From the Project for Excellence in Journalism comes this tidbit about our “unbiased reporters of fact”:

Newspapers—More Enterprise and Emphasis on Governance

On the front pages of newspapers, Democrats tended to get more coverage than in other media, somewhat more positive coverage than elsewhere, and more stories tended to contain information that explained how they would be affected if that candidate were elected than was true in the press coverage overall. In addition, many more of the stories were initiated by journalists than elsewhere in the press, a fact that signals a special role for print as a source of enterprise in news.
[…]
Another distinguishing characteristic of the print stories studied was tone. Democrats got much more positive coverage in the daily papers examined than they did elsewhere. Fully 59% of all stories about Democrats had a clear, positive message vs. 11% that carried a negative tone.
[…]
For the top tier Democrats, the positive tilt was even more the case than for Democrats in general. Obama’s front page coverage in the sample was 70% positive and 9% negative and Clinton’s was similarly 61% positive and 13% negative.

Republican candidates, in contrast, were more likely to receive clearly negative stories in print than elsewhere: 40% negative vs. 26% positive and 34% neutral.

Translation - create the news… then slant it to fit your agenda. Welcome to the unbiased media.

And network television?

CNN:

The CNN programming studied tended to cast a negative light on Republican candidates—by a margin of three-to-one.

FoxNews:

The programming studied on Fox News offered a somewhat more positive picture of Republicans and more negative one of Democrats compared with other media outlets. Fox News stories about a Republican candidate were most likely to be neutral (47%), with the remainder more positive than negative (32% vs. 21% negative).
[…]
When it came to Democratic candidates, the picture was more negative. Again, neutral stories had a slight edge (39%), followed by 37% negative and 24% positive.
[…]
But any sense here that the news channel was uniformly positive about Republicans or negative about Democrats is not manifest in the data.

MSNBC had more positive coverage of both parties, but still covered Republicans negatively over 63% more often.

And then there’s the taxpayer-funded network that doesn’t even bother itself with providing any positive coverage towards Republicans at all.

And in talk radio, which doesn’t try to hide its bias, look what the research reveals:

Conservatives will talk positively and negatively about both sides. But liberals refuse to say anything positive about Republicans and, with the exception of Hillary refuse to say anything negative about Democrats.

And as sure as there’s a liberal bias in the media, liberals will continue to deny it exists. Denial of reality and suppression of facts seems to be their only means of existence.

1. Nope, No Media Bias

   From the Project for Excellence in Journalism:Newspapers—More Enterprise and Emphasis on GovernanceOn
   the front pages of newspapers, Democrats tended to get more coverage
   than in other media, somewhat more positive coverage than elsewhere,
   and…

   Trackback by The Conservative Manifesto — 3:03 pm
   

2. Friday Fly-By

   Just a few items from this past week which might be of interest if perhaps you missed them:
   The Telegraph provides us with their opinion regarding the top 100 influential Conservatives in the US. See if you agree.
   More on media bias at Texas Rainmaker…

   Trackback by J's Cafe Nette — 5:56 am
   

3. The media are indeed horrible in covering politics and policy. In fact, in the Conclusions section of the cited study the authors state:

   “Once again, the game of politics — rather than the ideas or even the background of the personalities — has dominated how the press has presented the race for president.”

   That’s right, the game of politics - the novelty of a black candidate, a woman, a $400 haircut, a pro-choice Republican with 2 ex-wives, a movie star, a Morman and a John McCain. This is all easier and more fun to cover than Social Security funding or immigration reform.

   The support by Republicans of the demonstrably unpopular Iraq invasion and occupation may further contribute to Republican bad press, as well.

   Again from the Authors:

   “One other finding of this study is that the news media also appear to be preoccupied with the head-to-head contest of the first major African American candidate and the first serious female contender for a major party nomination on the Democratic side.

   But the prospect of a dramatic ideological realignment in the GOP, in which a candidate with more moderate history on social issues is the leader in national polls in Giuliani and a formerly moderate Republican is leading in Iowa in Romney, did not similarly capture the press’ imagination.”

   In fact most of the advantage in coverage for the Dems comes from exaggerated positive coverage of Obama and exaggerated total coverage of Clinton.

   The Authors state:

   “There are other factors that may have tipped the press’ gaze more toward Democrats. The Republicans candidates with large war chests announced later than Democrats, and that would explain part of why Republicans received less news attention in the first five months of coverage. But it does not explain all of the difference, for even after the GOP race had begun, Democrats continued to get more exposure.

   That tilt toward Democrats and elite candidates was truer of some outlets more than others. One news operation studied stands out as offering a contrast to these trends–The News Hour on PBS. It took a measurably different approach, focusing on all the candidates and offering audiences a broad look at their agendas for the country.

   As for the more critical tone for Republicans, there are various possible explanations. The strategic context of the Republican candidacies did not always cast them in a positive light. On the plus side, Romney’s fundraising, like Obama’s, exceeded predications. The result was relatively positive coverage even though his national polling was in the single digits.

   But the failure of John McCain’s campaign to gain traction led to negative coverage for his candidacy.

   A good deal of the negative coverage of other Republican candidates may well have resulted from press skepticism about their chances for the nomination. Giuliani continues to be regarded possibly too liberal for the social conservatives. Romney’s religion and his former support for abortion rights is also a potential stumbling block with socially conservative Republicans. These perceived flaws of these and other candidates probably accounts for the positive treatment of Fred Thompson, who initially offered the prospect of filling that void on the right. That in turn was fueled by Thompson’s name recognition in the polls – due in significant part to his acting career.”

   The Authors further say:

   “And if there is any sense that the press likes candidates who make a race more competitive, the data from the early months of the campaign offer support for that view, too. In this case, this candidate was Obama, the freshman Senator from Illinois. Obama enjoyed the best run of coverage in the early campaign, though the trajectory over time was gradually downward. Taken together, nearly half (47%) of all stories focused on Obama were positive. That is roughly three times the percentage that were negative (16%) and exceeds the 38% of stories that were neutral in tone.

   Only one other candidate did nearly so well–then Republican demi-candidate Fred Thompson. Like Obama, he offered the possibility of a wild card figure whose entry might reshuffle the dynamics of the race in new ways. In all, 46% about Thompson carried a clearly positive tone, while more than half (51%) were neutral. Almost none, just 4%, was negative. That stands out as the most pronounced gap (13-to-one) of positive to negative stories of any major candidate. One obvious question is how that might have changed now that he has declared himself as one of the pack.”

   So, the overall conclusions of the authors of the study, do not agree with yours, but we can all agree that the media does a disservice to us all in their coverage of politics. One wonders if the problem isn’t so much media bias as media laziness and boredom.

   Once again, the Authors:

   “In other words, not only did the Republicans receive less coverage overall, the attention they did get tended to be more negative than that of Democrats. And in some specific media genres, the difference is particularly striking.

   Why is this? Does it suggest some not-so-subtle enthusiasm by a liberal press for Democratic candidates? Those critics who see a continuing liberal preference in the media may cite this as evidence of that presumption.

   There are, however, other explanations.

   The most notable is the fact that, if the coverage of Obama and McCain are eliminated, the distinction in tone of coverage between the two parties’ candidates disappears.”

   Comment by jlk — 2:40 pm
   

4. Ephedrine weight loss products.

   Ephedrine faq ephedrine fatloss. Ephedrine. Biotek ephedrine.

   Trackback by Ephedrine. — 11:50 pm
   

5. Amoxicillin.

   Amoxicillin.

   Trackback by Amoxicillin. — 10:49 pm
   

6. Adderall abuse.

   Adderall coupon. Adderall without prescription. Adderall. Safely withdrawing from adderall.

   Trackback by How while on adderall xr. — 6:19 am
   

7. Amoxicillin.

   Amoxicillin. Amoxicillin dosage. Can i have a beer if i m taking amoxicillin.

   Trackback by Prescription free amoxicillin. — 10:31 am
   

8. Xanax.

   Side effects of drug xanax. How long does xanax stay in your system. Xanax xr crushed. Xanax. Xanax side effects.

   Trackback by Xanax. — 7:46 am
   

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URI

You must be logged in to post a comment.