Rob Kall has a great article (Cable News' War on America) about the pitiful state of network TV news, and their sensationalist disregard for the necessity of informing citizens in a democracy. Many comments on the article suggested that all we need to do is turn off the TV. I don’t watch TV news anymore, but that just isn’t enough to turn this country around and get it back on track.
I agree with just about all the sentiments voiced in response to Rob’s article, but I think that the majority of OpEd News readers have already forsaken TV news. As a group of publicly minded citizens, I think we need to come up with something more productive than saying “turn off your TV”. Right wing advocates don't just sit on their butts, they use money and political influence to turn public discourse in their direction. They have taken over television, radio, Armed Forces radio, many newspapers, and they are highly organized in churches and local government. Obviously, they have also taken over the federal government and are replacing judges and federal prosecutors to suit their agenda. We need to do something in response. Something much more than just turning off the TV which is akin to an ostrich putting its head in the sand.
I am wondering if it would be worth trying to take up a collection from OpEd News readers and contributors in an attempt to raise enough money to start advertising on radio and TV in order to drive more traffic to this site. I realize that OpEd News already gets quite a bit of traffic, but almost all of that traffic is liberal and progressive. We need to spread the word further. If we can get the attention of average Americans and get them to realize that there are other sources of news out there rather than just the corporate media, I think that will help turn things around in America.
I agree that one of the biggest problems in America right now is that the majority of citizens do not get useful information from their preferred “news sources”. I think we should make it a priority of ours to try and increase progressive news penetration into middle America where many people vote against their own best interests due to a lack of information. If the Democrats can do half as well as the Republicans have over the last 30 years in recapturing the attention of average Americans, we can turn this country around and get it back on track fairly quickly.
I'm not sure how to organize such a fund raising and advertising campaign, but I think we should start discussing it seriously here at OpEd News.
Dr. John Moffett is an active research neuroscientist in the Washington, DC area, who has published articles on the nervous and immune systems. Dr. Moffett is also the author and webmaster of the political opinion website www.Factinista.org, and is a Managing Editor at OpEdNews.com.
