Rich Media / 
Poor Democracy
Robert McChesney
Marc Crispin Miller

	Rich Media / Poor Democracy
w/ Robert McChesney		Marc Crispin Miller

"The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them."  Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington, 1787.

As the author of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson's words are timeless and profound in their assessment of the importance of the media and its relation to a functioning democracy.

Professors Robert McChesney & Marc Crispin Miller critique government failure to regulate rich corporations, thereby allowing media consolidation to undermine democracy and ignore the public interest.

Both Miller and McChesney have been in the forefront of addressing these issues in their respective positions as professors at New York University and University of Illinois and in the social movement to counter media consolidation and to promote media justice, media reform, and democratic ideals.

The struggle to control information and thereby manipulate society is older than government itself.  In the pre-Guttenberg world, literacy was by far the exception even among the nobility and the influence of a particular sector of society - the church - profoundly limited what information would be placed on paper and thereby disseminated.  

The creation of the printing press made the spread of information a new power in the world.  New forms of media utilizing the internet and other networks such as cel phones and WiFi are further upending the communication landscape. 

But like the medieval church with its then unequaled resource of monks and scribes, the mega corporations own the vast majority of radio and television outlets and are self-interested, self-serving, and with the best congressional suport that money can buy, self -perpetuating.  Their near monopoly perverts the function of an informed electorate in a democracy.  Their mantra is profit at any cost and private interest over the public interest at all times.  The failure of the MSM - mainstream media - in confronting the Bush administration and in beating the drums of war are tragic proof of the consequences of having a defense contractor - war profiteer might be more accurate - such as General Electric in control of a major network such as NBC.

Media Education Foundation graciously granted permission to post 
Rich Media, Poor Democracy on RFS! for one week only. To obtain a copy of the DVD, contact MEF.