I rarely if ever watch the local television news. There's little actual news reported and the coverage they do provide on real issues is remarkably shallow and incomplete.
But last night, I happened to be surfing the dial and came across a piece on the transportation bill on KARE 11. Billed as an "Extra" it featured Rick Kupchella explaining where the money from the various taxes was going to go and why all those taxpayers who are outraged about an increase in their tax burdens are drooling, knuckle-dragging Neanderthals, too stupid to think for themselves and blindly swallowing the misinformation being fed them.
It truly was one of the most offensive, condescending pieces of agenda journalism I've come across is some time. You can watch the video here or better yet read the "report" that Kupchella spewed last night here.
It begins with a common media conceit. Take a contentious issue, explain that there is a lot of discussion going on about it, and then claim that now an unbiased objective reporter is going to sift through the facts, cut away the clutter and partisanship, and give you the real story. You see this sort of "reporter as ultimate judge of the truth" crap all the time in the media. Last night's Extra was no different:
Clearly, we struck a nerve. Plowing through all the emails sent to us over the course of the last few months on this issue, we've come to a few basic conclusions:
First - people are still angry about the level of taxation in this state, if not the gas tax specifically, the tax burden overall.
Second - there's a tremendous amount of distrust in state leaders when it comes to managing state money.
Third - the public has a lot of bad information in terms of what's real, fueled largely by un-informed talk radio.
Ah yes, the real culprit of a misinformed public is always talk radio. Unlike Rick Kupchella, those un-informed talk radio devils are delivering bad information and not telling you what's real. Interesting to note that Kupchella didn't bother to site even ONE example of this "un-informed" talk radio last night.
Instead, he took a typical media approach to delivering the "real story."
First, cherry pick the people you want to present as being outraged and misinformed. No offense to the crew who appeared in the report last night, but they weren't exactly the most articulate defenders of their position. Portray them as "mad as hell" and slightly irrational by having them read some of their more outrageous statements on the air. Don't feel too bad fellows, I've been there and had that done myself and know how it feels to come off as the angry crank in the basement.
Second, frame the story in a way that allows you to present only the information you want. If you watched Kupchella's report last night, you would have assumed that the only way that bridges and roads could be funded in Minnesota was by raising the gas, license, and motor vehicle sales taxes. Read his entire report and see if you can find the words "bond" or "bonding." You can't. Create the illusion that you're presenting all the relevant context, while actually only discussing information that fits within your pre-conceived template.
Third, present public officials who support your positions as reasonable and well-informed to make sure that no one misses the contrast with the angry rubes (always men). And only present public officials who reinforce your views. If there was any doubt as to how much Kupchella was marching in lockstep with the DFL last night, it was quickly erased when he turned to this political leader for comment:
We took the stories of Mark and Rene, and others, to Margaret Anderson Kellerher, speaker of Minnesota's House of Representatives. We told her how so much of the frustration and anger in the public is based on a basic distrust of government.
She sees it as largely "par for the course."
"I think that is always a part of the relationship between the public and elected folks. And I think it goes back a few hundred years, to the way the country was founded," Anderson Kellerher said.
She was the only politician or pundit (other than a "lobbyist for homeowners") featured in the report. I guess Marty Seifert was busy. No one from the Governor's office was available. David Strom and Phil Krinkie didn't answer their phones.
My favorite part of the story was when Kupchella tried to help us ignorant peasants understand by providing some unbiased, objective perspective:
Finally, it helps to understand the scale of this whole thing. Roads and bridges are insanely expensive. Minnesota already spends $2 billion a year for roads and bridges.
Now, even the legislative auditor says we need $3 billion a year, just to cover the basics. Our whole state budget is less than $18 billion a year for everything!
Less than $18 billion! For "everything"? That's hardly anything! No wonder we can barely scrape by!
Kupchella didn't bother to explain what else besides roads and bridges this "everything" was and why a state government should have any reason to prioritize these other things over roads and bridges in the first place. But then again, that wasn't part of his agenda.
(Michael Mannske has more at True North in a post called Just Who Does KARE Care For Anyway?.)
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