Changing the American Political Information System

I would like to take a moment a touch on a recent idea covered in class. What minor adjustments do you think we could make to change the American political information system? Lets discuss some of the ideas presented in class by some authors. West’s remedy is a different approach to ad coverage. West believes journalist who focus on deceptive or misleading commercials help the public hold candidates accountable for ads that cross the threshold of acceptability. Compared to other countries journalists have an unusually high credibility with the public. They are seen as being more fair and trustworthy than reports in other countries.

Both Kathleen Hall Jamieson and David Broder have suggested that journalists should exercise their historical function of safeguarding the integrity of the election process. They could use their high public credibility to improve the functioning of the political system. Candidates often exaggerate claims in an effort to win votes and journalists need to look into these claims and report to the voters their accuracy. 

Bennett goes into extensive detail about his proposals for citizens, journalists and politicians to make important differences. I am going to as briefly as I can summarize these proposals. Proposals for citizens are as follows: recognize stereotypes and plot formulas, look for information that doesn’t fit the plot, recognize spin and news control in action, see additional sources of information to check partisan claims, learn to become self-critical, and find sources of perspective such as political comedy. Proposals for journalists are as follows: use personalization and dramatization creatively, introduce more of the journalist’s own background knowledge into the story, resist the standard plot formulas, define political situations in terms that appeal to ordinary people, remember the explain why the story matters, and involve the audience in producing and sharing content. And last but not least proposals for politicians and government are as follows: limit the flow of money to politicians, develop better formats for candidate debates and for coverage of legislation, control media monopolies, provide more funding (and a more creative mandate) for public broadcasting, strengthen public service requirements for cable and broadcast license holders.

Bennett has proposed excellent ideas to change the election process. The basic idea is for citizens and journalists alike to go beyond just scratching the surface and dig a little deeper. What thoughts and suggestions do you have on the topic??