Bernie Sanders and AMLO: The press is no longer objective

Turns out that since Iran has been trending these past couple of weeks the powers that be, and their spokespeople, began a new conspiracy theory against the beloved president of Mexico, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO). The Wall Street Journal, without any proof, decided to create a new villain plot and reported that Iran has connections with the Mexican president.

Today, AMLO responded to the Wall Street Journal saying the WST is known to lack professionalism and they tend to fly [with falsehoods]. A very classy way to say the Wall Street Journal is guilty of spreading “fake news.“ AMLO said the article does not comport with reality.

The President also said he ignores these type of outlandish reports from unprofessional news media outlets, specially because this is not the first time the Wall Street Journal writes a smear piece about AMLO without providing any proof.

“This is not the first time the corporate media, which is now owned by only five corporations and 15 billionaires, is use not as an information tool, but as a political weapon.” says Rafael Correa former president of Ecuador.

Senator Bernie Sanders and presidential candidate, recently made public a Manifesto calling out those 15 billionaires for capturing and monopolizing almost all the news media. Sanders says the press have been captured and held hostage, and accused the billionaires of using the press as a political weapon against non corrupt candidates in the U.S. — and against other leaders around the world.

In a piece for Columbia Journalism Review, the Vermont senator Sanders discloses that billionaires now own almost all of America’s top local and international media. In other words, a total of five corporations, with conflict of interest, controls the media and decides what to report to citizens.

“Walter Cronkite once said that ‘journalism is what we need to make democracy work.’ He was absolutely right, which is why today’s assault on journalism by Wall Street, billionaire businessmen, Silicon Valley, and Donald Trump presents a crisis—and why we must take concrete action.” quoted Sanders on his manifesto.

Right after that manifesto, a video of Bernie Sanders juxtaposed with news media falsehoods went viral. Millions shared the video on social networks, and few independent media commented about it.

“Real journalism is different from the gossip, punditry, and clickbait that dominates today’s news. Real journalism, in the words of Joseph Pulitzer, is the painstaking reporting that will “fight for progress and reform, never tolerate injustice or corruption, [and] always fight demagogues.” Pulitzer said that journalism must always “oppose privileged classes and public plunderers, never lack sympathy with the poor, always remain devoted to the public welfare, never be satisfied with merely printing news, always be drastically independent, never be afraid to attack wrong, whether by predatory plutocracy or predatory poverty.”’says Sander’s manifesto.

Just this week, MSNBC’s Morning Joe, talked about this Tuesday’s Presidential debate and discussed how Elizabeth Warren’s billionaires donors helped leaked false information that the media covered as truthful. The disinformation went as far as CNN asking Bernie Sanders on national live TV why he said “women should not run for President.” Bernie, just like AMLO, was able to call out the false news. Yet, CNN insisted that he said it.

Mika Brzezinski, the host of Morning Joe said, “I’m completely confused why CNN asked Elizabeth Warren something Bernie didn’t say. That is bizarre!! And this has become the news story. I have had private conversations, and the press have completely manipulated what I have said, this happens all the time with media .”

But who owns the media 2019?

As of 2019, 90% of the United States’s media is controlled by five media conglomerates: Comcast (via NBCUniversal), Disney, Viacom & CBS (both controlled by National Amusements), and AT&T (via WarnerMedia).

Investment Watch reported that Billionaires have been all over newspapers. Earlier in February 2018, Patrick Soon-Shiong, biotech mogul and number 175 on the Billionaires Index ($8.6 billion), acquired the Los Angeles Times, along with the San Diego Union-Tribune, Spanish-language Hoy Los Angeles, and some community newspapers. His private investment firm, Nant Capital, agreed to pay $500 million and will assume $90 million in pension liabilities.

The Washington Post, Time Magazine, The Atlantic, The Village Voice, and The Los Angeles Times; all American media icons, all bought by billionaires in the past half decade.

Forbes recently wrote a piece listing the “15 Billionaires Own America’s News Media Companies.“

And this phenomenon is worldwide. The News English Times reported that new statistics shown there are “5 Billionaires who own 80% of UK media.”

In his manifesto, Sen. Bernie Sanders explains that two Silicon Valley corporations—Facebook and Google—control 60 percent of the entire digital advertising market. “They have used monopolistic control to siphon off advertising revenues from news organizations.”

A recent study by the News Media Alliance, a trade organization, found that in 2018, as newspaper revenues declined, Google made $4.7 billion off reporting that Google did not pay for.

The question is why are billionaires buying up media companies?

“While some new billionaire owners say they are doing it for civic purposes and to ensure that journalism will continue as an institution, at the end of the day these folks are still businesspeople seeking profit.” said Samir A. Husni, journalism professor at the University of Mississippi.

Unfortunately, this picture is misleading. The Guardian did a systematic study of the 100 wealthiest Americans, and it indicates that Buffett, Gates, Bloomberg, Bezos and others, are not at all typical dudes who want freedom of the press.

Most of the wealthiest US billionaires more closely resemble Charles Koch. They are extremely conservative on economic issues. They are obsessed with cutting taxes, especially estate taxes – which apply only to the wealthiest Americans.

The Guardia reported that these billionaires also opposed to government regulation of the environment or big banks. They are unenthusiastic about government programs to help with jobs, incomes, healthcare, or retirement pensions – programs supported by large majorities of Americans. And they are also tempted to cut deficits and shrink government by cutting or privatizing guaranteed social security benefits.

Barons magazine reported that Billionaires are Buying Media Assets to control social change, and that leads back to President of Mexico Lopez Obrador and Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders complains. If the goal of this obsessive media buy by billionaires is to control the outcome of what society does, and they are driven by profit, then it’s a forgone conclusion that it’s of keen importance to them for whom people vote for in the elections.

Policies that are in favor of the majority is perceived as a threat to neoliberal multinationals and special interests groups who have benefited for having a candidate that will facilitate access to government funding, and granting access to all sectors of society where there’s money to be made.

Therefore, they want a candidate or president to provide access to control policy making; such as less labor and environmental regulations, or reduction of taxes for multinationals– while at the same time promoting high taxes for the middle class.

Therefore, a president that allows corruption and can give direct control of the government, is the ideal candidate for them. That’s the reason why in countries in Latin America, they always end up putting dictators, or authoritarian demagogue like it’s the case in the United States with Trump.

All of these are possible thanks to the enormous media army these billionaires now own and control.

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