Media Manipulation
Who do you feel was better at manipulating the media...FDR or Reagan??
[NS]Simonist
22-03-2006, 08:47
Who do you feel was better at manipulating the media...FDR or Reagan??
Are we basing this simply off of what we've probably learned in history books (which rarely brings up manipulation of media) as opposed to what we may have experienced in real life, or are you only leaving this open to people who have either experienced both or neither? I won't be voting, personally, because I believe that my opinion is highly skewed based on how little of this "media manipulation" we were taught in reference to FDR.
And perhaps because Reagan has hypnotized me with his Jelly Bean ray.....nobody ever fucks with the guy who stands for an entire candy industry.
Cannot think of a name
22-03-2006, 08:48
Who do you feel was better at manipulating the media...FDR or Reagan??
I would say that Reagan was the Secret Egyptian Master of it, but I don't really know enough about FDR and the media to really add too much to discussion.
Itinerate Tree Dweller
22-03-2006, 08:49
Lets not forget Abrahman Lincoln, who made a habit of imprisoning reporters and newspaper writers that he didn't care for. During his presidency over 18,000 political opponents and newspaper publishers were placed in jail with no trials.
I was thinking more in terms of how each man manipulated the media so that they (the media) would properly project the presidential image that each was hoping to impress on the people.
Who did a better job of making the people see what they wanted them to see?
[NS]Simonist
22-03-2006, 09:10
I was thinking more in terms of how each man manipulated the media so that they (the media) would properly project the presidential image that each was hoping to impress on the people.
Who did a better job of making the people see what they wanted them to see?
Hmmm. I still respectfully stand by my original assertion that most of the contribution you'll get will likely be largely generationally biased, and still will refrain from personal voting, but thank you very much for clarifying.
I was thinking more in terms of how each man manipulated the media so that they (the media) would properly project the presidential image that each was hoping to impress on the people.
Who did a better job of making the people see what they wanted them to see?
Framed in those terms, the answer is so obvious that it is hardly worth discussing.
Callisdrun
22-03-2006, 09:24
Reagan. He really knew how to manipulate it.
Eutrusca
22-03-2006, 09:34
Who do you feel was better at manipulating the media...FDR or Reagan??
FDR without a doubt. Most Americans didn't even realize that FDR had difficulty standing on his own because he refused to allow photographs of him in his wheelchair.
An interesting footnote to this is that the only member of the American military in history who was allowed to salute with the left hand was FDR's military aide. He had to help the President stand but couldn't stand to his right because the rule is "rank on right" and FDR obviously outranked him. Thus he had to salute with his left hand since he could only help FDR stand with his right.
FDR by far.
He fooled an isolationist society into unnecessary war, and used the media to steel more money than any sitting president before him. There were many who opposed him though, unlike what today’s cult of the saint FDR would have us believe. They saw him for the wanna be dictator he was. The man wasn’t entirely successful.
Reagan, on the other hand, probably couldn’t define the word dictator. No names are behind his fame.
AB Again
22-03-2006, 18:35
You can not compare the two. The media changed immensely between their periods in office.
Who knows what FDR would have done with the media Regan had to face, or vice versa.
The Half-Hidden
23-03-2006, 16:38
I'm not sure what Reagan did. I know that FDR broadcast his viewpoint weekly to Americans, so that must count for something.
He fooled an isolationist society into unnecessary war, and used the media to steel more money than any sitting president before him. There were many who opposed him though, unlike what today’s cult of the saint FDR would have us believe. They saw him for the wanna be dictator he was. The man wasn’t entirely successful.
Go to Britain and ask people wha they think of Churchill, FDR's UK counterpart. He was right-wing but even most lefties in Britain will rank him as one of the greatest prime ministers. In contrast, it's sad how ungrateful right-wing Americans are to him for winning WWII and killing the Depression.
Skinny87
23-03-2006, 16:41
I'm not sure what Reagan did. I know that FDR broadcast his viewpoint weekly to Americans, so that must count for something.
Go to Britain and ask people wha they think of Churchill, FDR's UK counterpart. He was right-wing but even most lefties in Britain will rank him as one of the greatest prime ministers. In contrast, it's sad how ungrateful right-wing Americans are to him for winning WWII and killing the Depression.
Churchill was a brilliant wartime leader. He had a great many flaws, but he got Britain through some tough times, just as FDR did. Y'see, however, to Undelia the US shpuld never have gotten into the war, saying that the US would never have been affected by Nazi Germany, conviently ignoring many historical facts that point to Hitler and his subordinates planning an eventual invasion of the United States.
Hiberniae
23-03-2006, 16:57
Go to Britain and ask people wha they think of Churchill, FDR's UK counterpart. He was right-wing but even most lefties in Britain will rank him as one of the greatest prime ministers. In contrast, it's sad how ungrateful right-wing Americans are to him for winning WWII and killing the Depression.
FDR didn't kill the depression any more then Hoover did. Seeing that they both enacted massive government building projects to try and lesson the pain from it. Nor did FDR win WWII anymore then Reagan won the cold war. Truman finished it in the pacific theatre and the Soviets all but had the Nazi's beat by the time the US finally got full into the European Theatre. You give FDR credit for things he didn't do. While ignoring that the gave the federal government a boost in power that hadn't been seen since Lincoln, tried to stack the Supreme Court to solidify is power even more so, break the tradition only two runs that was set by the very first president and respected by all the following and broke the laws of neutrality long before we we're attacked by Japan.
The Bruce
23-03-2006, 16:57
Reagan wasn’t just an actor. He was one of those actors during WWII who moved further into it to get out of fighting (there was a certain amount of activity as an actor you had to do to be released from being drafted). Then during the McCarthy witch hunts Reagan made a name for turning in his fellow actors to be blacklisted. There were a few actors we look on with favour today as people who played patriots that were just shy of being draft dodgers (Sylvester Stallone and John Wayne come to mind). Stallone was the worst because he started doing US military recruiting posters, until the US Veteran’s Association freaked about the fact that he was doing porn movies during the Viet Nam War and had a notorious doctor fake a letter saying he was unfit for duty. Reagan was nothing like Jimmy Stewart who was a really popular actor and demanded to do his part even when the US Government tried to stop him.
Both FDR and Reagan were practically drooling by the end of their last terms though. If a President were handicapped like that today they’d be ridiculed in the press continually over it, instead of having the subject not covered at all.
I think FDR did pull the wool over people’s eyes more (that whole World War thing when he was elected for on the platform of not going to war was a bit of a stretch). Reagan was right there, Cold War hardliner and ultra-conservative made manifest. Not much hidden agenda there.
The Bruce