Mollie Hemingway’s post at The Federalist — “Thanks To Media Blackout, Most Americans Are In The Dark About Planned Parenthood Videos” — sounded awfully familiar and I know why: I’ve been writing about media blackouts for years — on all of the important issues. Not only media blackouts, but pop culture blackouts and K-college blackouts as well. The unfiltered conservative message is rarely heard in America because conservatives aren’t seriously engaged in the information war.
Oh, don’t get me wrong, conservatives produce a ton of information. Conservative think tanks and countless right-of-center commentators fill the web and the radio airwaves on a daily basis with a wonderful amount of intellectual ammunition. The problem is, most if it only reaches those who already agree, while the rest sits wasted in website archives. I know, because this website contains the best archive on the web.
What good is it if the best, most convincing arguments are made but no one hears them? It’s all supposed to be about moving public opinion, but instead, what we have is a Republican/conservative entertainment complex. Instead of employing troops to take ground street by street, neighborhood by neighborhood, those who seek to support and defend the Constitution participate in the equivalent of community theater while the radical leftwing produces blockbuster after blockbuster.
If in reading this you’re not understanding what I’m saying or frustrated that I’m not giving more details, visit this page and begin your education. It’s all been written already — and yes, that’s right, what you’ll find there isn’t reaching enough people. But it is reaching some — and too many of them don’t want to believe it — or don’t want to do the work that’s needed, preferring instead to be citizens in name only.
Here is an excerpt from the Mollie Hemingway piece. In her opening she refers to a YouGov poll:
The vast majority of Americans — a whopping 70 percent — have heard little to nothing about videos showing the involvement of Planned Parenthood in the harvesting and trafficking of human fetal organs. The revelations from the videos have led to federal and state investigations, calls to end the $530 million a year in taxpayer funding, and questions from human rights activists about the propriety of the practice.
Yet the media have so struggled to cover the story, much less cover it well, that one third of the public has heard literally nothing about them while another 38 percent have heard only a little. Democrats are particularly uninformed on the videos, with more than three out of four reporting they have heard little to nothing about the videos.
Of those who had heard at least a little about the videos, only 45 percent had seen any video, or even a clip from the video. But since only 68 percent of the population had even heard of the video, that means that relatively few Americans — 30.6 percent — had been exposed to even a portion of the video by the media. Again, Democrats were the least informed about the videos, with fewer than one in four — 23 percent — having been exposed by the media to any of the full videos, the edited videos, or even clips from the videos.
It happens every day on every issue.
- Few people understand why government recognizes marriage in the first place, and because of that profound ignorance, five silly lawyers on the Supreme Court think they can redefine marriage.
- Few people understand that we have three co-equal branches of government, and because of that profound ignorance, confused Americans think the Supreme Court is the highest governing body rather than merely the highest court.
- Few people have even the most basic understanding of economics, and because of that, we sit by while the Federal Reserve prints monopoly money and our elected officials at all levels of government spend taxpayers into enormous debt.
- Few people have ever heard of the idea that things like health insurance, health care, and K-college education are commodities, and like food and gasoline and housing, the private sector can meet the needs of consumers far better that bloated and corrupt government bureaucracies can. Because of this lack of knowledge, government grows and taxes the nation at rates that kill economic growth and opportunity.
Again, it’s the same on every issue. The costs of failing to fight in the information war — to get good information to the uninformed and misinformed — are high.
Not enough Americans are seeing the Planned Parenthood videos. It’s a learning moment for conservatives. Will they learn?
You can read Mollie Hemingway’s article here.
Image credit and the source of the Planned Parenthood videos: Center for Medical Progress.
