The Myth (or truth) of Liberal Media Bias

Remove all ads!

You know, I looked more closely at the moveon.org site. It has this in the first paragraph:

What I noticed that was interesting is Bush gets to air an ad but not someone criticizing him. That isn't fair and it is completely against what long term media reporter Kurtz says above when he says the networks have a long-standing non-advocacy policy. Right? Sorta'.

I checked the footnotes for that cite. It takes you here:

http://www.adage.com/news.cms?newsId=39561

The Bush Whitehouse ad is an anti-drug ad. It urges children and parents to "intervene to get help for children or friends who are doing drugs." Well, that is an advocacy ad. From the context though, it sure seemed more... of a double standard. The Bush Whitehouse ad has nothing to do with politics. None of the ads do. Just thought that was interesting and, strangely appropriate given the topic.

About the papers, I don't think the Washington Times or the New York Post have nearly the circulation of the othe papers. I could be wrong but it just seems to me the New York Post is considered a bit of a joke while the New York Times is considered perhaps the most important paper in the US (though it has taken its lumps lately.) The Washington Post is considered one of the most important papers in the US while the Washington Times is largely considered a paper run by a cult. There are differences - circulation and prestige.

Another consideration - last night on CNN I saw a guy talking about how now a majority of younger people (twenty-somethings and below) now get their news AND opinions from various 'late night' sources such as Leno, Letterman, and Jon Stewart's Daily Show. They say Dean's barbaric yawp that is getting him skewed on these shows is REALLY hurting him. So, what is the political persuasion of, for example, Jon Stewart or Leno?

 

Another good point, but it is an ad taken out by the White House in which they play up the "family values" theme that is prevalent in their bedrock support. So, it can be seen in a two-fold light: against drug use, which is a good thing, but at the same time it gets a message to their homebase support. It is clever and has some nice side-effects, while at the same time it is still an ad for the White House, during an election year. But I may be a bit cynical here.

Again, good comments about the more conservative press - being run by Moonies and other loonies and not having the prestige of the more mainstream press such as the Washington Post and the New York Times, which is considered the paper of "chronicle." At least that is how the New York Times was described during my brief time as a journalism major by more than one prof at the university.

And your point is well taken that they would not have the impact that some of the more established papers would have. But I thought that they deserved mention, since some others certainly have an alternative outlet through these papers for a more biased conservative message.

[ January 24, 2004, 04:25: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

 

I went looking and saw this:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/columnists/neuharth/neu068.htm

The article is by the founder of USA Today Al Neuharth. I don't know his political beliefs. As USA Today doesn't endosrse, the article seemed a little "preachy" to me. He does, in fairness to him, include this as well:

Here is the relevance of the above to me. The New York Times hasn't endorsed a Republican in 40 years for President (we'll see who they endorse this year.) It is, to me, the nations most prestigious newspaper. The Washington Post, probably one of the top...3 or 4 in my opinion (WSJ, LA Times)has never endorsed a Republican for Pres. I'd be interested in seeing who they've endorsed for Senate and the House races.

I don't think this means these papers have a 'liberal' bias. As I said, I don't even really believe that is a particularly meaningful term. But, what it does do, is create a perception. Above, some have argued that the 'liberal' media concept is entirely a product of 'conservative' propaganda. Certainly I believe that 'conservatives' have played the idea up for their own benefit.

However, 'conservatives' couldn't sell that story without endorsement records like those of the NYT and WaPo. When Andy Rooney and Walter Cronkite then come out and say the media is 'liberal' and they need to be careful on how they report, they feed the fire. If 'conservatives' are pulling the trigger on a conspriacy theory the media seems to be loading the amunition.

And to clarify, I'm not saying the media IS 'liberal', I'm saying that it has taken more than just a conspiracy for it to be viewed as such by a majority of Americans.

 

Again we are in agreement, since not every Republican is a conservative, and every democrat is a liberal. Endorsements are only one measure or indicator of a bias on the part of the two papers that you cite most. And again I have to point to my own paper, which endorses more than its own fair share of Republicans. It could be the "blue state/red state" phenomenon that most everyone is hyping these days, since both New York and Washington tend to be red, while states such as Georgia and Texas, being blue states tend to reflect their readership. One can argue that the WP and NYT are national papers, and the Houston Chronicle and the Atlanta Consitution are not, but don't downplay the importance of their homeareas since they exist in their respective home enivronments.

 

@Laches


I am not sure I agree with the gist of your last post. Remember who pretty much own the majority of media outlets. IF you pretty much control the way information is disseminated and you dedicate your resources to spinning a certain message, it's not like you will need the help of liberals to keep the propaganda going.

One obvious thing the conservatives have done is to shift everything over one notch to the left on the liberal - conservative scale. This results in anything moderate being labeled as "left leaning", left leaning becomes "far left" and all otehr liberal sentiments beome "loony extremist left agendas".
At the same time extremist right views become "conservative" and right leaning views become "moderate".

It is quite insidious and this from a skeptic who does not go in for the conspiracy theory crap.

 

The general idea is that no one *cares* that little Johnny made it to school, safely.

However, they do care that little Johnny is really an undercover CIA operative, and has been trailing a KGB mole for the past 6 months, and had finally gotten the cypher codes for his messages and the name of his courier. And when little Johnny shot out the front left tire of the enemy operatives that were trailing the bus, and their car slid sideways causing the rocket to barely miss the school bus and blow up the large natural gas storage tanks next to the water treatment plant, he was just doing his job as he was trained to do and probably saved countless lives.

Media sensationalism totally ROCKS!

Also, alarmists make massive amounts of cash-money. In both grants, and kickbacks. And it doesn't matter if it's the States, Britian, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Norway, or Russia. The loudest alarmists make the most cash-money per kilogram mass.

The only places it doesn't pay to be an alarmist is North Korea, Iran, and Columbia. In Pakistan, as long as your an anti-Indian alarmist, you're good to go.