Dakota Beacon

The so-called mainstream media (MSM) isn’t what is used to be with the advent of the alternative media.  Infatuation with MSM news wore thin as hard news presented with bias and slanted commentary became little more than entertainment.

Once upon a time people held a lofty view of journalism. The profession was regarded as clean, pure and honest. Journalists in the MSM were the honest brokers and held in high regard. That’s when they were thought of as objective and open-minded.

That was the status of journalism fifty or sixty years ago, but not now. Things have changed. More and more people see the MSM (print, radio and TV) for what it has become -- corrupt and getting more so. To think of ABC, CBS, NBC, NPR and the New York Times as competing with one another is a mistake. They’re all on the same team or, as one wag put it, they’re all Democrats with bylines.

A case in point. Last week through an open microphone at the Mitt Romney press conference following the attack on the US consulate in Libya, two reporters, Jan Crawford of CBS (formerly with ABC) and a man from NPR, were caught coordinating their questions for Romney. It wasn’t so much that they were coordinating “gotcha” questions for Romney as much as it was laying the groundwork for the narrative they would build against Romney for the rest of the campaign. These are the folks we trust to bring us the straight, unvarnished news.

To be clear, “establishing the narrative” is something legal defense attorneys practice in court when they don’t have a good case for their client. They try to portray the events of the case as an entirely different narrative pointing away from the defendant in order to favorably influence the jury.

By setting the narrative, MSM journalists and the Obama administration effectively distract the public from the real issues. In this case these issue are the administration’s disastrous foreign policy failures and Mitt Romney’s justified criticism of the same.

The MSM are largely ignoring Obama’s foreign policy and intelligence failures. This became startlingly clear last week with the murders of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other consulate personnel.

Incredulously, the White House blamed the attack on a thirteen minute internet video trailer that allegedly insulted Mohammed. That’s what White House Press Secretary Jay Carney falsely stated, but wants the public to believe. The MSM took the statement at face value and ran with it without challenge.

Turns out the Libyan attack was well organized and had been planned for weeks. Other smaller anti-Western attacks around Benghazi had been carried out previously. These attacks don’t need an excuse such as a video. It would seem killing Osama bin Laden and the al-Qaeda leadership would be far more inflammatory than a silly internet video. In truth, Islamists hate us for our freedom. The video proved useful to whip a rabble into frenzy.

It’s not the movie. But that is the message the administration, supported by the MSM, want us to believe. It offered a not-so-great cover for the administration’s foreign policy failures and an opportunity to tag Romney as inexperienced in foreign policy to wit, “jumping the gun” with his press conference.

Romney, for his part, offered a strong defense of America’s interests at his September 12 press conference. Despite the MSM’s complicity with the White House, Romney’s opponents were not able to brand his comments as a “gaff.”

Mitt was correct in his criticism. The US Egyptian embassy had apologized for the Libyan attack. Later the State Department issued a similar statement, then “clarified” their statement, but never condemned the attacks on the Egyptian embassy. As Romney pointed out, our Middle East policy is in disarray and contradictory. We can do better.

At least Romney stayed to answer questions at his press conference. Obama walked away from his press conference en route to a Las Vegas fundraiser without taking questions. And the MSM covered for him.

The MSM no longer holds a monopoly on the news as they once did. They can no longer operate in a vacuum. The alternative media sees to that. The alternative media does what real journalists use to do.

Meanwhile, the MSM continues to prey upon the sentiments and dispositions of middle-America, especially the news-consuming elderly.

Dennis M. Patrick can be contacted at P. O. Box 337, Stanley, ND 58784 or (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).