So where exactly do the people who are getting all their news online think it is coming from? Most people, whether they recognize it or not, are getting their news from a one of the traditional media. As to leadership, I’m not entirely comfortable with system where the media tells people what to do. The media at its best is educational, not dictatorial. It provides a place where people can read debate, argument and information and then make decisions on their own. In the United States, the people are the source of power. If they aren’t capable of developing their own leadership, we are doomed.

I do not see the individual being the center John, quite the opposite. I’m seeing more group cohesion primarily from economic necessity. Additionally I’ve noticed more spirituality among the young that stresses the interconnectedness of all things. Also, some technology is seen as overreaching and dangerous. The Internet however does seem to bind people of reason and offer them a greater breath of ideas.

Somehow I do not think the “media” has ever lead anything and I doubt it ever will. Mostly, those in the media, newspapers, broadcast, or internet, attempt to manipulate by shaping facts so as to distort our perception of reality. The resulting response to such manipulations are temporary.

In the case of the Viet Nam and Iraqi wars, which were widely supported by the “media”, our citizen soldiers came home and we learned received an accurate accounting of those who assumed to be our leaders.

In the United States, the people lead they are not led. I suspect this is true in every nation in the world.

Big business, government and the media are involved in an unhealthy symbiotic relationship. None of them, as a result can fully fulfill their legitimate functions. Social good, if it is to come, will, in my opinion, come from individuals. Government has a limited obligation to lead but but has usurped far more power than is constitutionally granted. Has anyone considered the possibility that the government has sucked too much of the genreral public into an unhealthy symbiotic relationship?

I agree with Kurt on the role of media as being “informative”. They seem to prioritize a goal of directed social transformation over being informative.

@Dennis
Dennis is right on the mark. This article is a great example of the media’s propaganda and it’s distorting of facts to to create a false reality. CEOs of media think tanks put their spin on a subject — “lords of commerce” instead of “businessmen” — primarily to shape opinion and lead their unwitting audience where they want the audience to go.

“Technology, economics and human creativity converged to shape the post-collapse era, the connected and empowered culture we call the New Now.” Really? The post-collapse era has already taken shape and a “new” culture — subculture more accurately — has developed? As a student of sociology, I believe that’s a world record for a culture to develop — five months. Image the power of a bit of economic trouble completely changing the time it takes for a culture to develop. Ridiculous hyperbole is what it is.

Dwight :
Has anyone considered the possibility that the government has sucked too much of the genreral public into an unhealthy symbiotic relationship?

I have. I’ve really enjoyed reading the comments on this topic. Seems everyone kind of “gets it” from different perspectives. That’s good. We have to get “there” from “here.”

The media is – for all intents and purposes – owned by mega corporations. ~80% of all political donations (both parties) come from the top 1% of the economic scale. Most public political discussions are merely opportunities to trade inflammatory insults, designed to prevent people from speaking up or listening to each other. Why is everyone trying so hard to tell us what to say and think? And yes, people are compulsive joiners.

The human nature of group think;

an unprecedented sophistication in the science of propaganda;

a “mainstream America” perception that whatever’s healthy for Wall Street is good for America as long as “my” stock portfolio keeps growing;

a perverse delusion that we somehow “deserve” cheap gas prices (even though we own almost none of the world’s oil) never mind the impact it has on the environment;

the fact that 2/3 of Americans are on prescription drugs yet our government tells us that every one of the roughly 15,000 (highly profitable) chemicals in our food is safe;

constant talk that our health care system is in such crisis that it demands government control and involvement with the trillion $$ industries of pharmaceuticals, insurance and healthcare …

Ok, on and on and on. These are things many of us are starting to question.

I’m thankful to know there is such optimism among people who are “unplugged” from traditional media sources. I agree that there is enormous opportunity for growth in healthy, positive directions, away from our stale corporatocracy. Right now we are indeed in a world of hurt. But I don’t think that ever stopped U.S. before.

Alice Walker said, “The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.”

I am beginning to see my grand children seriously question motives, and seem to have little faith in government. On one hand, that is pathetic, on the other, they may be motivated to do what we have not had the backbone to do, and that is to remove politicians who develop pubic policy to buy votes. The following is a wise statement from a wise thinker!

“You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.”

Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931 to 2005

I’m unclear about the statistics cited. Comparing “breaking news” and “daily news” seems odd. Is there somewhere to view the data toplines and the questions that go with them?

The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Before 1980, the United States was a leader in virtually every scientific and techological field. Now it has fallen decades behind other countries in new technologies and pure sciences, as well as in science and mathematics.

This is something I find amusing because the European system of education was developed by COPYING the educational system that existed in America’s largest cities, mainly New York, as it existed from 1940 onward. The difference is that the Europeans held onto that system, and America dismantled it.

The first error that conservatives make is to insist that those who receive government benefits do not work, when in fact those who are at the lower income scale are among the most productive workers in the country. The average minimum wage worker in a big box store produces about 190,000 dollars a year for their employer, while those in the top two percent who “work for a living” produce an average of 385,000 dollars for their 250,000 dollar average income.

The next false assertion is that those at the bottom do not fund government, when income taxes only account for 43 percent of government revenues. The other 57 percent come from revenue streams largely paid for by the working poor and middle classes, that is in payroll taxes, and in various tariffs on inexpensive imports which are purchased largely by the working poor and middle classes. The taxes on a paid of 30 dollar shoes made in China and imported make up a much larger chunk of taxes than the 500 dollar pair of handmade shoes made in the U.S. or even those made in Italy.

To assert that those who pay that large chunk of government taxes are not entitled to services of the government, while at the same time there is a huge system of corporate welfare in the forms of grants and other return payments is rather digingenuous.

The bottom 50 percent of workers who pay almost no income taxes generally end up paying the exact same percent of their total income in taxes as the top two percent. The end result is that the bottom contributes much more in total dollars to the government coffers than the top two percent do.

@N.J.
Interesting. What are the sources of your data, particularly the productivity vs income stat?

“The bottom 50 percent of workers who pay almost no income taxes generally end up paying the exact same percent of their total income in taxes as the top two percent. The end result is that the bottom contributes much more in total dollars to the government coffers than the top two percent do.” So you’re saying that those who contribute the most TO the system GET the most FROM the system? That seems very fair.

I agree that it’s shameful the way we’ve allowed “progressives” to hijack our educational system and dismantle it. It’s ridiculous the number of times I have to remind the school administrators and the school board that it is us (my wife and I), not them, who are responsible for raising a functional, responsible child, with values WE believe in. The indoctrination we have to deprogram is really concerning. Moreover, most of the school day is spent on disciplining unruly kids rather than teaching and learning. If the time was used to learn rather than indoctrinate and discipline, I bet we’d be climbing back up the scale and would be better able to compete globally.