One of my gifts, as a person living with ADD is that every so often, I have to turn off the outside world for a while, and just do nothing. That's where I've been for the last few weeks.
When I get like that, it often takes something a little special to get me off my ass and back into my version of a "productive" mode. This time around, it was an email from Media Matters for America, announcing the publication of their list of candidates for the worst (best?, most effective?) media misinformation of 2007.
While the list mostly features the standup comics of the right --Billy O', Ann Coulter, Pat Robertson (whose senile irrelevance becomes increasingly embarrassing to watch with each news cycle) and that ilk-- there's some of the usual genuinely scary stuff in there, too. It's a good read.
All in all, it's been an interesting year in the news biz, and I like to think that if I stand back far enough there's a lot that's happened this year that gives this tired old hippie a fresh shot of optimism that the herd is starting to wake up. And even more encouraging, they are not even slightly amused at where it is that they find themselves. -- But that's another session at the keyboard.
Today, I'm writing to announce that I have THE solution to the self-inflicted crisis our traditional media has landed itself in*.
Actually, I've had it since the autumn of 2001, but nobody implemented it then, when it might have prevented an awful lot of the mess our country is in, and its time quickly passed. Now, the herd is waking up, and once again we're at a point where just one major publisher with sufficient moxie (and resources) could start the ball rolling on a wonderful project the could contribute enormously to shortening and easing the pain of our nation's recovery.
Here's what I would have done in the fall of 2001 if I were Arthur Sulzberger, Jr: I would have ordered the creation of a new front-page feature in all the Times newspapers called "Reality Check." Then, I would have networked with all my buddies in the publishing business to participate in the project. I even would have syndicated the feature and offered it absolutely free to any publication that wanted to carry it.
The job of the newly-created Reality Editor would be to commission a major nationwide poll (weekly? bi-weekly?) on the most important recent news events, measuring how accurately the public perception of these events coincides with what actually happened. The results of this poll, along with clarifying links and resultant correspondence (accompanied by further clarifying links when necessary) would be published prominently daily until the next poll is conducted.
I can see something like this spreading to a point where it's carried in nearly every fairly responsible publication in the country.
I can see it sparking all sorts of discussion and perhaps opening some minds along the way.
My home in America is in a mid-sized university town -- home to the University of Illinois. The publisher of the local rag and I have difficulty agreeing on the day of the week, let alone anything political, but he is (as, I suspect, are the majority of his brethren) a man with a great love of the constitution, and I can see even the Champaign-Urbana News-Gazette signing onto a project like this if it were done properly.
This is something that our traditional press ought to have been doing all along --who knows what it might have prevented?
How many Americans still believe that Sadam Husein had something to do with the attack on the World Trade Center?
How different might that number be if our traditional media had been doing their job from the get-go?
And, now, with the herd waking up, is a great time for something like Reality Check to really catch on. The right-wing noise machine is losing its effectiveness (as witness a good half the MM list being devoted to the comedians of the right), and a bold publisher (I recommend Time Magazine as a penance for their recent Joe Klein FISA fiasco.) could seize the opportunity and use a feature like this to keep the difference between the neocon spin machine and the real world fresh in its minds.
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*the increasingly large distance between reportage and what's actually happening in the real world, created by the tendency of the press to take and publish pronouncements from the current administration and their pals on the Right at face value.
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