The Media’s New Role

It is no mystery that that the mainstream news casted its vote early on for Obama. Given their left tendencies it was no surprise to see them fondling themselves in anticipation. The accolades, the adoration, the “tingles that run up their legs” with the prospects of an Obama presidency. Well they got what they wanted. Now what?

The news now days isn’t about reporting facts or stories, it is about creating the news, telling people what they should think, and allowing surrogates and talking heads time to fill up the 24 hour news cycle. Have you ever wondered why they only allow sound bites from the candidates themselves, but give endless time to their surrogates and talking heads to analyze what they said, how they said it and what you should think about it? It is because they don’t trust you. They don’t want you to think for yourself, they want to do it for you. You are not educated enough, you are not aware enough and you are certainly not capable of crafting your own opinion.

But now they have a problem. They promoted Obama, helping raise the expectations of his supporters. They fueled the fire of his greatness, the political messiah, the chosen one, to the point they know he cannot live up to. But when he can’t deliver on his myriad of promises, they won’t be able to criticize him. Now, I know that you are reading this several days after the election, but I wrote it the Thursday after the election and I will tell you what is going to happen, because it started this morning.

On the Today Show they had a full four minutes of “the daunting tasks that face the new President Obama.” Except, they used every chance they had both in the story and right after the story to lower the bar. They have decided that they need to begin, the day after the election, to douse the fire that they fueled for the last year. They realize that if they don’t, they will lose more credibility. What is telling about this is that they know they are manipulating you, and they don’t care. Why? Because, the general populace is too uneducated to follow their subtle “strategery.” They proved it during the election. They could give you the Obama talking points and you think it is the news. They could tell you what to think, how to think and what to say, then it was repeated over and over again by the uneducated watchers.

The media wants you to trust them. I say, you know better. So when they start defending the “failed Obama policies” remember, they put them him there, they need to own up to their bias.

Here is a great report on the history of studies done by reputable sources about media bias. Of course the numbers are not in for this last election, but I suspect that the results will be more negative news for the media. Here is the source: http://www.mrc.org/biasbasics/pdf/BiasBasics.pdf

Here are some highlights from 2004’s election:

The vast majority of American voters detected media bias: “83 percent of likely voters said the media is biased in one direction or another, while just 11 percent believe the media doesn’t take political sides,” Zogby reported.

By a huge margin, most of those who saw media bias thought it favored liberals: “Nearly two-thirds of those online respondents who detected bias in the media (64 percent) said the media leans left, while slightly more than a quarter of respondents (28 percent) said they see a conservative bias.”

Republicans and independents both saw the media as dominated by liberals, and even some
Democratic voters agreed: “While 97 percent of Republicans surveyed said the media are liberal, two-thirds of political independents feel the same....Just two-thirds of Democrats were certain the media skewed right — and 17 percent said the bias favored the left.”

Here is some from the horse’s mouth:

“I don’t know if it’s 95 percent...[but] there are enough [liberals] in the old media, not just in ABC, but in old media generally, that it tilts the coverage quite frequently, in many issues, in a liberal direction....It’s an endemic problem. And again, it’s the reason why for 40 years, conservatives have rightly felt that we did not give them a fair shake.”
— ABC News political director Mark Halperin appearing on The Hugh Hewitt Show, October 30, 2006.

“I believe it is true that a significant chunk of the press believes that Democrats are incompetent but good-hearted, and Republicans are very efficient but evil.”
— Wall Street Journal political editor John Harwood on the April 23, 2005 Inside Washington.

“At ABC, people say ‘conservative’ the way people say ‘child molester.’”
— ABC 20/20 co-anchor John Stossel to CNSNews.com reporter Robert Bluey, in a story posted January 28, 2004.

“As the science editor at Time I would freely admit that on this issue we have crossed the boundary from news reporting to advocacy.”
— Time Science Editor Charles Alexander at a September 16, 1989 global warming conference, as quoted by David Brooks in an October 5, 1989 Wall Street Journal column.