The Corporate Male's Big Media has a history of attempting to rig U.S. presidential elections by denying news coverage to anti-establishment independent or third party presidential candidates like Nader [and McKinney]. As The Other Candidates: Third Parties In Presidential Elections by Frank Smallwood concluded in 1983:
"The final major complaint of the third-party candidate involved the issue of the exposure--or more accurately, the lack of exposure--in the national media...Most were unable to obtain any significant coverage from the large television networks or national newspapers. According to the Rosenstone study, `in 1980 Reagan and Carter received about 10 times more coverage in leading newspapers and weekly magazines than did all the eleven third party...candidates combined. This disparity existed in network television news coverage as well.'...
"A review of the ballot access, the campaign finance, and the media issue reveals that the third-party...candidates face...institutional and procedural obstacles. During recent years these obstacles have increased in severity with...the erosion of equal-time access to broadcast media.
"Despite the homage that is paid in American politics to the concepts of free enterprise and free competition, the two major parties are intent on doing everything possible to kill off their third-party rivals..."
(Downtown 3/20/96)
James and the Twenty-Seven Bicycles
14 years ago
