by publius
As I wrote earlier this week, the health coverage debate poses a fundamental David Simon-like challenge to the media. Can the American media, as an institution, inform the public about what's really being proposed? And can it do so in the face of sustained, outright falsehoods (not good faith policy disagreements).
Well, this column by Steven Pearlstein sure is a good start.
It is a good start.
A good end would be a clear summary of what the plan* will or will not do, from top to bottom.
Since this is the Internet, if I think of a thing, somebody else has already done it and then erected a social networking site around it.
So. Where is it?
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*I understand sausage is still being made; a summary of HR 3200 will do.
Well. The Kaiser Family Foundation appears to have done a nice job summarizing all sorts of proposals.
It’s not web 2.0, but it sure is comprehensive!
yeah, it’s a start.
what would be ideal, though, is a straightforward, five paragraph, news-wire piece which simple knocks down each of the lies, and does it without a hint of partisan fury.
The problem is two-fold though. Media is very much like education. You can have a good teacher that still can’t reach their students. Maybe they have to dumb everything down to teach to the lowest acceptable norm in their class. The media – especially television media – is in a similar predicament, or at least they think they are, or their ratings reflect this. So even if they do put out some very good, very informative material, plenty of people will skip it to watch the talking heads yap at each other. The visceral, misinformation will continue to trump the good stuff.