Published: March 31, 2008 04:02 pm         

STUMPTALK: Why you can’t trust the mainstream media

The communication culture is in full bloom. People are in constant communication using every imaginable technology: e-mail, Internet, blogs, cell phones, SMS, Internet telephony, instant messaging, forums and chat rooms. In the political area, forums and chat rooms are the breeding grounds much like New England taverns were in hatching the American Revolution. Once the domain of “geeks,” citizen communication is now commonplace; regular folks increasingly reject the manipulative mainstream media (MSM) and turn to grassroots networks, a natural outgrowth of the new technologies, because they are more powerful and democratic than the old party machines.

Search engines are the “people’s encyclopedias” whereby they fetch unbiased information on their own. On the heels of search engines, innovators developed “Internet search trends,” exciting new tools that track every Internet search, effectively conducting continuous polling of hundreds of millions of people without any bias. Because trends determine actual national interest, it’s a much more accurate and timely than MSM small-sample polling. Let me illustrate:

In December 2007 the official polls claimed that Hillary Clinton and Rudy Giuliani were leading the pack. But in fact the more neutral trends showed that by December the public had already lost interest in Hillary and Giuliani and instead showed Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney ahead of Giuliani and Barack Obama ahead of Hillary. The MSM didn’t pick up on this until mid-January 2008. Then late January, while the MSM slept, Trends showed GOP John McCain emerging out of nowhere as a frontrunner.

The MSM just don’t get it. On November 5, 2007, a “money bomb” was organized that raised over $5M in one day on behalf of the Ron Paul. Obama tried to copy the money bomb but raised only $4,650. Huckabee also tried a Money Bomb but it fell flat. Why did it work for Dr. Paul but not for Obama or Huckabee? The reason is that it was entirely a grassroots effort without the Ron Paul camp’s knowledge. The media and old time politicians saw it controlled from the top down. How could individuals freely working together without central planning or organization pull it off?

Despite MSM’s meager 11 percent, trend charts showed Dr. Paul had five times as much support as all the other candidates combined and Internet polls showed that he won every TV debate. Old thinking politicians, bogged down with “machine” politics, believe that non-voters just don’t care and won’t show up. More likely, non-voters don’t care for what they were offered. Furthermore, old-thinking voters who depend entirely on print and TV news are out of touch, effectively disenfranchised since the hallmark of self-government is an informed electorate. But young voters offer hope.

College students have always been politically active whereas historically they stay away from voting booths in droves, but not this time. They are flocking to grassroots nets in record numbers because of newfound hope of end-running the political machines that have run America for 200 years. It’s a safe bet that 18 to 30 year olds will elect the next president of the United States.

Realistically, the Ron Paul campaign is over, but that doesn’t matter. The revolution he started will live on, because his message of liberty has universal appeal. People across Europe have organized Ron Paul clubs in support of his message. One day the Revolution’s escalating momentum will likely spark a march on Washington demanding the restoration of the republic. The MSM will predictably be shocked.