The New Republic magazine is not a fan of GWB

[mikkey 0]

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Let's face it they will never support any administration...

This comment made me think. A journalist I know well told me that the role of the media is not to be right or left. The media should critically examine any current government, no matter which side of politics.

The media has an important role in "keeping the bastards honest" as we say in Australia. Somebody "probing" and challenging the actions of a government does not make them automatically right or left. It is in the interest of the population that the media plays this role. I think that some of regulars of these discussions here "label" any media that questions the action of the current government as being left. As far as I remember, some of these media outlets were quite critical towards Clinton as well.
The problem many people have with Rupert Murdoch's media empire is that it has clear agendas: 1) Pure commercial focus - not a journalistic focus (i.e the tabloid style news) 2) Clear political agenda that leads to blind bashing of government if it is from one side and blind "following" when the other side is in power.

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When people look like ants - pull. When ants look like people - pray.

[SkydiverRick 0]

The problem many people have with Rupert Murdoch's media empire is that it has clear agendas: 1) Pure commercial focus - not a journalistic focus (i.e the tabloid style news) 2) Clear political agenda that leads to blind bashing of government if it is from one side and blind "following" when the other side is in power.

[Jib 0]

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If Fox is blindly following the right, why did O'Reilly disagree with Condoleezza Rice on 2 out of three of her major points on the No Spin Zone tonight?

Because the media is so left that it's changed the definition of right.

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the depth of his depravity sickens me.
-- Jerry Falwell, People v. Larry Flynt

[quade 4]

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The media has an important role in "keeping the bastards honest" as we say in Australia. Somebody "probing" and challenging the actions of a government does not make them automatically right or left. It is in the interest of the population that the media plays this role.

Well, yes, that IS sort of the basic idea.

http://www.cultsock.ndirect.co.uk/MUHome/cshtml/media/4estate.html

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The term fourth estate is frequently attributed to the nineteenth century historian Carlyle, though he himself seems to have attributed it to Edmund Burke:
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Burke said there were Three Estates in Parliament; but, in the Reporters' Gallery yonder, there sat a Fourth Estate more important than they all. It is not a figure of speech, or a witty saying; it is a literal fact, .... Printing, which comes necessarily out of Writing, I say often, is equivalent to Democracy: invent Writing, Democracy is inevitable. ..... Whoever can speak, speaking now to the whole nation, becomes a power, a branch of government, with inalienable weight in law-making, in all acts of authority. It matters not what rank he has, what revenues or garnitures: the requisite thing is that he have a tongue which others will listen to; this and nothing more is requisite.

Carlyle (1905)

Carlyle here was describing the newly found power of the man of letters, and, by extension, the newspaper reporter. In his account, it seems that the press are a new fourth estate added to the three existing estates (as they were conceived of at the time) running the country: priesthood, aristocracy and commons. Other modern commentators seem to interpret the term fourth estate as meaning the fourth 'power' which checks and counterbalances the three state 'powers' of executive, legislature and judiciary.

quade -
The World's Most Boring Skydiver