Journalists like Robert Scheer, Greg Palast and Chris Hedges write regularly on issues that from time to time make it into the columns of New York writers like Paul Krugman, Getrchen Morgensen, Frank Norris and James Stewart. All these opinion pieces rarely lead to follow-ups in the news section.
Overseas, the Telegraph in London has made this a beat as has Max Keiser's programes on RT and Press TV. There have been some Al Jazeera docs, but business channels like CNBC prefer to focus on greed by colourful bad guys, not the more boring but ultimately criminal practices by banks.
Most of our media is mesmerized by the antics of individuals, not the impact of institutions, Most media outlets are parochial, unwilling to see the economy as globalized force, with the US playing a major role.
'Too big to question'
Just as many outlets did not warn us about the coming market meltdown, most are not warning us today about what will happen if the depression we are already sinking into deepens.
The military is making contingency plans as things get worse; reports the Telegraph, "The military planning work has come to light after The Daily Telegraph
disclosed last month that British embassies in the eurozone have been
told to prepare emergency plans for the demise of the euro and the
possible civil disorder that could follow."
This could be one
reason for the passage of the new NDAA defence authorisation bill that
provides for rounding up dissidents branded as terrorists while
suspending legal protections.
A European economic think-tank called LEAP, with a history
of credible projections, warns soberly, "Already insolvent (the US) will
become ungovernable bringing about, for Americans and those who depend
on the United States, violent and destructive economic, financial,
monetary, geopolitical and social shocks."
Does anyone really
believe that our political leaders in both parties know what to do?
Along with the Fed, they have been pumping trillions into the economy to
mostly no avail. The promised recovery has yet to show its head.
The
trends forecaster, Gerard Calente, is more despairing than most
prognosticators, even predicting the possibility of a revolution. He
saves his fiercest words for "media morons" who avoid the stories that
matter most, noting:
"And the bigger they got, the more untouchable they became. TV Money Honeys, fast-talking finance finaglers, Nightly News anchors, Sunday Morning Beltway Blowhards, and Talk Show Tough Guys genuflected, scraped, kissed up and bowed down before those magnificent men in their money machines.
"When these kings, queens and aristocrats of 21st-century commerce spoke, their ex cathedra judgments went unquestioned. Thus, when they warned that if the 'too big to fail' were allowed to fail, the world financial system would collapse, their conclusions went unchallenged. No evidence was provided, no proof was needed, and no explanation was tendered. Harvard, Princeton, Yale ... the White Shoe Boyz had spoken. They who invented the 'too big to fail' were 'too big to question.'"
What matters most is covered least
So here we are once again at year's end debating our picks for the most important news stories of the year, and peering into a future that most of us don't want to see, as a narrow view stifles our politics and vision becomes a word reserved for eyeglass ads.
What matters most is covered least. The financial industry is likely to expose itself and bring itself down before the media does the job it should be doing this by demanding reform consistently.I may have been dissecting news too long because I think I may have written many of these words before. In the year ahead, I am going to try to keep writing about the resource rich -- even as I become more resource "challenged" while talking about what's not in the news but should be.
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