 Hey, well, thank you so much ladies and gentlemen It's great to see so many of you on a bright beautiful Saturday morning here in the fall in Lake Jackson Ron and Carol's hometown Since the late 1960s when they decided they wanted to get out of snowy Pittsburgh and that you could deliver babies in Texas Just as well as you could deliver them anywhere else So I know you are all excited this week about voting in the most important election of our lifetime woohoo You know I told Paul at my wife's this morning I said, you know, maybe if I make it to 80 or 90 I'll be looking at whatever kind of device we have for consuming news when I'm 80 or 90 and there'll be someone on there saying Well, the election tomorrow is only of moderate importance not that important vote if you want vote if you don't But you might ask yourselves A lot of you are obviously familiar with the Mises and see why is the Mises Institute Which is largely dedicated to talking about economics of a certain variety and also about liberty and libertarianism generally Why are we having a conference on media? I think the short answer to that question is that I Don't think liberty or economic science could advance without truth. I think the answer to that question is truth how we consume information is in in very large parts shaped by the media and Oftentimes the media's friends and politics and academia so without truth We don't really have a starting point for any kind of real knowledge or understanding or learning in society So I think it's a very important subject. I think it's a subject that touches all other subjects because as we'll see today There's a narrative that's being pushed So we're talking about media But first I'd like to mention or begin with the traditional media and when we say traditional media We mean legacy outlets cable news networks print Newspapers print magazines etc that have been around a long time and that find themselves struggling in this new environment And what they really provide for us is is a show And I think there's a there's a fundamental difference between producing a show and reporting news right those are two very different things, but sometimes the difference is subtle and You know, we all get a sense when we watch especially the cable networks that it's a show We have sort of an innate sense of that but At the Mises Institute we have a great friend Who shall we name? Nameless and he works for one of the legacy media outlets. I won't mention it by name But I'll just say it's it's it doesn't have an acronym. It's and it's named after a little furry woodland creature Three letters So he works at this legacy media outlet and he says Whatever you think of the cable shows he said it is ten times worse than you imagine behind the scenes just the the the lack of intelligence amongst the presenters the Narrative storylines being pushed upon them the petty backstabbing the egos the intrigue the extra marital affairs going on Behind the scenes the constant turnover. He said whatever you think of cable news. He says you have no idea What it's really like and and I'm going to tend to believe him so Again, there's a difference between telling a story Between crafting a story or a narrative and reporting news and that doesn't mean that what we watch or consume in the traditional Media is made up. It doesn't mean that it's conspiratorial It doesn't mean that that they don't actually report on organic or spontaneous events Lots of these things happen in in politics in in weather and science Etc. And these are real things. So I'm not I'm not implying that but you know Sometimes you look at something and it's very difficult to tell exactly what the narrative is and I think this migrant caravan story is just it's just bizarre on so many levels and and I Whatever is happening. I know that What it is is different from what I'm being told that's the only thing I know for sure whether this whole caravan is a Manufactured political stunt. I do not know but they're steering us They're not just informing us and and beyond that It's not just how they present the stories is whether they present them at all, right? They're their editorial choice and what to report or not report at all or at least what to emphasize and what to downplay is A very very very important and powerful feature in American life today and and because they have a show Rather than news because they're giving us a show Well, that's the reason why a lot of things happen It's the reason why when when Deborah Medina put the fear of God and Rick Perry and Kay Bailey Hutchinson in 2010 that that that they didn't know how to process that And and that they did not understand those polling results because that wasn't part of the story that they had for us And when someone like a rod-ons on his amazing website Runs for office or introduces Some referendums in the state of California that the public really like but are not part of the story It confuses them and they don't know how to report on it. It's the same reason why You don't see a Daniel McAdams Talking about Yemen or Putin on on CNN and I it's it's the reason why you don't see Scott Horton who literally wrote the book on Our 17-year endless war in Afghanistan who literally wrote the book It's got Horton knows more about what's going on in Afghanistan than a lot of the Pentagon DC generals themselves No about the war in Afghanistan There's a reason why Scott Horton is not on CNN at night talking about this But rather there's some hack from what we call the Acela corridor if you familiar with this term That's the the train the Acela train that runs between Washington, New York, see I guess it goes to Boston We'll allow Boston, but basically you got to live in Washington or New York City or somewhere in between To be on these cable news programs and part of that is of course because it's cheap to get local the same old same old Acela corridor guests every night don't require travel expenses, but in the age of Skype and video conference That's not really an excuse anymore. There's no excuse for CNN not to have Scott Horton on talking about Afghanistan So the Scott Horton's and the Ron unses and the Ron Paul's the Lou Rock was they're not part of the cast They're not part of the story and they're not granted a cameo appearance in the story So when you get these sort of unintentional cameos where something makes news that they didn't want they have a hard time dealing with it I read this great article the other day On a tiny tiny website alternative media. That's where I seem to get more and more of my insights these days And the article was I wish I'd come up with this I don't know if any of you had heard this term, but I can't claim it It was called fiat media So I thought that was a great term the idea that we just sort of issue media stories And so the author of the circle, I think he was writing under a pseudonym because it was kind of a jokey name Um, he he's talking about tells for any of you who play poker There's this concept of tells something that a particular player will do some tick or or physical nervous habit That'll give you a sense of what their hand is in poker So he said there's tells when you're consuming traditional or legacy media and and he gave a bunch of terms And let me read some of these whenever, uh, you know an anderson cooper, let's say on cnn uses the term because Or bad or therefore or however or nonetheless or as a result So watch for these terms because what these are the kind of terms that legacy media people use when they're trying to turn or a reporting Uh reporting of news into telling of a story they give their sort of wherefore to and I thought that was really interesting The idea of a fiat media fiat news So what fiat news has given us let's say over the last I don't know 30 years. Let's let's just say since the collapse of the berlin wall Well, they've given us a story and and the story Has been roughly the same regardless of what mainstream source you concern It's it's been some sort of down the middle path between either the the two dominant Sort of sociopolitical narratives of our time which are which are neoliberalism and neoconservatism And and both of those were based on this kind of dopey idea that there was an end to history And that everything was going to be okay now and and we weren't going to have these upheavals anymore because experts were in charge And so neoliberalism and neoconservatism have come to resemble one another more than they More than they appear dissimilar Both of them believe in some sort of regulated capitalism and they both promote social democracy basically is the political mechanism For organizing society They both talk a lot about universalism and globalism This this is a key part of the story. They both talk a lot about western hegemony, particularly american Influence around the world as as the sort of the number one driver Of how the world would be ordered and if you notice that they never they never couch this In terms of imperialism or neocolonialism, you know back when we Sent people to africa to exploit diamonds or oil, you know, that was bad But if we send them to africa now to tell them how to order their their country, you know, that's that's benign because we know best And they don't they don't see the hubris in this Uh, of course the narrative always involves interventionism nation building And it's not just politics. It's economics as well We've been we've been fed a narrative a narrative that i'm happy. Well, i'm not happy about it But i will i will report with severely challenged by the economic crisis of 2007 and 2008 that sent some serious tremors throughout the world But the the economic narrative as well Basically, we've entered an age of prosperity in the west and central banking Is is going to control money and it's going to control it just fine And that central bankers are going to be these sort of technocratic people who can you can use interest rates magically as a policy tool You know interest rates have nothing to do with whether how much people save and borrow They're just a policy tool and we can use them in a way that doesn't actually require people to work harder or be more productive in society We can just sort of create wealth Through the wizardry the alchemy of central banking A key part of the story uh, and of course A big part of the economic or financial story has been well Just like we have this kind of mishmash Between neo liberalism neo conservatism We're going to have this kind of post kanesian economics where you don't really need to understand it But the main thrust of it is that The role of government the role of fiscal and monetary policy is to create demand to stimulate us all to go buy stuff And that's how you run a society Of there, excuse me. That's how you run an economy. You you stimulate demand You create demand It has nothing to do with producing and saving and accumulating capital and investments Just about producing demand and I think that this story has done tremendous injury To all of us and I think if we don't oppose this story It's going to do tremendous damage and injury to our to our kids and our grandkids And it worries me quite a bit and of course it's all born out of hubris I think if there's one word to describe our legacy media it is hubris And of course there's this idea that the first amendment Grants some special status or privilege to institutional media. It does no such thing The first amendment is very clear on its face. It just applies to congress not passing laws about stuff It doesn't mean that cnn or msnbc or something deserves special access To the trump administration or anybody else it as a matter of fact the the pamphleteers of colonial times Were very oftentimes very anti-state. They oftentimes were very harsh and acerbic They were the they were the bloggers of their day and so the A blogger today in his or her house just cranking out their own opinions has every bit as much a right or to go Ask donald trump a question as as wolf blitzer does And let's not forget that legacy media are private for-profit businesses And the big networks are all owned by just a handful of people. This isn't some sort of benign Public interest industry These are for-profit companies. They have commercials. They have ads They don't deserve any more special status in society than any other for than your local dry cleaner Or your your local mcdonalds or hamburger chain. These are for-profit businesses They don't they don't deserve For us to view them as having some glorified or noble role as presenting the facts to us so that we can Go vote for congressperson x y or z on tuesday It really is a sham and and and i think we've seen Especially since a couple of more recent shocks than 2008 crash the the the The Victory of the leave forces and the brexit vote in the uk was a real shock to the european project And of course the election of donald trump over hilly clinton was a real shock to the u.s project So i think these things have caused the media to really get their backs up And i think they're really feeling it and our friend who works for the furry creature network You know one thing he'd said to me. All right, it's judge napolitano I And i'm not implying i'm super close to him occasionally talk or email with him. He's on our board um He said they really hate the term fake news It really bothers them on a visceral level because they have been the kings for so long You know when walter cronkite a lot of you don't know that name. You got to be over 40 I guess when walter cronkite went on the news that was the news and he told you what he was going to tell you Between 720 and 735 about vietnam or whatever it was And then tom brocott whomever but it's not like that anymore And it bothers them quite a bit I can tell you that so The question for us is what are the alternatives alternative media because That's the only media you and i have You know, that's really the only media that's available to us And the the amount of money involved in the legacy media is so staggering I saw that megan kelly who used to be she was at fox i believe right and then she went to msnbc and I guess based on on halloween Somehow people were talking about proper costumes and someone brought up the topic blackface And apparently she said something untoward about this and she's being Nixed from msnbc And I saw that she her and her lawyers are aggressively going after something 36 some million dollars under her contract to go away I mean think of the money they're spending on studios and and personnel and payroll and then think that some blogger can come along and sort of Touch and reach all of us that that bothers them a lot So it's it's it's it's it's so important that we're all involved I think in alternative media in some sorts even if we're just consuming it Rather than consuming The mainstream media and by alternative media today we can speak very broadly we can speak of a site like mesas.org which We're not as big as the big financial sites like a forbs or a real carmark It's been in the pure econ site And they excuse me the pure econ segment We're one of the largest sites in the world in terms of traffic Sites like ron unsis site sites like the rockwell.com Like daniam mcadam site at rpi I mean these are the these are the mechanisms by which we have to consume our news and and A personal favorite of mine, which you should never read before bed A zero hedge It's it's better in the morning when you need with that coffee When you need to get juiced up a little bit and you know, there's a there's a blogger that many of you may be familiar with she appeared Digitally at the ron paul conference earlier this year named katlyn johnson And she's an australian blogger who really just came out of nowhere She had written some other kinds of books from children's books And she's become a very powerful anti-war blogger and she wrote a very interesting story about the narrative You know that whether we like it or not we're all fighting every day To grab ahold of this narrative or do at least nudge it a little bit and and as much as I don't like that I don't like a politicized america I don't like the idea that we all have to be so political because I think so many smart people are out busy in business Doing creative things and they're not doing this and then we so we end up with a lot of dummies in academia and media um So it concerns me but the bottom line is as they say about politics the same is true about about the story that you know whether The narrative is interested in us Whether we're interested in it or not. So it's it's a trying time in america But the digital revolution came along and it made Our ability to communicate with each other So cheap almost free And it's something that we all have to seize And I think some of our speakers today are going to be good examples of people who have done just that so thank you very much