In America today there is a price for everything... A price for life and a price for death, a price for truth and a price for lies. All our troubles can be laid at the feet of the people, just as in ancient Rome, Americans have gotten lazy, fat, obsessed with pleasure visual, and physical. If we had real patriotism in this country, there would be hundreds of thousands of people demanding truth in there newpapers and in the media....our founding fathers could not have foreseen the wealth and power of America, nor could they forsee the degree that corporations would go to reamin powerful at the cost of working Americans. One might ask was the dream that the founding fathers had unrealistic? no outside enemy or terrorist is destroying America but it is Americans themselves with their own apathy and ignorence. Gore''s book is one voice. But like so many other voices who speak truth, is it too much trouble to read the truth, or hear it, or to find it out? Isn''t it much easier to believe a nicely packaged lie or half truth, a lie dressed in preconceptions and easy prejudices?...no outside terrorist could do the damage that is being done to our country right now by men and women who call themselves Americans and who sit in seats of power. Healing has to begin with truth, even if that truth costs someone thier jobs.

Your criticism is off base and like it or not, Gore's concerns are right on the money--but have most to do with media consolidation. Your editorial is so defensive that you sound silly--like you don't "get" how important it is to steer television and all media more toward being better watchdogs for citizens to help our political and day-to-day situations.

Be it media consolidation, an increasingly dumbed-down audience preferring Paris Hilton or whatever? The "watergate"-breaking, upstanding, at-least-sort-of-independent, Vietnam-in-your-living-room compelling media must collectively find itself again.

MAJOR KUDOS to those doing the job right for the public because it's so hard to do with all this big business consolidation hanging over our heads.

I'm no Gore groupie but give a guy with good points due credit. Hope more high profile types find a fricken soul.

Your point about Current TV is idiotic, guys. The whole point of his network is that it's user-oriented and user-driven, much like the internet (which he was prescient in supporting). The problem he sees in normal TV is that it's controlled by a select few and reaches millions upon millions.

And thanks for keeping my email address private like I opted for. Not that it really matters, but still...

“Assuming for a second that Gore is absolutely right on the mark, how in the world did Gore’s old boss, Bill Clinton, get raked over the media coals for 24 hours a day during the Monica Lewinsky scandal and still maintain the support of the majority of the electorate?”

I’m a bit unclear with this. Are they implying that, if for some reason Clinton was eligible to run in 2000, he would have won? Isn’t that a bit presumptuous?

I have to admit my memory is getting a bit fuzzy, but when Clinton launched those missile strikes against al Qaida… did the TV networks and cable news put any effort into finding out the legitimacy of the al Qaida threat, and not the “Wag the Dog” arguments that soon followed? If not, that’s an awfully wobbly soapbox on which Anon. was standing.

And shouldn’t everyone, including B&C, be concerned on some level “that the ‘well-informed citizenry’ is in danger of becoming the ‘well-amused audience,’” whether it’s as imminent as Gore says or not?