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February
9, 2002
John Blair
Criticize
Cheney, Go to Jail
February
8, 2002
CounterPunch
Wire
Ashcroft
the Bigot
Molly
Secours
Racism
and Real Estate
Wole Akande
World
Economic Forum:
The Aftermath
Cockburn/St.
Clair
Dita
Sari Tells Reebok
to "Shove It"
February
7, 2002
Patrick
Cockburn
Taliban's
War on Chess
John Chuckman
Howdee,
Dick!
Tariq
Ali
Mullahs
and Heretics
February
6, 2002
Amira
Hass
On
the Edge of the
Non-Violent Demonstrations
Vivian
Berger
Sentenced
to Rape
Vladimir Georgiyev
Russian Intelligence:
War on Iraq Begins in Sept.
Tom Turnipseed
"Axis
of Evil" a Cover for Corporate Corruption?
David
Vest
The
Enron Creature
February
5, 2002
Norman
Madarasz
Dispatch
from Pôrto Alegre
Tom Malinowski
What
to do with
Our "Detainees"?
Dita Sari
Why
I Rejected the
Reebok Human Rights Award
February
4, 2002
Eric Miller/Beth
Daley
Five
Weapons Systems
That Bilk the Taxpayers
Kenneth
Roth
Dear
Condoleezza,
You've Misstated the
Geneva Convention
Robert
Jensen
The
Occupation Must End
Shahid
Alam
How
Different Are
Islamic Societies?
David
Vest
Everybody
Says I Loathe You
John Chuckman
American
Politics of Grief
February
3, 2002
Zoltan
Grossman
War
and New Military Bases
February
2, 2002
Francis
Schor
Carlucci's
Strange Career
February
1, 2002
Dr. Susan
Block
The
Great Ashcroft Cover Up
Jeremy
Voas
Why
We're Suing Ashcroft
David
Vest
10
Things I Know About Him
January
31, 2002
Rahul
Mahajan
The
State of the Union:
A New Cold War
Dave Marsh
Miles
Copeland, War
and the Future of Music
John Pilger
The
Colder War
Alexander
Cockburn
American
Journal:
Killer Dog, Weird Couple
Dr. Susan
Block
Blowback
and Daniel Pearl
January
30, 2002
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Linda
Lay, Hill and Knowlton and the Tears of a Clown
Jack McCarthy
Free
Noelle Bush!
Michael
Ratner
Memo
to Bush: Adhere to
the Geneva Convention
Jay Moore
Proud
to be an American?
Susan
Block
The
Great Pretzel Swallower
and Guantanamo Porn
January
29, 2002
Gary Leupp
Why
This War Was, and Remains, Utterly Wrong
Alexander
Cockburn
The
Birds of Kandahar
Patrick
Cockburn
Afghan
Opium Trade
Back in Business
January
28, 2002
Larry
Chin
Brosnahan
for the Defense
Mokhiber/Weissman
Tyranny
of the Bottom Line
George
E. Curry
Civil
Rights Nominee Called Affirmative Action "Racist"
Sen. Russ
Feingold
Campaign
Finance Reform?
Think Enron
John Chuckman
Liberal?
Media?
A Photographic Journal of Life
in an Afghan Refugee Camp
By Judith Mann
Resources:
100s of Links
About 9/11
CounterPunch:
Complete
Coverage of 9/11 and Its Aftermath
Five
Days That
Shook The World:
Seattle and Beyond
By Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
Photos by Allan Sekula
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Published Oct. 15, 2001
8-Page Special Issue
War Diary
CIA's Assassination Plan a History of
Torture in US Prisons
bin Laden and Bush
Business Connections
Aisha Ikramuddin on the Hidden Hype
of US Food Bombs
Peter Linebaugh on
Pakistan
Christopher Hitchens' Love for Mrs. Thatcher
Jiang Zemin Tells Bush:
Nuke 'Em
Search
CounterPunch
Read Whiteout and Find Out
How the CIA's Backing of the Mujahideen Created the World's Most
Robust Heroin Market and Helped to Finance the Rise of the Taliban
and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The New Crusade:
America's War on Terrorism
By Rahul Mahajan
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
Phoenix Program
by Douglas Valentine
Al Gore:
A User's Manual
by Cockburn
and St. Clair
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This Explosive
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Amazing Discount!
Reviews of Gore:
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February 9,
2002
The Media Monolith
Synergizing America
by Walt Brasch
Saturday night in the middle of Winter in northeastern
Pennsylvania.
About the only social life were myriad
Bingo games and fat-laden church dinner socials. There was nothing
exciting in the local theater that I hadn't already seen, and
TV was spewing re-runs. Time to tune in The Nashville Network.
But, on this cold Saturday night, even
TNN was unfriendly. No Statler Brothers. No Grand Ole Opry.
Not even a luke-warm "Dukes of Hazzard." Just pro-fake
wrestling. TNN had been Viacomized.
Media conglomerate Viacom had exorcised
the soul of the once-independent TNN, renamed it The National
Network, and had stripped its country roots. The Nashville Network
had begun in March 1983 with Ralph Emery hosting "Nashville
Now," a variety-talk show that would anchor the new network.
A decade later, "Music City Tonight," with hosts Charlie
Chase and Lorianne Crooks, replaced "Nashville Now"
when Emery retired. In 1997, Westinghouse, which had bought
out CBS in 1995, added TNN and sister cable network CMT to its
acquisitions. Just a business deal. Nothing more.
But, two years later, Westinghouse/CBS
decided it was good business to shift from country to "country
lifestyle," and cancelled several prime time series, including
"Prime Time Country," "This Week in Country Music,"
and a re-named "Crooks & Chase." Less than a year
later, Viacom bought out Westinghouse/CBS for $50 billion, placed
TNN under Viacom's MTV division, dumped long-time employees,
and shifted most of the administration from Nashville to New
York City. "Country lifestyle" was now replaced by
"general entertainment." The intent was "to be
as diverse as the nation itself and break out of a regionalism,"
said Herb Scannell, president of Viacom cable networks Nickelodeon
and TV Land who now notched TNN on his resume.
So long Waltons, the Real McCoys, and
Boss Hogg. Bring on the apparently non-regional World Wrestling
Federation's forms of fake-blood-and-head-banger entertainment,
and mix it with numerous "Star Trek" reruns and other
Paramount films since Viacom--in addition to owning CBS, Nick,
TV Land, MTV, and VH1-- also owns Paramount Pictures. Viacom,
which recorded about $20.1 billion in revenue in 2000, also
owns cable networks Showtime and The Movie Channel. It also
owns the UPN TV network, Spelling Entertainment ("Beverly
Hills 90210" among other shows), Blockbuster, several theme
parks including Kings Dominion and Kings Island, movie theater
chains, radio and TV stations, and Simon & Schuster book
publishers, the largest educational publisher in the country.
Among the other megamedia conglomerates
are Disney ($25.4 billion media revenue in 2000), AOL Time Warner
($25 billion), German-owned Bertelsmann ($16.6 billion), Canadian-owned
Seagram's, itself owned by a French conglomerate ($14.8 billion),
and Australian-owned News Corporation ($14.1 billion), British-owned
Thomson, and Japanese-owned Sony. Through an intricate series
of intertangling alliances, directors of one conglomerate can
be found sitting on the boards of others, while the conglomerates
themselves own parts of each other. In Viacom's case, with Seagram's
it owns the Sci-Fi channel and USA Network; with AOL Time Warner
it owns the Comedy Channel; and with Robert Redford it owns
the Sundance Channel. The trend of corporations swallowing other
corporations, and conglomerates merging with other conglomerates
may mean that the universe may one day be ruled by a mouse.
The conglomerate-advocates claim that
in largeness is more efficiency, cost-cutting, and the development
and use of greater resources to improve the product. They're
right. But, also right are the opponents who see even more layers
of management, layoffs and "downsizing" in the name
of "streamlining," and the gradual development of
a conglomerate with innumerable divisions, each with its own
identity and target audience, but all of which reflect the
ownership's values and mind-sets.
The six major conglomerate-owned film
companies (American-owned Warner Brothers, MGM/UA, and Disney;
and foreign-owned Universal, Columbia, and Fox) and five "mini-major"
corporations bring in about 90 percent of all box office revenue,
and essentially control distribution, even of independent films.
Only four major recording companies--Sony, BMG (owned by Bertelsmann,
which also owns RCA and Arista), Universal (owned by Seagram's/Vivendi,
which also own MCA), and Warner Brothers (AOL Time Warner,
which also owns Atlanta and Electra)--control nearly 90 percent
of the recorded music in the U.S. Chain ownership is now the
prevalent model for daily newspapers, with 13 chains accounting
for about 54 percent of all circulation; only about 300 of the
nation's 1,480 dailies are not parts of group ownership. Tied
into all this is the lack of local competition. In 1923, 502
cities had competing dailies; today, only 14 cities have competing
dailies. Half of all bookselling is now through Barnes &
Noble or the Borders chains. A decade ago, independent booksellers
accounted for about one-third of the market; now they sell about
15 percent.
Fifteen book publishers, owned by six
megamedia conglomerates, account for more than 90 percent of
all book publishing in America. Only 10 of those publishers
placed about 95 percent of the year's best-sellers. With corporate
business models replacing literary adventure, what seems to
matter most is the bottom line. Editors first ask, "Can
it sell?" Booksellers ask, "What's the promotion budget?"
The emphasis is upon names rather than writers, which is why
O.J. Simpson girlfriend Paula Barbieri received a $3 million
advance from Little, Brown, part of the AOL Time Warner chain.
It's also the reason that Beavis and Butthead's Ensucklopedia
sold more than 400,000 copies in 1995, more than books by Peter
Benchley, E. L. Doctorow, Joseph Heller, Jack Higgins, John
Irving, James Michener, and Herman Wouk.
Book publishers now look for manuscripts
that can be turned into film properties and sold to a sister
company. Good writing is often rejected in favor of probable
spin-offs. It's not even necessary for films to show a profit
in theaters. Film companies, buying books even before they're
published, can make their profits not in theaters, but by selling
videos to chain video stores, and air rights to television and
cable networks which the parent conglomerate owns. The American
media have become so incestuous that few people even thought
it unusual that Warner Books paid former General Electric chairman
Jack Welch a $7.1 million advance for his rules-laced business-guide
autobiography, then announced a $1 million marketing campaign
that included two days of interviews on the "Today"
show which is produced by NBC, part of the G.E. conglomerate.
It's all called "synergy."
And it's synergy that downsizes staffs
while calling it "streamlining," and has helped exclude
worthy projects, while promoting a corporate climate that rejects
the "regionalism" of The Nashville Network in favor
of mass audiences that will raise the profits while dissolving
America's literary and cultural diversity into reams of bookkeeping
records.
Walt Brasch
is professor of mass communications at Bloomsburg University.
His latest book is The Joy of Sax: America During the Bill Clinton
Era.
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