The Project for Excellence in Journalism released its first quarterly report based on its excellent weekly News Coverage Index this morning, and it’s interesting stuff.
Unsurprisingly, the PEJ found that the war in Iraq took up more than three times the news space than the next most covered subject. Strikingly, “the majority of the war coverage, 55%, has been about the political debate back in Washington. Less than a third, 31%, has been focused on events in Iraq itself. And about half that coverage has been about American soldiers there.” A mere one in six stories have been about Iraqis themselves, or about the internal politics of the country, while “more than eight in ten have focused primarily on Americans or American policy.”
Coming in under the category of something I knew, but didn’t know I knew, is the fact that coverage of the upcoming presidential election has so far been slanted toward the Democratic race, with sixty one percent of the coverage focusing on Democratic candidates, with just twenty four percent dealing with Republican candidates. If you think that proves that the media is liberal, think again: “Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Michael Savage were the most Democratic focused of all—75% of their time on Democrats and only 13% focused mainly on Republicans.”
In a disheartening sign of things to come, PEJ reports that nine out of ten stories focused on “horse race” coverage, rather than on the actual positions of the candidates in the race.
This is going to be a long election year.
Paul McLeary Wrote
"...coverage of the upcoming presidential election has so far been slanted toward the Democratic race, with sixty one percent of the coverage focusing on Democratic candidates, with just twenty four percent dealing with Republican candidates. If you think that proves that the media is liberal, think again: "Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Michael Savage were the most Democratic focused of all--75% of their time on Democrats and only 13% focused mainly on Republicans."
padikiller notes the obvious irony
Paul McLeary is only too happy to consider Limbaugh, Hannity and Savage to be among his colleagues as "professional journalists"... When it suits, McLeary's agenda, that is..
Any other time, McLeary would rather suck mud than elevate these conservatives to the journalistic ranks...
Of course, these three men are NOT journalists (nor do they claim to be).. They are instead politically biased radio talk show hosts...
McLeary's attempted dodge is typical of his need to slant the truth... He attempts to equate apples and oranges... And this sort of false comparison can survive only in that deranged, liberal province we know as McLearyland... Such trickery cannot stand in Realityville...
The FACT, cleary demonstrated in the report McLeary vainly attempts to spin, is that the MSM is plainly slanted in favor of Democrats and against Republicans..
Any way you look at it..
PERIOD...
Posted by padikiller
on Fri 25 May 2007 at 12:48 PM
Um . . . despite your use of quotation marks, padikiller, I don't find the words "professional journalists" anywhere in McLeary's diary.
He just referred to Limbaugh etc. as being part of "the media," which of course they are.
And McCleary's point was that discussing Democrats more than Republicans doesn't necessarily make you "liberal," since sometimes people who mention Democrats do so for unfriendly reasons, not because of pro-Democratic bias.
It was a simple point, quite difficult to misunderstand.
Posted by kweberlit
on Sat 26 May 2007 at 11:03 AM
kweberlit wrote
McCleary's point was that discussing Democrats more than Republicans doesn't necessarily make you "liberal,"
padikiller responds
"Discussing"?.....
You are committing the same malpractice that Paul McLeary has committed...
You fail to distinguish between "reporting" and "commentary"... Improperly labeling both of these distinct forms of communication as mere "discussion"...
The simple, undeniable FACT is that the MSM news outlets give nearly TWICE the news coverage to Democrats than they give to Republicans.. That's just the reality here.. It's not going to disappear simply because McLearyites click their ruby red slippers together in unison and wish it to evaporate..
McLeary tries to hide from this reality behind (of ALL people) Rush Limbaugh and his ilk who engage not in journalism, but instead in political commentary...
One simply cannot justify news bias by comparing journalism to talk radio..
Conservative talk radio hosts spend most of their time railing against Democrats and liberal talk radio hosts spend most of their time railing against Republicans... (Notice that Mr. McLeary convenietly and utterly ignores the liberal talk show hosts-so much for "balance" in McLearyland...)
Political commentary has NOTHING to do with news coverage, but it does make a nice Reality Dodge...
McLeary's logic is, as usual, terribly flawed... Using this logic, a Baptist minister's sermon could be used to justify Satanism, if it "discusses" the Devil.. Or John Murtha's speeches could be construed to justify the Iraq war if they "discuss" the war...
"Discussing" Democrats by ranting about them on a talk radio show is a HELL of lot different than fairly COVERING politics in the news, and it is distressing to see that people like Paul McLeary and the other self-appointed "watchdogs" of "professional journalism" can't distinguish this difference..
Posted by padikiller
on Sat 26 May 2007 at 01:16 PM
Calm down a sec, padikiller, and follow McLeary's link. As his post made clear, he lumped Limbaugh and other talk show hosts together with conventional news reports because the source he was discussing, the report issued by the Project for Excellence in Journalism, did so. (I followed his link and the report itself is quite explicit about that.)
You could argue that this is a flawed methodology, but your quarrel then is with PEJ, not McLeary.
Posted by kweberlit
on Sun 27 May 2007 at 04:44 PM
kweberlit wrote
Calm down a sec, padikiller, and follow McLeary's link. As his post made clear, he lumped Limbaugh and other talk show hosts together with conventional news reports because the source he was discussing, the report issued by the Project for Excellence in Journalism, did so.
padikiller responds
No it didn't..
Mr. McLeary selectively cited a passage from the report and then deliberately blew it all out of context by saying that "[i]f you think that proves that the media is liberal, think again..."
Here's the entire relevant passage from the report:
"Or are reporters, who according to various surveys tend more often to be Democrats than Republicans themselves, just more personally interested in that race?
At least one piece of evidence might argue against the idea that the Democrat-centric coverage reflects a liberal bias of the press. The medium most wrapped up in the Democratic race has been the radio talk shows —where our sample is made up more heavily of conservative talkers who dominate the medium.
THREE things Mr. McLeary "forgot" to mention about the report..
1. According to the study, a potential cause of the bias in political reporting is the PLAIN political bias of journalists.. Journalists are NOT representative of their readers, politically-speaking, but are instead MUCH more liberal. Mr. McLeary managed to gloss right over this little tidbit of reality...
2. The comparison that the study made to talk radio was PLAINLY speculative, and suggested that there "might" be an alternative explanation because talk radio hosts also focus on Dems... McLeary presents this speculation as fact, admonishing his readers to "think again" before considering any prospect of media bias..
3. The study freely admits that its talk radio sampling is skewed and that it considers more conservative hosts than liberal hosts.
This type of slimy spin is typical of Paul McLeary's yellow journalism. He routinely engages in such malpractice.
Posted by padikiller
on Sun 27 May 2007 at 06:03 PM
Note on Liberal Bias:
I realize this story was posted a long time ago and that I may be the only person who ever knows this is here, however I would like to mention a quick fact. While reporters are primarily Democrats, Editors and Owners are primarily Republican. Bias is not as big an issue as people make it out to be. You can read any number of biases into anything if you try hard enough. All one must do is THINK and they can pull out the facts and disgard the rest. Bias is no match for a critical reader.
Posted by Tjb38
on Tue 7 Aug 2007 at 02:15 PM