Posted on 08/31/2002 12:51:29 PM PDT by NorCoGOP
DURHAM, N.C. -- Ronald Reagan made the poor poorer. There are two things wrong with this statement. First, it is blatantly false, and second, it is widely believed to be true. Why?
As Bernard Goldberg illustrates in his bestselling book "Bias," the main culprit in the dissemination of outright falsehoods we hold as truths is the biased mainstream media.
Now, there is definitely not a conspiracy here. The media does not plot to get Democrats elected. But it certainly cannot be trusted for two different and important reasons: It is liberal, and its primary objective is profit.
The mainstream media -- network news stations, magazines such as Time and Newsweek, and newspapers like The New York Times -- is liberal. This accusation is so self-evident it's not worth discussion. What is perhaps debatable is that this makes the media untrustworthy.
As the ballots were being recounted after the 2000 election, I was amazed at how completely nonpartisan issues having to do with vote counting divided people right down party lines. In this instance and others, politics is so personal and important that it is impossible for one to objectively analyze a conflict while so emotionally tied to one of its sides.
This principle applies to the media, which is so outrageously liberal that it usually cannot be trusted to objectively report the news.
It is next to impossible for Dan Rather, who has spoken at a Democratic fundraiser, to objectively tell us about the impact affirmative action has had on our society. When Rather said that Bill Clinton was "an honest man," he meant it. When he told Goldberg that The New York Times was "middle of the road," he meant it.
A good example of the media's bias involves its identification of racists. It seem to have an unwritten rule that if an individual shows him or herself to be racist, then he or she will never again be taken seriously. I have no problem with this. People and institutions such as John Rocker, Fuzzy Zoeller, David Duke, and Bob Jones University will never again be paid lip service because they have shown themselves to be racists.
I only wish the media would apply this standard to all racists--conservative and liberal alike. Regrettably, the media takes seriously people like Spike Lee, who bragged about giving dirty looks to interracial couples and lied about watching Liz Claiborne make racist comments on Oprah. We hear from Jesse Jackson, who called Jews "hymies" and New York City "Hymietown." Robert Byrd, a former Ku Klux Klan member who used the n-word on television last year, also gets respect. That racists are demonized unless they are liberal activists shows that the liberal media cannot be trusted to be accurate.
Likewise, the media's main concern is profit -- and that's not a criticism. Viewers should recognize that, except in rare cases such as Sept. 11, the stories they see are designed to garner ratings. If this goal conflicts with accuracy, then it often supercedes it.
Take the 2000 presidential primaries. The media could have accurately reported that Bush and Al Gore were virtual locks for their parties' nominations. But would this have made a sensational story? No. So the media inaccurately hyped up Bill Bradley and John McCain as major threats.
And why do we view HIV as a legitimate danger to most Americans when nearly all American victims contracted it through very high-risk behavior? For the same reason that the homeless are depicted as regular Americans who were just victims of our brutal capitalist system: Because viewers are more likely to watch stories about the problems of people like themselves. These examples affirm what common sense tells us. A business whose goal is to make money is not the most objective source for information.
The media's biggest problem lies not with how it reports the news, but with how it claims to be reporting it. Even though it consists of liberals driven by ratings, it claims to be an unbiased truthteller.
Remember this the next time you hear a story about why the minimum wage helps people.
In our country - with our technology - you can find any point of view which interests you; Left, Right, up, down, New Age, Biblical, etc.,etc.,etc. That's about as close to objective as human beings can achieve.
Can you cite one example of a Fox News reporter "biasing" a news story?
Hannity and Colmes are commentators, not reporters.
I repeat: Can you cite one example of a Fox News reporter "biasing" a news story?
FNC goes it alone among the news networks. Every other network, mainstream or cable, is blatantly, unapologetically LIBERAL.
And because Fox hasn't joined the club, that makes them CONSERVATIVE?
Sorry. I don't buy it.
Incidentally, could you please name the "conservative" counterparts on the other networks to these Fox News liberals:
Greta Van Susteren
Juan Williams
Mara Eliasson
ALAN COLMES (now that you mention it)
Geraldo Rivera
Let's see...ABC has George Will.
Shucks. Guess I'll have to get back to you when I can think of some more.
True, but to put a few conservative radio commentators and columnists and one cable network up against the vast reaches of the New York Times (and 1000 NYT wannabes throughout the country), Rather, Brokaw and Jennings as well as CNN and MSNBC and the many, many liberal TV commentators and colunminsts is absurd.
When the average TV viewer sees Dan Rather claiming that Bill Clinton is an honest man, a lot of those viewers are still unaware that Rather is a liberal of long standing and sees Clinton through that politically liberal filter. On the other hand, no one misunderstands that Rush Limbaugh is a conservative commentator.
The piece doesn't say you can't get another slant on the news, simply that the majority of the news and comment available is slanted liberal and also comes with a profit motive attached.
That's an honest representation of the facts and a few exceptions such as FOX and Rush Limbaugh make the liberal domination of the media even more noticable.
Every morning E D Hill blathers on and on about Saudi Arabia. She is an educated person but is clueless about the Saudi's. She knows what the folks who pay her want advanced so she carries on and on.
This same bias is evident in "My Word" Commentary. John is totaly anti Saudi biased and also clueless, even when flat out told by his guests he ignores what he heard.
They forget that if they were anywhere else, they wouldn't get to do the things that they do. Instead, they routinely bite the hand that feeds them. That's why you'll see such media idiocy as having the American media on the beaches of Somalia with floodlights on in order to broadcast the surprise landings of American marines going into Mogadishu.
Journalists first, Americans second.
-PJ
Say what? That's about as unbelievable a statement as I have ever heard.
Talk radio is dominated by conservatives. There are respected newspapers and magazines which are conservative. If your point is that conservative voices are drowned by the overwhelming blare of liberals, you're wrong.
If you're point is that many liberals cannot be reached, you're right. You can lead a horse to water... You can fool all of the people some of the time and some of the people all the time....
The last time I looked most people grow up with their politics and their religion and die with them. It takes exceptional circumstances and exceptional people to change that. Fortunately, there are enough of them.
It's not easy to change basic political positions - nor should it be.
The author's view is, I believe, that the media constitute a group of like-minded people who are impelled to "do the right thing"...as they see it.
A "conspiracy" connotes plotting and scheming to "do the wrong thing". So far as the media is concerned, though, they are not conspiring, they are simply doing -- each in their own way -- what civic-minded people should be doing.
As if they were all Kiwanians building a ballpark for underprivileged children...
Personally, I believe this interpretation might be giving the media elite too much credit, but it's a valid construction.
But we have a conservative President. Reagan was elected not too long ago. Where do their voters get their news? It can't be too difficult to find conservative views.
Of course, you can always argue that Reagan was an anomaly, that what you usually get are RINO's of one flavor or another. But the Left has the same problem. That's the way our system works. It's not the fault of bias in the major media.
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