The News Media in America – The new advocates of Tribal Warfare – Destroyers of Truth – Disciples of Dissent – Imposter of Integrity – Abuser of Constitutional Protection!

Once upon a time the news media members of the Fourth Estate, those who claimed to be the defenders of freedom and watchdogs for the public, were signatory to the Code of Ethics for the Society of Professional Journalists.  That Code of Ethics identifies the various standards for the industry which they summarize as follows.

Journalists should:

Take responsibility for the accuracy of their work. Verify information before
releasing it. Use original sources whenever possible.

Remember that neither speed nor format excuses inaccuracy.

Provide context. Take special care not to misrepresent or oversimplify in
promoting, previewing or summarizing a story.

Gather, update and correct information throughout the life of a news story.

Be cautious when making promises, but keep the promises they make.

Identify sources clearly. The public is entitled to as much information as possible
to judge the reliability and motivations of sources.

Consider sources’ motives before promising anonymity. Reserve anonymity for
sources who may face danger, retribution or other harm, and have information
that cannot be obtained elsewhere. Explain why anonymity was granted.

Diligently seek subjects of news coverage to allow them to respond to criticism
or allegations of wrongdoing.

Avoid undercover or other surreptitious methods of gathering information
unless traditional, open methods will not yield information vital to the public.

Be vigilant and courageous about holding those with power accountable.
Give voice to the voiceless.

Support the open and civil exchange of views, even views they find repugnant.

Recognize a special obligation to serve as watchdogs over public affairs and
government. Seek to ensure that the public’s business is conducted in the
open, and that public records are open to all.

Provide access to source material when it is relevant and appropriate.

Boldly tell the story of the diversity and magnitude of the human experience.
Seek sources whose voices we seldom hear.

Avoid stereotyping. Journalists should examine the ways their values and
experiences may shape their reporting.

Label advocacy and commentary.

Never deliberately distort facts or context, including visual information.

Clearly label illustrations and re-enactments.

Never plagiarize. Always attribute.

The Society of Professional Journalists, formerly known as Sigma Delta Chi, is the oldest organization representing journalists in the United States. It was established on April 17, 1909 at DePauw University, and its charter was designed by William Meharry Glenn.

For over one hundred years this society has worked to adopt and maintain a Code of Ethics to guide all journalists in their work and to make certain every effort is made to assure fair and balanced news coverage.

Today, sadly, as is obvious when reviewing the standards inherent in the Society Code, a vast number of principles of good journalism are being violated by the news media.  It seems the day of objectivity, fair and balanced coverage, even measures to assure truth in reporting, have been cast aside by our news organizations.

From the corporate boardrooms of the news media to the college classrooms teaching our next generation of journalists there is a wholesale disregard for our Constitutional protection of the news media.  You see, no Constitutional guarantee comes without reciprocal action to accept responsibility for adhering to the standards being protected.

In truth, our Bill of Rights is really a Bill of Rights and Responsibilities in which the federal government provides protection and those protected must assume responsibility to adhere to standards and principles consistent with our way of life.  That responsibility to maintain standards has been tossed on the trash heap of forgotten promises to the people.

News reporting used to be a meticulous search for truth but today it is no more than a stampede for ratings and readers using a profit driven bias and a desire to exploit the public while serving the stockholders.  They are hypocrites through and through.

Once upon a time our news anchors represented the best in American values.  But all that died when the Walter Cronkite’s of the world passed the baton to the New World Order of journalists.

Bias is the new standard and truth is no longer a priority in reporting.  The media and the profit mongers controlling them decided ratings were dependent upon controversy, generating hatred, undermining truth and exploiting a combined campaign by multiple news sources.  The members of the far left (extreme liberals) were united against a very few defenders of the president, Fox News most notably.  Both sides were guilty of many questionable news practices to hype their cause.

One thing they really underestimated was that the public would immediately see through the falsehoods bombarding the general public through the news media.  It is the public who are the true watchdogs of the public interest for they are the only defenders of the public interest.  They also long ago recognized the impending collapse of institutions like the news media, federal government, political parties and others who have outlived their usefulness.

People no longer trust the media because the media has abandoned the search for truth.  There can be no more telling sign than the cancellation of newspaper and magazine subscriptions, the epic collapse in television ratings, and the cord cutting of the public from the broadcast and cable television networks.

Back in that time, Walter Cronkite consistently drew 27-29 million viewers every night and on occasion soared to over 50 million for special events.  He was the most trusted man in America.  Today there are far more media outlets and there were 205 million people in the US back then compared to 330 million today.  Yet, if you total the audience for all the news media today, broadcast and cable, it falls short of Walter alone.

In the not too distant past news directors decided what to report.  Today, algorithms and artificial intelligence (AI) decide what to publish and how to maximize the bias.  The news media of today works to create the news, not just report it.  It wants to convince people what to think, not to present both sides of issues and let the people make up their own minds.

The news media and social media owners became collaborators and made a calculated decision to tell people what to think, subtly of course, in the dominant issue of the day, President Donald Trump, the consummate outsider.

Why?  Because he threatened those news reporters who used government insiders to routinely get leaked confidential, proprietary and even classified information, the lifeblood of an unscrupulous media.

The Trump threat must end so they first tried to stop Trump from getting elected which failed miserably.  Then they tried to force him to resign from the presidency through scandalous events from Trump’s past which also failed miserably.  Finally, they united to get him impeached which has failed thus far.

By using a variety of highly questionable news services and mysterious anonymous sources to generate news stories, thus creating an avalanche of spurious and incendiary rumors, half-truths and fake news to stop him from getting re-elected, such was their hatred and fear of the renegade president.

That was only the beginning.  Once credible news outlets like the New York Times, Washington Post, NBC and ABC along with most cable affiliates and channels such as CNN, MSNBC, CBSN and network streaming services were part of the movement to impeach or disenfranchise the duly elected president of the people.

For those of you not familiar with the news business, there are many ways to slant coverage in a negative light like misleading headlines leading into the story or using dated or provocative videos with bad people such as Trump with Epstein though the video is over 20 years old.

They consistently load all panels of experts with Obama/Clinton lovers and Trump haters, Republicans who are outcasts from their own party, or officials fired from the Trump era.  Often times CNN and MSNBC seem more like the PR arm of the Democratic National Committee than news outlets and it seems as if a requirement to get on the air is to have worked for Obama, be fired by Trump, or pledge allegiance to the destruction of Trump.

Of course, the public knows better as noted from the collapse in ratings and readers so in the end, should Trump survive and get re-elected, the Swamp may yet get drained.  This should be a lesson to all aspiring journalists, if you want to report the news you must have solid principles and take responsibility for your actions in serving the public trust.  Seek the truth.  

What Happened to the News Media in America? Part 1 – The Golden Age of News – Defenders of Truth

There was a time between the Civil War and the dawn of the twentieth century when the American news media became so corrupted and so viciously biased that character assassination, fake news, lies, scandalous rumors, bias, racism, and invasions of privacy were the new norm.

In time the few honest news organizations and reporters decided such “Yellow” journalism tactics had to end in order to protect the integrity of the entire news industry that claimed Constitutional protection under the Bill of Rights.

For those of you ignorant of history and blinded by political correctness, the term “Yellow” at the time was used to denote gutless, unethical, immoral and outright lies promulgated by certain publishers and reporters.

The general public was sick of the nonsense and the vast majority no longer believed the news media or press.  To the public, the media had lost all signs of objectivity, were beholden to their advertisers, and intent on destroying opposing views or competition.

The newspaper business started in the 1800’s with papers being affiliated with political parties.  In time the editorial was introduced to allow papers to post articles showing the other party opinion on issues, a technique adopted more to expand the business than to result in fair coverage.  Horace Greeley, founder of the New York Tribune in 1841, is credited with inventing the idea of segregating news reports from opinion writing, by giving opinion its own page.

No national media organizations existed at the time but eventually a group that today is known as the Society of Professional Journalists, founded in 1909, first adopted a Code of Ethics in 1926 covering the print media only.

Although the Code was not enforceable except by voluntary means and had no basis under the law, it was still embraced by all major members of the news media, including radio and television networks and affiliates after the 1973 rewrite.

Three major technological advances would eventually revolutionize the news media industry with the commercialization of the radio in the 1920’s, telephone in the 1930’s, (just 32% of American households had a phone by 1937), and television in the 1950’s (in 1950 just 10% of homes had black and white television, by 1964 a staggering 94% of all homes had television).

Reporting, as a result of the Code of Ethics, took a sharp turn to become popular with the general public.  This tremendous growth in public exposure by television heralded in the Golden Age of reporting, the 1960’s and ‘70’s.

Suddenly television news anchors were among the most trusted people in America, like Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite, Chet Huntley and David Brinkley who drew millions of faithful followers for their nightly news broadcasts.

Announcing death of JFK

Cronkite’s integrity was so beyond reproach he reached 57 million viewers for the Apollo landing on the Moon in 1969.  At the time there were 125 million viewers in a population of 202 million Americans meaning nearly 50% of all viewers were tuned to the CBS News with Cronkite.  In terms of average network followers, the 1969 average was about 31 million, with Cronkite pulling 11 million versus 9 million in each of the other two networks.

The population has tripled since the 1969 Moon landing but what happened to network news watchers?  As noted, 125 million people watched the Moon landing on all three networks, with Cronkite pulling 57 million.  Today, with three times as many people, we still only have about 119.6 million network viewers.

From the 31 million average network news viewers in 1969, it rose to 48 million viewers in 1985, then began a rapid descent.  By 1998 there were 30.4 million network news watchers, but today the number has dropped to about 21 million total watchers.

As for the popularity of anchors, Walter Cronkite was consistently voted the most trusted anchor on television and in 1972, he was named the most trusted man in America in all walks of life.  Today the most trusted network news anchors are only known by 21% of the TV audience.

Watch for Part 2 – The Golden Age of News – Destroyers of the Truth.
  

The Melchizedek Chronicles - Why are we so sad, hateful, disrespectful and depressed? Are we, the master of, or victim of, our environment?

Are you hiding behind your fears?

It matters not what side you are on, liberal or conservative, rich or poor, victim or perpetrator, majority or minority, republican or democrat, Christian or Islamic, not even race, color or creed, it only matters that you have created barriers to hide behind.

All it took was a little effort on your part to decide you were different, not one of them, an outsider, and you were determined to never become one of them.  They, your polar opposite, are your enemy.

Funny thing about humans that distinguishes us from about everything else in Creation, we think this Earth is our very own world made for the only creation with the ability to “think” and with the choice of a “free will.”  I guess we think we are the Masters over our creation and know what is best for Earth and mankind.

I do not remember reading anything in my research about God’s Creation being sold to the highest bidder.  Not a penny, pound, shekel, dirham, riyal, dinar, ruble, euro, renminbi, yen, franc, or peso among others, was paid to God so we could “own” the lands.  It was given to us, all of us, as a gift.

Earth was never ours to own, possess, control, dominate or abuse.  More than likely the Creator intended for us to use what we needed and leave the rest for others.

I have a lot to say about the self-bestowed title of “Master of the Earth,” given to humans by humans.  Then, not content with destroying the Crown Jewel of the Universe, Mother Earth, [so we think], we have now turned our attention to imposing our dominance on the rest of the solar system and universe.

Are we exploring the unknown of outer space to discover the full scope of the universe, or are we fleeing from our own self-destruction?  Perhaps, we made some bad choices along the way and might want to reconsider the path we pursued.

So, let us start with the environment of Earth that causes us to embrace all the wrong things on the Road to Kingdom Come.  We share the same environment with all other creations.  We think we are entrusted as masters of earth by the Creator.

Our natural or physical earth is protected by a series of miraculous creations.

The complex atmosphere of our earth…

The magnetic attraction of gravity…

The penetration of natural electromagnetic waves from the Sun…

The land, water and air supporting us…

And of course, the miraculous vessel we call Earth which was created and never ceases to continue recreating, repairing, and purifying so we have a place to exist.

Thus, when I say natural environment I mean like our oxygen-based atmosphere, our magnetic polarity resulting in gravity, the magical interdependence of the Earth, Sun and Moon in stabilizing the solar system, the life-giving natural electromagnetic waves from the Sun vital for maintaining our existence, and the land, water and air we require to exist.

Well, all of these things are contributing gifts from our Creator and when they function in harmony and unity, when we see the face of Jesus in everyone else, and when they see the face of Jesus in you, me and us, we are almost back home again.

As for us, the humans, remember we fellow homo sapiens were not the first life forms on the planet Earth, we were more like the last.

Give or take a few billion years, let us assume all of Creation as we know it is at least thirty billion years old, since the original Big Bang of Creation at the beginning of time, Earth has evolved and matured in our solar system.

After say ten billion years of evolution earth finally reached the physical stage, acknowledging that earth began in a gas form, which eventually evolved into the earth, Sun, Moon and galaxies.  Once physical the earth then created a permanent atmosphere, which transformed the once invisible planet into mountains, rivers, lakes, forests, continents and oceans.

After the addition of birds, animals, reptiles, bugs, mammals, a range of living species from ants to dinosaurs, along comes mankind now that earth can provide all the needs of humans.  Thus, in truth we are the first alien species to occupy the earth.

Can you imagine how Earth must have felt when the Creator said now that we have the Crown Jewel of planets in the skies, Earth gets to be permanent host to mankind.  Sounds more like Earth was being punished than rewarded.

Just look at the results.

Noting that the very first humans on Earth were created, then seeded throughout the world, and all subsequent generations of humans have been conceived, not created, one thing is not clear.  After the spiritual and cultural evolution of a whole bunch of known and unknown civilizations over the billions of years since humans were first seeded on Earth, what have we achieved?

One day our true history will be known.  Melchizedek says there have been seven disruptions in the evolution of mankind, when humans strayed too far from the plan of the Creator thanks to their free will, and it was necessary to make natural adjustments to the earth.  The vast majority of humans were lost in those meteor strikes, floods, droughts, maybe even wars.

At best our known history only covers the current cycle of civilization.  Far more information will be released in the coming days that will greatly extend knowledge of the existence of humans on the planet and shed light on our prior civilizations.

The vehicle of Earth has survived every imaginable catastrophic event throughout time and it is still here providing for our needs.  For billions of years Earth withstood the far more devastating natural disasters ranging from monstrous comet strikes powerful enough to create the Gulf of Mexico, super-volcano eruptions blowing holes in the Rocky Mountains and creating a debris field in the sky thick enough to block the Sun for years, ice ages that buried the Earth under glaciers, warmups and floods so severe man barely escaped extinction.

As if the really big disasters were not enough, there were the endless weather anomalies over the billions of years with “once in a lifetime” blizzards and freezing cold, relentless floods and drought, volcano eruptions burying towns and villages, earthquakes that swallowed up entire cities and continents, and fires that scorched massive quantities of forests.

Those are the natural earth changes.

Humans, of course, have become a force for concern because of our contributions to the destruction of the earth as well.  Whether we rape the land of resources, disrupt the balance of nature through development, blow up 2,000 nuclear bombs testing to see if they work, try to harness rivers not meant to be controlled, build on beaches not meant to be human habitat, destroy natural resources, become dependent on things excessive to our needs, we are not a good partner to Earth.

Perhaps, we should recognize the tremendous ability of Earth and protection of the Creator for our planet.  Melchizedek says humans will not destroy the Earth.  If we do bad things there will be bad consequences to pay, but it will not in our power to destroy Earth.

However, if we do not use our energy to learn to co-exist through the Creator’s commandments of love, then continue to sow the seeds of hate and polarity, judgement and war, dark over light, we will fail.

There is one aspect of our environment we do control, the negative energy we introduce to our world, the same negative energy we are so quick to inflict on our enemy no matter what human form it may take.  You might call this the spiritual environment of Earth, and it has been seriously neglected over the years.

Can you give up your prejudice and hate, your bias and fear, and replace it with love as the Creator and Jesus instruct?  Are you willing to project a positive message of hope for all humans if we just accept our equality as creation of the Crestor?

We shall soon learn the truth…