IlliniBob72 Posted May 17, 2004 Share Posted May 17, 2004 It is interesting how the GOP has used their criticism of the media. Basically they are telling voters to not believe anything they hear if it is critical of Republicans. They have made themselves teflon. You can only trust what the GOP tells you, very similar to the old Soviet Union and TASS. Cannot trust the media, we will take it over and have a government run media. Of course all you GOPers will believe a government run newspaper. This should probably be regarded as the greatest political victory ever. A free press is one of our greatest liberties and, as a tool to protect us from the government, even better than guns. But the Republicans have been able to get all their followers to dismiss that right. Beautiful thing. If the GOP gets criticized, it is the messenger that is wrong, not the GOP. And occording to the GOP, the media is one way. When they attack Clinton, they are 100% accurate. When they criticize Bush, they are acting on their bias. And when you look at media, which liberal media are you talking about? Rush, Hannity, O'Reilly, Reagan, Drudge, We need happy news to keep this country from being "There's something totally out of whack in this country." Each day the newspapers should report only good things the Republicans are doing. Happy talk. No one is dying, no one is starving, all economic indicators are Happy. Then we will have an unbiased media. Two guys on the radio, one guy on cable, one guy on the internet, and I have no idea where to read, hear, or watch Reagan. The liberal media referred to by most is mainstream media, i.e. the major networks, CNN, NPR, etc. And any media outlet that isn't as liberal as those, i.e. Fox News, the WSJ, are viewed as Conservative propaganda machines. Besides, who in the world is dismissing the right to a free press? Someone can believe that the media is biased without infringing on anyone's right to free press. I don't see how it is possible to deny the fact that the mainstream media is biased when soldier after soldier comes back from Iraq or writes back and says that the way the situation is being portrayed in much different than the reality. Even if they are only half right, that is 50% more than we are hearing or reading. Also, I assume your reference to criticism of Clinton being viewed as 100% accurate by Republicans is a joke, seeing as there wasn't any criticism. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Texsox Posted May 17, 2004 Share Posted May 17, 2004 Two guys on the radio, one guy on cable, one guy on the internet, and I have no idea where to read, hear, or watch Reagan. The liberal media referred to by most is mainstream media, i.e. the major networks, CNN, NPR, etc. And any media outlet that isn't as liberal as those, i.e. Fox News, the WSJ, are viewed as Conservative propaganda machines. Besides, who in the world is dismissing the right to a free press? Someone can believe that the media is biased without infringing on anyone's right to free press. I don't see how it is possible to deny the fact that the mainstream media is biased when soldier after soldier comes back from Iraq or writes back and says that the way the situation is being portrayed in much different than the reality. Even if they are only half right, that is 50% more than we are hearing or reading. Also, I assume your reference to criticism of Clinton being viewed as 100% accurate by Republicans is a joke, seeing as there wasn't any criticism. Didn't criticize Clinton? Gee then how did we ever learn about Monica, or any of the Clinton ladies? Whitewater, and I could go on. Nope, no criticism there. How about the impeachment hearings? Wasn't that the media? If the evening news spends :30 seconds reporting a Bush mistake the Republican talk show hosts will spend hours claiming media bias and that Bush is correct. Keep buying into the Republican plan. Only believe what they want you to believe. Why not just ban all newspapers and just have a GOP media. Keep repeating ,mega dittos Rush, mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush. I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP. A free press is out to get me. A free press is scary. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LowerCaseRepublican Posted May 17, 2004 Share Posted May 17, 2004 The idea of a "liberal media" is a joke. Geoffery Nunberg, a Stanford professor of linguistics and research scientist, used a database of the top 20 most popular newspapers and found that "media" appears within 7 words of "liberal bias" 569 times while "conservative bias" is found just 17 times. It raises the question: if the liberals control the media, why do they spend so much time and effort publicizing their ruthless suppression of their adversaries? Back in 1995, Bill Kristol admitted "I admit it. The liberal media was never that powerful and the whole thing was often used as an excuse by conservatives for conservative failures." Newspaper editors, the ones that decide what stories get printed, 48% voted for Bush and only 23% for Gore in publication endorsements by their papers. (The others chose another candidate or did not endorse) In papers with circulation of less than 50,000 Bush won by a margin of 3 to 1, under 100,000 Bush won with a margin of 5 to 3 and over 100,000 Bush won endorsements on an average of 5 to 4. A study commissioned in 1990 showed that of the top 7 pundits who got regular space in over 100 newspapers, 4 of the 7 were conservative: Will, Kilpatrick, Safire, & William F. Buckley. Only one, Ellen Goodman was classified as a liberal. This is similar in 1999 when they made it the top 14 columnists by simple volume of how many papers their articles were published in and how many readers they had. All of the top 4 were conservative in in the list in total: 9 conservative, 3 liberal and 2 centrist. Re: Clinton, I'll quote Ralph Reed "I think if you look at the way Clinton's been treated, for example, I think you'd be hard pressed to say that the persona liberal ideological views of most reporters...have somehow led to a free ride for Bill Clinton." Gore and Clinton getting smashed over the Buddhist temple "fundraiser" that never took place, the Gores and "Love Story" debocles, smashing Gore over the "creation of the internet" while Bush has gotten soft hits on Meet the Press etc. John Harris states "Are the national news media soft on Bush? The instinctive response of any reporter is to deny it. But my rebuttals lately have been wobbly. The truth is, this new president has done things with relative impunity that would have been huge uproars if they had occurred under Clinton. Take it from someone who made a living writing about these uproars." Conservatives enjoy the Washington Times, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, the New York Post, United Press International, CBN, Tribune-Review, Weekly Standars, National Review, Fox News Channel ad nauseum. NBC's channels had the Wall Street Journal editorial board host their own show, Michael Savage, Alan Keyes, Laura Ingraham, Ollie North, Bay Buchanan, Pat Buchanan, Robert Novak, Lawrence Kudlow, Jerry Nachman and Don Imus. All conservatives. The one liberal they hired was Phil Donahue who was fired even though he had the highest ratings. Whistleblowers within NBC released the documents showing that he was fired because he "would give the anti-Bush and anti-war audience a voice without a conservative counterpart to dispel the claims". If the media was so damn liberal, wouldn't they want that? Even in 2001, when CNN brought Carville and Begala to Crossfire, thee was an informal directive that leaked from the Senate Republican leadership discussing a GOP boycott of Crossfire in an attempt to intimidate the hosts or CNN management. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JUGGERNAUT Posted May 17, 2004 Share Posted May 17, 2004 Just in case you hadn't notice, juggs, my references were very tongue and cheek. Of course that's not the answer, but if we're going to "nuke" one place, we should look no further then our own country for extremeists. That was my point. I assumed you were making pun just like NUKE CLEVELAND does. I'd prefer he change that to NUKE TWINKIES. But there are some on this board that might actually think it's a cool thing to drop nukes & I wanted to spell it out verbatim it's not. As for the topic at hand which appears to have shifted to GOP vs DEM & conservative vs liberal media I'll lend my two cents. Many of you spend too much time believing that one is good & the other is evil. The reality is that both are evil. There isn't an institution in existence that does not have it's good & evil parts. There never has been & there never will be. At least not as long as this planet is run by mankind. So when choosing between the two you simply choose between the lesser of two evils as they affect your individual life. The more open-minded you are the more you will seek information from both sides so that you have enough evil on both to compare them on a scale. Right now for being either too stupid or too wicked in his handling of Iraq I have a big :fyou to Rummy. Based on all the information I've read from both sides he simply failed to do all he could do in his job there. I personally think he's done a s***ty job & it goes to show you that no amount of higher education can prevent stupidity or wickedness from gaining power in America. I mean it's pretty much the same argument with Clinton & his scandals. After it's all been said or done you either say he was too wicked or too stupid. I tend to think Bill's more horny than wicked so I give him the stupid classification. My jury's out on Rummy. I'm leaning toward stupid but there's a lot to suggest too wicked so the best I can say is too wicked & too stupid. In either case I don't like wicked or stupid people controlling the life & death decisions of American service persons. Adios Rummy .. you deserve more than just a resignation. How about a nice kick in the pants? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlaSoxxJim Posted May 17, 2004 Share Posted May 17, 2004 I hoped you would put together a response to the 'liberal media bias' chestnut Apu, as I knew yours would be more detailed than any I tried to put together. Yes, the Liberal Media Bias is a fantastical creature conjured from imagination, much like Bigfoot and the Easter Bunny. And maybe the Compassionate Conservative, too? When PNAC co-founder Bill Kristol admits it's bunk, and when you look at the political leanings of the media outlet owners it is amazing the myth still persists. Who was it that said 'the greatest trick the Devil ever pulled off was convincing the world he didn't exist'? In the same vain, the greatest trick the Conservative-run press ever pulled off was convincing the world of a Liberal media bias. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IlliniBob72 Posted May 18, 2004 Share Posted May 18, 2004 Didn't criticize Clinton? Gee then how did we ever learn about Monica, or any of the Clinton ladies? Whitewater, and I could go on. Nope, no criticism there. How about the impeachment hearings? Wasn't that the media? If the evening news spends :30 seconds reporting a Bush mistake the Republican talk show hosts will spend hours claiming media bias and that Bush is correct. Keep buying into the Republican plan. Only believe what they want you to believe. Why not just ban all newspapers and just have a GOP media. Keep repeating ,mega dittos Rush, mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush,mega dittos Rush. I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I do not believe the newspapers, only Rush and Hannity, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP, I am programmed for the GOP. A free press is out to get me. A free press is scary. Jeeze, Tex. Kinda worked up over this, eh? Who here ever said they don't believe the newspapers? Who here suggested they told lies? You can't tell someone definitively that they are wrong when they say they believe that if Bush got his knob gobbed in the Oval Office he'd take a much harsher beating from the media than Clinton did. How did we find out about Monica, Whitewater, etc. you ask? The media told us the facts, of course. The question in the minds of people who believe the media is biased isn't if we are getting the information. It is how it is given and how it is emphasized. The media didn't give us the impeachment hearings like it was a made-for-TV event. Congress gave us that, as did Clinton, indirectly. You attack people who believe there is a bias in the media as if they are for squashing the Constitution. People can be pro-information and dislike the way it is conveyed, without wanting to ban information. s***, if I complain about Darrin Jackson, you would say that I am screaming about shutting down the White Sox! And Apu, that is good evidence of lack of bias in the print media. I would question the use of the quote from Bill Kristol though. For one, I am not sure what context it was in, and secondly, contrary to Jim saying he says the idea of bias is bunk, Kristol says that it wasn't that powerful. That isn't denying it exists. If I say that Bartman didn't cost the Cubs the series, I am not saying he never touched the ball. Bias is perception. Bernard Goldberg made good points in saying there is liberal media bias in the major networks. Dan Rather is very liberal. The fact that he is one of the major newscasters in the country immediately leads to bias. And people are just naturally sensitive about what they are close to. If I have to read one more thing here about how ESPN is biased against the White Sox and the Midwest, I'll puke. But I'm sure ESPN says good things about the Sox when warranted and bad things when warranted. The thing about bias about the war is this, IMO. Soldiers dying is news. Opening a watermain in Baghdad isn't. A prisoner with panties on his head is more intriguing than an Iraqi child hugging a G.I. I do believe that there is much more good going on in Iraq than bad. This is because I have read and heard enough from soldiers there to know that. I can also see the bias in Hannity and Rush and know to take them with a grain of salt. Whenever they get a caller who challenges them with facts and reason, they shoot them down by accusing them of being put up to calling by the DNC. And for the record, I didn't believe Clinton should be impeached. Yeah, I was pissed in that I knew that if I had an intern fellate me on the job, I'd be fired, but I wasn't for the huge $$$ spent in prosecuting him. I also had no problem with him lying about it. I know that if I had done that, I'd lie through my teeth about it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlaSoxxJim Posted May 18, 2004 Share Posted May 18, 2004 Good points, Bob, particularly on the inherent juiciness of some stories over others and the danger therein. In that regard, the media in general suffers from an inherent bias in running the stories that have legs over those that don't regardless of which stories have the deeper remifications/implications. As far as the Kobol dismissal of the liberal bias notion, I focused more on the second half of the statement (that a scarecrow liberal bias was convenient because it hid conservative failures so the notion is best perpetuated from their standpoint). As far as the partial admonition that the liberal media was 'never that powerful,' I would tend to also interpret it to mean if it held no sway over the masses it could not be truly considered any sort of meaningful bias. But I concede Kobal's statement does fall short of absolutely dismissing the notion of liberal bias. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YASNY Posted May 18, 2004 Share Posted May 18, 2004 I just know what I see and what I hear. Tom Brokaw is one of the worst. In fact, he's put off his retirement until after this election. I wonder what his agenda could be. Look guys, I don't trust "W" as far as I can throw him. So don't put me in that "Republican" catagory. All I'm saying is that I would appreciate it if the media would present an unslanted view of things so that I can make up my own mind without them trying to influence me. When they pound on the prisoner abuse story for 10 days and give 1 day of coverage to the beheading, that tells me that SOMEONE in the media has a political agenda. They are trying to beat down Bush through Rumsfeld. I wish they'd just back off and let things take it's natural course. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kapkomet Posted May 18, 2004 Share Posted May 18, 2004 I just know what I see and what I hear. Tom Brokaw is one of the worst. In fact, he's put off his retirement until after this election. I wonder what his agenda could be. Look guys, I don't trust "W" as far as I can throw him. So don't put me in that "Republican" catagory. All I'm saying is that I would appreciate it if the media would present an unslanted view of things so that I can make up my own mind without them trying to influence me. When they pound on the prisoner abuse story for 10 days and give 1 day of coverage to the beheading, that tells me that SOMEONE in the media has a political agenda. They are trying to beat down Bush through Rumsfeld. I wish they'd just back off and let things take it's natural course. I agree. Most Americans, (MOST... hehe), when they smell a rat, set the rat trap. Otherwise, people think that the media has it in for Bush, and he gets sympathy. THHHHWWWAAAACCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKK! (rat trap) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Texsox Posted May 18, 2004 Share Posted May 18, 2004 When further developments came out with the prisoner abuse story, what should our media do? Not all the facts came out at once. Should they have ignored the rest of the pictures? What I am attacking is the Republican Party who wants Americans to reject any criticism of them by calling the messenger bad. I also find it ironic that, at least on my radio dial, there is 18 hours a day of Republican talk show hosts claiming the media is biased. And the GOP party faithfuls go looking for any example of the media criticizing Bush and say "ditto Rush, look at these attacks". Again, the greatest political strategy of all time is the Republicans painting the media as biased. When the GOP screws up, like the Dems and every other elected official, the Republicans claim media bias and deflect all criticism. In a sense making themselves perfect. It was probably at 1/3 the reason why I left the GOP. I'm not saying the media is not biased. Everyone, in everything we do, is biased. I just reject that there is an overwhelming leftist bias. There is a bias towards accuracy. There is a bias on what will sell newspapers and reach more eyeballs. I heard Rush the other day attacking the media for not talking about the Iraqi children who are now attending school instead of talking about prisonor abuse. Instead of spending the hour attacking the media, why not spend the hour talking about school children? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kapkomet Posted May 18, 2004 Share Posted May 18, 2004 When further developments came out with the prisoner abuse story, what should our media do? Not all the facts came out at once. Should they have ignored the rest of the pictures? What I am attacking is the Republican Party who wants Americans to reject any criticism of them by calling the messenger bad. I also find it ironic that, at least on my radio dial, there is 18 hours a day of Republican talk show hosts claiming the media is biased. And the GOP party faithfuls go looking for any example of the media criticizing Bush and say "ditto Rush, look at these attacks". Again, the greatest political strategy of all time is the Republicans painting the media as biased. When the GOP screws up, like the Dems and every other elected official, the Republicans claim media bias and deflect all criticism. In a sense making themselves perfect. It was probably at 1/3 the reason why I left the GOP. I'm not saying the media is not biased. Everyone, in everything we do, is biased. I just reject that there is an overwhelming leftist bias. There is a bias towards accuracy. There is a bias on what will sell newspapers and reach more eyeballs. I heard Rush the other day attacking the media for not talking about the Iraqi children who are now attending school instead of talking about prisonor abuse. Instead of spending the hour attacking the media, why not spend the hour talking about school children? Again, most if not all of what these radio shows (Rush and Hannity) say are all about R-A-T-I-N-G-S. Nothing more, nothing less. But, remove yourself from the biases of either side. Why DON'T we read more in the "mainstream press", ie most morning newspapers, most morning television shows and where most people go to get their news, (why don't we read more) about the rebuilding efforts, the schools, the "every day Iraqi"? Because BAD NEWS SELLS. If everyone were wiping a tear from their eye in glee about all the good things in Iraq, there wouldn't be anything else to say about it, and there'd be no contraversy. They HAVE to drum up this contraversy to feed each other's political agenda, and that's where all this "bias" comes from. Depending on what's news, you can tell often times what the political agenda is... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlaSoxxJim Posted May 18, 2004 Share Posted May 18, 2004 Why DON'T we read more in the "mainstream press", ie most morning newspapers, most morning television shows and where most people go to get their news, (why don't we read more) about the rebuilding efforts, the schools, the "every day Iraqi"? Because BAD NEWS SELLS. If everyone were wiping a tear from their eye in glee about all the good things in Iraq, there wouldn't be anything else to say about it, and there'd be no contraversy. They HAVE to drum up this contraversy to feed each other's political agenda, and that's where all this "bias" comes from. Depending on what's news, you can tell often times what the political agenda is... Truthfully, Kap, there's not all that much meaningful rebuilding going on right now. The schools in session and the hospitals etc., up and running are positive and we should see updates on progress there. But Sunday's ABCnews page ran the story "Too Violent to Rebuild?" that relates that there's not that much actual rebuilding going on. The German subcontractor in charge of getting a big power plant up and runnning has fled to safety, so > 300K fsamilies in Baghdad will spend the summer without power, including air conditioning which is more necessity than luxury there. Of the 2,000+ construction projects that were supposed to be in progress by now, only 42 are. Only 5% of the $18+ Billion approved for construction aid has been spent out, though $300 million of the money for construction has had to be diverted to security and administrative costs. The insurgency lies at the heart of the reasons it has all stalled, to be sure. But even an umbiased media outlet would have a hard time squeezing a whole lot of positive press out of the rebuilding success story, because so far there isn't much of one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kapkomet Posted May 18, 2004 Share Posted May 18, 2004 I don't have time to expand on this right now, but I was talking with someone who was over there just a week or two ago (I will if I can later today)... but suffice it to say that there's also a lot going on over there that's NOT being reported. I think part of the insurgency is directly tied to the media outlets. I'm not saying that's wrong, I'm saying that is a fact. They KNOW that the media will report on the insurgency, they KNOW that the media outlets will blow the political flames. If they didn't report on it, there's no hope to their cause. The media is the enabler of all this violence, without them, there wouldn't be nearly as much. Again, to emphasize, I'm not saying that in and of itself is a "bias", I'm just stating a fact. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JUGGERNAUT Posted May 18, 2004 Share Posted May 18, 2004 *********************** **** SMACK warning !!! ** It's every American's God given right to spread dis-information. God only knows that seems to be the norm around here. With the exception of myself of course **** SMACK warning !!! ** *********************** PS> SMACK is not to be taken literally. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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