{"id":930,"date":"2008-10-21T23:49:25","date_gmt":"2008-10-22T03:49:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stonescryout.org\/?p=930"},"modified":"2008-10-21T23:49:25","modified_gmt":"2008-10-22T03:49:25","slug":"taking-the-media-and-democrats-to-task","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/?p=930","title":{"rendered":"Taking the Media (and Democrats) to Task"},"content":{"rendered":"
Orson Scott Card, who is a best-selling author and a newspaper columnist (and, incidentally, a Democrat) takes the media to task in his latest column <\/a>for their collective failure to fully investigate the housing crisis (hat tip: Hot Air<\/a>):<\/div>\n
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This housing crisis didn’t come out of nowhere.\u00a0 It was not a vague emanation of the evil Bush administration.<\/p>\n

It was a direct result of the political decision, back in the late 1990s, to loosen the rules of lending so that home loans would be more accessible to poor people.\u00a0 Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were authorized to approve risky loans.<\/p>\n

What is a risky loan?\u00a0 It’s a loan that the recipient is likely not to be able to repay.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

This is the kind of story that should have received extensive coverage in newspapers all across the country. He goes on to reveal the crux of the story:<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
\n

This was completely foreseeable and in fact many people did foresee it.\u00a0 One political party, in Congress and in the executive branch, tried repeatedly to tighten up the rules.\u00a0 The other party blocked every such attempt and tried to loosen them.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

Any guesses who tried to fix the problem and who stopped those who wanted to fix it? Don’t take my word for it. Mr. Card nails it:<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
\n

Isn’t there a story here?\u00a0 Doesn’t journalism require that you who produce our daily paper tell the truth about who brought us to a position where the only way to keep confidence in our economy was a $700 billion bailout?\u00a0 Aren’t you supposed to follow the money and see which politicians were benefiting personally from the deregulation of mortgage lending?<\/p>\n

I have no doubt that if these facts had pointed to the Republican Party or to John McCain as the guilty parties, you would be treating it as a vast scandal.\u00a0 “Housing-gate,” no doubt.\u00a0 Or “Fannie-gate.”<\/p>\n

Instead, it was Senator Christopher Dodd and Congressman Barney Frank, both Democrats, who denied that there were any problems, who refused Bush administration requests to set up a regulatory agency to watch over Fannie Mae
\nand Freddie Mac, and who were still pushing for these agencies to go even
\nfurther in promoting sub-prime mortgage loans almost up to the minute they
\nfailed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

And then Mr. Card turns his attention to the media:<\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/div>\n
\n

Your job, as journalists, is to tell the truth.\u00a0 That’s what you claim you do, when you accept people’s money to buy or subscribe to your paper.<\/p>\n

But right now, you are consenting to or actively promoting a big fat lie \u2014 that the housing crisis should somehow be blamed on Bush, McCain, and the Republicans.\u00a0 You have trained the American people to blame everything bad \u2014 even bad weather \u2014 on Bush, and they are responding as you have taught them to.<\/p>\n

If you had any personal honor, each reporter and editor would be insisting on telling the truth \u2014 even if it hurts the election chances of your favorite candidate.<\/p>\n

Because that’s what honorable people do.\u00a0 Honest people tell the truth even when they don’t like the probable consequences.\u00a0 That’s what honesty means .\u00a0 That’s how trust is earned.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

\u00a0<\/div>\n
Take the time to read the entire thing. There’s a reason that people don’t trust the media anymore. A very good reason.\u00a0<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Orson Scott Card, who is a best-selling author and a newspaper columnist (and, incidentally, a Democrat) takes the media to task in his latest column for their collective failure to fully investigate the housing crisis (hat tip: Hot Air): \u00a0 This housing crisis didn’t come out of nowhere.\u00a0 It was not a vague emanation of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,22,26,12],"tags":[1041,149],"class_list":["post-930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-democrats","category-media","category-politics","category-tom","tag-media","tag-orson-scott-card"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/930","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=930"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/930\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stonescryout.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}