Page 62 - Mass Media, Mass Propoganda Examining American News in the War on Terror

52 Chapter 2

has four times the number of major dailies as New York. London-based papers
include (not accounting for financial papers or tabloids): the Telegraph, the
Times (UK), the Guardian, and the Independent, as compared to the city of New
York, which has only the New York Times (not counting financial papers and
tabloids).

Table 2.1

British Newspapers: Daily Circulation for 2005
Telegraph
Times (UK)
Guardian
Independent

Sunday Telegraph, "Circulation of Quality Newspapers," 2005,
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/pressoffice/graphics/research/circaugO5.pd
(13 Sep. 2005).

Total consumption levels for the London-based papers amounts to just over
2.2 million, as opposed to the New York Times with a national circulation of
only 1.1 million on average. The dramatic difference between these two cities
and their media systems (in terms of corporate consolidation and concentration
of ownership) translates in part into significantly different political climates.
This is evident after reflecting upon the wider range of opinions presented
throughout the British media (from the more conservative leaning Telegraph and
Times to the anti-war leaning Guardian and Independent), versus the smaller
range of "acceptable" opinions seen in major American newspapers nationwide
(from the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, and USA To-
day, among others).
American papers have traditionally been far more alike than different in
their reinforcement of pro-war arguments, and their questioning of anti-war per-
spectives. The uniformity in terms of promoting pro-war views (and pragmatic
criticisms of the war) as seen in the four American papers listed above is the
subject of most of the rest of this book, although the wider range of public de-
bate as seen in the British media is discussed in chapter 9.
Drawing distinctions between the British and the American media is not
meant to insinuate that there is something inherently "better" about British cor-
porations than American ones, but to highlight rather that there is more room for
expression of a diversity of views within the British press than the American
mainstream press, partly as a result of less media consolidation. A number of
media critics have persuasively argued that the British corporate media has also