Media and Politics Essay

We all agree that a well-in appointed worldly concern leads to a more(prenominal) open, rightful(prenominal) and civic-minded society. Yet today it trip upms every major and mild give-and-takeworthiness ne twork has a Sunday talk show or weekly roundt able-bodied dedicated to educating the American public most politics. In addition, with the growth of the Internet, thousands of Web sites exist with cultivation on politics and government. The irony is that era the quantity of places we can go for semipolitical in pass wateration continues to increase, the look of that information has non. Recent voter turnout shows an American public with a gen eonl apathy toward government and the political process. If we continue to concentrate on innuendo instead of insight, we threaten to create even more public apathy. For everything a quick lead bite delivers in sharpness, it often loses the resembling in substance when the message reaches the public.While it may be wakeful to fault the media for the lack of public confidence in Americas political system, policymakers argon as well partly to blame. Because increased political fondness has led to an adversarial relationship between policymakers, it has created a disconnect with the media who cover them. It is sole(prenominal) natural for the media to present the watchword program in this crossfire approach when that is all it hears from politicians on a daily can. Thus, instead of creating a well-informed society, policymakers, and the media can unknowingly work together to give the appearance that complicated issues argon black or w forme, with no in-between. We all know this is not true.For video, and the American media generally, the preference of 2000 ordain be the first real taste of things to come, the beginning of the end of an era if not the end itself. Whispers of the information revolution could be heard in 1994, most(prenominal)ly in the accents of the Right, but in 2000, the Inter nets streak presence allow for be sounded in shouts and with cymbals.Campaigning via Websites and the use of e-mail, already routine, pull up stakes edge toward dominance. In addition, a significant fraction of the public pass on be getting its politics from the Internet the Pew investigate Center found that in 1995, merely 4 percent of adults went on-line for news at least(prenominal) once a week by 1998, the manikin had reached 20 percent, and rising. Today, however, television, which displaced the press and radio (and movies, for that matter), is itself substantially be elevate aside. It is not even surprising that, according to the Pew Research Center, while 60 percent of adults regularly watched TV news in 1993, that figure dropped to 38 percent in 1998. Like the press and like radio, television will retain much of its power its quality of its influence may even try out what is certain, however, is that it will stool to change.If we argon lucky, that change will hel p Americans reclaim virtually of democracys old charm. Our communities have been weakened or shattered by the market, mobility, and technology, and the centralization of the media and of party politics has taken much of the spirit out of our politics, emphasizing mass and hierarchy, and hint citizens to seek dignity in a toffee-nosed life that seems increasingly confined. Our politics, like our society, is more and more divided into two tiers. The elite levels, e special(prenominal)ly around the national capital and the media centers, be dense with organized groups and with information about the subtleties of policy and politicsThe great majority of Americans, by contrast, atomic number 18 socially distant from power, baffled by its intricacies, anxious about change, and inundate by the welter of information being made available to them. The link that connect citizens to government are thin, mostly top-down, and dominated by notes the parties are increasingly centralized bu reaucracies, and participation is apt to take the form of donating money in response to direct appeals, voicelessly, without any ordinate in group leadinghip or policy. As for the dominant news media, they are not seen as a stratum between citizens and centers of power, but as part of the powerhouse, an element of the elite or in its service.The great majority of Americans know that they depend on the mediathe media decide what opinions to attend to and in what ways. Viewers, wanting(p) a voice, can assert their discontents only by changing channel or by turning off the set, and in relation to politics, set out has become startlingly common, a silent protest against indignity. It doesnot help that, eager to cultivate and hold a mass audience, the news media tend to dumb down their political coverage, as indicated by the ever-shrinking sound bite afforded to views and leaders. It is probably even worse that the media in addition pander, playing to our beat impulses. Early an d consistently, survey showed that most Americans were convinced that coverage of the Lewinsky affair was doing scathe to our institutions, telling surveyters that they wanted it to receive much less attention from the media. However, media leaders knew, of course, that despite this public-regarding judgment, very few Americans, as private individuals, would be able to resist getting caught up in the tacky salacity of the thing.As a result, we got coverage in agonizing detail Russell Baker called it disgusting, an meter reading that the media market is dominated by edge, attitude, and smut. Moreover, it encouraged millions of Americans to view the media, for all their power, as worthy of contempt. Political societies can be symbolized but not seen, and the most important political controversies turn on courselike justice, equality or libertyand hence on public speech. A sketch makes a strong impression, but one that tends to be superficial. Many see who you appear to be, Mach iavelli advised the prince, but not some will substantiate who you are.And often, visual coverage of politics is banal or beside the point. In the internet, a well behaved many observers discerned a trend toward a more deconcentrate communication and politics, more interactive and hence friendlier to democratic citizenship. However, the Internet, at least so far, is not leading us to the public square. It does enable minorities to reveal like-minded volume, to avoid the sense of being alone, and sometimes this gives strength and say-so to our better angels, although at least as often it gives scope to the unrelenting side. In general, however, the Internet creates groups that lack what Tocqueville called the power of meeting, the face-to-face communication that makes claims on our senses, bodies as well as minds. Over the past five decades, the American electorate has come to depend more and more on the news media for discipline about political campaigners and making votin g decisions. The growth of all forms of media and the rise of objectivity in the press has made voters more dependent on the news media for promote information. Today, about seven in 10 voters depend mainly on the news media for information to make choices when they cast their ballot. Voters addiction on the news increases the importance of the role that the news media play in American elections. just what do American voters want from election news coverage? And how do voters evaluate the news medias coverage of presidential elections? In a word, lukewarm detects the general feeling of voters about the action of the news media in covering presidential campaigns, according to national scientific surveys of the American electorate conducted from February through November 1996, as well as a more recent survey, conducted in October 1999, on the current campaign.The surveys were conducted by the Center for abide by Research and Analysis (CSRA) at the University ofConnecticut. Fundi ng for the 1996 surveys was provided by The Freedom Forum. why the tepid feelings? American voters are quite consistent in what they say they want from election newsand they are quite agnise in saying that what they want is often not what they get. The American electorate is hungry for news and information that allow it to evaluate the substance of presidential candidacies on the basis of issue positions and on the likely consequences of electing a particular candidate to office. countersign provided outside of these parameters, while perhaps socialise, is viewed as nonsense in the words of our focus group participant. Two types of storiesthose that review how candidates stand on issues and those that describe how election outcomes might affect votersare clearly the kinds of stories in which voters verbalise the highest levels of interestingness.The remedies suggested.enhanced coverage of issues and candidates positions, more coverage of the possible impact of election outcomes on public policy and broader coverage of thefull field of candidates, not just the front-runnerscould improve the quality of news and promote voter learning, which would be water-loving for American democracy. At the selfsame(prenominal) time, less coverage of the election as a sporting horse race and less obsession with entertaining stories about candidates personal lives would, according to voters, be an improvement.In election periods, the tips highlight the role of public opinion in the political process. They also illuminate the importance of public opinion measurements in the media. Fundamentally, and at their best, media polls are a way for public opinion to be describe and perceived, thus fulfilling the eminent 19th-century British visitor James Bryces mood of the American press as the chief organ of public opinion, and connection weathercock. However, when employed inappropriately by overzealous taradiddleers and analysts, polls can be used to create an exaggerated sense of precision that misleads more than it informs. canvas routinely bring the public into election campaigns. In an otherwise abrupt and even alienated society, poll reports may be the only inwardness individual members of the public have in situating themselves in the greater society. news show reports of poll results tell individuals that they are part of a majority or a minority on various issues.In campaigns with more than two candidates, especially early in the primary season, information about relativecandidate rest gives voters the information to help them cast a vote that is strategically advantageous. But most importantly, polls take that strategic information about candidate performance away from politicians control and places it in the hands of the public. News organizations no longer are forced to rely on the instincts of party leadersor on carefully orchestrated leaks from partisan pollsters for data. Because they are numbers, poll results sometimes create the appearance of a false precision in reporting of candidate support or presidential approval. In fact, some polling organizations flaunt this alleged precision by displaying results to a 10th of a percentage point. Of course, the error due simply to the have design is unremarkably at least 30 times greater than the specificity presented. Moreover, there are growing concerns about the ability of survey researchers to reach the majority of households selected in their sample. Some respondents refuse to be interviewed.Others have become ever more difficult to reach during the short news survey-interviewing period that must be sandwiched between public events. This perception of precision and accuracy leads journalists into making blunders, including attempting to govern deep meaning when there probably isnt any. Newspaper and television reporters often try to attribute a three-point difference in the margin between two candidates to some campaign action. Either the slipping candidate has made a mistake, or there has been a successful strategic decision that has brought supporters to the rising candidate. Sometimes underage movements in the percentages of subgroups that form only a part of the total sample are presumption the same explanatory treatment. Those differences, however, are more likely to be caused by sampling error than by campaign events.In mid-October, a prominent presidential candidate addressed his largest audience. Hundreds of thousands of voters heard his messagebut they never got the news that his message contained some distortions, omissions, and half-truths. Those significant matters were either ignored or buried in coverage by the leading news media. Why? It was not because of bias. It was because the candidates message was delivered not at a campaign event but in campaign television ads. And when candidates communicate via ads on the tubeinstead of on the stump, journalists act as if we are stumped about our role and responsibility. Jour nalists at most major and medium-sized newspapers are proud that they are now at least covering political advertisements at all. They report on them in small-boxed features called Ad go over or something of the sort. But they harbort figured out that they are still being manipulated by the ad-makers. The Ad Watch reports carry the transcript of the 30-second ad, followed by a small section in which a reporter subjectively interprets the ad-makers strategy. then(prenominal)in the most valuable sectionthe reports briefly focus on the factual accuracy of the ads claims. Newspapers display these Ad Watch boxes on inside pages, back with the snow tire and truss ads. work out about it from a journalists viewpoint when a candidate distorts his record in a huge rally speech, a good reporter fact checks the claims. The resulting news story will surely focus in part on the candidates omissions and distortions that present a different and more accurate picture of his record.And that may wel l be a page one story. Now think about it from the political strategists viewpoint Democratic and Republican strategists expect yarn-dye journalists will check ads for accuracy but then downplay the results. So, being skilled manipulators, they are willing to take a light hit in a box that is buried back with the truss ads and will run just once if they can pour their unfiltered, exaggerated and depraved message into living rooms where it may be seen by millions, not just once but perhaps 10 times in a campaign.There is one mistake that all journalists make whether we are covering politics at the White reside, state house, or courthouse. both time we report on money and politics, we fail to tell people the real story about how the system very works because we are victimisation the wrong words to describe what is happening right in the first place our eyes, every day. So no wonder people just gesture when we report that a special interest contributed $100,000 to Democrats or Republicans. Because, this special interest really did not contribute this money (which my dictionary explains means that it was given as though to a charity). What the special interest representative really did was invest $100,000 in the Democrats or Republicans. Big business people (see also big labor, trial lawyers, et al) invest in politics for the same creator that they invest in anythingto absorb a profitable return on their investment. white plague the right word and suddenlyeverybody understands what is really going on. They will especially understand when we regularly report that the largest agribusiness investments in Senate and House races routinely go to the top agriculture committee members, and largest energy special interest investments go to the top energy committee members, and so on.Use the right word and suddenly our next task as journalists becomes clearand clearly difficult we need to do a better traffic of discovering the campaign investors motives. We need to ask, Just what profitable return did the investor expect to reap for that campaign investment? A tax subsidy? A normal waived? A loophole that is difficult for a squinting journalist to see with a naked eye? Whatever the return, this much is clear the money in the long run comes out of the U.S. Treasury. Clearly, our present system, which we like to say is based on private financing of campaigns, can also be viewed as a form of backdoor public fundingwhere the taxpayers pay the final tab, no doubt many times over. We journalists have yet to find a way to gauge how many billions of tax dollars it now costs us to finance election campaigns through the back door. At least we can begin using a vocabulary that will finally tell it like it is.