Media Hype? Or real protests?

News has filtered out this weekend that their are planned protests all over the country, including 2 here in Georgia to protest (or celebrate) the outcome for the Ferguson trial. The 2 in Georgia are at 5 points in Atlanta and in Kennesaw according to their timblr: http://fergusonresponse.tumblr.com/.

These are on top of what is already having, The national Review got some on camera saying "we don't give a f--- about your laws http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/393294/ferguson-protests-grow-larger-we-dont-give-f-about-your-laws-ryan-lovelace

The question is, after ther verdict will more people come out and if thy do how bad will it get, the media seems to think it will be bad riots but is this media overhype or will it be a changing point in history? We'll find out soon.

Pew Research Quiz

http://www.pewresearch.org/quiz/the-news-iq-quiz

This is disturbing, this was assigned for a class, 69% of people couldn't get half of these right.

The demographic breakdown is disturbing but not surprising, the only one of the 12 questions that women out polled  men on was minimum wage, this bring to mind the discussion of the wage gap between men and women.

Age difference is also unsurprising either, younger people outdid over on the poverty line question, min. wage and the unemployment rate (which in that one the elderly came in a close 2nd to the young. The other questions older people outpaced the younger, which is disturbing it itself.

8 ways White House blocking information

http://blog.ap.org/2014/09/19/8-ways-the-obama-administration-is-blocking-information/

This appeared in a blog earlier this week from Associated Press Senior Media Relations Manager Erin White, what I would like to know is your thoughts on should the Admin. be doing this, some of it directly compares what Pres. Obama is doing to what Pres. Bush did.

1) As the United States ramps up its fight against Islamic militants, the public can’t see any of it. News organizations can’t shoot photos or video of bombers as they take off — there are no embeds. In fact, the administration won’t even say what country the S. bombers fly from.--------------

ME: This one I might be able to see for safety reasons, but i'm not sure how we did it in the past

2) The White House once fought to get cameramen, photographers and reporters into meetings the president had with foreign leaders overseas. That access has become much rarer. Think about the message that sends other nations about how the world’s leading democracy deals with the media:  Keep them out and let them use handout photos.-------------------------------------

ME: Depends on the circumstances, if the media has been granted access to those types of meetings in the past then shey should still be allowed to continue.

3) Guantanamo: The big important 9/11 trial is finally coming up. But we aren’t allowed to see most court filings in real time — even of nonclassified material. So at hearings, we can’t follow what’s happening. We don’t know what prosecutors are asking for, or what defense attorneys are arguing.

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Whenever there is nonclassified materials being hidden from public we have a problem, this is gross violation of 1st amendment

4) Information about Guantanamo that was routinely released under President George W. Bush is now kept secret. The military won’t release the number of prisoners on hunger strike or the number of assaults on guards. Photo and video coverage is virtually nonexistent.
see above

5) Day-to-day intimidation of sources is chilling. AP’s transportation reporter’s sources say that if they are caught talking to her, they will be fired. Even if they just give her facts, about safety, for example. Government press officials say their orders are to squelch anything controversial or that makes the administration look bad.

who is "she"

6) One of the media — and public’s — most important legal tools, the Freedom of Information Act, is under siege. Requests for information under FOIA have become slow and expensive. Many federal agencies simply don’t respond at all in a timely manner, forcing news organizations to sue each time to force action.

7) The administration uses FOIAs as a tip service to uncover what news organizations are pursuing. Requests are now routinely forwarded to political appointees. At the agency that oversees the new health care law, for example, political appointees now handle the FOIA requests.

8) The administration is trying to control the information that state and local officials can give out. The FBI has directed local police not to disclose details about surveillance technology the police departments use to sweep up cellphone data. In some cases, federal officials have formally intervened in state open records cases, arguing for secrecy.

Mass Media and Politics

This is Don Webb's blog for Mass Media and Politics for POLS 3380 at Kennesaw State University, Kennesaw, GA