Picture this: you’re watching your local news channel, the two anchors going on and on about the latest human interest story. During a commercial, you see an ad with a man talking about how you are in the wrong for being politically correct, ads that praise the Republican Party and bash the Democrats, and, in particular, fervent bias towards President Donald Trump.
When you change the channel to another local station, you hear the same message. Word for word. It sounds too terrible to be true, but, unfortunately, Republican bias on many news stations may be a reality soon.
This is because of the Sinclair Broadcast Group, a powerful telecommunications company. SBGI, which is worth approximately $2.73 billion, is the largest owner of local television stations in the United States, and is working to become even more powerful with a $4 billion acquisition of Tribune Media, which will mean that Sinclar will have networks that are shown in 72 percent of American homes.
Now, Congress has been working very hard to make sure the merger doesn’t go through, as the merger has not yet been approved by the Federal Communications Commission. However, one man has been well known to want this merger to go through: President Donald Trump.
“The Fake News Networks, those that knowingly have a sick and biased AGENDA, are worried about the competition and quality of Sinclair Broadcast. The ‘Fakers’ at CNN, NBC, ABC & CBS have done so much dishonest reporting that they should only be allowed to get awards for fiction!” the president tweeted.
“We are here to deliver your message,” SBGI CEO David Smith said to President Trump.
If this is true, then this is beyond criminal, especially when considering that local news stations will be affected the most. According to a Politico poll, more people trust local rather than national news stations, with 41 percent trusting local versus the 27 percent who trust national, and, as such, Sinclair pushing a Republican agenda through local news would create a media bias against those who oppose Trump, making it completely unreliable.
The media, through FOX News, has already been poisoned in terms of trust on the national level. There needs to be not only calls of action, but also boycotts of Sinclair channels in favor of national news in order to make sure that the merger does not go through.
Instead of watching local news channels owned by Sinclair, watch networks such as ABC News, NBC News, CBS News and CNN. If you want to watch some recreational programs, watch something that’s not on networks such as The CW, since the majority of those stations are owned by Sinclair.
Regardless, we cannot allow Sinclair to merge. After all, what good is the media if it is not balanced? None at all.