A Modest Proposal
September 15th, 2008Sick of the lying in politics? Jeffrey Zeldman gives us a modest proposal.
From the article:
Just as they once united to stamp out cigarette advertising, radio and TV stations and advertisers must get together and agree that false statements in political advertisements will not be tolerated. If you run a political ad that proves to be a lie, your network will pay a steep fine, and the advertiser will pay an even steeper one.
It's a great read. The only downside I see is that Americans seem to want the dramatic campaign as real politics seem to bore most people. I do agree that candidates should be held to campaigning on the truth (not sure how we'd force them to campaign on the actual issues).
- Via Daring Fireball.
September 15th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
In the meantime, maybe we can just not pay any attention to the networks and stations and advertisers that do it so it hurts them financially? Anybody? Hello?
September 15th, 2008 at 4:11 pm
The other thing I’ve seen is that the news has become profitable medium. Meaning that to keep people watching they want to make sure it’s dramatic (”lipstick on a pig”, etc), and that it’s a close race. It’s like WWF but the actual outcome will actually affect us more than one night of crying at our favorite.
September 15th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
[...] recently blogged about “a modest proposal”, in which the linked article asks for more fact checking in the news. That may be a long time [...]