NPR on Obama’s ‘chiding’ of the media:
‘President Obama delivered a stern rebuke to the media, for their role in the 2016 campaign and, as he sees it, not holding candidates accountable for “unworkable plans.”
‘Unworkable plans,’ you say?
Perhaps NPR is being a little skeptical of the current administration’s words and deeds, despite being apparently sympathetic to many of his ideals and principles.
Either way, we can probably all agree the political and media scenes are quite the clusterf**k right now.
NPR in my experience (it’s usually 1968 and should you read this you are a devoted reader indeed): Notions of radical & revolutionary freedom, the stuff often pushed by the harder Left (with generally authoritarian and totalitarian consequences), doesn’t tend to make NPR prime-time, but the showcasing of activist concerns and the consultation of ‘experts’ is quite common.
Sometimes, these experts are folks in the sciences going where the math and data lead, people well-aware of the limits and depths of their work and who don’t mind speaking to a broader public. Science can be fascinating, after all.
Other times, social-scientists are consulted: People who often consider themselves adding to a body of knowledge capable of improving society/humanity/the public. Though, to be fair, these are people who often follow the data where it leads, too, just with less math.
Different fields in the social sciences have differing levels of empirical rigor, and different people in the social sciences have differing levels of personal/professional achievement and investment in any sort of policy recommendations favorable to NPR. Generally, though, the leap from the social sciences to public policy, law, politics (actually shaping lives) tends to be a less of a leap to make.
***Various and sundry other guests on NPR often have achieved some success in music, the arts, or pop-culture, but to my mind, a certain framework is often followed: They were less free and less wise (due to religious belief, ‘patriarchy’, tradition, etc) and are now more free (less religious, less ‘patriarchal,’ less traditional).
Maybe they’re playing a concert for equality and/or peace. Maybe they’ve just gotten back from a secular mission in the Global Village. Perhaps they’ve finished a book containing a rather clear feminist, environmental, or civil-rights theme.
It’s not race, but class!
More freedom, equality and solidarity are next, you know.
Repost-A Few Thoughts On NPR And Current Liberal Establishment Thinking Under Obama