Posted: 11/27/06

It's the Media, Stupid

By Ted Baehr and Tom Snyder

Since the launch of the Moral Majority in the late 1970's, conservative Christians, Jews and other like-minded traditionalists have put their time, efforts and cash into Republican Party coffers. For the last several years, the GOP leadership has rewarded their efforts by running the most liberal government since Lyndon Baines Johnson! 

On November 7, the GOP lost not just the House of Representatives to the Democrats, but also the United States Senate. Were it not for the incompetence of the Democrat Party and its erstwhile political leader, the narcissistic Howard Dean, who misspent money on campaigns he already had in the bag, the Republicans would have lost even more seats, according to political expert Dick Morris.

Politically-minded traditionalists and conservatives fail to realize that throwing so much money into political campaigns, not to mention one political party, is the height of folly. It is a myopic, short-sighted activity that will only lead to disappointment and disillusionment.

The political structure in the United States is not controlled by either the Republican Party or the Democrat Party. It is, in reality, controlled by the culture, and the culture is controlled by the mass media, especially Hollywood.

Even Christians are influenced by Hollywood, because it is Hollywood that has spent 50 years or more persuading children to accept sexual promiscuity, homosexuality, adultery, atheism, violence as a means of solving problems, and, last but not least, big government handouts for every conceivable social ill under the sun.

In fact, the socialist tyranny in which we now apparently live (especially here in California) has spent trillions of dollars on public schools that do little to teach children about traditional values while indoctrinating them with humanist and atheist values.

Instead of spending hundreds of millions of dollars on political campaigns, conservatives and traditionalists, including committed Christians and Jews, should concentrate more of their money and time on redeeming the values of the mass media, especially film and television.

Statistics show that young people get their news from late night television. They spend an average of five hours a day watching their favorite television programs or finding out the latest about TomKat, Brangelina, and Bennifer.

Can these kids identify their member of Congress, the Vice President of the United States or the 16^th President? If they spent as much time on civics as they do on the latest version of iPod, then investing all this time, money and effort in politics would make sense.

But, we are losing their hearts and minds to the influences of the entertainment industry and that's where we need to focus our efforts.

As Russell Kirk, the father of the modern conservative movement and a traditionalist, said, there is an enduring, transcendent moral order created by God that all human beings are obliged to obey.

The inscription on the Liberty Bell crafted by our Founding Fathers, specifically in Pennsylvania in the 1750's, proudly uses a verse from Lev. 25:10, "Proclaim Liberty throughout all the Land unto all the inhabitants thereof." In other words, the Liberty that we enjoy in the United States is inherently linked to the Liberty that the God of the Bible grants to His people.

That precious Liberty, however, cannot be so removed from God's Law and His Commandments in the Bible as to completely overturn, and thus mock, God's moral and social instructions for His people. Yet, that is exactly what the mass media has been doing in our culture for decades. And, it is that immoral, decadent culture that has polluted and corrupted America's political system throughout the 50 states as well as in Washington, D.C.

It's the mass media that we should be focusing upon in our efforts to save our political system from moral and cultural destruction. Because, it's the mass media that creates the culture that elects the politicians who appoint the judges who rule our courts and who hire the teachers who instruct our children.

To learn more about MovieguideŽ's efforts and action items to redeem the values of the mass media and Hollywood, please go to www.movieguide.org and click on the "About MovieguideŽ" item in the "About Us" menu button on the top left-hand side of the website.

By Ted Baehr Click here for bio and archived articles