Gasp! The press has an agenda?!?

Dan Rather, who didn't show any bias by rushing to air the forged Bush memos in 2004, does think that media bias exists. At least at Fox. Did anyone see him on Real Time on HBO?

"I think it's fair to say, Bill, in fact I know it is, that Fox News operates in at least a somewhat different way than every other news organization that I know. They have their talking points....We know that they get talking points from the White House....I think it's pretty clear that they had wished the election had gone another way....That's not a crime, it's not an indictable offense. This is America, they can do what they want to do, but I think that's the perspective through which one should view it."

Or how an ABC boss admitted media bias on conservative talk radio:

Host Hugh Hewitt: "And so everyone that you work with, or 95 percent of people you work with, are old liberals."
ABC News Political Director Mark Halperin: "I don't know if it's 95 percent, and unfortunately, they're not all old. There are a lot of young liberals here, too. But it certainly, there are enough in the old media, not just in ABC, but in old media generally, that it tilts the coverage quite frequently, in many issues, in a liberal direction, which is completely improper....It's an endemic problem. And again, it's the reason why for 40 years, conservatives have rightly felt that we did not give them a fair shake."

I sure did see a lot of puff pieces on Nancy Pelosi before the election, but I don't recall any pieces like that about Gingrich in 1994.

Or when they talk about foreign policy on the Chris Matthew's show:

Andrea Mitchell: "[What] could be the most profound [foreign policy] problem...is how much hated the United States is, for a variety of reasons...."
Gloria Borger: "That's why the American voters... are going to say, "˜Next time around we want somebody who can work in a bipartisan way....We're done with the arrogance of American foreign policy. We want to see people work together. We want to see us work with our allies, and we're just not the bosses all the time.' And I think that Americans are looking for that."

Or a former Washington Post reporter, Thomas Edsall:

"I agree that the "” whatever you want to call it, mainstream media "” presents itself as unbiased when, in fact, there are built into it many biases and they are overwhelmingly to the left."

You all remember the whole 'march Rove out in handcuffs' hoopla, right? And how there was no real coverage once it was clear Rove wasn't the leak? CBS's Gloria Borger explains why the leaking of confidential information was only important if Rove did it:

"I'll tell you why the Richard Armitage thing was sort of a big yawn and why we didn't cover it that much, is because, first of all, everybody was anticipating a Karl Rove indictment, and that would have been a huge, huge story....Well, guess what? Karl Rove was not indicted. The air went out of the balloon at that particular point."

My point is that is that people can't help by be influenced by their biases and beliefs. If you are a liberal who thinks poorly of tax breaks and smaller government, you choose stories that make your point. Perhaps the information is accurate, perhaps it is correct 'in context' (like the six people that were never set on fire), but it is there. How can you possibly think that liberals outnumbering conservatives in media by a 12 to 1 margin doesn't affect or slant the presentation of the news?

I think Kat put her finger on the distinction I tried to make. Reporters are trained to expect and deal with their own bias, and readers are pretty good at detecting it too. But that does not mean there is an editorial agenda driving things - that's a different beast, and for that, we need to look at Fox News, The Washington Times and the LA Times, in my opinion. At least for mainstream outlets. (Arguably, Judith Miller represented a conservative agenda on the Iraq War at the NYT, but that's another discussion.)

The press has more interested in maintaining the status quo now that it is completely corporatized. I trust the press for nothing more than it is: Advertisements and celebrity gossip.

Mayfield wrote:

The press has more interested in maintaining the status quo now that it is completely corporatized. I trust the press for nothing more than it is: Advertisements and celebrity gossip.

And a propaganda machine for pro-corporate legislation and politicians. When was the last time any major news organization did any serious reporting on anti-citizen legislation that favors corporations?

Okay, I'm not arguing that bias does not exist, or that it does not influence things. I'm arguing that it's an effect that journalists are well aware of, and that they are often capable of controlling it themselves, and that most editors are conservative, and that can have a balancing effect. I'm arguing that people are capable of detecting this kind of bias, so it's overall effect is relatively small.

But what's equally true is what Rather is addressing - that there are outlets that have an institutional bias, an agenda as Kat describes it. I simply see that as a lot more effective at influencing people who frequent those outlets, left or right. I see that as being championed by Roger Ailes, and that as a part of that, the idea that all bias is equivalent in effect has somehow come into the picture. You don't distinguish between a mild slant and an editorial position that literally changes content, and I think that's over-reaching.

I don't think the effect of the liberal journalists is anywhere near the impact of an organized outlet like Fox News with a methodology for distorting news on a regular and across-the-board basis. That's what I'm arguing.

I'm surprised you mention puff pieces on Pelosi, all the coverage I saw was negative. Some frothing. So it's not the case that the positive stuff took over the media somehow. I didn't see the positive stuff emerge until after the election, and even then there were comments like Dowd's, that her best part of winning was "throwing like a girl" or something.

I honestly don't think you can compare an issue that is front and center with journalists since they begin their college careers - don't let bias interfere with accuracy - with an actual campaign to put biased reported into the mainstream, as Ailes has admitted to. The latter is capable of far more effectively influencing people, and Fox News in it's heyday was a good example of that. (I also think that the disconnect between what was really happening in the world and what they reported is responsible for their loss of viewers, leading me to the early conclusion that even with well-coordinated news rigging, consumers eventually figure it out and head for more reliable news sources. People are good at detecting and discounting bias when it's not all that they see.)

Gorilla.800.lbs wrote:

Luckily for those yearning for more balance, there's a new fresh voice launching on the conservative end of the news media spectrum!

I thought Al Jazeera and other terrorist networks were strongly allied with the Democratic party.

JMJ wrote:

Dan Rather

Fair assertion, and that memo thing was appalling. But he's retired and there's evidence he didn't have much power in CBS to begin with. Why would the liberal media move to block a very well-known, passionate journalist with a liberal bent?

I was most impressed by your citing of Halperin; that was interesting. Unfortunately, it directly contradicts the fact that he gave instructions to his staff in 2004 to cover the campaign in an unbiased way. And he took a serious beating for it from conservatives - and now he's flogging a book on Karl Rove's genius. He even noted that

As an economic model, if you want to thrive like Fox News Channel -- [if] you want to have a future -- you better make sure conservatives find your product appealing. [Emphasis added.]

So there's a profit motive for him to put this out. At best, this makes his admission suspect, although there may be some kernel of truth to it. Check out Media Matters take on his change in position.

Bear in mind that the Rove stuff was complicated. Rove was a big fish, Armitage was not. And there was a HUGE amount of manipulation of information by the White House and it's allies on this, specifically designed to mute the impact of the scandal in the press. Those two elements right there are far more likely than some nebulous, disorganized bias affecting all of the media as the story changed. When the big fish drops out of the picture, interest wanes.

And yes, there was a TON of coverage of Armitage, it did not just sink suddenly, but faded away over a few weeks.

I'm unsure how the Andrea Mitchell report plays into this, unless you mean Chris Matthews baiting the hook with the "everyone hates America" stereotype?

I'm unsure how the Andrea Mitchell report plays into this, unless you mean Chris Matthews baiting the hook with the "everyone hates America" stereotype?

Andrea Mitchell was a guest on Hardball when she said what I quoted. Sorry for the confusion.

LobsterMobster wrote:

If you think the media in general is overwhelmingly liberal, here's a little test. Name extreme right-wing and left-wing pundits in nation-wide media.

Right:
O'Rielly
Limbaugh
Coulter
Hannity
Colmes

Left:
Franken
...Lil' help?

Talk radio/TV pundits do not equal "the press" (or, more accurately, do not equal all of, or even a majority of, "the press")

All that you are pointing out is that in the space of talk radio and TV pundits, the right wing dominates the space.

And that is true. Talk radio/TV is by and large a domain of the right wing.

Many, including the pundits themselves, would consider that to be a reactionary enclave to the rest of the media at large, which they perceive as being left-leaning. You can argue about whether the rest of the media is left-leaning or not. But the perception is widely held, especially on the other side, and so the right-wing has carved out their niche in the mass media. Those on the right might claim that the rapid rise and success of these talk pundits came due to them presenting a viewpoint that was under-represented in the existing media before them. There certainly may be something to that claim, seeing how rapidly they have galvanized a large following. (There might also be something to the claim that a lot of the appeal behind these pundits is the sensationalized, heavy-handed, "news-ertainment" presentation).

So, at the very least, there is a perception among many that the "media" on the whole is liberal, and that the popularity of the right-wing pundits is due to their state as an "alternative" to all that lefty-media that dominates the rest of the media space (again, stating a common perception, but not necessarily my personal opinion)

KaterinLHC wrote:

If we acknowledge that everyone on an editorial staff has a particular bias, then which comes first: the editorial staff that writes with a liberal/conservative slant, or the readership that demands articles written with a liberal/conservative slant? That is, which came first: The New York Times or readers who wanted articles like those The New York Times writes? This is a deceptively simple question and shouldn't be dismissed off-hand.

Well, I think the first more than the second - just like in art/entertainment, the audience is much more effective at finding you than you are at finding the audience.

But why does the editorial staff have a particular bias? Is it an unspoken, nefarious plot? Or are there more logical reasons?

JMJ claims polls indicate reporters tend to be Democrats on a ratio of 12:1. Let's suppose something in this ballpark is true. Is it because Republican reporters are being barred entry? Or might it be that left-leaning people are more likely to choose journalism as a career than right-leaning people, just as right-leaning people may be more likely to choose business careers than their lefty counterparts? We see more Republicans in business and apparently see more Democrats in journalism, might both be explained as simply as people with certain political leanings tend more favorably to certain career choices over others?

Robear wrote:

I don't think the effect of the liberal journalists is anywhere near the impact of an organized outlet like Fox News with a methodology for distorting news on a regular and across-the-board basis. That's what I'm arguing.

I find statements like this about FOX News funny.

Why?

Because anytime I turn on FOX News, I see them spending most of their time sensationalizing things completely outside the realm of politics.

When Chandra Levy was gone, when Laci Peterson was missing, when Scott Peterson was on trial, when Robert Blake was on trial, when Michael Jackson was on trial... anytime something that can be sensationalized is happening, FOX News drops Bush and "White House talking points" like yesterday's garbage. They are FAR more interested in the over-the-top story than they ever are in right-wing politics.

Pundit talk shows like Hannity & O'Reilly are an obvious exception. But when those guys aren't on, FOX News is much more interested in train wrecks and car chases than D.C. politics.

It all makes sense when you come to the realization that FOX News exists for ratings. Period. Not as a White House puppet media outlet, or the "voice" of the right-wing. They can't run away from politics fast enough when there's a ratings-grabbing story to follow instead.

They are FAR more interested in the over-the-top story than they ever are in right-wing politics.
...
It all makes sense when you come to the realization that FOX News exists for ratings. Period. Not as a White House puppet media outlet, or the "voice" of the right-wing.
Even we at Fox News manage to get some lefties on the air occasionally, and often let them finish their sentences before we club them to death and feed the scraps to Karl Rove and Bill O'Reilly. And those who hate us can take solace in the fact that they aren't subsidizing Bill's bombast; we payers of the BBC license fee don't enjoy that peace of mind.

Fox News is, after all, a private channel and our presenters are quite open about where they stand on particular stories. That's our appeal. People watch us because they know what they are getting. The Beeb's institutionalized leftism would be easier to tolerate if the corporation was a little more honest about it.

-- Scott Norvell, London Bureau Chief for Fox News, in an op-ed in the May 20, 2005 Wall Street Journal Europe about liberal bias at the BBC.

Whatever other practices they have, overt bias is apparently okay, because they are privately held.

Robear wrote:

Whatever other practices they have, overt bias is apparently okay, because they are privately held.

The fact that Fox is a privately held company is quite significant when it's being compared to the BBC, as in that op-ed.

The BBC is not privately held, but is funded in part by a tax on television-owning residents of the UK. While its spokespeople have long insisted that it is totally unbiased - and have used that, IIRC, as a justification for its continued use of public funds - its left-liberal bias is, as far as I'm concerned, beyond debate at this point, as many of its senior people have recently admitted it themselves.

If you don't like what Fox has to say, you can change the channel and have nothing more to do with it. If conservative Britons don't like what the BBC has to say, that's tough. They still have to contribute money to it, or else face a hefty fine and possible jail sentence.

That slight derailment aside, I don't have a problem with any news programs that are upfront about their biases. I doubt that anyone familiar with English language news media is unaware of Fox's conservative bent; as Norvell states, they are quite open about it. I do have a problem with news programs that claim to be impartial, because I find it very hard to believe that a profession so heavily weighted towards one side of the political spectrum could lack an agenda.

But perhaps we could stop arguing about generalities and try an experiment. We could spend a night or two watching a news broadcast that we consider biased, make a note of biases we detect, then come back here and bicker over.. er, I mean, discuss those specific examples instead.

That could be fun.

Legion wrote:

Let's suppose something in this ballpark is true. Is it because Republican reporters are being barred entry?

This implies there's such a thing as an institutionalized barrier, such as women getting lower salaries simply because they're women, or blacks and hispanics being over-represented in prisons and welfare because the rules and values of our society make it harder for them to get a foothold on the socio-economic ladder. These are ideas that many conservatives vehemently deny. Of course Limbaugh suggested that any sort of drug abuse was a character flaw, unless he was the addict, in which case it's a sickness beyond human control. Might be the same thing here. Everyone gets exactly what they deserve based on merit and effort, except Republican journalists, who are unfairly oppressed and marginalized by the liberal media in its unending quest to get people to do horrible things like accept gays and allow secular heathens near our children.

This implies there's such a thing as an institutionalized barrier, such as women getting lower salaries simply because they're women, or blacks and hispanics being over-represented in prisons and welfare because the rules and values of our society make it harder for them to get a foothold on the socio-economic ladder.

Not to single you out, but that might be the most ignorant statement I have seen in a long time.

Women with the same qualifications, working the same jobs, do not make less than men. Maybe they did fifty years ago, but they surely don't today. Men might earn more, but they are not paid more. If men were actually paid more for the same work, why would any profit-oriented company hire men? Men are more likely to study higher-paying subjects at school, enter high-paying fields, perform riskier tasks, take less stability or less fulfillment for more pay and work longer hours. Women who make these same choices make just as much as men.

Blacks are over-represented in prison because blacks are over-represented in the criminal population. And it has nothing to do with the 'values of our society'. It has everything to do with black 'street' culture and the breakdown of the black family. The single greatest common denominator in the criminal population is being 'fatherless'. Seven out of ten repeat felony criminals grew up in a fatherless household, and the deterioration of the black family since the 1960's is the culprit.

Or might it be that left-leaning people are more likely to choose journalism as a career than right-leaning people, just as right-leaning people may be more likely to choose business careers than their lefty counterparts? We see more Republicans in business and apparently see more Democrats in journalism, might both be explained as simply as people with certain political leanings tend more favorably to certain career choices over others?

I definitely think this is close to the truth.

We could spend a night or two watching a news broadcast that we consider biased, make a note of biases we detect, then come back here and bicker over.. er, I mean, discuss those specific examples instead.

I like this idea, so I'll kick it off.

On Friday morning on CNN, reporter Suzanne Malveaux derided President Bush as a "Kool-Aid" drinker who won't admit failure in Iraq in a blatant example of editorializing instead of reporting.

"President Bush and his closest ally, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, have stood shoulder to shoulder on the Iraq war since the very beginning. Critics calling Mr. Bush 'the cowboy' for stubbornly leading the charge, and Mr. Blair 'the poodle' for obediently following. But three years since the U.S. invasion, the two are still adamant their Iraq mission is sound. President Bush didn't just drink the Kool-Aid, he made it. But perhaps now it's a little less sweet."

I'd retort, JMJ, but I think you did a fine job of that yourself.

Was that an editorial piece, an interview/talkshow, or a news report where she put that commentary, JMJ? If it was a news report, that was completely out of line.

It was a news story about the 'Change in Iraq strategy' on their 'American Morning' show.

Thursday:

That actually might be the silliest thing I have ever heard.

Monday:

Not to single you out, but that might be the most ignorant statement I have seen in a long time.

Good to see you've decided to raise your game.

Good to see you've decided to raise your game.

Glad you appreciate it. Maybe you guys should stop saying silly stuff

You've just upgraded to the Ricky Bobby school of ad hominem, congrats.

Here's another Suzanne Malveaux quote from last Friday. Clearly, she's pretty right wing. I've bolded the part where she gives Bush props.

HARRIS: Breakfast time huddle -- it's more than just coffee talk. Right now, President Bush is meeting with Congressional leaders from both parties, part of the search for a new approach in Iraq.

White House correspondent Suzanne Malveaux joining us now -- and, Suzanne, you've been so great this week at sort of keeping us up to speed on all of the meetings that the president has been having with Congressional leaders.

I'm just curious about, A, the tone of this. And, secondly, do we get a sense that there is real frank discussion going on back and forth?

SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, this is really a formality, if you will. But the president -- this is a new reality of this White House. What you see here is really a very aggressive and active outreach not only to the Republican leadership -- we've seen a lot of that, of course, in the last couple of years -- but now to the Democratic leadership, as well.

Both of them, from the House and the Senate here having breakfast with the president in the Cabinet Room. We are told that the president is going to talk about this report from the Iraq Study Group, his impressions of it.

So that really is somewhat new here, Tony. We certainly hope that we'll get a sense of whether or not there's a little bit of give and take there. But certainly more aggressive outreach.

It comes at a time, as we know, the president is weighing his options about how to change U.S. policy, if he will change U.S. policy.

We know there are a couple of things that he has already ruled out and things that he's entertaining. We heard yesterday again refusing one-on-one talks with Iran and Syria. But he has not ruled out a regional conference involving his administration and those regimes.

We also heard the president talk about suggesting a more robust role for the Bush administration in the Israeli-Palestinian Middle East peace process. That is something that the group has called for.

And we do know that there has been no indication from this administration that they would commit to pulling out U.S. troops with any kind of specific timetable or window. The report calling for trying to reach a goal, at least, for 2008. President Bush reiterated that it all depends on what happens on the ground -- Tony.

I dunno Johnny, I saw the full transcript at Newsbusters and it seems to me that her comments summed up things that had been already noted about Bush. She certainly didn't say anything not already said, that was not already in the cycle. The bit about "critics say"? Well, it's kind of hard to report what the critics said - which she did, in summary form - without using the phrase. It does not have to be a code.

I read a number of her transcripts since you cited the wrong day for her quote - no problem - and what you posted is never repeated in tone in any of them in recent days. She's not Brit Hume taking potshots on every show, she simply was picked out for reporting on what was floating around on the opinion pages. Nothing that she said is inaccurate - Newsbusters was nailing her on tone, but if you look at more of her reporting, she's actually pretty neutral.

The newscasters asked her what was being said about Bush and Blair for their remaining terms, that was the context. And another thing to consider - the term "drinking the Kool-Aid" is not a direct reference to Jonestown, it's a commonly used phrase to indicate someone who believes what they want others to think. By the measure Newsbusters used, if she'd said "He eats his own dog food", they'd have headlined her as calling Bush a dog.

What I'm having trouble with is finding a Fox News show that is not right-wing commentary. When do they, you know, actually put the news on?

JoeBedurndurn wrote:

You've just upgraded to the Ricky Bobby school of ad hominem, congrats.

Thanks for sticking up for me Joe.

What I'm having trouble with is finding a Fox News show that is not right-wing commentary. When do they, you know, actually put the news on?

Tough to say. They try to squeeze it in between slow-motion shots of the flag waving and panoramic scenes of the Heartland.

You can say she wasn't showing bias in her reporting if you like. I personally think that saying he 'made the kool-aid' was biased (I didn't take it as a direct comparison to Jonestown), but that is the point of the exercise, right?

That reads a lot more like a round-table morning news discussion than like a straightforward news report to me.

[edit]Which, if it's supposed to be a straightforward news report, is a problem: that segment didn't read the way it should then.[/edit]

That reads a lot more like a round-table morning news discussion than like a straightforward news report to me.

Feel free to judge for yourself. Here's a clip.

I'll check that when I get home (no media viewing for me at work ;))