TW: To provide additional perspective on the issue of media bias I post comments from Jim Leach former Republican House member from Iowa although an Obama supporter.
From Leach via Politico's Arena:
"There is no doubt that, with the exception of one network and a small number of newspapers, most of the news of the last election was slanted to Sen. Obama. But despite the well documented fact that the majority of the media leans to the liberal side of most issues, it is not clear that the media was unfair to John McCain. A lot depends on how one defines fairness and balance.
If one suggests that a definition of balance is to give each side in a dispute or race equal billing as if there is equal substance and imagination and historical perspective at play, then of course there was an unfair tilt to reporting in the last election. On the other hand, what happens if one candidate sets forth substantive approaches and holds newsworthy events and the other doesn't, is it balanced or fair reporting to give equal billing and neutral appraisals. Likewise, if the national and international circumstance reflects a national hemorrhaging and one candidate calls for change and the other represents policy continuity with only hints of pseudo-change, is it balanced news analysis to ascribe equal judgment to each. One of the above perspectives would vindicate the case that a startling news failure occurred. The other might indicate how extraordinary it is how much uncritical attention was given the candidate of the status quo."
No comments:
Post a Comment