Should there be consequences for distorting facts and misguiding the public in news media, radio, and in our government, etc? This goes for republicans democrats conservatives liberals, third party whom ever.

Personally I think so. I should be able to trust what I see and hear in those places. It irritates me to have to fact check for a particular news channel to be sure I am not being lied to.

When the news channel can take a set of facts and twist them just slightly to mean exactly the opposite of what it really means that should be punished for causing violence and confusion and bad decisions made by the public and law makers.

What should that consequence/punishment be. Does free speech allow of distortion and out right lies?

Example: When Senators deliberately lie about something in the health bill and even after being debunked they continue to spread the lie to their base to sway people to go against something.

Give em the chair!

yes there should

I dunno what should be done but the media has got to be cleaned up

all media has become is propaganda outlets for special interests and left wing and right wing spin meisters

come to think of it, just the fact that we have a word called "spin meisters" is evidence of the problem

Maybe (a big maybe) the populace can be trusted to make good political decision but they can't do it without true facts

There should be in principle, but since most are hopelessly reliant on government, it won't seriously happen (in my lifetime, for sure).

Goes to show, as the majority of the people wake up and see the truth about Nationalized Health Care, it doesn't matter how many of our Tax dollars BHO pumps into NBC or CBS.

The people aren't stupid or misguided.

Pumping Tax dollars? Yes! Where is the public service in the commercial with a sit-com actor, George, I forget his last name.

I guess you can't even have a thread like this to discuss the mechanics of information dissemination and manipulation without the spinners trying to dominate the discussion and turn it to their particular spin. And if it is so pernicious at this basic of a level I don't know what you could do on the macro national scale

If a person is caught lying in their regular job, they would most likely be put on probation. If the lying continued, they would be fired.

News channels - fine them. But...they might do keep doing it anyway and just accept the fine.

The big problem with these lies is that when they are debunked, the fear still remains.

Ya' gotta' know somethin's up when one-time Dem. supporters are backin' away from Nationalized Health Care and dropping their support for BHO.
What's he and his plan at now? About 45%?

Should there be consequences for distorting facts and misguiding the public in news media, radio, and in our government, etc? This goes for republicans democrats conservatives liberals, third party whom ever.

No- the suprem court has already ruled that lying is legal.

That's the only language that any politician knows!

Would you expect anything different?

I know we deserve better, but remember who puts them in office!

Now that I mention it...every politician should have to take a polygraph on a regular bases!

May not catch all, but I feel it would certainly cut down on some of the corruption.

JMO

Good morning Winx!

It's my understanding that the government censors the news anyway...letting them tell some news(their way)or not telling the news!

There again, we are only(most of the time)getting only what and how the governments wants us to know!

What is the definition of propaganda again?

Propaganda is communication aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position. As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda in its most basic sense, presents information primarily to influence an audience. Propaganda often presents facts selectively (thus lying by omission) to encourage a particular synthesis, or uses loaded messages to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented. The desired result is a change of the attitude toward the subject in the target audience to further a political agenda.

Sound familiar?

Let me help you out here...does US Government sound about right?

JMO

That is a perfect example of spin which doesn't help anyone. In fact most answers so far are spin and not even an answer to my question, except for Winx and Quite.

p.s....The first amendment prohibits this. It's smarter to be guided by "Caveat Emptor" when listening the to the crap in the media.

As long as GE who owns: NBC, CNN, HLN, and MSNBC is getting billions of dollars From the obama administration, those networks will most certainly not stop. The fact that NBC is selling BHO merchandise on it's web-store I think is reason enough for NBC to be Fined and overhauled from the top down. Its my belief that media should be forbidden to endorse any candidate or incumbent.

Here is the problem:

Churnalism:

Churnalism is a form of journalism in which press releases, wire stories and other forms of pre-packaged material are used to create articles in newspapers and other news media in order to meet increasing pressures of time and cost without undertaking further research or checking.

Traditional newspapers have cut staff as their advertising revenue has declined because of competition from other media such as television and the internet. They no longer have sufficient staff to generate news stories by making the rounds of civic and business activities. Local newspapers and trade magazines are commonly produced by only one or two staff and these rely upon stories which are increasingly brought to them by professional PR representatives, according to a senior public relations professional. When the matter was debated at the Foreign Press Association, it was agreed that there was a relationship between the numbers of PR staff employed and journalists unemployed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Churnalism

Bit of spin in the op.

ie... example: 'When Senators deliberately lie'... 'to sway people to go AGAINST something'...

what about when they lie... To get people to go FOR something.

Lies to the left of me lies to the right.

Not a single party has yet said the actual truth... Health Care debate is one of many smoke screens to cover the real truth...

WE AS A NATION ARE BROKE...

But there is still time for those in the know to get rich from the fall... ergo multimillion dollar advertising campaigns (no one advertises unless they are going to make a profit from it).

and our grandchildren and great grandchildren will pay for it all.

There was a court case between Fox and 2 of it's regional reporters about a story concerning Monsanto. The judge ruled that any of these news outlets can in fact tell whatever lies that they want to, regardless of how it's presented, because it's their channel.

I believe that I said anyone who lies, not just one side. I think if we ignore the possibility that we are being swayed against the public plan by money spent by insurers and drug companies etc, it's just as bad as being swayed 'for' it is based on a lie. So far I have seem more lies on the opposition side, and seen Senators and media opposition backing those lies.

If I am being lied to on the left of course I want to know that as well, but so far what motive is there on the left? (serious question)

Who benefits from having a public plan other than the people themselves? Who benefits from 'NOT' having a public plan, that part is pretty clear. I would like to know who benefits from a health plan designed to help all Americans?

It's clear that the insurers and health care providers in opposition fear the public plan because they won't have a monopoly on who provides our insurance and that will mean they can't regularly squeeze us financially.

We have been fighting about health care for over 30 years, it's hardly a cover up for our country's financial situation, you'd have to be blind and stupid not to know we are in financial difficulty. But with so many families losing everything because of health issues and premiums going so high people can't afford it, something has to be done. And frankly I don't trust the insurance companies to fix themselves, and they aren't going to want restrictions that prevent them from the loopholes they so love to exploit to make even more money at the expense of our health and welbeing.

So my next hopefully legit question is who benefits from 'HAVING' a public plan that should or would make me suspicious of it?

Are you serious? So it's ok to lie? Wow. So much for our future when it's ok to flat out lie. I don't know how anyone can ever know the truth if we allow people to lie to their audiences. Amazing.