Quote Originally Posted by Nessus View Post
Randy's suave "pshaw, we all knew this stuff anyway, no one cares" is actually just a further symptom of the uselessness of media as an information outlet. We're just to blithely assume that news is mostly empty fluff, and we should trust our instincts and guts about what's really going on. News have moved from reporting into nearly fully manufacturing a product; spinning information with an interpretation you think your customers will buy. And people who're in media's focus have to take that into account with their behaviour, which then gets interpreted in some way, and so on. I'm not so sure media ever really just reported, but that's pretty immaterial to the point (unless one wants to continue with the suave cynicism and say that this is how it's gots to be, son, it's how it's always been) anyhows. Looking forward to be banking world leaks!
One of the main problems with the media is that most journalists are not trained in the area they report on; most are journalism or English majors. So they're usually out of their depth reporting on any complex topic and therefore end up dumbing it down, not because they're assuming the audience is dumb, but because they're dumb.