Follow the Money

Seen a major news media story lately...or not seen one? There's a piece of analysis that would help your understanding, figure out what monied interest benefits. Whether the story supports your particular political bent or not stop and think about it.

I've complained about the constriction of media ownership before, and I'll do it again. There are vast amounts of money moving through the corporate owners of the media and their interests do not neccessarily coincide with the American public's interests. Let's back up in time a little and see what I'm talking about.

Enron. Right up until its collapse the corporation was touted as the wave of the "new" economy and an example of the benefits of de-regulation. But hey, there were warning signs all over the place that things were not as they seemed. Rolling blackouts in CA, skyrocketing energy prices, low profile complaints of gouging and manipulation by low profile (low readership) publications. These were ignored or ridiculed if noticed and certainly not ever mentioned after the collapse by major media. Of course little outfits don't have the resources to really investigate Big Business, but there are media companies with those resources, question is, do they have the will? Follow the money where? Enron got big and powerful through "de-regulation," that's the same philosophy that's created the media conglomorations, remember the mantra: lower prices, better service through the "free market." Yes, there are more money trails to be followed, but this is just a Blog, after all.

There are plenty of other examples that could be put up, but I've chosen one that is relatively uncontroversial and "politically neutral." If a story doesn't involve a local crime type issue the chances are it affects somebody's profit margin. Politics affect profit margins, ok that's not a news flash, but there seems to be a willingness to look at news as though it were news, sure there's the " I watch CNN and you watch FOX," type dispute, but even that is essentially meaningless, these medias are all controlled by a small group of very large corporations. The competition for viewers of one political bent over another is still nonsense as far as getting the truth about the world and our government, it is simply illustrative of the ability of a corporation to tailor the news to suit its ends.

One media outlet still exists as fairly open, the internet. Yes, there is a definite shortage of money for investigative reporting but the ability to quickly disseminate very local low budget discoveries gives it some clout - and interest to major media. So the story has to do with internet access, hmmm, where's the money? Do political types benefit? Do large money organizations benefit?

How about the Public's benefit?