me:
>> The problem is that the _production_ of information (journalism, etc.)
>> is not free; it has a positive marginal cost.
Laurent GUERBY wrote:
> When you think about it: most if not all interesting information out
> there is *not* produced by journalists. It is produced by event
> witnesses, politicians, public servants, corporations, social figures,
> researchers and experts of various fields, and citizens as part of the
> public.
"journalism" doesn't have to be done by professional journalists; nor
does it have to be done by the official media (the NY TIMES, etc.) Nor
should you forget the "etc." in my parenthetical explanation.
David Shemano wrote:
>Don't forget that most of the prominent viewpoint magazines (Nation, National
>Review, etc.) are not profitable as stand alone companies and are subsidized
>by wealthy individuals who obtain enjoyment and pleasure from the
>dissemination of ideologically shaped information. Therefore, while the
>number of nominally "objective" information producers and disseminators may
>shrink, information will continue to be produced and disseminated in a highly
>diversified way.<
Diversified, but biased toward rich folks' politics. In general, the
richer one is, the more one wants to preserve one's net worth, if only
to be in charge of how it's distributed to charitable causes. In
general, the more concerned one is with preserving wealth and the
control over its use, the more one leans toward economic conservatism.
In US society, that kind of conservatism leans toward free-market
nostrums ("libertarianism" or neoliberalism) or toward free markets
guided and regulated by enlightened rich people (cf. George Soros) and
their allies.
On the other hand, on "social" issues (feminism, minority rights, gay
rights, etc., etc.) rich people as a group are represented more evenly
along the political spectrum.
Carrol Cox wrote:
>Of course there is an illusion that The Government consists only of the
'official' government, so (for example) the NYT was non-government and
Pravda was government. That is nonsense. In fact in general
investigations of how the ruling class rules are handicapped by (a)
this illusion that the The Government is made up wholly of public
officials and (b) the illusion that the core of that ruling
[governing?] class _is_
the ruling class. But such a small core could not rule. It takes about
5% of the population to maintain a regime.< [typos fixed]
I think it's useful to distinguish between the state (which following
Weber monopolizes legitimate use of the means of coercion in a country
and following Marx reproduces class relations over time) and the
government (which explicitly runs the state, making _collective_
decisions for society).
Here, Carrol seems to be referring to the "Government" as being the
same as the ruling class. To my mind, the ruling class in a capitalist
society would consist of those people who benefit from class
exploitation (the entire bourgeoisie). This is the broad group and is
much larger than the governing stratum, i.e., the people who actually
govern the state. In these terms, the publishers of the New York TIMES
are part of the ruling class but not part of the governing stratum.
But they are clearly allied with the government, though sometimes that
alliance doesn't work out so well (as under Nixon or Dubya) in which
case they are part of the loyal opposition.
Just as under US capitalism, there was competition within the ruling
class of the old Soviet Union. It just didn't show up in the way we in
the US are used to. It was more a matter of bureaucratic in-fighting
and the like.
--
Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own
way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante.
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