Mittens and the Media, by Eric Peters

From Eric Peters on a guest post at theburningplatform.com:

Have you noticed that major media web sites like CNN no longer publish reader replies to their stories? Could it be that they realized the false consensus maintained by print media was being eroded by allowing people to openly disagree with and question the propaganda being peddled by them?

No question.

It wasn’t just that people disagreed. It was that thousands disagreed. Each MSM story typically had a tsunami of contrary reader responses so lopsided that it clearly indicated the public and the MSM are profoundly at loggerheads on major (and minor) issues. This public divergence encouraged individuals who, previously, felt very alone – that “everyone” agreed with the major media/party line about whatever the topic du jour happened to be.

Unlike the letters-to-the-editor page of a print newspaper, they had no control over what people wrote online in response to their dreck. And most of what the readers wrote radiated contempt for the “stories” published by the MSM, which typically left out critical facts and were (and still are) suffused with pro-state/pro-authority premises.

The people whacked the pinata – and the major media outlets began to be seen for what they were and still are: Propaganda organs for the nexus of corporate/crony capitalism and the warfare state. That is, for a tiny minority of interchangeable influence peddlers and job holders who have managed to get their hands on the levers of… everything.

For the con to work, the illusion of consent and consensus was critically necessary. But the people clearly did not like the endless wars, the flowering police state; the flooding of the country with “immigrants” … the politically correct lecturing about What We Should Think… . The occasional shootings performed by some defective loon were not having their intended effect of galvanizing public opinion in favor of “sensible” gun control. The people saw through the sham of “free trade” deals with authoritarian regimes that benefitted the Wall Street Crowd at their expense.

Etc. Etc.

It was embarrassing – and becoming dangerous.

The manufactured consensus that made viable the illusion of consent was crumbling.

Something had to be done.

So, the comments sections have been taken down. Check around, see for yourself. The major organs realized they were losing the debate – so they’ve stifled the debate. They are doing the last thing they can do – short of having the government shut down contrarian media.

To continue reading: Mittens and the Media