Being a World Socialist, however, Walsh comes to some strange conclusions about why this is so:From the beginning, in its treatment of the JonBenet Ramsey murder the American media has pandered to and encouraged the very worst instincts in the population: prurience, a fascination with the lives of the wealthy, obsession with celebrity in general. The television networks, daily newspapers and weekly news magazines have wallowed in the gutter in this case and so many others—the Simpson trial, Michael Jackson’s legal problems, the Chandra Levy and Laci Peterson murders, etc.
The Ramsey case shows the media at its ugliest, most shallow and most ignorant.
No doubt a political motive was involved here too. The terror bomb plot in Britain was threatening to unravel, or at least disappoint, the war in Lebanon had not achieved US aims [what were those, anyway?], the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are disastrous. The media instinctively strove to change the subject. What does it know best, what makes it most comfortable? The intersection of sex scandals or sex crimes with the lives of rich or famous people.
I know I say this a lot, but: I don't get it. Is he saying that if the terror bomb plot hadn't "unraveled," nobody would have paid attention to the JonBenet case? Sure.
And how does Dave navigate from the media's "instinctive" change of subject to this, the very next paragraph:
Both the billionaires who own and operate America’s “free press” and its leading figures, for the most part, are human refuse. They write or say whatever suits their immediate purposes, which corresponds to the economic and political interests of the largest corporations, the richest individuals and the most predatory circles in Washington. They lie as ordinary people draw breath.The left can't see anything straight anymore.
(h/t: Snapple)
Update: World Socialist coverage of JonBenet continues here.
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