The Patriot Post® · The Mindless MSM Talkingheads — Time to Detox

Long before sunrise each day, Patriot Post editors are reviewing hundreds of news and policy reports in order to segregate the few important trending stories from the endless loop of mainstream media noise.

All that noise occurs because news and opinion platforms, whether print, cable or online, are almost universally sustained by noxious advertising. Thus, those outlets are, first and foremost, compelled to recycle the hype, ad nauseam, in order to keep the ad revenue flowing. Some of the “conservative news” media outlets are as guilty of this hype as the Leftmedia — a prime example being the now-ubiquitous “Fox News Alert” banners.

Of course, print and cable media hold great contempt for competing online media — though print and cable media increasingly depend on their own online presence for ad revenue — arrogantly asserting that they are the only legitimate arbiters of news, policy and opinion.

A case in point would be a CNN story this week: “Trump supporters call to boycott Pepsi over comments the CEO never made, which is both a hit piece about "Trump supporters” and a condemnation of online media, particularly Facebook, where many people now get their news. (The Patriot Post now has more than 500,000 Facebook followers.)

According to the CNN story, which, by the way can be read on Facebook, “Fake news has been a major issue during the election.” CNN goes on to blame “Facebook for not doing enough to remove false content,” and complains about “sites designed to trick people.”

Facebook is already blocking reputable conservative news and commentary, but that is beside the point. CNN leads the pack of propagandist “fake news” sites, and the ubiquitous reference to “Trump supporters” in this headline betrays that bias — as if there are not a plethora of examples of leftist groups propagating false information to foment discontent. Indeed, this CNN “news report” ends with a reference to some obscure “white supremacist” group in an effort to equate them with “Trump supporters,” no doubt evidence of yet another “whitelash” in the election night words of CNN talker Van Jones…

Fact is, consumers should be skeptical of all media sources — print, cable and online — especially those creating and recycling news hype, notably incessant polling, in order to generate ad revenue. But the most unfettered resource for news, policy and opinion is the online medium, where the reputable exercise of First Amendment “freedom of speech” and of “the press” are most vibrant. It is time to detox from the relentless MSM claptrap.