Would you prefer the politics rule the economies?
(it's a dual system, they will always influence each other)

Back to your question: if fail to see any relevance of the 10c to todays politics/economies.*
Wait...maybe...

Something you should remind the French of. :grin:



*: Dante on the other hand is a direct hit.

I vote for polititians. I do not vote for heads of hedge funds or banks.
And do not say the F word, there may be children reading this forum ; )

That’s not totally true. To show why I need to get a bit philosophical as it raises the issue of how we decide what constitutes truth or reality. There are two broad classes of question that we are faced with:

The first can be answered by direct observation. In simple cases of this class, such as whether a particular table in front of us has four legs, the answer is a matter of straight verifiable observation - anyone with the necessary visual sense should agree on the answer (and people who don't agree are usually labelled delusional). A more realistically newsworthy example of the same thing would be an earthquake in Japan. This type of 'truth' then can be viewed as 'objective', easily verifiable and NOT dependent on your prior opinion (unless you want to admit to being delusional!)

(There is a more complex variant of this where the observations may require specialised apparatus (eg microscopes) or specialised training/education to be able to discern the facts, but again, anyone with the training and access to the required instruments should be able to agree.)

Then there are questions that are tightly bound up with people's value systems. In these cases simple observational answers are usually not available. Examples of these questions are: is abortion justified?,
was the decision to invade Iraq correct?,
what should be the responsibilities of the state?
In questions like these disagreements are common.

Any competent (honest) news organization should have no difficulty in reporting the first class above. With the second class if they are to give a fair and balanced representation they will need to tread more carefully. In fact, a good way of distinguishing between ‘news’ and ‘propaganda’ is by seeing how diligently a news organization attempts to tread this fair and balanced path.

And here is the problem. The Reagan administration in 1987 effectively abolished the requirement for television news to attempt to provide balanced and fair coverage (I believe the argument was that it infringes freedom of speech and property rights - i.e. wealthy media owners should be able to have their organizations say what they damn well want). This opened the door for the current situation in American news broadcasting where the news channels, having abandoned the need for impartiality, have become ever more partisan in their presentations. It also increases the tendency to chase market share which can lead to sacrificing accuracy of coverage in order to pander to your perceived demographic (i.e. twist the facts so as to keep your viewers)

As Bewolf said, this has generally bad effects on a democracy. For the people to be able to make good judgements they must first be given accurate information. In the UK there is still a requirement for TV news to be impartial. I would suggest that for healthy democracy keeping the media bias-free is important. For this some regulation is needed.

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The above also takes us back to climate change where the argument can be viewed as about being whether it is a Class 1 observable fact (most scientists) or a Class 2 opinion (liberals V conservatives)?

Political vs financial elite - one care for the cash, the other for a short note in the book of history. Both usually break their word. Same crooks.

We're having a hard time in Switzerland keeping our politicians on a short leash - now, you live in Germany...lol.

To summarise the above:

In the UK TV media organisations are required to fairly report both Class 1 and Class 2 above.

In the USA currently Class 2 reporting has moved from balanced news into propaganda-driven presentations. Arguably (?) some of the Class 1 items may be being distorted and skewed too, as this necessitates accurate reporting of the 'other side's' position without distortion, spin or value judgement.

Once Class 1 'facts' are routinely distorted we are into Goebbels territory and it is time to be worried. :)

Same in Switzerland, this rule will be also supported as long as they stay on their socialist track...

Like the other guy said; free speech, free will - you only have to share mine.:evil:

With the difference that you can vote the latter out of power or join a party yourself without any preconditions. I chose the short note in the book of history anytime over care for cash, thanks. At least the note on history has some flexibility in how to achieve that.

Besides, the current political system in Germany these days works quite fine and is not as bound to populism as other countries are.

One of the basic rights of stockholders at the ASM is...?


True, doesn't matter which party you vote for, the result is always the same.

What// We only spend like 800 BILLION a year. Dont all countries spend that much.....:-)

Are you saying that the Swiss mainstream media have a socialist bias?

The BBC has been getting attacked for some time now from the Conservative right for supposed bias. Interestingly Labour have also had a bash at them at times. My opinion - if you're annoying both sides you're probably doing ok.

As I argued above - once you get past the verifiable factual stuff (earthquakes in japan, numbers dead in a car crash) and move into the Class 2 stuff it's arguable that there are only opinions anyway. In this territory even if you try hard to be impartial it is likely that someone will be annoyed.

It's also likely that the further out you are from the centre on either left or right, the more you are likely to perceive the attempt at balanced, centre-line coverage to be biased.

Which explains why those with more hard-line positions are the ones getting most annoyed...