Word: evenness
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...EDITING REALITY. More worrisome than the influence of individual commentators is the effect that can be achieved by the selection of film or tape footage. In this way TV producers can more or less edit reality. Television, even more than other media, has a bias for action and excitement. A small disturbance at a cross-section can, when it fills a TV screen, suggest an entire city in riot. Similarly, during the Newark riots of 1967, TV reporters and their audience were duped into believing that a church assistant was a minister and prominent black spokesman. Hundreds of charges...
...Cronkite developed at least one gloomy streak in the form of a premonition of censorship. "People are beginning," he said, "to mistake us for the stories we're covering." Those who were charging TV journalists with biased reporting were "doing so for political reasons, for the most part." Even mere reminders that TV stations were licensed amounted to censorship, he felt. "When they talk about public responsibility in the news, they're talking about censorship." And, he added, "they'll come to newspapers next. They won't stop." David Brinkley, "liberal, but not very," is just...
Thoughtful, deliberate Eric Sevareid probably comes closest to the liberal intellectualism that is anathema to Agnew. Yet, even he shares an Agnewesque distaste for "professional intellectuals. They tempt me to agree with Eric Hoffer, who said that intellectuals must never be given power because they want people to get down on their knees and learn to love what they really hate and hate what they really love...
...what authority does this "small band of commentators and self-appointed analysts" (Agnew's words) shape the presentation of the news each evening? As in any business, their rise depends on intelligence, talent and merit. But TV is not just business; it is show business. Top commentators are in the $200,000-a-year bracket because they draw audiences. Thus, even though Agnew calls them "unelected," TV newscasters and commentators are more elected than any other newsmen in America. Every night the viewer votes with his channel selector; the Nielsen rating company tabulates the results. Just...
...never has. Over the years, most commissioners have gone into or served as lawyers for the broadcasting industry once they left the FCC. Even if they had been eager to bite the hand that promised to feed them, the commissioners never had sufficient funds to monitor stations properly. Only lately, under the prodding of Nicholas Johnson and a few other activist commissioners, has there been a change. Last January Boston station WHDH-TV lost its license for several reasons, including the other media interests of its owner. And last August, an FCC hearing examiner recommended the suspension...