What happened to all the love?  Since the 1960s, public protest has been widely reported and even romanticized by the drive-by media.  But now that regular Americans are protesting against government overreach into healthcare and the financial industry, there is no love to be found on the major U.S. TV networks.

For years, the anti-war, anti-globalization and anti-capitalism fringes have been treated as deserving of coverage by the major TV networks as if they offer respectable and thoughtful alternative viewpoints. Why aren’t the regular folks at least worthy of parity with Marxists, anarchists, pseudo-nihilists and other ideological constructs?

Protesting against modern society is an organized and typically far left activity.  Books have been written about how to conduct a successful demonstration or rally.

Rule Number One is to make sure that the media will be there to capture it. Success is measured in news articles and broadcast coverage.  Once the TV cameras leave, the protesters often disperse.

But until recently, TV cameras were not even showing up at these lively U.S. town hall events.  There were no tip offs to the local media.  Even now, only FOX News seems to be covering them and reporting both sides of the debate.

Being arrested is a favored tactic by some of the more radical protesters because it satisfies the need to supply hard news while providing the individual with a tangible sense of accomplishment.  What better way to legitimize your struggle than to get arrested?

And maximum impact can be obtained if TV pictures show police carrying away a defiant but peaceful protester, particularly if she is female.  This helps characterize the protest as a David and Goliath struggle, giving it greater legitimacy and engendering an element of sympathy from reporters and television viewers.

Who hasn’t seen this type of event on a TV news broadcast?

But, alas, the regular folks protesting health care reforms don’t seem to want to get arrested.  They just want to make their points.

Of course, none of this is to question the genuine views of protesters at more traditional demonstrations and rallies.  But the situations they put themselves in are largely manufactured for news organizations: the banners, the chants, the arrests, the civil disobedience.  It is well known that labor disputes in the United States often include paid protesters.

But now groups of regular citizens across America, who traditionally have limited their political activism to voting and writing to members of Congress, are complaining in public meetings about government policies with which they disagree.  What could be more genuine and less manufactured?

Yet the drive-by media and the American left do not consider this form of protest as legitimate.  NBC, CBS and CNN have belittled the health care opponents, denigrating them as organized and extreme.  Speaker Pelosi has even compared them to Nazis.

One reason is that many political journalists do not view their arguments as legitimate.  Nine out of ten U.S. journalists are Democrat supporters and, presumably, most of them favor the policies that are being protested. 

But, ironically, the lack of legitimacy given to the healthcare reform opponents also flows from the tactics used – raising issues at town hall meetings.  There are no tip offs to the media, no sit-ins, no banners and no arrests.  It is just straight democracy at work. 

Americans are proud of their freedoms

America’s heartland has watched protesters win significant airtime and consideration over the past forty years. Now, it is asking why the political and media elites do not show them, and their deeply held concerns, at least the same level of respect as an anti-war rally. What has changed?   The very dismissal of their anguish is feeding frustration and leading to more widespread protest.

What we could be seeing in America is the establishment of a limit beyond which citizens will not allow their government to encroach.

Vice President Joe Biden argued that American patriotism is measured by a willingness to pay new taxes.  With government debt out of control and tax hikes imminent, patriotism may be more accurately defined as objecting to a government takeover.

There may be a little less love in America right now but this is still the land of the free.

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