They Know What Matters!

If you were in the Twin Cities from about 1986 to the early nineties – after Channel 11 changed their call letters from WUSA to KARE – you probably remember their ubiquitous, supremely annoying branding campaign:  “we know what matters”.

Remember those?

Not sure KARE expected any but the dimmest viewers to think that the station was, in fact, the final arbiter of actual meaning.  It’s all what they call imaging in the business; “branding” in other businesses.  It all falls under the rubric of marketing; making people think there’s a reason to tune into your station rather than the other news stations in the market.

Everyone does it.

Including the dozens of stations owned by Sinclair.   Same basic idea – only their ads glom onto something that happens to be a hot subject these days – the fact that most Americans trust used care salesmen and meth addicts more than the media.  Here’s the script:

“Hi, I’m(A) ____________, and I’m (B) _________________…

(B) Our greatest responsibility is to serve our Northwest communities. We are extremely proud of the quality, balanced journalism that KOMO News produces.

(A) But we’re concerned about the troubling trend of irresponsible, one sided news stories plaguing our country. The sharing of biased and false news has become all too common on social media.

(B) More alarming, some media outlets publish these same fake stories… stories that just aren’t true, without checking facts first.

(A) Unfortunately, some members of the media use their platforms to push their own personal bias and agenda to control ‘exactly what people think’…This is extremely dangerous to a democracy.

(B) At KOMO it’s our responsibility to pursue and report the truth. We understand Truth is neither politically ‘left nor right.’ Our commitment to factual reporting is the foundation of our credibility, now more than ever.

(A) But we are human and sometimes our reporting might fall short. If you believe our coverage is unfair please reach out to us by going to KOMOnews.com and clicking on CONTENT CONCERNS. We value your comments. We will respond back to you.

(B) We work very hard to seek the truth and strive to be fair, balanced and factual… We consider it our honor, our privilege to responsibly deliver the news every day.

(A) Thank you for watching and we appreciate your feedback”

It’s topical, it’s powerful, and it is utterly factual.

And that makes Big Media all skittery:

This is not exactly a scandalous or groundbreaking message, but you’d think otherwise from observing the reactions from certain entertainers and members of the press.

The Washington Post, for example, referred to the video as “stunning,” and added that the anchors, “seemed to parrot one of President Trump’s favorite themes.” Which is kind of funny, because you could also say they’re parroting one of his critics’ favorite themes about fake news being shared around from untrustworthy sources.

Late-night host and on-again-off-again political commentator Jimmy Kimmel, who is himself no stranger to parroting a demagogue’s talking point, said of the Sinclair video, “this is extremely dangerous to our democracy.”

And – this almost reads like parody – the man who took “fake news” mainstream 13 years ago, sounds off on the sanctity of…well, Dan Rather:

Dan Rather, who famously lost his job when he was caught trying to undermine the 2004 U.S. presidential election with forged documents, said: “News anchors looking into camera and reading a script handed down by a corporate overlord, words meant to obscure the truth not elucidate it, isn’t journalism. It’s propaganda. It’s Orwellian. A slippery slope to how despots wrest power, silence dissent, and oppress the masses.”

There are mornings I think “this nation can not possibly split into separate red and blue countries soon enough”.

 

 

33 thoughts on “They Know What Matters!

  1. Funny enough, I just saw Channel 9’s latest effort at branding themselves as a fair and unbiased news organization. Obviously, I spit out my coffee.

  2. True enough, bh429, but they are, for me anyway, less annoying than the other stations – although the channel 4 girls do dress nice (heh).

  3. America has been destroying its independent press for a couple of decades under the rubric of vertical integration and economies of scale. Sinclair’s bid for Tribune Media would extend Sinclair’s reach to more than 70% of US homes.

    70% is another word for Pravda.

  4. When I heard what Sinclair was doing, I panicked – but then it has gotten that I always panic when I hear someone is doing something.

    Maybe I should swear off the news.

  5. Pig bodine, don’t forget PBS.

    Tell Emery to watch Democracy Now! then come back and talk about Pravda.

  6. In any case, it’s not going to help. Social media has dis-intermediated MSM power permanently, with good and bad news for democracy.

  7. Sinclair’s bid for Tribune Media would extend Sinclair’s reach to more than 70% of US homes.

    Who then are forced to watch Sinclair or be sent to camps in Idaho?

    This may be the clumsiest bit of propaganda I’ve seen. What it means is 70% of Americans will live within broadcast range of a Sinclair broadcast property, and have the option to tune in. In exactly the same way as 99% live near a Ford dealership, 95% near a WalMart, or 99% within the signal of a National Pravda…er, Public Radio station.

    70% is another word for Pravda.

    If you understand neither the free market, broadcasting, Soviet History or Russian? Perhaps.

  8. Can anybody name the KARE-11 reporter stationed in Syria to report on the war? How about the KARE-11 reporter stationed in Israel to report on the attempted invasion? No? The KARE-11 reporter stationed in Washington to cover the latest Never-Trumper response to the President? Anybody?

    That’s because KARE-11 doesn’t have any reporters in those locations. KARE-11 gets all its news from the wire services, same as every other local television and radio station, and Star Tribune and the Pioneer Press.

    When you hear the same story on the radio, see it on television and read it in the paper, you figure it must be true because it’s been confirmed by three sources. No, you’re getting the SAME story, repackaged three times. A few entities control all the information you receive. That’s the modern media model and that’s what Sinclair’s promise threatens.

  9. Oh, and Emery, about the power of social media to sidestep the mainstream . . . why’d that woman shoot up YouTube? Does the word “de-platforming” ring any bells?

    Liberals totally controlled the media but Trump went around them to get elected. They’re working overtime to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

  10. When you hear the same story on the radio, see it on television and read it in the paper, you figure it must be true because it’s been confirmed by three sources. No, you’re getting the SAME story, repackaged three times.

    So true, Joe.

    It’s like that story on Scott Pruitt’s travel expenses. The guy spent over $120,000 flying around the country.

    My God! $120,000!

    When I heard that I panicked.

    Then some conspiratorial voice whispered out of fogsphere……but his predecessor Gina McCarthy averaged that during her tenure and Lisa Jackson did the same.

    So who is Sinclair going to listen to? The wire service or FAKE NEWS?

    The purpose of news is to mold opinion in conformance with the arc of history….not to confuse with the facts.

  11. The purpose of Emery’s posts is to mold opinion in conformance with the arc of history….not to confuse with the facts.

    Emery represents the dogged voice of the status quo

  12. Trump’s approval rating is between 40 and 50 percent.
    In my small town paper, I have never read a pro-trump editorial or columnist. Never. Not a single one. The paper rotates between liberal columnists Dana Milbank and Paul Krugman, conservative columnist George WIll, and “moderate” Kathleen Parker. All are are fanatical Trump haters. The opinion section also reprints columns by the editorial boards of the LA Times, the Washington Post, the Saint Louis Dispatch, and the Chicago Tribune. All are deranged in their hatred for Donald J. Trump.
    This is what Pravda looks like.

  13. MBerg: When Sinclair uses its anchors to recite a word-for-word jihad against “fake news”, that’s Orwellian enough. What you appear to gloss over is that Trump-appointed regulators have altered competition rules to make it easier for Sinclair’s bid for Tribune Media to succeed. At the same time Trump is doing what populists always do. They target independent media.

  14. So the same media that gives us 95% anti-Trump stories is now accusing the other 5% of lock-step coverage?

  15. America hasn’t been destroying the free press. The free press has. When “fact-checkers” actually change the questions to make one side of the aisle look bad–and they do this a LOT–exactly what is the value proposition for those who want to learn the truth? When every gun used in a crime automatically becomes the “horrible gun of the month”, exactly what value is their crime reporting? When every article about the possibility of cutting the rate of growth discusses it in apocalyptic terms and never discusses the question of whether government should do things, or whether it does them well, what is the value proposition?

    What’s gone on is that the press has, with a few exceptions, decided that they’re going to tick off half the nation, and the half that agrees a bit more with them already knows the narrative they’re spreading. It’s hard to get people from either side to buy the paper or watch the evening news with that going on.

    The collapse of the press is, really, a suicide.

  16. Then you have the Trump DOJ attempting to block AT&T’s acquisition of Time Warner.

    I think most Americans have two concerns here:

    1. They don’t want Trump to interfere with the Antitrust Division, to punish CNN or for any other reason.

    2. They want the Antitrust Division to do its job, including to recognize frankly that approval-with-monitoring has not always worked very well, that mega-corporations created by these mergers indeed have found ways to exploit their market power.

  17. it is team emery’s job as resident 走狗 to defend the entrenched left, what else have they been doing for the past 2 years?

  18. Then you have the Trump DOJ attempting to block AT&T’s acquisition of Time Warner.

    If it were Obama’s DOJ, it would be heralded as a sensible step to uphold democracy.

  19. This strikes me as a “Damned if you do, damned if you don’t” situation. If Trump had never expressed opposition to the merger, Democrats (who usually oppose mega-mergers) would say he’s in the back pocket of AT&T. If, on the other hand, he opposes the merger, he’s said to be trying to punish CNN.

    One hopes the DOJ is just doing its job, which I think is the case

  20. There seems to be a substantial amount of coordination of the attacks on EPA chief Scott Pruitt this week. It seems to be related to Pruitt’s attack on Obama era CAFE regs, but of course it is being disguised as criticism of Pruitt ethics. No comparison is ever made between Pruitt’s actions & his obama-appointed predecessor’s actions, which likely means Pruitt has no more ethical challenges than Gina McCarthy.
    Also I see that Dan Rather has a new job instructing journos & others on “Fake News” deetection.
    But, yeah, the problem is a Sinclair editorial that doesn’t mention Trump.

  21. if the DOJ were doing its job they would have put the brakes on Amazon gobbling up WAPO, or moderated google slurping up youtube, or cast more than a cursory glance at Facebook’s purchase of WhatsApp.
    Here’s a thought experiment how docile would the left be if WalMart tried to buy the NYT?

  22. When [MSM] uses its anchors to recite a word-for-word jihad against [President Trump], that’s Orwellian . . . .

    Well gee whiz, Emery, that’s been standard operating procedure for the MSM since the “journo-list” scandal. Now, when conservatives do it, all the sudden it bothers you? Your sudden conversion tells us your objection is not sincere, it’s partisan, and that tells us we can safely ignore it.

  23. If 70% is “Pravda,” what do you call the 90% negative coverage of Trump on the MSM? Super-Pravda?

  24. Naming things is powerful. Gaslighting and the eternal culture war can get you far these days, even into the White House.

  25. Kevin Willimson got fired from the Atlantic after his first column. He was silly enough to believe that there was a tiny amount of tolerance for conservative views on the left. Perhaps this was a teaching moment for Williamson, but I doubt it. Williamson is not a flexible thinker, he is starting to mimic the thought patterns of the left, especially lack of introspection.

  26. Naming things is powerful. Gaslighting and the eternal culture war can get you far these days, even into the White House.

    Yup. I remember hearing all about how it was actually an “Affordable Care Act” instead of a “Health Insurance Deform Act”, how Benghazi was all about a video, how that dossier was impeccably sourced, how keeping classified information on a private server was OK (if your name was “Hilliary Clinton”), and a whole bunch more. Obviously gaslighting in politics started with Trump.

    MP: gone already, eh? Part of me must wonder whether the left is “hiring” conservatives, only to fire them quickly, to get them out of their element and neutralize them. Call me cynical, it’s fair.

  27. Woolly wrote: “There seems to be a substantial amount of coordination of the attacks on EPA chief Scott Pruitt this week.”

    Do you think this will tamp down on Trump’s wish to replace Sessions with Pruitt?

  28. Pingback: In The Mailbox: 04.05.18 : The Other McCain

  29. “Do you think this will tamp down on Trump’s wish to replace Sessions with Pruitt?”
    I have no idea what you are talking about. I can comment on what I see, and that is multiple spurious attacks on Pruitt the week he announces that his EPA will weaken CAFE standards.
    Trying to make sense out of WH leaks is foolish.

  30. It’s almost as though someone told Trump about Nixon’s “madman” tactic, and he adopted it as a general approach.

  31. “When Sinclair uses its anchors to recite a word-for-word jihad against “fake news”, that’s Orwellian enough.”

    Says Dunning_Kruger, king of the cut and paste propagandists. Lmao…you poor thing.

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