After yet another ABC fiasco in last night's debate, I was again reminded of the ridiculous job this network has done in any respect as a journalistic enterprise since the time Disney took over the operation.
So, I do something I have never done. I'm reposting it for all the new crowd out there here on DKos that might not have seen it before. I think it serves as a very important reminder that the REAL Powers-that-be that dominate our so-called maintream media coverage are the corporate puppet masters pulling the strings. Have fun taking a gander below the fold...
I've stayed out of the fray on the whole "Path to 9-11" thing to this point, mainly because I'm trying to 1. win an election next Tuesday and 2. I think the viewership on the show is going to be piss poor in the face of Week 1 of NFL football.
But this whole thing -- particularly the pictures of Dubya in Mickey Mouse ears -- brought back some hard memories for me with regard to the American Broadcasting Company. Memories in which I had a personal stake.
It wasn't that long ago...actually, yes it was. It's hard to believe, but it was over 12 years ago, when I worked for this man:
Now, for those of you who don't recognize that loveable mug, this is Jim Hightower. Hightower is the former agricultural commissioner of Texas, now turned author, pundit, and radio commentator.
I used to work for Hightower. I consider him a friend, and a personal hero of mine, because Hightower GETS it. He GETS messaging. And he GETS politics.
I got to work for Hightower for a couple of years, mainly parttime whilst attending the University of Texas. I mainly did research for him, and helped edit and produce his three minute recorded radio commentaries.
Back then, Hightower had a radio show that broadcast on the weekends, carried on ABC Radio Networks. Back in the summer of 1995, we were working in the office when the word came down: : Disney was buying ABC to the tune of $19 billion, creating -- at the time -- the largest media company in the world.
Now, we joked about it a bit in the office. I passed around a copy of the ABC logo with Mickey Mouse ears attached. But we also talked about how we would deal with this news on Hightower's weekend show. Considering Hightower spoke frequently against media conglomorates and the consolidation of media power in a few companies. After all, what he was attempting to do -- long before Air America, long before any progressive radio talk shows -- was to be the Johnny Appleseed of progressive talk radio and return the power of the airwaves to the people.
So, Hightower decided, we HAD to deal with the issue on the show. We had to confront the fact that our little show is was now part of the Disney family. So Hightower, kicking off that weekend's show, as the music came up, spoke very deliberately into the microphone, and said:
Looks like I'm working for a mouse now.
It was a funny line. And normally, if it were say, Howard Stern delivering the line, nobody would have blinked.
But it was Jim Hightower. And Hightower went on to critcize ABC and Disney for their media power grab. And criticize the media industry as a whole for their craven chase of the dollar at the expense of the public airwaves.
We didn't think much of it ourselves. This was Hightower being Hightower, after all.
A few weeks later, though, we got the message: ABC cancelled Hightower's show. And as a consequence, Hightower couldn't keep me on as staff anymore. He had to let me go. I was hurt, sure, because the job was helping me eat...I was a poor grad student, after all. But more than that, I thought it was a chickenshit move on ABC's part.
It was especially chickenshit on ABC's part when they said, no, no, it wasn't anything to do with Hightower's critcism of the merger...it's just that Hightower had "low ratings". (A lie that was perpetuated further by Ann Coulter a decade later in her book "Slander").
Now, I was there. I saw the ratings. And Hightower was the number three political talk show in the nation , behind Rush Limbaugh and Michael Reagan. So excuse me if I didn't buy ABC's bullshit.
And excuse me if I don't buy their bullshit now. My story isn't really related to the "Path to 9-11", but it did remind me how powerful the corporate media is in this country, and how it takes an concerted effort to make them change. Which has occurred here and elsewhere this week.
Hightower's vision of a "people-powered media" is coming true, right here in the blogosphere. Enough so that we can say "the hell with ABC" and the rest of their ilk.
For the record, my time with Hightower was the best job I ever had...or I suspect, I will ever have.
Because if it weren't for him, I wouldn't be here with you. Or be the person I am.
But I'll never forget the summer ABC cost me a job because they were too scared to hear the truth.