Jim Avila's 'Media Remedy' is a quack and basically a defense of the old news media

I love Barrett News Media (BNM), as it covers the media from a right of center worldview and defends the First Amendment and Freedom of Speech when it comes to the media at large.  But sometimes there are pieces I need be critical about.  Even at the websites I love.

BNM since last year, has brought on ABC News Senior National Correspondent and 20/20 Correspondent Jim Avila (who was also a White House Correspondent for ABC News and previously worked for NBC News, NBC O&O KNBC in Los Angeles, and CBS O&O WBBM-TV in Chicago) to contribute commentary on the media for the BNM website.  His recent piece, presents 5 Media Sources You Can Count On To Deliver News, Not Misinformation.  I read the piece not knowing who Avila is at first, but as the old proverb from Germany goes; Who’s Bread I Eat, Who’s Song I Sing…more/less; but basically, his piece is a defense of the old mainstream press…both TV and print and who you should turn to if you want to go on a news diet.  While I would agree not to believe everything on the internet, I do have to raise many concerns about his remedy to this…but first;

Here are his five sources that he claims to deliver news.

1. Turn off cable news, unless there is a major breaking news; a new war, a school shooting, plane crash or otherwise. And then tune into CNN which has the world’s largest TV reporting staff, way ahead of any other domestic broadcast service.

Oh, and Rachel Maddow is his guilty pleasure

2.  Watch one or more of the 3 evening network TV broadcasts and 60 Minutes on Sunday. Even watching all 3 nightly news programs takes less than an hour if you fast forward through the commercials. They are a quick 18 minutes of news, a summary of the top stories of the day reported with perspective and in most cases experienced journalists. They have seasoned editors who vet each story and best of all, there is no time for opinion. No commentators, just news. CBS is my favorite, NBC a close second. But that’s subjective…

His mentioning of CBS News is what I mean by more/less…but hey you’re standing up for people that may be competitors but part of the Democratic Party/Progressive/La Gouche (The Left) hive mind.

3.  Respected national newspapers: The New York Times, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal.

4.  If you have time, move to the second tier of newspapers on line.  LA Times, Chicago Tribune, Atlanta Journal-Constitution or your local paper.

5.  The Daily podcast. An arm of the New York Times

Another guilty pleasure of Avila is Keith Olbermann…ANOTHER LEFTY!!!

Granted he did leave out by design websites like Politico and The Daily Beast which he says are; “insider type publications or in many cases aggregators which merely take from other news sources and re-publish to the internet.”  Avila says don’t read them but there are not for the "General Reader."  He also goes on to say to avoid tabloid formatted publications like the New York Post and the UK’s Daily Mail along with the likes of Breitbart and Daily Caller which he claims are agenda driven, and “filled with conspiracies and disinformation.”  But never the NYT, the WAPO (Washington Post for short), and while The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) does have editorial pieces that come from a right leaning and/or pro-economics viewpoint, the reporters for work for the respected paper do tend to lean left to center.

Radio & Television Talk Show Host, and Constitutional lawyer Mark Levin; showed the skeletons of the NYT’s past. Skeletons they never repented of and/or apologized for.  During the rise of Nazi Germany in the 1930’s, the Gray Lady (as the NYT is nicknamed) basically burred and/or omitted altogether the stories about how the Jewish people in Germany were being treated, coupled with actual documentation that Adolf Hitler and his followers conducted a systematic extermination campaign to eliminate the Jewish people and then some.  Levin is not alone in this.  Back in 2005, Laurel Leff who was a reporter for the WSJ, The Miami Herald, and has been a professor at of Journalism at Northeastern University for some time now; wrote the book Burred by The Times in which she took aim at the Gray Lady for not raising awareness of Hitler’s extermination program; and thus, enabling Hitler to commit what is commonly called now, "The Holocaust."  While the left in general has disowned Hitler, the Gray Lady was never really held accountable for its actions as it continues to be up to the present day a respected newspaper.  After all Avila said so.  Of course, the New York Times is guilty of many other things including covering of their famed Moscow bureau chief Walter Duranty as he defended the actions of famed Soviet Union leader Joseph Stalin and his intentional starvation of the Ukrainian people which lead to a mass genocide of millions of Ukrainians and ushering in the Great Famine.  A Famine that was not natural but perpetrated by the Russian state at the time.  Stalin is still respected by certain progressives.

One more thing about the Gray Lady.  They were one of the biggest enablers of Fidel Castro and his Cuban revolution; and thanks to The New York Times; Castro would enjoy a five-decade rein over Cuba; which continued via the Communist Party of Cuba, via his brother Raul and later succeed by it current leader; Miguel Díaz-Canel.

Avila admitted that he was a fan of CBS News.  That in spite of working for one its direct rivals; but then again; "scratch my back, and I will scratch yours."  Like he said; “it’s Subjective.”  What is not subjective is that "the Most Trusted Man in America" should have not been trusted.  Regardless of what you thought of the Vietnam War; Walter Cronkite’s famed commentary on Vietnam helped the Vietcong win the war in the long run (calling it “unwinnable”) and that was even admitted by a top Communist General in the documentary Vietnam: A Television History which aired on PBS during the 1980’s and was spun in the favor of the Vietcong.  Cronkite was good at herding the American people towards what La Gauche in America wanted, and his body language would dictate his opinions along with the choice of stories Cronkite would cover.  Cronkite speaking just to his colleagues at the Radio and TV Correspondents Association dinner in 1996 said; “Everybody knows that there’s a liberal, that there’s a heavy liberal persuasion among correspondents.”  They major lefties in the news media still deny this and Avila is among them. 

CBS News enjoyed being the most popular evening newscast during Cronkite’s reign, and he likely helped Jimmy Carter win the Oval Office in 1976; but could not keep him for getting ran out by Ronald Reagan, who’s campaign paid for air time and thus bypassing the likes of Uncle Walt and media's hive mind.  Cronkite and/or his producers did make sure that Richard Nixon got ran out of that office three years earlier in hopes of ending the Vietnam War in their desired favor (and I am not a Nixon fan by any means).  CBS News would lose their standing with Dan Rather taking over the anchor chair in 1981, as Rather did not have the charm and charisma that Cronkite had on the America people.  The CBS Evening News has never recovered ever since, but has done well in other areas including its radio service and the long running newsmagazine 60 Minutes.

I could go on about Jim Acosta, Sam Donaldson, Gayle King, George Stephanopoulos, Chuck Todd, etc, etc, but I think I have said enough for this piece regarding certain journalists.

Avila has his remedy; let me present mine…in spite of any flaws it has.

1.  Do your homework whenever possible.  Do not just believe what you read, see, and hear.   Find out what is being reported is true and/or what parts of it are true.

2.  Choose three to four media outlets primary that you can trust.  Even if they cannot do everything that CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, AP, NPR, PBS, or even Fox News can do.  Many do get their sources from these and other media outlets.  The Worldview In 5 Minutes from Kevin Swanson’s Generations Ministries gathers information from the above outlets and more, but is good at spinning the news in favor of a Biblical Worldview, or at least how Swanson sees it.  Still if you love an in-your-face Biblical Worldview in your news; TWI5M is a great choice to get that.  Another Christian News publication called the World has their own podcast called The World and Everything In It which is a Morning Edition and All Things Considered (NPR's flagship and drivetime news programs) styled program which also features the news of the day from a Christian worldview as well.

3.  Be open to your local news (be it TV, Radio and even Newspaper).  Far from perfect, most local television newscasts (but not all) are produced in the communities that they serve.  The people that work for these local news stations are living among you and are closest to you.  They are not getting rich and maybe among the most honest people just making a living in something they love to do.  Also, the local news deals with issues impacting the community and many do their own investigating, and an important element of getting up to date weather information at the local level and they offer their own weather apps as well.  Radio is also a great source of news and getting it faster, and some markets have better radio news departments than others.  Newspapers also have reporters living among you as well.  Not everyone that is in local news wants to hit the big time, and are content to being big fish in smaller ponds…some are bigger than others of course…but depends on the media market as you well know.

4.  Check out international news outlets like the UK’s BBC and ITN, Japan’s NHK, and Germany’s DW.  While they have their faults, their bias is still different from the American News Media.

5.  Find a few commentators that you can trust their judgement on things.  Its good to get opinions on the issues of the day, especially ones that can think critically on those issues; both on the left and right.

6.  There are several websites that track Media bias.  Among the most objective websites include Ad Fontes Media, mediabiasfactcheck.com and allsides.com.  They do a good job with sub categories’ as well showing the bias spectrum of ABC News on the web and ABC News on TV for instance.  For a more conservative spin there is Newsbusters.org from the Media Research Center and yes; you have Media Matters on the left which gets its money from Soros…sadly.

I am not counting this among the remedy’s but I do listen to from time-to-time 1010 WINS and WTOP out of New York City and Washington DC respectfully.  Both stations broadcast a 24/7 all News Radio format and being in major markets they can conduct such a format while other stations that market themselves as NewsRadio like a KSL, KKOB, WLW, WFLA, KRDO, KLBJ-AM, KFBK, WBAL, have to balance their programing with talk and/or human-interest programs and automation during certain dayparts, as it does take lots of money to invest in an all-news format (KNX Los Angeles, WBBM Chicago, KYW Philadelphia, and KCBS (AM) San Francisco also do NewsRadio 24/7).  1010 WINS claims to have the most listeners while WTOP makes the most money among all radio stations in the United States.  I usually listen to them when I seek breaking news on weekends and holidays when my favorite Talk Radio programs/personalities on not on.  At least I have an ideal of what is going before my favorite talkers can make a statement on the air.

I would also recommend getting a copy of Mark Levin’s book Unfreedom of The Press and while I have not read it myself, you might want to grab a copy of Laurel Leff’s book as well.

The bottom line is that Jim Avila is basically defending his turf and its legacy, while propping up its current line up of of early evening propagandists of the Democratic Party and Progressive Causes named Holt, O'Donnell, and Muir.  The establishment news media has too much respect it does not deserve, and basically is defended by like-minded people…past and present.  Avila is no different.  He continues to deny its bias and worldviews of its respective reporters and it ignores the culture and values of middle America that it continues to attack and tries to shape in its image while living the bubbles of New York City, Washington DC, and Los Angeles.  Either by its own ignorance or its contempt and arrogance…if not all of the above.

If Avila is a Doctor of Journalism, I would call him just another Quack.  Give Maddow and Olbermann my regards Mr. Avila. 

Nothing wrong with going on a news diet, but I don’t like what is on Avila's menu.  It’s worse than the 'diet food.'

P.S.  Looking at Avila's Twitter feed, it seems that he is also a fan of former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich (who served in the position in the Clinton administration).  "Know Your Role and Shut You Mouth" indeed, Mr. Avila.  I'll take my chances with the New York Post, and then some.

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