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Press Favored Obama Throughout Campaign
narcberry writes "After complaints of one-sided reporting, the Washington Post checked their own articles and agreed. Obama was clearly favored, throughout his campaign, in terms of more favorable articles, less criticism, better page real-estate, more pictures, and total disregard for problems such as his drug use. 'Stories and photos about Obama in the news pages outnumbered those devoted to McCain. Reporters, photographers and editors found the candidacy of Obama, the first African American major-party nominee, more newsworthy and historic. Journalists love the new; McCain, 25 years older than Obama, was already well known and had more scars from his longer career in politics. The number of Obama stories since Nov. 11 was 946, compared with McCain's 786. Both had hard-fought primary campaigns, but Obama's battle with Hillary Rodham Clinton was longer, and the numbers reflect that. McCain clinched the GOP nomination on March 4, three months before Obama won his. From June 4 to Election Day, the tally was Obama, 626 stories, and McCain, 584. Obama was on the front page 176 times, McCain, 144 times; 41 stories featured both.'"
Bush had a good run in the media especially in making "the case" in the war against Iraq. He got a nice handshake from the mainstream media then, but when the shoe is on the other foot it's like the end of the world. Besides, the Republicans got so unpopular after two Bush terms it would be hard enough ramming the same trash down people's throats again.
Analytic & algebraic topology of locally Euclidean meterization of infinitely differentiable Riemmanian manifold
On NPR's Talk Of The Nation show last week, they had callers from all over the world give reactions to Obama's victory. I was shocked to hear Palestinians, Iranians and everyone be so totally knowledgeable about US internal politics. They talked about the Christian Right, neocons, and more. They sounded just like American media junkie citizens.
Then it dawned on me. Thanks to satellite TV, now the whole world can watch US TV news. They are influenced by media coverage just like US residents are.
Then I tried to think of cases in recent decades where world opinion differed significantly from the US media's dominant spin. I can't think of a single one.
Maybe I'm not conspiratorial enough in my thinking. Have we allowed a self-appointed unregulated, unaccountable group of elites to take control of world opinion and thus overshadow the power of people and governments?
Is democracy a viable form of government if voter opinions are so readily influenced and shaped by the media?
Suddenly, I'm no longer so sure that absolute freedom of the press is such a good idea any more.
To the US, much of Western Europe (minus perhaps the BBC) appears hilariously liberal - this coming from a regular reader of the NY Times (and who lives in New York) and someone who voted for Obama.
I do emphasize 'appears,' though, because I don't think this necessarily means there is a bias on the part of the reporters or the editors. By any objective measure I can think of, Obama was incredibly newsworthy. I wanted to vote for McCain (I'm a small business owner) but I couldn't stomach Palin; still, McCain received plenty of coverage around here. I think that the newspapers do their best to report stuff that they think is newsworthy, and having some arbitrary rule like 'we must publish an equal number of pieces about each candidate' is the type of gesture-laden but meaningless decision that is all too regular these days -- and it would ultimately result in fluff pieces or lowering the standards of what makes the news just so you get an even count.
My biggest beef with the NY Times is that, particularly since Obama was elected, it's been piece after piece about the 'barrier-breaking' historical significance of the event; the guy has gotten a big pass on making substantive policy statements just because he's such a 'game-changer.' I don't mean to take away the gravitas of the historical situation, but I think we've been congratulating ourselves so much on our enlightened stance that we've indirectly said that, had we elected McCain instead, it would've been nothing more than backwards racism at work (since electing Obama was so forward-thinking of us). We get quotes from people around the world like 'There is the feeling that for the first time since Kennedy, America has a different type of leader' (http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/05/reactions-from-around-the-world/?scp=3&sq=america%20president%20rest%20of%20world%20follow&st=cse) and similar comments praising the basic fact of the event itself.
So it comes as no surprise to me that McCain would have to work twice as hard to get attention from such a 'landmark' event. I like and respect Obama, and I'm very interested to see how he'll do - but I think we let him skate by, particularly in the debates, with a lot of vague promises. I'll celebrate him being a game-changer once the game has actually changed.
As for your original point, though, a (more liberal) friend of mine pointed out that, even in spite of the semi-regular absence of substance -- these were campaign promises, after all, and he's hardly alone in making vague ones -- there is an unavoidable perk in our reputation abroad not because Obama is a proven diplomat (he isn't) but because he's not George Bush and not a Republican.
Actually, yes I will, because McCain's losing ratio was less than his "coverage" ratio. And then, of course, there is the content of the stories — it is not just the quantity, you know... And that's been near-universally in Obama/Biden's direction.
For example, think of the word "gaffe" for a second — it is more famous already, than the word "snafu" was at the end of Clinton's term. Every mistake made by Biden — from an actual gaffe ("Hillary Clinton would've been a better choice") to a flabbergasting moronity ("We and France kicked Hezbollah out of Lebanon") — has been smoothed-over by the press, while Sarah Palin's inability to name another act by her boss (she did name one) was replayed on comedy and "news" channels umpteen times.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Sometimes, I really wonder if any of you people "get out" and "see the world".
You want liberal bias? Watch or listen to PBS/NPR?
Although that said, it was NPRs in depth coverage of who Obama
actually is and where he actually came from that started to
demystify him considerably. If you scratch beneath the surface
he seems a lot less unreal (imagine that).
This is a good example of how journalists should be providing
a lot of useful information, so much so that there's enough
real information there to allow the audience to make up their
own mind and counteract whatever bias might be obvious in those
presenting it.
Enough information will eventually destroy all bias.
Of course Americans tend to be lazy and generally anti-intellectual.
So if the news is anything more than a sound bit or two it might just
get filtered out. Commercial media has to account for this.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Funny, I find MSNBC less biased than CNN. Perhaps conservatives and liberals perceive bias differently :-) But the slant I noticed on CNN was elegant and subtle. Not only were they unlikely to run a positive story on McCain, but if they did then all other stories on the main page would be negative. If the biz section had a downbeat story on the economy, then the political section would have a McCain story. If the Science section told of some breakthrough, they would run an Obama story in National or Politics. Stories also ran for very arbitrary periods of time... negative stories could stay on the page for weeks unchanged. Positive stories lasted half a day to two days. I think there was an intentional effort on CNN's part to paint the public mood as gloomy as possible, which helped Obama.
Also although I agree that Obama's message did strike a chord and McCain's messages were largely negative, in all fairness McCain had lots of positive messages but they were flatly refused to be reported. The new outlets only mentioned his negative stuff. Obama had *lots* of attacks on McCain but he was getting a lot more coverage so it didnt appear as if thats all he was saying.
But then the "red" states would suffer. You see, they take from the economically more productive "blue" states, on average. It is ironic that the GOP whines about income redistribution, when their states benefit from it.
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2004/11/29/8192719/index.htm
Also although I agree that Obama's message did strike a chord and McCain's messages were largely negative, in all fairness McCain had lots of positive messages but they were flatly refused to be reported.
If we're doing things in all fairness, then I should also point out that there's a difference between "McCain/Obama" ads and ads run by "McCain/Obama" supporters.
A lot of negative ads run against McCain/Obama were not directly from McCain/Obama but supporters of McCain/Obama.
Then, of course, we need to talk about money. When one side spends 3/4 to 1 on ads (Obama to McCain), it gives them a lot better ability to change their ratio of positive/negative advertising.
If, for example, McCain ran 10 negative ads and 10 positive ads and Obama runs 15 negative ads but 40 positive ads, Obama has actually run more negative ads but at a smaller ratio.
Hehe, maybe that's why the major media outlets loved him? He gave them a ton of money in advertisement.
"The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became truth." ~1984 George Orwell
I wanted to vote for McCain (I'm a small business owner)
That would have been a mistake. Unless your business is insanely profitable, you would've gained nothing from McCain. His health insurance plan, for instance, would have been a disaster for everyone but insurance companies. In general, conservative policies are only good for big business and the investor class.
We've had the same BS with Sarkozy here; he claims he's pro-business, but his fiscal measures only profited the wealthiest. And most small business owners aren't that rich. In particular, just like McCain's plan, he targeted income tax; if your small biz is incorporated, as it should be (mine is!), this makes no difference at all to the business itself. It only matters when you've made so much money that you are going to pay yourself.
And if you don't want to pay that income tax, just invest that surplus money into expanding the business. Corollary: with decreasing income tax, it becomes more attractive for the small biz owner to just take more of the profits, instead of investing and hiring.
He showed McCain's 2008 concession speech: boos from the republican crowd.
He then showed Kerry's 2004 concession speech: no boos from the democratic crowd.
Notice how it's the right always claiming that the other side is just as bad as they are. Authoritarians: it's not bad/illegal when WE do it!
"Obama had *lots* of attacks on McCain "
You mean like how McCain was a Bush clone?
You are right in that bias is in the eye of the beholder.
Many people feel Fox is fair and balanced just as many people feel the Washington Post is.
The key is if the news service shares you bias then you see it as unbiased.
To be honest every liberal should only get their news from Fox and every conservative should only get their news from NPR.
I do feel that McCain got a bad deal. I think he would make a good president and this to be honest was his last chance at it.
That being said I really do hope Obama is a good president I wish him all the luck in the world.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Agreed! I dont think Obama's ads were all that negative. The *Union* adds against McCain were some scary shit. SEIU made the AFL/CIO look like kittens. The thing that worries me about the election results were how many favors the Dems owe the Unions for their millions this election cycle.
I disagree with the NPR crack. I do agree that in the circle of my conservative friends, cracking on NPR as liberal is a common theme. But I listen to NPR and they work very hard to be non-biased. You rarely detect it in their stories or how they conduct their interviews. Sometimes you do though like Terry Gross blunder of an interview with Mrs. Cheney.
I, however, am a Liberal. I fully recognize the MSNBC bias and admit it as much as I recognize the Fox bias. Both networks have some good shows, and some clowns. Just because I am liberal does not mean I don't see a biased show for what it is. I wonder though if conservatives can tell the same.
I used to think McCain would make a good president but not anymore. He ran a bad campaign. If you cant run a campaign and drive your people, your not looking good to be running the executive. McCain of 2000/2004 would have made a good president. McCain before he sold his soul to the Bush team.
I also live in Indiana, and didn't encounter the barrage of negative ads that you talk about. The "negative" ads that I did see were about how the middle class would do better with Obama's tax plan than they would with McCain's, and how impotent McCain's health care plan was. Note how Obama is "attacking" McCain on the issues.
McCain's attack ads were basically saying that Obama might be a terrorist and that we can't trust him. Note how McCain is making ad hominem attacks.
In my book, it is perfectly fine to attack someone's position on the issues, but you shouldn't attack the man himself. That is why McCain's campaign was far more negative than Obama's.
That doesn't work. Letting the free market provide balance presumes that there isn't a built-in bias. Fox news is a perfect example. It was purchased and continues to be operated as a conservative news network. They accumulate viewers who agree with them, and perpetuate that agreement by feeding them appropriately biased information. They do this specifically for the purpose of creating a population that's better educated on their point of view.
Similar to your typical monopolistic practices, it's possible to spend money in order to expand your customer base. It happens again and again.
For news agencies, however, it only matters if they claim to be an unbiased news source. At that point, they are obligated to maintain a certain level of neutrality. The Washington Post is identifying that they breached their own moral code to an extent.
Not that I blame them. Not only was McCain negative, he was boring. He just didn't do much that was newsworthy.
http://www.theonion.com/content/news/top_story_on_john_mccain_run_out
Wake up - the future is arriving faster than you think.
The ethics laws said you can't do something to benefit yourself or people you know. Now if that was the case behind the firings, that would mean that the laws were violated and therefor the firing would be illegal.
And the committee found that to be the case, that she had violated the ethics law. Yet, as you note, that was not the purview of the investigation. When they say the firing was not illegal, that means with regard to the laws of interest to the investigation. Illegal in one context, not illegal in another, it isn't a contradiction.
That could very well be. I know a lot of people who didn't like her for a number of reasons ranging from her being a woman to the way she talked and everything in between.
It could be that my opinion of her was not significantly affected by some local Alaskan politics, and rather it's between her XY chromosome or her colloquialisms? Thanks. Frankly, it's what she said that turned me off. Between her stated stances on the issues, and her flagrant ignorance, I couldn't care less whether she abused power in Alaska, I don't want her to have any power in this country. And while I'd love to have a woman president (or VP), I'd rather not have it one who is bound and determined to set women's rights back two steps for the one step forward that her election would be.
The enemies of Democracy are