In an article written by Sam Stein of the Huffington Post, it was reported that Mitt Romney and a radical conservative group 60 Plus, simultaneously launched attacks aimed at President Obama and Senate Democrats for attempting to “end Medicare as we know it.”
Sam Stein pointed out that the most glaring omission in the Mitt Romney attack was “a mention of Romney’s own plan, which would create an optional voucher system for beneficiaries.” A plan that is, “far more likely to “end Medicare as we know it” than what the president’s proposed.” An optional voucher system is basically code for privatize it, which would mean that those who would stand the most to gain would be members of the “privileged sector.”
The conservative group 60 Plus focused their attack on the Democrats that are up for re-election in the Senate. This attack consisted of a television ad accusing Senate Democrats of slashing Medicare benefits. In reality, “the 60 Plus Association is spending millions of dollars to distract voters from the Republican plan to privatize Medicare which would make seniors pay thousands more for their coverage,” said Matt Canter, spokesman for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.”
The trick is to literally “frame” the opposition (ie, President Obama and Senate Democrats) for GOP actions to end Medicare, and then endlessly repeat the linguistic frame of “end Medicare as we know it” on Fox news in order to convince as many people as possible that this misinformation is accurate, or should I say “fair and balanced.”
Once this occurs, and enough people are convinced, or duped into believing the George Orwell Party’s lies, then the GOP is free to hand the purse strings of Medicare over to the “privileged sector.” As a consequence, the money needed to provide for the sick and elderly in America to sustain their daily living will be used to create the latest feeding frenzy in the Wall Street Casino, where only the house wins!
Glenn Beck has persistently attacked George Soros by name, depicting him as the puppet master for everything that is wrong in society, when in fact Rupert Murdoch is to blame. Glenn Beck is simply “framing” George Soros for Rupert Murdoch’s actions. Actions that largely benefit the top 1%, or “privileged sector” at the expense of the bottom 99%.
In an interview with Fareed Zakaria, George Soros was asked what he thought about Glenn Beck’s endless pursuit to paint him as the puppet master. Soros indicated that Glenn Beck is projecting what Rupert Murdoch is doing through Fox news.
Fox news makes a habit out of doing this says Soros, “it has imported the methods of George Orwell, you know – ‘newspeak’, where you can tell the people falsehoods, and deceive them.”
Glenn Beck even goes as far as making the outrageous claim that George Soros literally helped put people in ovens during the holocaust in Nazi Germany when he was just a small boy. This statement is way out of bounds, not to mention utterly despicable. However, like other radical right wing talk show hosts, Glenn Beck serves a purpose for the “privileged sector”, which is to use negative language to evoke strong emotions because this tactic works! The use of emotions is a very powerful motivator, especially when combined with Orwellian newspeak.
A prime example of this tactic working can be seen here, describing how Byron Williams intended to kill people at the ACLU and Tides Foundation after watching Glenn Beck depict George Soros as the puppet master.
It appears that profiting at the expense of the people (which is what George Soros is being “framed” for) is viewed by Bryon Williams, and other believers of the Orwellian right wing “frames” as totally unacceptable, and warrants the motivation necessary to start a revolution in this country. The problem is that people like Bryon Williams are getting their information, or misinformation from Rupert Murdoch’s Fox news network, and end up placing their anger in the wrong direction!
Interestingly, the motivation to stop the top 1% from further oppressing and exploiting the people in Egypt and Tunisia, for instance, has led to revolutionary uprisings in this region, beginning with the Arab spring.
The same type of motivated behavior aimed at preventing the “privileged sector” from profiting at the expense of the people is also occurring in the United States. This movement is known as Occupy Wall Street, or 99% vs 1%, and is currently spreading throughout the world!
And of course, all of these movements are being “framed” by Rupert Murdoch’s media empire as a bunch of Socialist, Marxist, and Communist’s, who are trying to wage war against America.
This is how Glenn Beck is “framing” the uprisings all across the globe.
“The war is just beginning”
“Shoot me in the head if they try to change our Government”
“You have to be prepared to take rocks to the head, the other side is attacking”
“There is a coup going on, grab a torch, drive a steak through the heart of the bloodsuckers”
“They are taking you to a place to be slaughtered”
In the end, the radical right wing is attempting to “frame” George Soros for the actions of Rupert Murdoch’s global media empire. Take a look at Rupert Murdoch discussing his global media enterprise and how he tries to use it to shape public opinion.
When asked if he was using his global media enterprise to shape public opinion in favor of the war, Rupert Murdoch replied, “we’ve tried”, then started to laugh. He followed this up with, “Clearly public opinion NOW, has grown very, very tired of the whole enterprise.” (emphasis added on NOW)
This is a joke to Rupert Murdoch and his loyal puppets like Glenn Beck and others, who willingly import the methods of George Orwell with the intention of manipulating public opinion to support an ideology that is based on the principle of profit over people, and in the case of war, profit at the expense of people’s lives!
As George Soros put it, “people need to be aware that they are being deceived.”
In his recent article, The Republican Brain: Why Even Educated Conservatives Deny Science — and Reality, Chris Mooney describes the differences in beliefs held between Conservatives and Liberals on the issue of global warming. He also touches on other tea-party favorites, such as the belief that President Barrack Obama was not born in the United States, and that he is a secret Muslim. The outright misinformation campaign being waged by Fox news and other corporately controlled media outlets is leading to what Chris Moody calls the “smart idiots” effect.
What he found by looking at various studies is the paradox that more educationamong conservatives leads to even further belief in the misinformation propagated by radical right wing conservatives in this country. With respect to the growing resistance to accept what climate scientists have confirmed, (that the planet is warming due to human activity of burning more and more fossil fuels), “Again and again, Republicans or conservatives who say they know more about the topic, or are more educated, are shown to be more in denial, and often more sure of themselves as well- and are confident they don’t need any more information on the issue.”
In an attempt to describe what accounts for the “smart idiot” effect, Chris Mooney had this to say, “For one thing, well-informed or well-educated conservatives probably consume more conservative news and opinion, such as by watching Fox News. Thus, they are more likely to know what they’re supposed to think about the issues—what people like them think—and to be familiar with the arguments or reasons for holding these views. If challenged, they can then recall and reiterate these arguments. They’ve made them a part of their identities, a part of their brains, and in doing so, they’ve drawn a strong emotional connection between certain “facts” or claims, and their deeply held political values. And they’re ready to argue.
Not only does this explanation confirm the recent study showing the more you watch Fox news the less you know, but it sheds light on what I would call the “framing effect.”
“In fact, there is even research suggesting that the most rigid and inflexible breed of conservatives—so-called authoritarians—do not really become their ideological selves until they actually learn something about politics first. A kind of “authoritarian activation” needs to occur, and it happens through the development of political “expertise.” Consuming a lot of political information seems to help authoritarians feel who they are—whereupon they become more accepting of inequality, more dogmatically traditionalist, and more resistant to change.”
This activation, I would argue, is felt upon being exposed to right wing “frames” and cause one to fall victim to the “framing effect”, where only the frames make sense, and all other facts that don’t fit the frame are rejected. The more right wing political knowledge Conservatives acquire, (ie, the more exposure to these frames) the more adamant the rejection of the facts that don’t fit the frame, and the more likely the “smart idiot” effect will be found.
A recent study by Fairleigh Dickinson University, known as the PublicMind poll, found that some news leaves people knowing less.
The most revealing highlights of this study were the comparisons made between Fox news viewers and those who don’t watch any news at all.
Fox news viewers were 18 points less likely than those who don’t watch any news at all to know that the people of Egypt overthrew their corrupt Government, and 6 points less likely to know that the people of Syria were not yet successful in overthrowing their corrupt Government.
Dan Cassino, political science professor, and one of the analysts for this PublicMind poll, “Because of the controls for partisanship, we know these results are not just driven by Republicans or other groups being more likely to watch Fox News. Rather, the results show us that there is something about watching fox News that leads people to do worse on these questions than those who don’t watch any news at all.”
What is it about watching Fox news that grossly misinforms its viewers?
Simply put, Fox “frames” facts! Here is a brief summary of this framing effect.
- According to the Fox news network, Liberals are taking money away from hard-working Americans through “tax and spend” policies, and are using the revenues to support “wasteful Government programs” (EPA, FDA, Dept. of Energy) and giving free stuff to “welfare recipients” who don’t deserve it! Liberals are also bankrupting our country through funding of “entitlement programs” (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid).
In reality, here are the facts!
Conservative politicians are taking money away from hard-working Americans by favoring a tax policy that continues to lower taxes on the top 1% (while increasing the burden on the bottom 99%)
The revenues generated are going straight to the top 1%, since this elite group now enjoys an historic low 35% tax rate, as opposed to the average rate of more than double this figure throughout the 20th century.
The Environmental protection agency (EPA) and other Government agencies are being “framed” as wasteful, since keeping our air clean to breathe and our water safe to drink is cutting into the profits made by this elite group.
As far as giving free stuff to those who don’t deserve it, billions of taxpayer dollars are given to corporate jet owners, and hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars are given to dirty energy (oil, coal, gas) companies that don’t need them!
We are not going bankrupt because of providing health care to sick and elderly people in need. We have a massive deficit because we have continuously lowered the top tax rate on millionaires and billionaires, and because of two unfunded wars president Bush decided to “frame” as necessary to bring freedom to the Middle East.
In the end, there is something about watching Fox news.
Fox is the poster child for the common “frames” being generated by right-wing think tanks and language experts that are used to convince us of an ideology that appears to make sense, but one that is detrimental to our health and well being, as well as our intellect!
As this study shows, such deliberate misinformation by Fox news stands in direct contrast to those who listen to NPR (non-profit radio station), or read the New York Times, for instance, and the best informed people were those who watched Sunday morning news programs.
According to Dan Cassino, “the real finding is that the results depend on what media sources people turn to for their news.”
Bottom line: We have a choice. We can continue to be victims of the Fox news framing effect, or we could actually learn something about our country and the world from watching Sunday morning news, listening to NPR, or reading the New York Times.
Sen. Rand Paul (R) applauds tax dodging by Google and other big businesses! No wonder Republicans are insisting cuts to our earned benefits. 5 months ago
Joseph Lambert
