The End of Democracy

MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann used to be the voice of liberal justice.  Now, because MSNBC’s parent company, GE, doesn’t like Olbermann picking fights with Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly — because Bill harps on GE’s Iran’s investments — the truth is silenced by corporate interests as news dies on the vine and Democracy dies a slow death.

Glenn Greenwald explains why corporate censorship of the truth in news damages democracy:

Does anyone need it explained to them why it is so dangerous and destructive to have our political debates controlled by GE executives, sitting in their offices censoring the journalism of our leading media outlets in the name of “civility,” code for: you will respect those who can harm us? Our entire political culture is already designed to ensure corporate control of our political institutions.

Their lobbyists literally write the laws enacted by Congress and control their implementation. The reason the journalism industry insisted for so long on the ludicrous fiction that corporate parents never violated the sanctity of journalistic independence is precisely because everyone understood why that would be so dangerous. Apparently, they no longer feel a need to maintain that fiction.

While Greenwald is eminently correct; what he relates is no surprise to anyone who writes a blog or independently publishes on the internet.

We know the national news is tainted by backend greed and that’s why the “blogosphere” has erupted with truth squads on every side investigating what really happened and why.

I believe the Alaska bloggers had a large influence in keeping a shining light on Sarah Palin’s shenanigans while in office and, in the end, the blogging truth squad forced the early resignation of what was clearly a compromised governorship.

The truth, when crushed to the ground, shall rise again — and if the mainstream media won’t tell us the truth in Iraq or Iran or detail their vested interests that purposefully skew the news in their favor — then the remedy against the company lie must be found elsewhere; and that is why the internet must always remain free and accessible the world over.

We are set free by providing access to the truth and not by hiding the truth behind corporate coffers.