Wednesday, July 2, 2014

THE DETRACTING MISCONCEPTION OF WHAT IS MAINSTREAM MEDIA


There has been a perception that American Media is largely dominated by “Left leaning” sources, however it’s safe to say that quantity does not equate to quality when reviewing weekly Radio/TV ratings and its influence over the populace.

Over the past few weeks, there have been numerous articles written about today’s Media influence that helped the Virginia primary loss of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor to who is has larger fault for Iraq's downfall and other abbreviated narrative with other daily issues.

Yes, it’s true that the Media does influence the populace on issues, even though many will squeal that they are not “sheeple.” Sorry folks, whether it’s politics, sports or any other story, many are programmed to accept the force fed Media opinion as their own.


However, there’s this “myth” that we are led by the “Left leaning” media, but that’s only true when speaking of the over abundance of TV Media.

CBS, NBC, ABC, MSNBC, and CNN are all considered as pawns to the Left.

CBS, NBC and ABC only report the news in a 30 minute sprint after the local news. Now if we add those boring morning shows to the equation and the time frame jumps to 2 hours 30 minutes, even though that time is filled with “fluff” pieces of dancing puppies and smoking Koala bears.

I will not argue that MSNBC is far Left of center in their reporting, which also explains why their ratings are so dismal. Outside of the 3 hours of Morning Joe, each hour features a new talking head repeating the same story in different voice with each going further Left.

And for the life of me, I still don’t know why Al Sharpton has a talk show and I don’t! Maybe I'm too wide for TV.

Per Zap2it.com for the week of June 16, after Morning Joe at 9am MSNBC averages roughly around 326,000 viewers till the 5pm. That’s when partisan talker Ed Shultz vents his frustrations and the number jumps up by about 160,000 viewers.

CNN has been re-inventing itself for the past decade and it seems they finally found a path to success, but their ratings fall roughly 80,000 short of MSNBCs

By comparison, even when combining CNN & MSNBC ratings, they fall extremely short of FOX News.

Fox & Friends, too which I find Steve Doocy the most annoying personality in Media next to Al Sharpton, averages 954,000 viewers daily, with the numbers jumping to an average 1.12 million till 5pm.

I still find humor when FOX News points out, with graphics, that they are reporting on a topic while other networks aren’t. It takes the slogan “Only on (blank)” one step further. I’m positive there will be a future 60 minute report on FOX News with guerilla reporters stalking network VP’s as to why they are not reporting on some topic like FOX

Oh wait they already do that with Jessie Watters.

But it’s the partisan Poli-Yakkers between 7p-11p that have the biggest influence and this is where the networks make their money. These partisan Poli-Yakkers and their passion grab the viewers to regurgitate their words on Social Media or the next day inside the cubicle. And FOX News, again, leads the pack by an average of 1 million viewer difference of the combined CNN/MSNBC ratings.

The sad part, from MSNBC to FOX, viewers take this passion as a “whole story” when in truth it’s a passionate abbreviated narrative.

So again, it’s the quality that equals domination, meaning that yes FOX News is Mainstream media no matter how much they and their viewers squawk against it.

I admit, I enjoy flipping between FOX, MSNBC and CNN every 15 minutes to see what and how the news is being reported. At one point I thought CNN’s management was punishing Martin Savidge by keeping him hostage in a flight simulator and mini-sub for the 2 months non-stop coverage of Malaysian Flight 370.

But the Conservative Mainstream domination is not only on the TV. Even on radio, where most point to NPR as the leader in Liberal reporting, Conservative talk radio is the force in media dominance.

Currently there are roughly 2,000 forms of Conservative talk radio shows compared to nearly 100 Liberal talk radio shows.

Per Talkers.com, the June 2014 numbers all too well tell the tale of what is Mainstream on the radio, Conservative Poli-Yakkers.


Now the list is filled with all types of talkers. Dave Ramsey and Clark Howard may put a political spit & polish comment into the mix, they are not Conservative talkers. So you have to go to #8 to find Thom Hartmann to find the leading Liberal talker.

There are 11 names ahead of Hartmann, who is roughly 11 million less in listeners than the leading voice of Limbaugh.

Oh sure there was the 6 year stunt of a complete Liberal radio network called Air America. 6 dreadful years it lasted, constantly revamping its lineup till the plug was pulled. From comedians to actors to actual journalists, Air America was dead on arrival. With names like Rachel Maddow, Al Franken, Ron Reagan, Montel Williams and so on, it was a Hollywood wet dream.

It wasn’t the “talent” that killed Air America, it was the constant turnover of higher management that sank the venture.


In my opinion, it was Tucker Carlson’s failed MSNBC stint that brought Rachel Maddow from radio to TV and her current Liberal reign at MSNBC, as she was a regular guest and fill-in host when Carlson was out Bowtie shopping.

I’m not knocking Limbaugh’s dominance of the golden mic, he has his disciples that listen to every word as if it’s Gospel.

I admit, I listen to Conservative talk radio; an hour of Beck, an hour of Limbaugh and an hour of Hannity, the Big 3 have set the Conservative political talk standard. But the ones I truly enjoy the most; Doyle and Savage can’t be found in my town. And I’ve slowly grown to enjoy Andy Dean’s show as well.

Yet the true reason I enjoy Savage, Doyle and Dean is that they do not fall into the daily talking points memo cycle and go against the grain of the Big 3 Conservative talkers. They are not afraid to call out a GOP member for mistakes and stupidity with equal venom of a Dem, unlike the Big 3 whipping boys. Hell they even call the Big 3 out for being party suck ups.

Wait, is Beck still considered a Conservative talker? I mean he changes his political posing each Presidential cycle. One year he considers himself a Conservative, than an Independent and I believe recently he’s called himself a Libertarian. At least Liberals stay true to their political calling.

Ratings don’t lie, Conservative talkers from all aspects of Media source; Radio, TV, and Interweb are leading the pack, because money talks. You want to make money in talk radio, be a Conservative voice and you’ll get picked up immediately. Just ask Dennis Miller, once a Liberal hack and out of a job, he turned tables to being a Conservative hack and the paycheck clears all the time.

In the end, people are going to take the force fed Media abbreviated narrative of their favorite Poli-Yakker as truth, no matter right or wrong. Hell even Beck admitted he was wrong and Liberals were right on Iraq and no one changed the channel.

That’s it, slap the tap on the Arrogant Bastard Ale, pass the peanut bowl and keep swallowing the Media drivel as unvarnished truth.

CHEERS!