11.21.19 Bee-otch of the Day: the media

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Name: the media
Age: ageless
Occupation: informers and entertainers of the general public
Last Seen: everywhere
Bee-otched For: Bernie? Who's that?
 

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Yesterday, I was on Facebook and read a very thought-provoking post by Michael Moore.

He talked about how the media is saying virtually nothing about Bernie Sanders. He's selling out every venue he appears at and is in the lead in the Iowa polls. Yet, they all claim that either Grandpa Biden or Elizabeth Warren is in the lead, simply because in the great words of Paul Harvey, "exit polls are the crack cocaine of politics".

Moore brought up the fact that Disney didn't want people to see his 2004 docupic "Fahrenheit 9/11" because they were afraid that it would offend their conservative base. So, another company bought it, it finally got released and made over $222 million at the box office. Moore - 1, Mickey - 0. Well, the longer story was that '9/11' was supposed to be released through Miramax, a Disney subsidiary since 1993. Under its original owners, Miramax was one of the most-respected indie studios. However, when Disney bought it, they refused to release anything they thought was too controversial. "Kids" from 1995 was a prime example. In the case of "9/11", Disney simply ended up locking it in their vault - presumably next to "Song of the South" - but Moore didn't give up. Miramax's founders bought the film and the rest is history.

OK, so I failed to mention that Miramax was founded by Bob Weinstein and his disgraced brother, Harvey. Also, Moore and the Weinsteins had a falling out, which is partly why Moore chooses to release his movies through very, very tiny indies these days.

But yes, it's true. When people are denied something, it will create more demand for it. Kinda reminds me of the South Park episode where Cartman buys an amusement park and doesn't allow people to go there. However, lines start to form outside of the park and because of the cost of owning and maintaining the park, Cartman has no choice but to allow people in, whether he liked it or not.

To me, radio is like that, too. The reason I created this website and blog 20 years ago was because I was forced to live in northern Michigan. The dominant rock station, WKLT didn't give a shit about my generation. Want Rage Against the Machine, KoRn, Tool and others? Too bad. The station had to play their daily quota of shitty 70s butt rock from Styx, Eagles, Journey and Foreigner. Thankfully, there's now Rock 105 and 95-5, and they're starting to kick KLT's ass in the ratings! Not only that, KLT's owners from North Dakota are trying to sell the station. Shoulda done that 20 years ago when radio was worth a shit.

Look at WKLQ here in Grand Rapids: in 2002, their idiot general manager, Matt Hanlon fucked over that station royally by demoting Howard Stern to their shitty AM sister, WBBL 1340. In 2005, the station canned Stern altogether. Well, guess what? Stern's move to Sirius and 97.9 WGRD flipping to Active Rock delivered a one-two punch to KLQ.

Of course, GRD these days is, well, too boomer for my tastes. But since I have SiriusXM, plus Spotify on my phone, same here. People like me will revolt from the norm and go with something better.

Well, that's how I look at the media and their relationship with Bernie Sanders. They want him to lose simply because they're scared, period. They're scared that nasty 'ol Bernie will order the FCC to stop media mergers from happening. This means that companies like Disney couldn't buy 20th Century Fox so they can put 4:3 episodes of The Simpsons on their streaming service in a 16:9 ratio, cropping many jokes. This means that companies like Sinclair and others can't create fake companies to create mass duopolies and triopolies like they have here in Michigan in towns like Traverse City and Flint. This also means that if Bernie's president, we'll all be on a universal health plan, so no more Blue Cross/Blue Shield, Priority and other healthcare giants that pay big-time bucks for commercials.

The people have spoken. They don't want the media to tell them who to vote for. Bernie got FUCKED big time in 2016 by the DNC and they would love a repeat. After all, a bad president in the White House means easy jokes for SNL and late night comedians.

So, like Mr. Moore said, media, just keep your mouth shut. The people will decide.

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