’ll let Cheryl know if I find something.
In regard to some other posts I’ve long maintained that most activists actions and demonstrations should go to MSM offices. Politicians and prominent orgs can’t make headway against a media (social media included) campaign, or even one well executed hit.
boatboy_srq
@TenguPhule:
Nobody knows what Lord Dampnut wants. Not even Dampnut himself.
EthylEster
@cain wrote:
Yes! Covered the recent Ukraine Russia bridge thingy before NYT or WaPo
And I agree about just changing the channel.
I am fortunate….my cheapo cable does not carry CNN or MSNBC or CNBC or Fox News.
EthylEster
@TenguPhule:
Translation?
TenguPhule
@EthylEster:
Automobiles are big ticket production for both countries and the firms that make them have huge influence in the national politics.
Both countries can be expected to become very involved in a Trade War if/when tariffs on those commence.
sukabi
@Nicole: agree, 2 pronged attack, let them know (specific shows and their parent company) you won’t be watching if they refuse to put actual experts on (there is no universe where santorum is an expert in anything) AND target the sponsors of the shows — let them know that you don’t support companies that support disinformation / propaganda.
Feckless
CNN, NBC – Burn the motherfuckers down start over.. figuratively, of course.