Media strongly favors Democrats

Parent Cafe
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<p>Oh, Kluge, let us have a few lies of our own. I am starting to feel warm and fuzzy knowing that Bill Clinton, Madeleine Albright, Sandy Berger, William Cohen, Tom Daschle, or Nancy Pelosi were all disguised Republicans. </p>

<p>What do you think Obama’s position would have been in … 1998? </p>

<p>By the way, thanks for telling about *the *truth! Of course, here’s the other version of the same truth.</p>

<p>“The community of nations may see more and more of the very kind of threat Iraq poses now: a rogue state with weapons of mass destruction, ready to use them or provide them to terrorists. If we fail to respond today, Saddam and all those who would follow in his footsteps will be emboldened tomorrow.” – Bill Clinton in 1998 </p>

<p>“Saddam’s goal … is to achieve the lifting of U.N. sanctions while retaining and enhancing Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction programs. We cannot, we must not and we will not let him succeed.” – Madeleine Albright, 1998 </p>

<p>“(Saddam) will rebuild his arsenal of weapons of mass destruction and some day, some way, I am certain he will use that arsenal again, as he has 10 times since 1983” – National Security Adviser Sandy Berger, Feb 18, 1998 </p>

<p>“I am absolutely convinced that there are weapons…I saw evidence back in 1998 when we would see the inspectors being barred from gaining entry into a warehouse for three hours with trucks rolling up and then moving those trucks out.” – Clinton’s Secretary of Defense William Cohen</p>

<p>“Iraq is not the only nation in the world to possess weapons of mass destruction, but it is the only nation with a leader who has used them against his own people.” – Tom Daschle in 1998 </p>

<p>“As a member of the House Intelligence Committee, I am keenly aware that the proliferation of chemical and biological weapons is an issue of grave importance to all nations. Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons of mass destruction technology which is a threat to countries in the region and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process.” – Nancy Pelosi, December 16, 1998</p>

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<p>Maybe there were more negatives for Obama simply because he screwed up more.</p>

<p>[And imagine how many MORE negative comments there would’ve been about Obama if the media WEREN’T biased in his favor!;))</p>

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<p>^ No - believe me, McCain has screwed up more and flip-flopped on many more issues (being a former McCain supporter in 1999/2000).</p>

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<p>I don’t mean to be overly contrary, but why should I “believe you”? Got some data to back up that assertion?</p>

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<p>Thank you for bumping this. Dh raised this study with me a couple of days ago, and I hadn’t seen it. </p>

<p>Now that I have, I feel even more correct about my initial assessment: HUH?</p>

<p>“Two-hundred thirty-five journalists donated to Democrats, just 20 gave to Republicans — a margin greater than 10-to-1. …”</p>

<p>This is nowhere near a representative sampling. Out of the tens of thousands of working journalists, only 255 gave anything? Hardly indicative of a widespread liberal media bias.</p>

<p>"Searches for other newsroom categories (reporters, correspondents, news editors, anchors, newspaper editors and publishers) produces 311 donors to Democrats to 30 donors to Republicans … " Same problem.</p>

<p>“A few journalists list their employer as an organization like MSNBC, MSNBC.com or ABC News, or report that they’re freelancers for the New York Times, or are journalists for Al Jazeera, CNN Turkey, Deutsche Welle Radio or La Republica of Rome (all contributions to Obama). Most report no employer. They’re mainly freelancers. That’s because most major news organization have policies that forbid newsroom employees from making political donations.”</p>

<p>Uh, yeah, exactly. No journalist worth his/her salt is going to donate money to a political candidate. A number of media outlets not only forbid political contributions but also don’t allow the displaying of yard signs or bumper stickers. Some journalists I know don’t even vote in elections (I think that’s a little too much dedication there). I’m sure many of these people who are calling themselves journalists and “NYT free-lancers” (oh, brother) are members of the “new media” who don’t really have any training – they just set up a website, blog away and then think they’re legitimate journalists, thereby smearing the whole business.</p>

<p>That said, I am appalled at how few journalists ask real questions of any of the candidates. Even more than that, where are the investigative pieces? The presidential election should not be covered like a horse race.</p>

<p>BTW, who compiled those stats? Mr. Tate, it looks like. Not sure I want to trust him. I tried to find out for what paper the esteemed Mr. Tate won his awards and came up empty, though I see his novel about what would happen if the Dems had won the 2000 election reviewed by a service where you can pay to get a review and lend your book some legitimacy.</p>

<p>People, people.</p>

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<p>For instance, McCain thought the war would be “quick” and “easy” - and considering his supposedly foreign policy/military “expertise” - we can blame him for such a drastic miscalculation. </p>

<p>Didn’t he learn anything from is classes on insurgency at the Academy (despite his poor grades) or even his experience in Vietnam?</p>

<p>And yet, once things got messy, McCain changed his tune…</p>

<p>McCain, the “foreign-policy expert” seems to not comprehend that Somalia is more of a hotbed for Islamic radicals than Iraq due to much more local support.</p>

<p>From his just recent flip-flop on affirmative action - to his stance on off-shore drilling to his stance on interrogation practices performed at Gitmo and other facilities to the Bush tax cuts, etc.</p>

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<p>What’s really funny Hindoo is that up here in Cincy they put Air America et al on a local 50,000 watt flame-thrower of a station. It didn’t last 2 years. They couldn’t sell enough advertising because their ratings were terrible. I used to listen and all they did was whine and complain. People got sick of it very quickly. Even the hometown boy Jerry “I wrote a check to a prostitute” Springer couldn’t get listeners. It used to give me great delight to listen to them snivel and drone on about things…never once suggesting a fix for anything. Just whining. </p>

<p>If you can get it and can handle some good old fashioned middle of the road common sense try Mike McConnell on 700 WLW (you can stream it live or catch him on podcasts from the website). You’ll want to elect him the next POTUS after you’ve listened to him for a while.</p>

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<p>Gee, I wonder why Rush, Hannity and O’Reilly are so popular?</p>

<p>Maybe right-wingers, unlike others, enjoy WHINING and COMPLAINING?</p>

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<p>k&s - you can accuse McCain of flip-flopping all you want. He isn’t afraid to take a stand on an issue, and then, if facts should change, he isn’t afraid to reassess, and be honest about it. I respect that so much more than someone who tries to “finesse” his answers to questions on the issues in attempt to avoid being “nailed down” to his stances.</p>

<p>“Flip-flopping” is no great sin compared to attempting to ride BOTH sides of an issues AT THE SAME TIME.</p>

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<p>I don’t think they complain much - unless it’s complaining about the whiners. :)</p>

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<p>One of the mainstays of the right wing radio hosts is telling their listeners how much smarter they are than anyone else, and how “other people” (i.e those stupid “liberals”) are so inferior to the right thinking dittoheads. It’s interesting to watch the dementia play out here on CC, as the righties congratulate each other on how superior they are to liberals. :rolleyes:</p>

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<p>I don’t listen to Hannity or Limbaugh. They are juvenile and their rhetoric, like Air America, gets old very quickly…</p>

<p>I think your die-hards on either side whine and complain a lot.</p>

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<p>The latter sounds like Obama on the gun control debate.</p>

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<p>The Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University, where researchers have tracked network news content for two decades, found that ABC, NBC and CBS were tougher on Obama than on Republican John McCain during the first six weeks of the general-election campaign.</p>

<p>During the evening news, the majority of statements from reporters and anchors on all three networks are neutral, the center found. And when network news people ventured opinions in recent weeks, 28% of the statements were positive for Obama and 72% negative.</p>

<p>Network reporting also tilted against McCain, but far less dramatically, with 43% of the statements positive and 57% negative, according to the Washington-based media center.</p>

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<p>Here’s a link to a report about that study:
[Study:</a> Media rougher on Obama - UPI.com](<a href=“Study: Media rougher on Obama - UPI.com”>Study: Media rougher on Obama - UPI.com)</p>

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<p>I don’t know which evening news they have been listening to, but the one I have been listening to give Obama a very favorable coverage. </p>

<p>How did they measure negative coverage?</p>

<p>Why not include Fox. MSNBC and CNN?</p>

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<p>tega:</p>

<p>All of the studies done so far have considered only the evening news programs.</p>

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<p>Why the evening news? How many people watch the evening news? How many people watch CNN, MSNBC, and Fox? Did they exclude the other news networks because it didn’t fit their narrative? </p>

<p>I have been watching the evening news almost every night for the last couple of weeks, and Obama has enjoyed a very favorable coverage during that time, so I am not sure how they are measuring this “negative” coverage.</p>

<p>This measure is very subjective.</p>

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<p>The story says this study hs been conducted since the '80s, so, maybe for consistency sake, they’re not including some of the newer stations?</p>

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<p>Something is screwy about that study - in order to accurately measure the pos & neg of reporters, it would have to ensure that all reporters were critiquing actions by the candidates which were essentially “equal”.</p>

<p>Given that the candidates engage in different activities at different times, it would stand to reason that the reporting on those tasks would vary greatly from reporter to reporter at any given time.</p>

<p>I don’t see how those numbers have any great significance.</p>

<p>Am I wrong? (I’m open for discussion if anyone can defend the study).</p>