An on-line poll appears to show that most people still don't get it.
All of the recent bad news for Republicans and the increasing cinicism of the public for the current administration has served to raise the hopes for many of us that this country can yet be turned around and made to return to its founding principles.
An online poll that is currently underway seems to suggest that a large part of our population still does not get it, however. Incredibly, even after observing the turnabout in media behavior between 2000 and 2001, a majority of people still seem to buy into the notion of a liberal media. They (59%) still think that FOX is fair and balanced and only 38% think that it is conservative! 58% view CNN as a liberal voice and 55% think of MSNBC as liberal.
Unfortunately the definitions of the terms liberal and conservative have become a bit muddled in recent years, so it is not clear exactly what these figures mean. Moreover, the poll is ongoing and so the numbers will probably change. In fact they may well have changed since I checked them ten minutes ago. However, they do seem to clearly suggest how little the message has gotten through to the public that the right-wing has taken over the media. Ownership of both broadcast and cable media is in the hands of about five large conservative mega-corporations.
The need for ratings is the only thing that drives these conservative media sources to broadcast any diversity of opinion, but the general thrust is rightward. This is the principal reason that our politics have drifted rightward in recent years and why our politics appears downright reactionary when judged by the standards of the 1950's.