Look, I don't mean to sidetrack your post, so I'll drop it after this one. Just for the sake of argument, yes, the NYT editors would be a good starting point. For your consideration from one of our own FRN chapters:
Conspiracy and the Media
Dan Chavez
08/05/2002The issue of whether or not a conscious conspiracy exists among the members of the "mainstream media" has exercised many minds among their opponents. How to address this topic needs to be clearly understood by those dedicated to reducing the power of the media. First, so we can clearly identify our target and second so they cannot smear and vilify us with one of their favorite terms of opprobrium, namely, "conspiracy theorist".
There are many of us who believe that a conscious conspiracy exists among the liberal media to advance a left-wing, pro-statist agenda. Despite the odium attached to the term, a conspiracy is merely an agreement between people to pursue a common goal or engage in certain actions, chosen in advance. Whatever the reason one believes there exists a conspiracy among the media it is best, for tactical reasons, to simply use these beliefs, whatever they may be, as a motivator to action rather than a position for debate. Reason being that exceptions may exist to any conspiracy theory and will undoubtedly be trotted out by the media. Plus we must not give our opponents any excuse to marginalize or weaken our cause by smear tactics.
It is true that the majority of journalists and editors in the "mainstream" media characterize themselves as Democrats. It is also true that in a hierarchical structure the values of those lower down in that structure will reflect echo or at the very least not be a threat to those higher up. For our purposes it is better to articulate our struggle as being a combat against those who share certain values and assumptions. This, by the way, will be entirely true.
One of the reasons for the power of the media is that they have been able to function as a conspiracy while yet being able to claim it does not. Not so much by argument as by ad hominum and vilification campaigns against those who were against them. Or, by simply ignoring them. When you have a group of people that share certain values and assumptions, like the media's editors and journalists do, you can predict with a certainty what their political slant and biases for or against certain issues will be. Add to this the structure of the media being a hierarchy where those above can weed out or deny advancement to those on the lower levels and you already have what to an outsider would appear a conscious conspiracy. But what is in reality a series of assumptions expressed by a group of people that takes on the appearance of unanimity. But, at the same time is something that can be denied as a conspiracy. So, the mainstream media has had the best of both worlds, namely, to be able to function as a conspiracy, albeit an unconscious one, and to be able to mock, denigrate and point up rare exceptions to their otherwise unanimity on most issues, when they are not otherwise ignoring their critics, which is most of the time.
Bernard Goldberg in his book "Bias" writes of network newscasters "Liberal bias is how they see the world" and " It just happens. News isn't just a collection of facts. It's also how reporters and editors see those facts, how they interpret them, and most important, what facts they think are newsworthy to begin with". These are the terms and the context within which the issues of a "conspiracy" within the "mainstream" media should best be articulated. If we can reduce their power and influence in an effective fashion then the opponents of the "mainstream" media will be well served no matter what their views on media "conspiracies" might be.
Read Dan's previous columns:
FGS
