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Britain’s outgoing Prime Minister, Tony Blair, wrote an insightful commentary in where he says today’s media are “a media that increasingly and to a dangerous degree is driven by “impact”; that “attacking motive is far more potent than attacking judgment. It is not enough for someone to make an error. It has to be venal. Conspiratorial. . . What creates cynicism is not mistakes; it is allegations of misconduct. But misconduct is what has impact.” and ” more than ever before, (the media) hunts in a pack. In these modes it is like a feral beast, just tearing people and reputations to bits.”

He says that the “final consequence of all of this is that it is rare today to find balance in the media. Things, people, issues, stories, are all black and white. Life’s usual grey is almost entirely absent. ‘Some good, some bad’; ‘some things going right, some going wrong’: These are concepts alien to much of today’s reporting. It’s a triumph or a disaster. A problem is ‘a crisis.’ A setback a policy ‘in tatters.’ A criticism, ‘a savage attack.’”

Blair’s remarks were none too well received by the British media of course. But as I read his commentary, I could not help thinking about the American MEDIA and its handling of health care issues in the past. If I ‘m not mistaken, health care has been in “crisis” for the last 20 years or so, maybe even longer. And just about everyone in health care, from drug companies, insurers, doctors to even consumers, have felt the sting of what Blair is pointing out.

If we agree with what he is saying, then the question is, what can we expect will be the media’s treatment of the health care debate where it is now front and center in a presidential election? And by the media, we can’t leave out our own ‘health blog industrial complex’ that we’ve now inflicted upon the rest of the planet. I am almost afraid to speculate what will happen when we move from tossing around ideas to making real decisions. Will we have a ‘revolution’ in health care, or will the ‘haves’ once again triumph over the ‘have nots’ through deception and money? In other words, what tired and over-used ideological narrative will the media choose to fit the facts within? Will the calls for moderation and sanity be voices in the wilderness, or worse, seen as the enemy?

No answers here, and maybe our fate is already sealed by some undetected political and media dynamics already set in motion. Anyway we are all along for the ride, so get your pens, pencils and laptops ready. The game is afoot.