“Representative institutions no longer represent voters. Instead, they have been short-circuited, steadily corrupted by an institutionalized system of bribery that renders them responsive to powerful interest groups whose constituencies are the major corporations and wealthiest Americans. The courts, in turn, when they are not increasingly handmaidens of corporate power, are consistently deferential to the claims of national security. Elections have become heavily subsidized non-events that typically attract at best merely half of an electorate whose information about foreign and domestic politics is filtered through corporate-dominated media. Citizens are manipulated into a nervous state by the media’s reports of rampant crime and terrorist networks, by thinly veiled threats of the Attorney General and by their own fears about unemployment. What is crucially important here is not only the expansion of governmental power but the inevitable discrediting of constitutional limitations and institutional processes that discourages the citizenry and leaves them politically apathetic.”

    This quote means from the time government in this country was developed, many changes have happened. Media has gone from scrutinizing what the government is doing, to telling the public things in manipulative ways that scare them into not wanting to dig for more information. In turn, people have become less involved in what is really going on. The events that are disclosed by the media is only what the major corporations want you to hear. Unfortunately, that does not usually tie into what the average american needs or wants. This quote states, the politicians of today have agendas that revolve around the politics of big business, not the people who work for them.

    I chose this quote because it rings very true to me. For many years, I stopped reading the newspaper and watching the news. There was never anything positive in it. For a long time, I believed that my vote didn't count and became a conspiracy theorist. Through furthering my education, I was required to expand my way of thinking. I realised that the media was not reporting for the purpose of fully informing the public. Instead it was to publicise half of the story and you have to dig if you want the whole truth. It is important to read or watch more than one publication about a topic, this way you will can peace facts together and take out the hidden agendas.