Ted Koppel tell Hannity to his face: You're bad for America

LOL at you snowflakes.

 

You do not know this. You are assuming.

Can't the bloviating, irrational and partisan talking head be regarded as bad for discourse regardless of which side they claim to represent?

 

Maybe we need some sort of ratings to News station programs where its like "O" for Opinion show, or "S" for Strictly News.

(Before 2020 I hope Facebook comes up with some sort of ratings system to verify and flag "News" reports that gets shared on Facebook. Maybe like a Rotten Tomatoes for Facebook news feeds)

I don't really have a problem with opinion shows or talk shows geared towards a certain perspective. I used to love the Daily Show & Colbert Report which are geared towards one opinion but with entertainment & comedy to drive the show.

But where the issue is now is that the far Right has now infiltrated our government where the Right opinion "Entertainment" view is used as fact that drive legislation. Its used as propaganda for our President which is essentially State Run Media. Im also not comfortable with the owner of the Media Giant on the Right being owned by someone who is this close to the President (Ivanka is a trustee for Rupert Murdoch), and has vested interest in his success in spreading his agenda globally so he can spread that Right Wing media in Europe etc.

So is Hannity "Bad for America"... right now he sure as hell is. It would be the same thing too if Obama would have had a vested interest in let's say NBC where Malia Obama was a trustee in Steve Burke's fortune, and Obama was using the Rachel Maddow Show as propaganda to drive legislation.

Also there is the wiretapping fiasco which came from Brietbart opinion pieces with hacks like Mark Levin weighing in, and causing the President to present a disruption in a serious FBI & Congressional Investigation.

So yeah... right now the Right Wing media and its connection to the President is a SERIOUS problem and bad for America.

 

The irony is a man like Koppel is what the Republican party used to be about. The current Republican party is more fringe, more radical, more fear/hate mongering, and less intelligent than it has been in many decades.

 

to be clear, you made this post out of your ass and got owned.

 

I love whataboutisms

So who is the Sean Hannity equivalent on the left? Someone with that much influence who spews as much bullshit and does it all with only a high school diploma?

 

Its interesting they trace the "division" back to Rush Limbaugh and the end of the fairness doctrine. They never seem to consider WHY Rush became so popular. Limbaugh (whom I've personally almost never listened to in all these years) filled a niche that was not being served by the news media of that time. Exactly why do you think he got so popular? The lack of balance in the media at large has been well documented for many years now. Only now that more options are available for the people to access is this all suddenly a "crisis". In fact, the only REAL crisis is in media newsrooms across America. Their power wanes, they understand this and they are panicked.

 

Anyone who's isn't a conservative shill is a liberal hack. That's the age of stupidity we're in right now.

 

You won't find me to be any supporter of Hannity. I personally think he's a train wreck. Meanwhile, can you point to the liberal figureheads he "called out" in this piece?

Your lack of response to my question of how Limbaugh became so popular and powerful is duly noted.

 

I wasn't speaking about liberal hacks. This was only speaking about the top 3 among conservatives, not all. First of all, none of the liberals are on radio, so I don't have the chance to listen to them (and I watch very little TV, so I'm not privy to the liberal hacks which is where most of them are, I'm assuming). Second- yes, of course there are liberal hacks. I would guess probably Chris Matthews, for starters.

But there are conservatives who are reasonable. Like Savage- he seems to be pretty even-keeled. O'Reilly's fine - he's a bit weird about certain things, but he's not too bad.

Hannity is a first-class liar and distorter. It's not even up for debate. It's fact. Again, if you have a few hours, I'd be glad to run down the 100s of instances. And yes, there is a difference - there are many conservative commentators who don't rise to his level of deceit. This has been indicated over and over and over again.

Socially liberal- b/c I don't give a **** if you're white, black, gay, transgender, Muslim, Catholic, a cat person, a dog person- you treat everyone with respect, and if there is a group that has been discriminated against, you do something about it rather than just leaving it be and letting it "works itself out." Doesn't work that way in real life.

Fiscally liberal- anyone who owns a business has to be, by nature. Conservatives like to tout that they're fiscally conservative, but many are not- they want to spend just as much as the liberals, but on what they want- which makes it OK.

Overall, I guess I would be liberative.

 

That's why this entire thread and Koppel's opinion is simply another hit piece. Let me know when you're serious about media bias and its root cause.

 

Thanks for the link and the quotes. But it doesn't quite get you off the hook.

Why did you have to add this in on page 2 of this thread? And only after someone called you out on it? Why only conservatives in the thread title and your original post? Your original post (and all your posts here frankly) show you to lean left. Meanwhile, you won't even discuss the reason for the rise of folks like Limbaugh and Hannity. Could it possibly be the folks watching these shows felt they had nowhere else to turn to to see their beliefs represented? Why doesn't this concern you too? Don't you think that had a LOT to do with the rise of this problem you called out here?

Your earlier off hand dismissal of my question suggests you aren't serious about trying to get to the root cause of the problem. And yes, Ted Koppel...as respected as some here are of him...is part of what caused that problem. So until I see Mr. Koppel do his own self reflection on being a part of the legacy of the industry which helped spawn today's media, I won't take him too seriously.

 

No, actually it comes from them telling verifiable lies. There was a book once about Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Liar. It lists many of lies, the actual facts that back it up etc. There are things where he was just wrong and not lying, and there are things where he simply omitted facts and didn't tell the "whole truth". But there are times when he flat out lied during his broadcasts and did so repeatedly. I believe that book was from the 90's. His lies haven't stopped since then.

 

Has this thought ever occured to you? That maybe just maybe that these people already had preconcieved notions that were already biased either through their religion or just living insular lives(never leaving their home town) and these people disagreed with reality and found an alt reality to ease their pain of figuring out for themselves that their entire ****ing paradigm is batshit insane?

 

I don't pretend to know all there is about where folks on the left come from or why they think they way they do, but I do know that I would never...EVER...make assumptions about the totality of their "preconceived notions" about religion or their insular lives or their reality vs. an alt reality. I know that's way above my (or anyone's...including your) pay grade.

Humility. Try it on for size.