New Conservatives and the Media

New Conservatives and the Media
By Daniel G. Jennings
One of the biggest challenges facing the New Conservatism will be its relationship with the media. Basically New Conservatives will have to ask themselves: “how do we unplug ourselves from the media while still staying tuned into what the media is saying?”
The media is one of the biggest and best weapons liberals and leftists have and they use it very well. It enables them to control the discussion even when they have nothing to say and lets them force their agenda on the country. Particularly when they can drive their arguments with emotion and hysteria.
A prime example of this was the Department of Homeland Security, most conservatives resisted the call to create a massive new bureaucracy to protect the country from terrorism. Yet the Big Government crowd was able to foist another massive bureaucracy upon us, one that will surely invade our private lives time and time again with fear. They filled the TV screens and newspapers with stories about how unprepared America was and focused on the efforts of a few whiny self proclaimed Sept. 11 victims. Even the opposition of people like Rush Limbaugh wasn’t enough to stop the stampede to Homeland Security.
The saddest part of this is that the Department of Homeland Security is now an object of ridicule by the very same liberals who demanded we create it in the first place. Conservatives look like they’re the big government crowd wasting the taxpayers’ money and trampling the citizens’ rights.
The question conservatives have to ask themselves is how do we prevent the media from setting the political agenda? I suppose the best way would be for politicians to simply ignore the liberal media. For average people this is pretty easy but for active politicians it’ll be harder.
After all politicians crave attention, they wouldn’t be in politics if they didn’t. Senators and Congressmen want to appear on the talking head commentary shows and see their names in the big newspapers. They want to be on Nightline and Larry King and the Sunday Morning Shows.
The problem is that once conservatives whether they be public office holders or commentators go onto those shows they step into enemy territory. The media sets the agenda there and decides what gets said.
The Senator or Conservative commentator who appears on a network or cable talk show has to discuss what the host and producer want not what he wants. This way the media liberals effectively keep popular or potentially conservative issues like tax reform off of the airwaves. Take national sovereignty, America’s sovereignty our constitution and our very rights under threat from a variety of poorly written international treaties that would transfer authority to undemocratic international agencies. Yet you never hear this on national TV. Why? Because any conservative who wants to discuss the issue wouldn’t be allowed on air to talk about it. Instead the conservative congressman has to discuss the latest White House scandal even if the latest White House scandal was just manufactured by the writers in the network newsroom.
There are ways around this, radio talk show hosts like Mike Rosen at Denver’s KOA and the Internet do an effective job of getting these issues out but the audience they reach is limited. The same for conservative magazines and websites which for all their influence appear only to a small educated elite interested in such issues.
One suggestion would be for Republicans on Capitol Hill and across the nation to simply boycott the liberal media. Simply tell the network news producers discuss what we want or no Republicans will show up on your shows. This would be hard but if the liberals had only themselves to talk to they’d look ridiculous and after a few weeks cave in. Perhaps Republicans should tell ABC, we won’t appear on This Week until you either fire George Stephanopoulos (a paid political operative) or balance him out with an equally attractive and intelligent conservative co host.
Now what about average conservatives out in the heartland? Oddly enough it’s much easier for average people to unplug themselves from the Big Media than for professional politicians. Millions of people already have many of them by taking advantage of modern technology.
Vast numbers of people no longer watch network TV they watch cable, where they can choose networks that reflect their interests or values. Many families don’t even watch either cable or over the air TV, they rely on DVD players and VCRs which enable them to choose what entertainment their families watch.
The new media has also enabled many Americans to effectively boycott the liberal news media. Instead of watching the news or reading the newspaper or news magazines they can watch Fox News or turn to the Internet for news.
Conservatives have been very adept at utilizing the new media to spread their values and view points while liberals haven’t. Liberals now have to play catch up in New Media. Unfortunately, they’re catching on, leftists are now blogging at a rate that rivals conservatives, and liberals are beginning to utilize things like talk radio and the Internet in new ways. It was savvy use of the web that enabled Howard Dean and his leftist coalition to effectively take control of the Democratic Party.
So conservatives will have to retain their new media edge and be constantly on guard against leftist advances in New Media. There are a lot of smart people on the Left who’ve had years of experience manipulating the media and popular opinion, they have a lot of money behind them and many of them are dedicated to destroying our values.
Perhaps the conservative solution should be to unplug completely from old media and concentrate entirely upon New Media. Or more precisely to only deal with the media on their terms. That’ll be hard to do but if conservatives can pull it off they’ll have won the all important battle for popular opinion.