Perhaps because my first degree was in radio, television, and film production, I’ve remained more than casually interested in how the media covers the news. Each news organization decides what is newsworthy and what isn’t. For instance, very few have considered the investigation into New Jersey senator Robert Menendez’s activities, which include granting favors to a very large donor and having sexual relations with prostitutes, as worth their notice. Marco Rubio’s sip of water, though, has garnered major attention. MSNBC ran the clip of the sip more than 150 times in a day. CNN pondered whether the sip spells the end of Rubio’s political ambitions. CNN, of course, is totally in the tank in the ratings race.

This is CNN—focusing on the trivial. What’s worse, Rubio’s sip of water or CNN’s wholesale gulping of the kool-aid?

The worst offense, however, has been the fawning over Obama. Honest liberals have to admit the networks were on his side. To what lengths will they go?

Anyone who thinks this is fanciful has not watched MSNBC.

President Obama, meanwhile, simply cannot abide any dissent from his media acolytes:

I don’t expect a drone strike on Fox News, but I think the cartoon does capture Obama’s feelings quite well. Fox seems to be the only news outlet unwilling to let Benghazi rest. May they not let go of that story. May real journalism revive and prosper.

There was a time in television news when the only sources were CBS, NBC, and ABC. We were all subjected to essentially the same “newsworthy” stories, deemed so by the powers-that-were at those networks. They still march in lockstep, but they’ve had to deal with competition with the burgeoning of alternative sources, particularly on the internet. The cable news outlets that have arisen—CNN and MSNBC principally—are no different than the original three networks, with MSNBC merely an outgrowth of NBC.

Only one cable network has dared to be different, and it ties the others up in fits. Fox News hasn’t followed the same drummer; it allows for a significant conservative voice to be heard while also having on-air commentators from the liberal perspective. Studies show time and again that its catch-phrase—Fair and Balanced—is close to the reality, certainly much closer than what can be found on the other networks. Its primetime programs trample CNN and MSNBC continually; overall, Fox has been the highest-rated cable news network for over a decade.

This hasn’t gone over well with the mainstream media. If you listen closely, you can hear the perpetual whine:

It’s a little silly, but that doesn’t stop them from complaining that there is someone not marching with them. Many genuine news stories that Fox covers are hardly even mentioned on those other sources. Of course, the same can be said in reverse. How about a little cartoon montage to illustrate the kinds of things that merit serious treatment in the mainstream media? One example?

How could Fox not consider this to be important? Perhaps it has something to do with a different worldview—one that comports more nearly with reality.

Controversy over the role of the media, both the news and entertainment varieties, on the nature of our culture rages on. For a Christian who knows even basic Biblical truths, this should be no controversy. There are numerous passages of Scripture that point to the fact that we become what we think, and that if our minds are inundated with false ideas and/or repeated scenes of degradation and depravity, we certainly will be affected.

On the false ideas front, we have the news media. It is so out of balance that a majority of our population rarely hears another side. The only major news outlet that provides a fair shake to anything Christian or conservative is Fox. It is noteworthy that it does lead the ratings, yet since it is only one of a number of news organizations, if you tally up the numbers for all the others together, most people are still getting their perspective from a very biased source. And the Obama administration does its best to marginalize Fox. A recent study reveals that even though Fox is #1 in the ratings, at presidential news conferences that channel’s representatives rank ninth in the number of times they are called upon to ask a question. As a result, Obama and his minions are hardly ever pressed on controversial decisions they make.

I’m told we have a flu epidemic in the country right now. Well, there’s a different strain of that epidemic also making the rounds:

As for the entertainment media, we are quickly becoming what we watch. I’ve noted before that it’s difficult anymore to find a television program that doesn’t showcase, from time to time or even regularly, a sympathetic homosexual character. There’s an agenda to make homosexuality normative . . . and it seems to be working.

Our latest episode of navel-gazing over gun violence—attacking the guns and not the sinful actions of men as the cause of the violence—has us wondering again about the influence of all the violence in the entertainment field. Movies, in particular, are a major factor in shaping our collective character. Have you noticed which movies are currently most prominent?

Here’s an Oscar they should give out at the awards ceremony:

Not all depictions of violence and depravity are uncalled for. Sometimes, as in the case of Les Miserables, the contrast between the degraded lifestyle and the redeemed makes for powerful visuals for the better. Les Miserables doesn’t glorify depravity; it shows instead the grace of God in leading people out of their sinfulness. Yet, for most films, the opposite seems to be more common—violence and degradation for the sheer fascination of it. That’s when a line is crossed, and we cross that line incessantly.

That’s why we are what we are.

Last week I wrote about the main problems I see in the church today, and why Christians aren’t making as much of an impact on the culture as we should be. I wanted to be sure we understand that’s where the greatest blame lies. We must always examine ourselves before pointing fingers elsewhere.

Sometimes we can be our own worst enemy, but there are other times when deliberate distortion of Biblical positions and those who espouse them takes center stage. Unfortunately, that is happening quite often now in the media, both the entertainment variety and the supposedly unbiased news media.

When 90% of those involved in the major networks and newspapers rarely go to church, let alone actually believe the Christian faith, what can one expect but bias? Those in our society who believe in nothing more than themselves or who have no clear belief system will be heavily influenced by the distorted presentation of Christians and Christian beliefs in the news. This has come into focus, in particular, on the “gay rights” issue where anyone who holds to Biblical morality is deemed hateful.

This approach carries over to all conservatism in America. Nearly every conservative stance is questioned in a way liberal positions never are—with the exception of Fox News—and it’s a double treat for the media if the conservative who is being attacked is also an evangelical. The over-the-top bias during the last election cycle was worse than ever. Stories that should have been extremely significant were relegated to irrelevance if they could in any way be a detriment to Obama’s reelection.

In fact, one might say, without too much critique even from the Left, that the media was pulling for an Obama victory:

Now, we can bemoan this unfair treatment and complain about the bias—which I am doing and will continue to do—but that can never be the last word. Christians—and conservatives overall, to the extent conservatism retains its Christian moorings—have to expect to be portrayed unfairly. We are bringing the light of God’s truth to a sinful world; people steeped in their sinfulness don’t like to be told they are wrong. Do we need this reminder directly from Jesus?

This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.

We also have this “promise” from the apostle Paul:

Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.

Some promises are not as welcome as others. Yet Paul didn’t stop there. After informing his disciple Timothy what to expect, he proceeded to give him instructions on what he should do about this state of affairs:

You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.

Paul didn’t leave Timothy with a negative. He encouraged him to move forward with what he knew to be the truth, to keep teaching, reproving, correcting, and training his hearers. I plan to follow the same sage advice, and I hope my readers will be edified by my continuing efforts.

On January 1st each year we fall into a pattern long emblazoned on our psyche of saying “Happy New Year!” I realize it’s mostly a hope that we hold out, expecting that things certainly have to be better this time around. But on what basis do we hold to such a hope? Is there a solid reason for hoping, or is this more a shadowy, wispy type of wishful thinking?

For me, on a personal level, I have what I consider to be a well-grounded hope. Having been salvaged from a life of despair and purposelessness by the grace of God, hope is real. Yes, I will be affected adversely by circumstances in the world around me—by culture rapidly losing its Biblical underpinnings and a government in the process of destroying basic American liberties—but even if the worst occurs, I will still have the faithful God who gives the promise of eternity in a much better place.

It’s our society on the whole that concerns me. What is happening right now that would give anyone a reason to hope that things will improve? As I noted above, the culture is changing for the worse and needs to be turned around for anything to get better. There are a lot of reasons for that change; some can be seen in this political cartoon’s depiction of our current situation:

The cartoonist used the image of the Newtown murders as one manifestation of how our culture has been debased. Then the media and the politicians come along and make matters even worse by blaming the wrong people. One newspaper decided to show a map of the homes of all those in its county who have legal gun permits. The goal, according to the paper, was to increase “awareness” of the gun problem. Excuse me, but the legal ownership of weapons is not the problem. Yet now those who have followed the law, and have always done so, are being targeted [the use of that word is intentional].

The other focus of news reports at the moment is the so-called fiscal cliff. Few, though, are the news outlets that are willing to expose the real issue: it’s not a revenue problem; it’s a spending problem. The media are in protection mode—ensuring that the One is not blamed. Of course, he has made blaming others into an art:

The next fiscal controversy will be the debt ceiling, which Obama seeks to have removed altogether. He wants the power to spend whatever he desires, without any constraints. The result would not be difficult to foresee:

And what of the loyal opposition? To what extent are Republicans willing to go to stand for sound principles, regardless of the political fallout? There is a segment of the party that mirrors the old Republican lack of vision that dominated pre-Reagan: never challenge the roots of the problem but just try to be a little more moderate than the Democrats:

That approach has always led to defeat.

So, I ask again—on what basis can we hold out hope that anything will improve this year?

In my view, the main reason we are where we are as a society is that the church of Jesus Christ has not fulfilled its obligations as the salt and light of a nation. There are a number of areas in which we have failed, but let me acknowledge three that are paramount:

1. We have watered down the message of salvation in the desire to draw more people to the faith. A watered-down message leads to a weak faith, or no genuine faith at all.
2. We have deviated, to some extent, from Biblical morality and do not grasp how Biblical principles apply to a proper understanding of the limitations on civil government, the primacy of the rule of law, and how economics really works.
3. We have abandoned control of our children’s education and turned that task over to the government, thereby making the problems worse with each succeeding generation.

Those are the three areas I want to address the rest of this week.

Some regular readers of this blog might be wondering why I haven’t yet commented on the horrific elementary school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, that occurred last Friday. First, I wasn’t even planning on doing blogs this week since my wife was having more surgery and we had to go out of state for that. She has had the surgery and is recovering; all seems well.

Second, the blogs earlier in the week were written late last week, about the time that shooting took place, and there wasn’t time to find out enough facts about it yet. Neither did I know for sure how the media and politicians would treat the incident—although I could have guessed without too much trouble. They have exhibited their natural tendency to blame all the wrong people and offer all the wrong solutions. If you were to take their analysis seriously, you would have to consider the NRA public enemy number one, and the absence of gun-control laws as the cause for the loss of innocent lives.

I am not a gun owner; I’ve only ever shot guns one time in my life at an NRA shooting range. It turns out I’m actually a pretty good shot. But I’ve never had the urge to buy a gun for myself. Generally, I’ve felt fairly safe. But I do believe in the right of gun ownership without interference from government. The Founding Fathers went through an experience that confirmed the need for a people to defend themselves against a government that sought to take away their basic liberties. Self-defense is Christian. Being meek and humble does not equate to being a fool.

Those on the liberal/progressive/socialist [choose one---they are synonymous] side of the spectrum, due to the worldview from which they operate, mistake the problem and the solution. Gun-free zones, rather than offering more safety, instead advertise just how defenseless those in that zone are. And I know this will sound like a cliché, but gun-control laws only affect the law-abiding; criminals ignore them. Therefore, all they accomplish is to make the criminal’s task easier.

I oppose, then, any presumed solution that concentrates on the external without taking into account the hearts of men. Only a few commentators have braved the political correctness police to say what really needs to be said: the real problem is the evil that lurks in the minds of sinful men. Evil does exist, and it is explained by the Biblical worldview. Man is at odds with God, rebelling against His righteous ways. Man seeks to do his own will, whatever fulfills his own selfish desires. Evil is real, and it won’t be appeased by any gun-control law.

We have to look deeper to find why these episodes seem to be increasing. It has to do with a culture that pushes God and His laws to the periphery. It has to do with a culture that idolizes selfish pursuits regardless of the moral law God established. It has to do with a culture that has overthrown sexual restraints. It has to do with a culture that has lost the belief in the image of God stamped upon every person, leading to disregard for the sanctity of human life. And this is how we train our children. At least a couple of cartoonists get it:

The only amendment I would make to the second cartoon is “easy access to guns without proper moral guidance.”

Some may object: doesn’t the Bible have a lot of violence in it? Yes, it does. But it roundly condemns the sinful actions of men. I’m not against all depictions of violence; what I am against is the loss of right and wrong when we encounter violence, particularly in the entertainment media. All too often, evil is glorified and righteousness is derided. A generation raised on that type of indoctrination is the real Lost Generation.

Here comes my “simplistic” solution: we must return to the Biblical understanding of man’s sinfulness, God’s judgment on sin, and the hope that is given through the Cross of Jesus Christ. When we recognize our sin, repent of it, and turn to the mercy and grace offered to us in that Cross, the heart is changed. If enough hearts change, a culture is changed. When a culture is changed, a nation may yet survive and prosper.

The new Lincoln movie is getting good reviews. I haven’t seen it yet but hope to soon. Perhaps the publicity over that film led to the following political cartoon:

That expresses how I feel about the recent election. It’s sad to be forced to the conclusion that our fellow citizens can be so shallow as to believe Obama is the answer when he has only made everything worse for four years. And so many are ignorant of his radical ideology, no matter how much some of us try to make it known. A big part of the messaging problem is that most of the media won’t do their job. They’re too in love with the very idea of Obama to care. Harping on media bias can get old at times, but what can you do when it is so evident? Shouldn’t it be showcased? At least for posterity—if there will be one?

There are still a few pesky reporters out there who try to bring up sensitive subjects but they are put in their place by dramatic displays of feigned righteous indignation:

But most of the time he doesn’t have to worry about it; after all, the election is over now. He has more “flexibility.”

While all this can be discouraging, now is not the time to pack it in. Despair cannot be allowed to reign. With God, all things truly are possible. You never know what may await around the next political bend. Keep alert and pray for godly change.