old story

John Edwards has been ignored because corporate leaders want to insure that the party would nominate candidates who can be relied upon to protect and foster their interests. With his challenge to their power, Edwards does not qualify for those powerful companies. In the 2004 primary, the corporate-owned media used many strategies to take down Howard Dean in Iowa and make the voters believe that the candidate to represent the Democratic Party was John Kerry. For the 2008, the media narrowed the Democratic candidates in to two; both very important candidate that would change American history. Even though Hilary Clinton has the highest negatives of any Democrat, the media had to choose her because of her name recognition and fundraising ability. John Edwards has offered a detailed universal health-care plan. He has promised to make union organizing easier. As president, Edwards has said he wants to increase the minimum wage and retract tax breaks for the wealthy. He believes that the United States should cooperate with other nations rather than unilateralism. Unlike Obama and Clinton, he does not believe that nuclear power should be part of the mix to decrease dependence on fossil fuels.

How will these policies affect major corporations? First, a health care plan could harmfully damage health insurance companies. Helping unions organize easier and to increase minimum wages is something that is unpleasant for corporate-owners. Retrieving tax breaks will give the wealthy people difficulties. The armament companies will have a decrease on their sales and so does companies that deal with nuclear power. In addition, John Edwards has accused FOX that they are too sympathetic to the GOP. He has skipped a debate in Nevada last year because FOX was the host. With this kind of a relationship, there will be no hope for Edwards to appear in such media companies.

How was the media coverage of the candidates based on political parties? A joint report by “The Center for American Progress and Free Press” has announced that a conservative talk radio is broadcasted ten times longer that progressive talk radio. Looking at the headlines of mainstream media there might be a clue to understand which political party is more important to the media corporations. With the understanding that there were terrible tragedies of the tornados, excluding The Wall Street Journal and the Associated Press, most online news sources had their headlines about the tornados right after the “Super Tuesday” was over. But reading the political page, CNN and ABC were referring to the GOP. The New York Times, CBS and MSNBC— splashing both of the stories, the primary and the tornado half and half— chose the Democratic Party. It was interesting that the FOX— being accused by John Edwards— had the pictures of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John McCain nicely divided into one-third each. Overall, it was unfortunate, but there were more media that had chosen the Democratic Party for their headlines than the GOP.

Merci