While it isn’t surprising to me at all that people want to verify the quotes that reporters are ascribing to them, the implications of this particular method are a little bit more than frightening. That you must clear quotes from the White House, that they come back heavily redacted to the reporters, and that the reporters discuss this on the grounds that they remain anonymous is, well, a little Orwellian. Isn’t it? You can read the story here.
Then the real issue behind the issue is rather thoroughly laid out in this article which clearly points to a very serious issue within our society. For starters, the massive corporate consolidation within our nation is a major problem in not only media, but agriculture, food processing, manufacturing, retail outlets, and more.
The consolidation of all sectors and control of information to the majority by only a few leads one to recall what was reportedly a quote from Henry Ford, “You can have any color you want, so long as it’s black.”
The problem seems to me to be that we have a government that doesn’t enforce the laws on the books that are actually beneficial to the freedom to profit from our labor, and the breaking up of monopolies under various federal acts just isn’t happening. This leads to the thinking that the federal government must bail out corporations that are “too big to fail”, while the same entity (the government) doesn’t enforce the laws that are meant to halt the danger of things becoming “too big to fail”. Inevitably, this top heavy control paradigm leads to the thing that really should be “too big to fail”…That being our freedom and our nation and the opportunity for individuals to make it or break it on their own merit and effort.
There is no bail out available for the failure of principles. The sacrifice of decency on the alter of corporate consolidation and continued campaign contributions keeps the charade rolling on. As we choose our candidates for state and federal offices it seems to me that we must push them on the issue of breaking up this excessive consolidation.
I realize that there is a fair argument that our votes don’t even count, but I am also certain that the abysmal turn outs at primaries and the continuous return of the same people into positions that can effect positive change are largely responsible for our situation.
Get as informed as you can and try to make a difference by deciding who it is you have to choose from as your representatives. As I am fond of saying, and as appears to hold true to history, it all comes down to the consent of the governed.
Truth Farmer 
Jul 25, 2012 @ 10:22:00
Nothing IMHO is too big to fail, and there are NO monopolies in a true free market, other than government, but for some reason people are OK with government having a monopoly on everything they do.
The danger in the business’s that you mention are because they have managed outright own and control our government. They even have an official organization for corporations to write our laws (and they write most of them) check out ALEC:
http://www.justice.org/cps/rde/xchg/justice/hs.xsl/12343.htm
The causes of this are many. The most important is that people are dumbed down, and not educated and they don’t care. But that is the way all societies go. In light of this our governments have way too much power over us, and we the awake people have very few accessible, and effective checks on government malfeasance. If we ever get to do it over again be very, very careful how much power you give to government and have a slew of ways to check government encroachment.
If government was not able to control every aspect of our lives and us almost powerless to stop them, the corporations would not have this easy to use tool to enslave us.
“But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain – that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist.” ~ Lysander Spooner