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well, this is interesting.
first off, let me say that i dont know what ustwo is talking about either.
the construction of this illusion called "the liberal press" was an aspect of the populist conservative movement's shift to the hard (read neo-fascist) right...it normalized the move to an extent, making it seem reactive. such moves require a blurring of interpretive lines, a collapse of distance--if folk were to say to themselves "i am becoming neo-fascist" rather than "i am becoming conservative" because the dulcet tones of a limbaugh--to pick an easy example from the past--make sense, i doubt there would have been such drift as there was.
you can see the constructedness of the notion of "the liberal press" in its immobility. it doesn't require justification, does not require systematic application, in fact the meme works better when there is no data. liberal basically means that which excludes conservative premises. that's it. so it has no content. it needs no content. it is "not us" that is its content.
but ustwo asserts its existence as a fact--and perhaps in certain quadrants of the world of the right, it is. in the bigger world, there is a diversity of positions running through any media outlet, some more enamored of conservative-friendly special ways of thinking and writing, some less so.
but you do have a clear consensus across all of this--that stuff lke neo-liberalism makes sense, that it is meet not to report too much on the catastrophic record neoliberalism has produced for itself as the official ideological frame for all kinds of extensions of american empire dressed up as "globalization"--that it is meet not to cover political dissent--that it is meet to provide the Dear Leader with whatever is required to maintain a veneer of political legitimacy to the overall order because it is only within the context of an order understood as legitimate that a loyal opposition can operate.
the loyal opposition accumulates cultural capital for itself no matter which actions it takes relative to the existing order: if it supports elements, it wins, if it opposes other elements, it still wins. this generates the impression of a viable circuit which links criticism and by extension a wider public to the discourses and fact of power: this generates the impression that the is a viable circuit which links dissent to clarification of problems to the processes whereby policy of formulated/power is exercised.
so you do not see much in the way of questions raised about the ideological assumptions that shape this movement, nor do you see much in the way of serious critiques of the existing order as a whole---so much for any idea that the press works in opposition--so much for the idea of the oppositional "liberal" press, so much for any suprise coming from the various movements in support of, in opposition to, obscuring or pursuing. the american press works for itself.
the logic of the op is obvious enough if you read the posts...the sweeping away of questions concerning the 2000 election--which you would think would require a serious investigation--because you would think that questions about the integrity of the voting system would be yet another serious blow to the rickety edifice that is the legitimacy of this system--but apparently folk think that this is not necessary and so are willing to allow problems to eat away at the procedural legitimacy of the system they imagine themselves to be defending.
it's bad enough the wreckage left by 7 years of sustain incompetence by the present administration..rather than try to look out for procedural legitimacy, the right prefers to pretend nothing is happening. ustwo, faithful little belleweather of this in the micro-world of tfp, shows as much.
it's like watching a train wreck in ultra slow motion. except that the way the camera is positioned, you cant quite escape the impression that when this sequence ends, there wont be a whole lot of other watching for you.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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