Media Bias

[cableguy]

http://www.newsroom.ucla.edu/page.asp?RelNum=6664

new study, not done by the media or a think tank, liberal or conservative, finds that the media is left of center... even the drudge report wound up left of center... the discussions here could be fascinating... please do jump in...

 

[Cman]

Someone needs to read more Al Franken books lol.

Thats the main argument of his "Lies" book. Disproving the myth of the left-wing media

 

[Iceberg]

I can see this only if you average out all newspapers, radio stations, and television stations, there may be a minimal left-tilt to the media. I cannot believe this, though, especially with the total access of the media.

If you take into account the total viewership of right vs. centre vs. left media, media with a right-wing tilt definitely has more presence. Heck, even CNN, which many psychos like Limbaugh, O'Reilly, Coulter, etc. believe is liberal has a slightly right-wing tilt. Combine this with MSNBC/CNBC and FOX News and you get likely 3/4 of the US population as viewers. None of these three stations have one iota of left-wing tilt. Face it, cable, in terms of access, there is a definitive right-wing bias to the news.

As for the fool who thinks the Drudge Report has a left-wing tilt, they must be to about the same extreme as Pat Buchanan, Pat Robertson, or some other idiot to think that.

 

[Duke E. Pyle]

Remember the 10's of thousands that died in New Orleans? Remember the false documents? Remember all the conspiracy theories? Notice how when anything good happens in Iraq its called "a rosey painted picture"? Notice how Millions just showed up to vote and hardly anything has been said? In the Clinton era first term, before i even got interested in politics i can still remember turning on the news and seeing casters with their fingers crossed discussing how they hoped Clinton would win. You've never met a person in your life that was offended by Christmas, yet that's all you fucking hear about on the news now. Fuck i've never met an atheist that didn't exchange presents. I believe the left will continue to deny this until absolutely nothing good about anything is constantly broadcast 24-7, and they are already mighty damn close. Y

 

[mikegellatly]

"The greatest trick the devil ever pulled, was convincing the world he didn't exist."

Everyone knows this Kevin Spacey line, but it is the perfect analogy for this. The right wing constantly talks of this biase and people start to believe it. All they say is "Where is the right wing POV in media." There should not be any wing's POV, but because the right claims not to see their POV expressed, they claim biase.

It's the big lie theory-Say something utterly outragous so many times that people have no choice but to believe it.

The only true biased in the media comes from the right (Fox, The Washington Times etc.).

 

[Cman]

The question should be where ISN'T the right wing represented. Hello?? Rush Limbaugh?? Ann Coulter? Tucker Carlson? Fox News?? Ringing any bells?

Not to mention the entire US govt. How the hell is that a left wing bias?

(Yes, I realize I'm Canadian, I just watch a lot of US News, ok? haha)

 

[Duke E. Pyle]

The only true biased in the media comes from the right (Fox, The Washington Times etc.).

FOX the only media to ask the public to please find their lies and deceptions in exchange for ridicule and public apologies. Want to see obvious lies and deceptions just tune in to the others to see our next president...President ALLLL GOOOORE everybody....oops:redface: If the media was a snake, which it is, you'd all get bit.

"The question should be where ISN'T the right wing represented. Hello?? Rush Limbaugh?? Ann Coulter? Tucker Carlson?"

When right or left wingers stop representing themselves, i'll personally buy you a hot mug of cocoa on the first day of an icey hell.

 

[Preferred User]

I sure wish I had someone/something to blame every time someone called up an inconvienient fact in a bar conversation. Must be nice to have the dastardly "liberal media". You can explain away anything you don't like. You don't even need your own data....ya just say...."well the liberal media ya know"

It's kinda comforting being a victim isn't it?

 

[Duke E. Pyle]

Multi-billion dollar giant world wide media's giving perfectly timed inconvenient facts..hahahahahahahaha I can explain away anything i don't like? I don't like lies, is that a bad thing. Listen that's two in a row of personal comments regarding nothing more than negative space. Now I know there aren't any examples to prove your points, so why not make some shit up! Hey they do it in the media all the time. Hell you got your polls and charts showing a tilt to the left, and i know how the libs love their little charts, so why even dispute it.

 

[Preferred User]

Duke, I'm not saying only this side or that side tilts the facts. Of course liberals tilt the facts. We all do.

We've got a conservative White House that has purchased "positive" (meaning favorable to their cause) stories in the US, positive stories in the Mid East, won't let anyone show pics of coffins coming back from Iraq, FOX news mysteriously touts the same talking points the rest of the White House is using on any given day, and Rumsfeld's first gut level response to the prisoner abuse stuff is to be irate that it got out to the press.

I'm just tired of this "liberal media" crutch, and in the first post that was the excuse leveled at liberals, implying that bias is a liberal phenomena. We all see things the way we want them. We all sell.

 

[mindido]

Jeez,

You want to see a great example of media bias, just check out the differences between the cable networks on the Dover, PA ID case. Fox News is outraged (looks like they're the new Pat Robertson).

 

[cableguy]

cman, frankens book, in addition to being fiction, would have better been titled simply "lies i tell."

your cited right wing bias can be consolidated into two categories--rugh limbaugh and fox news... oddly, geraldo, alan colmes and many others are conveniently left out when fox news is mentioned... funny... the US government does actually have a left wing bias... the state department, and other beaurocracies (cia, fbi, and others) have plenty of holdouts from previous administrations that lend a decidedly left wing lean to many things they do...

berg, it isnt about access... perhaps the reason what you call right wing media has the viewership/readership it does is because of left wing bias in MOST MEDIA OUTLETS... if you believe cnn to be anything but liberal, you are on your own--there is nothing i can do for you if you have already drunk the coolade...

you also either didnt read the article supplied in the link, or grossly misread the part about drudge... the reason he scored left, is that his site is primarily a link dump that leads to other sutes, usually sites with left wing bias... when you run the numbers, the stories there average left...

mike and preferred, please see the koolade comment above...

preferred, first and foremost, nothing published in iraq that was paid for by the US is false... not a single mistruth has been found... sometimes, the good news is bottled up because it doesnt blend well with the desired world view of a news outlet... sometimes fictions are published because they do blend with that view... i say paying for facts to come out is better than allowing them to be smothered due to their inconvenience to someones politics... in the US, i am comfortable saying that nothing new happened here, either... the worst thing i have heard is that someone was paid to write something that was in agreement with what he felt anyway... i certainly wouldnt protest getting paid to post here, and if i was paid, my posts would still be the same... where is the harm or the impropriety??

if you live in the US, YOUR first reaction to the prison story should have mirrored rummys... i purposely didnt use the word "abuse" because there is nothing yet that has come out that meets the criteria for it... perhaps you would prefer prisoners to be housed at the hilton or the sheraton... the other prison story--the "secret" prisons in foreign countries story, was an outrage, and i feel that its presentation borders on treason...

min, sorry... koolade apparently for you too... i have yet to hear alan colmes outraged about this... could you please remind everyone who he works for??

 

[Cman]

alan colmes and many others are conveniently left out when fox news is mentioned... funny...

oh yeah, you never want to omit the credibility there. those are some top quality examples

i wouldn't say geraldo is left or right wing, just retarded and not worth mentioning for either side. as far as colmes goes, he never gets a word in above the shouting of hannity, so it doesn't matter.

 

[cableguy]

not true... he actually gets about equal time with hannity... in any case, i am merely pointing out a trend...

 

[Preferred User]

preferred, first and foremost, nothing published in iraq that was paid for by the US is false... not a single mistruth has been found...

Cable, I didn't respond because we start with such different assumptions. I don't believe there is anyone who doesn't shade things and tell his version, including me, you, and the US military. I do respect your opinion, but our starting points are so far apart let's not stand here and throw things at each other.

Bill O'Reilly and Letterman

Speaking of Media Bias, I thought this was a good place for this little video . O'Reilly quoted some lyrics to Silent Night, supposedly a skirmish in his big battle, The War on Christmas. Letterman tells him "I have the feeling 60% of what you say is crap". Sure enough, the real story on the lyrics is quite different than what O'Reilly presented.

 

[endymion]

Cable, to quote you quickly, "I say paying for facts to come out is better than allowing them to be smothered due to their inconvenience to someones politics.."

So news stories should be allowed out at all times, not matter what, right? Even if it inconvieniences the current administration?
Then doesn't the fact that the Bush Administration is meeting with editors and reporters in meetings they are not allowed to report on, to delay or kill important news stories, go completely against this ideal? Against the first amendment, of free speech?

http://www.cjrdaily.org/behind_the_news/the_times_and_the_post_go_sile.php

Now the Columbia Journal Review is meant to be quite unbiased from all reports, and I don't think is really about left or right biased media. But if this story is true, it's about media being told what to say and when, which is just plain scary. And before you say "Well, they must be biased", they also reported on the same report you did, and here's their view of it. Quite down the middle, and they admit it's an impressive (if flawed) report.

http://www.cjrdaily.org/behind_the_news/bias_study_falls_43_7_perce.php

It's also a report baed over a period of 10 years. I'd be more fascinated by one which covered any difference in the bias in the media from when Clinton was in Power, and then a separate reviw for Bush's time in the big, white house. THAT'D be interesting.

Just my thoughts from over the water.

 

[cableguy]

endy, there is a distinct difference between news and national security issues... IF exposure of a story can have a negative impact on national security, the story should, by all means, be squashed... thankfully, most news outlets ask before running this type of story. if a story embarrasses or is inconvenient to an administration, but is still newsworthy, it can, and should, be run... the detention center issue IS a national security item, not an embarrassment... in all honesty, whoever let that info out should be tried for treason...

your first link makes mention of the ny times not publishing anything about wireless wiretapping for over a year... this, while factually accurate, is so unbelievably flawed it nearly defies description... a more accurate statement, while sticking to the exact theme of the story, would be that the times didnt report on warrantless wiretapping for over 26 years, as the practice of warrantless wiretaps goes back AT LEAST to President Carter. Presidents Reagan, Bush, Clinton, and Bush have merely held to the status quo on these... the very fact that this omission has become so widespread should mean something to anyone concerned about the political leanings of media outlets...

in a perfect world, no media would have any bias.. that can never happen, as story selection and rejection is a part of bias... there simply isnt enough room for every point of view on every story... absent that, there should be every effort made by ALL media outlets to stick to who, what, when, where, and how... if why is known and verified, it may be included as well... adjectives describing people should be avoided if at all possible, as these are easy to manipulate and add to encourage the viewer/reader to adopt a certain point of view... journalism is about spreading the word of what happened, NOT how someone should feel about it...

item two--great link, btw--requires me to refer back to something earlier in this post... story selection... a lot of how we feel about things has to do with what we have heard about them... there havent been many stories in major media outlets about iraqs infrastructure, for example... there have been a few, but largely these have been tainted with a heavy dose of negativity...

story selection is a great way to insert bias, even if there is no blatant bias in any of the stories reported on... if you heard nothing but glowing stories about something, you would probably support it, or at least feel good about it.. the same is true for only bad news about something being reported... by selecting stories that are primarily bad, or good, news on any topic, the media outlet is delivering a built in bias for or against whatever that story happens to be...

there is no report on bias that can measure accurately, because there is no way to quantify the omission of stories..

if you want a comparison of media coverage now vs the Clinton years, check stories on the US economy, homeless people, certain dow jones milestones (10,000 was a major milestone, while 11,000 now is "just a psychological marker").. the stories about US military actions will also tell you a lot...