JUDGE: PRES. BUSH'S WIRETAP PROGRAM VIOLATES CONSTITUTION & MUST STOP

[headsplice]

Originally Posted by MaggieL

I can't think of an objective measure that could be applied across the period 1974-2006...and if I could, I wouldn't think excluding demographics of the press would be appropriate...they are, after all, who they are; trying to tune out shifts in the population would distort the overall picure.

My subjective impression over that period is that the mainstream media have moved left over that time, but then I've moved away from the left over that time, so that's a moving frame of reference.

And I've moved left
So, my general theory is that in the past few years (say, from the mid-90's, when media de-regulation really kicked into overdrive), fewer and fewer companies have controlled larger and larger percentages of the top-down, traditional media. And, though I may disagree with alot of the right's politics, they're generally better business people than the left. Therefore, the people that own top-down media have decreased in number, while simultaneously moving to the right politically, which has influenced the overall tone of media outlets.
So I wasn't trying to remove the demographic shift of the newsroom staff, I just didn't think it was relevant.
RE: Diggs-Taylor's potential links to the ACLU:
Probably not a big deal. After, Scalia didn't recuse himself from the SCOTUS case involving the VP, and they're friends.

Originally Posted by UG

What makes us tired is that somehow all the findings of people like these are clearly aimed not at increasing, but reducing US effectiveness in prosecuting the GWOT. This "we must lose because we're, uh, America" attitude is nonsense, and must go if we really want a good world.

And how is the prosecution of the GWOT going at the moment? Hmmm...increased hostility towards Americans? Check. Increased incidences of acts of terrorism? Check. Decreased political stability in notoriously unstable regions of the world? Check.
And BTW, how exactly do you win a war on terror? Simple answer: not by blowing shit up or undermining civil liberties (those pesky little things that make us BETTER than the rest of the world), but by NOT BEING TERRORIZED.