Is the US press really that free?

[Nathonas]

I hear people say over and over that the US press/journalism is nothing like in authoritarian states like Russia and China where journalists can't write anything negative about the government. But is this really the case? Mainstream media in the US ignores the corruption of the US government, while reporters that try to break the silence by releasing important stories get harassed and silenced. Just recently I read about the story of James Risen, a New York Times journalist who is about to go to jail for refusing to give up a source he used to write his anti-government book "State of War".

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/03/us/james-risen-faces-jail-time-for-refusing-to-identify-a-confidential-source.html

What do you guys think?

[Ekaros]

It's not state owned, but large outlets are owned by same oligarchs who pay off  the elected officials... What difference that makes, I do not comment on...

[Kluge]

Persecution and prosecution of journalists in the US over the past few years has gone beyond anything in my lifetime, but Obama's a lame duck. Since they're largely administrative (DoJ, admin lapdog) decisions, it's kind of pointless to talk about it except maybe to bring awareness to it and see what 2016 pres. candidates say.

[beetcoin]

yeah it's owned by the de-facto oligarchs.. but i'd say it's probably better than being owned by some autocratic form of government that gets to control every little detail that gets out there. at least we can bitch about how corrupt and fucked up our government is, unlike china and russia.

a big issue, also, is that our media outlets are not so much concerned about informing the public, but more like raking in cash for the big billionaires standing behind them.

[IamCANADIAN013]

I look at it this way.  It's more free than some, but not free enough.  It's no different in Canada, mainstream media has it's own agenda that's driven by whomever owns it.  Media is no longer non biased.  

I try to tune out from it as much as possible.  Far too much fear mongering on a daily basis.  You'd think it was a war zone outside by the way the media reports sometimes. Much easier to push through a militarized police force when the public lives in fear of violence that is actually declining.

[Cicero2.0]

Our press chooses to be protective of the administration. They were originally given the protections they have to be a watchdog but hav ebecome lapdogs. There have been some chilling moves by the current and previous administrations.

[mladen00]

2-3 peoples control news programs in USA

In USA you have monopol on news, and truth

[IamCANADIAN013]

2-3 peoples control news programs in USA

In USA you have monopol on news, and truth

Yep, and it's only going to get worse.  I know this is a little old, but it paints a pretty good picture of where we are headed.



Same thing with all the banks, Department stores, etc.

Once all our choices are taken away, I fear what our future will look like.

[tinof]

However un-free you think you are, Russia and China have it worse.

[DrG]

However un-free you think you are, Russia and China have it worse.

While we haven't been shooting down air transports carrying "aide" that happens to be 40+ soldiers, the US media is increasingly becoming a joke (if not already).

The morning news on ABC spent 2 min talking about how handsome an inmate was while it spent 13 seconds on missing emails and conflicting information from FBI vs IRS.

[cryptasm]

The US press freedom ranking (including the UK) has gone down over the last few years though we're still a lot better than say China and most parts of the Middle East.

https://image.guim.co.uk/ni/1398941918470/Press_Freedom_map.pdf

[DrG]

The US press freedom ranking (including the UK) has gone down over the last few years though we're still a lot better than say China and most parts of the Middle East.

https://image.guim.co.uk/ni/1398941918470/Press_Freedom_map.pdf

Probably pretty accurate barring the most recent events.  Silly they would put India's press behind the US - India skewers their candidates.  In the US we have reporters asking what Obama's most enchanting moment was:
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/obamas-enchanted-answer/

So hard hitting I just threw up.

[majakn]

Bilderberg group control media all over the world

[Marlo Stanfield]

People always knock on the government here but a strong independent unbiased publicly funded media source is important in my opinion. Just look at the state of American media to see why.

Although it doesn't have to be government funded, it could be funded on donations, but I don't think people have the will to fund such an organization.

[Lethn]

In the U.S any blogger can usually say what they like no matter what and you could set up a newspaper by yourself and print it with a home PC but one thing that does happen a lot is the biggest media outlets take sides in any debate no matter how wrong they are, you will usually find that they take the side of whichever particular ideology they belong to. So for example, Fox news as we all know is blatantly on the side of Republicans and don't even try to hide it, MSNBC and CNN tend to be on the side of Democrats.

How can you tell? Whenever someone on the opposite side fucks up they're all over it, Obama fucks up, Fox News go after him, if Bush fucked up people like MSNBC will go after him but the real clue into who they belong to is in who they defend or DON'T mention, so with Fox News you'll never hear them attacking Bush or other Republicans very much ( except for Ron Paul ) and with MSNBC you'll barely hear them mention anything Obama has done unless it's major or the news journalists can't be bothered keeping up the façade anymore.

You'll even see this mentality on these very forums and it makes it very difficult to talk to Americans about politics because if you mention things that Bush and Obama have done if they're supporters of either ( and I noticed a couple of mainstream republicans worming their way in here ) they'll get extremely defensive about it and try to blatantly deflect the blame. I always wondered why I could never get along with anybody before when it came to talking politics/religion and now I know it's because my views weren't mainstream, they were with the Anarchist/Libertarian type ideologies, hell I bet I could get along with Marxists better than I could with the common politics people follow today but they all seem to have vanished.

[Justine]

In the U.S any blogger can usually say what they like no matter what and you could set up a newspaper by yourself and print it with a home PC but one thing that does happen a lot is the biggest media outlets take sides in any debate no matter how wrong they are, you will usually find that they take the side of whichever particular ideology they belong to. So for example, Fox news as we all know is blatantly on the side of Republicans and don't even try to hide it, MSNBC and CNN tend to be on the side of Democrats.

How can you tell? Whenever someone on the opposite side fucks up they're all over it, Obama fucks up, Fox News go after him, if Bush fucked up people like MSNBC will go after him but the real clue into who they belong to is in who they defend or DON'T mention, so with Fox News you'll never hear them attacking Bush or other Republicans very much ( except for Ron Paul ) and with MSNBC you'll barely hear them mention anything Obama has done unless it's major or the news journalists can't be bothered keeping up the façade anymore.

You'll even see this mentality on these very forums and it makes it very difficult to talk to Americans about politics because if you mention things that Bush and Obama have done if they're supporters of either ( and I noticed a couple of mainstream republicans worming their way in here ) they'll get extremely defensive about it and try to blatantly deflect the blame. I always wondered why I could never get along with anybody before when it came to talking politics/religion and now I know it's because my views weren't mainstream, they were with the Anarchist/Libertarian type ideologies, hell I bet I could get along with Marxists better than I could with the common politics people follow today but they all seem to have vanished.

Exactly.

People should debate the issue and not the person/party.

[kuroman]

This question shouldn't even be asked, how can you expect from companies (that's what they are) owned by big corporations to be partial when it is will known that those corps are elites when it comes to lobbying, and they are politically involved

[beetcoin]

one way i see china as being different from the U.S. is that in china, the government controls everything (including commerce). in the U.S., it's an oligarchy where corporations and billionaires run the government.

china controls its media outlets by shutting their mouths with an iron fist, while the U.S. does it by marginalizing the peoples' collective voice.

[Ron~Popeil]

In the U.S any blogger can usually say what they like no matter what and you could set up a newspaper by yourself and print it with a home PC but one thing that does happen a lot is the biggest media outlets take sides in any debate no matter how wrong they are, you will usually find that they take the side of whichever particular ideology they belong to. So for example, Fox news as we all know is blatantly on the side of Republicans and don't even try to hide it, MSNBC and CNN tend to be on the side of Democrats.

How can you tell? Whenever someone on the opposite side fucks up they're all over it, Obama fucks up, Fox News go after him, if Bush fucked up people like MSNBC will go after him but the real clue into who they belong to is in who they defend or DON'T mention, so with Fox News you'll never hear them attacking Bush or other Republicans very much ( except for Ron Paul ) and with MSNBC you'll barely hear them mention anything Obama has done unless it's major or the news journalists can't be bothered keeping up the façade anymore.

You'll even see this mentality on these very forums and it makes it very difficult to talk to Americans about politics because if you mention things that Bush and Obama have done if they're supporters of either ( and I noticed a couple of mainstream republicans worming their way in here ) they'll get extremely defensive about it and try to blatantly deflect the blame. I always wondered why I could never get along with anybody before when it came to talking politics/religion and now I know it's because my views weren't mainstream, they were with the Anarchist/Libertarian type ideologies, hell I bet I could get along with Marxists better than I could with the common politics people follow today but they all seem to have vanished.

Good debate requires intellectual honesty. That is a lost art in general whether the topic is religion or politics or just about anything else. That's why we have an aristocracy of idiots playing gotcha politics steering the ship in the US.

[RodeoX]

I think the real problem is that the news has become nothing more than a hook to get you to watch commercials. So no bad news or anything that might rock your boat. Certainly nothing that would spoil your shopping mood.