Will the Inaugural Protests Be Covered?

by Danny Schechter

published by MediaChannel.Org

Will the Inaugural Protests Be Covered?

Some of us are old enough to remember that bright day in January 1977 when Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter got out of their limo and strolled down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House. We remember it now with nostalgia because that more hopeful American moment is long gone. Now we have elections deemed "brief accountability moments" and a garrison state to insure the trains of social order run on time.
<snip>
Not surprisingly, the protesters will be out in force as they were in 2000. Back then, the press barely took notice of the biggest inaugural protest in American history. Writer Dennis Loy Johnson wrote a must-read little book called "The Big Chill" on "The great unreported story of the Bush Inauguration Protests..." (Melville House.)

The protests were ignored, he charges, "There seemed to be a determined and almost paternalistic effort by the media to soothe and assure the populace that everything was fine, that the democracy was running smoothly (as if that was the obligation of either print or broadcast journalists) that there was, in any case no dissent except from the usual suspects …"
That was then. That event signaled a new media paradigm for marginalizing dissenters
<snip>
So if media outlets can't or won't cover a major war in the making, is it any surprise that they won't cover the political war at home, right in their own backyard?