But, the media doesn't talk about the way the private enterprise system actually functions, and I think that has a non-negligible effect on how people are receptive to arguments about private enterprise.
If I say "standing in line at the DMV" this is a code phrase for government that is wasteful and inefficient and unpleasant to deal with. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to notice how much fun it is to call "customer support" for many corporations and be directed first through a maze of punching buttons on your phone in order to finally be put on hold for 10 or 20 minutes waiting for the person in India who will not be able to help you much. So in theory I could have the same kind of code phrases to stand for the inefficiency or ineffectiveness or unpleasantness of private enterprise. I think if it was in the constantly-repeated messages of the media it would be in the consciousness of the public. This is not really a highfalutin argument, which is why comedians make this argument it in their stand-up routines and people laugh.
In the health care debate, we start with the missing fact of exactly how much of the money collected by the for-profit insurers actually *doesn't* get spent on providing anyone health care. The answer is hundreds of billions of dollars per year. That's enough money to pay for the entire annual budget for the US Postal service at least four times over (probably five), and still have enough money to pay for the combined budgets of all 50 state DMVs. Any so-called Joe the so-called Plumber can understand the argument about the so-called wastefulness of the USPS or the DMV, so I think people are capable of understanding just how much money the for-profit insurers waste. This isn't a super-intellectual argument, either. But it's an argument that only gets made by PNHP. Obama merely echoes Frank Luntz and talks about the waste in Medicare and Medicaid.
You want complicated charts of how health care actually works today? How about holding up all the possible claim forms for different insurers that a doctor's office might have to fill out in order to get reimbursed for their work? The forms will outweigh your telephone book. Of course the media doesn't show how it works in other countries, either, as Michael Moore did in SiCKO. No forms. People imagine that it's like waiting in the DMV line in countries that have universal health care, when in fact it's our private enterprise system that is much more of an unpleasant experience for the patient. How often does the media show RAM clinics (as 60 Minutes did) or go to an ER and watch the uninsured waiting in pain with a problem that could have been treated months ago, while the doctors first finish up with all the gunshot wounds? I think not a lot of brainpower is required to see how it all works, if the lens is turned in the right direction. Propaganda
isn't just about which arguments get made, it's also about which arguments are left out.
----- Original Message ----
> > Doesn't this poll sort of argue against the idea that it's
> > just plain old American common sense that makes people
> > oppose health care reform? Talk about catapulting the
> > propaganda! They managed to get half the population
> > believing lies. That is an achievement that ought to merit
> > an award (suitably designed to resemble a propaganda
> > catapult of course)
> >
>
> [WS:] I do not think you can attribute that just to propaganda. First of all,
> I do not think that the public was bombarded with propaganda that drowned out
> all other voices. Instead, there was receptiveness to anti-government voices,
> even though such voices were not the only ones to be heard.
>
> To put it in another way, corporate propaganda has little difficulty swaying
> public opinion in Amerika, whereas anti-business voices have a much harder time
> being heard. Left leaning media have audiences counted in thousands whereas
> right leaning media - in millions.
>
> Therefore, mere existence of propaganda is not enough to explain public
> attitudes - you need also explain public receptiveness to that propaganda. For
> example, Soviet block countries were among most heavily propagandized, yet large
> segments of the public was not receptive to this particular propaganda claims.
> In other words, we need to focus not just on what is being said, but also on
> what is being heard.