US Media Bias

I just borrowed the following from NicaLiving. It was clearly re-directing the discussion and, in stead, deserved its own thread. But, it also was pretty removed from Nicaragua topics so it is here.

Unfortunately, it's become more complex and more subtle than just a question of bias. We know that almost all of the mainstream broadcast journalists, most of the major newspapers are liberal. They admit it. I don't mind bias when it's disclosed or blatant (like an NPR program I was listening to a couple of years ago, when the thread went from a discussion of theater to what a scumbag George Bush was).

And what they report can be completely true. It's just not complete disclosure. I was watching Meet The Press a couple of Sundays ago where the guests were talking about approval (or lack thereof) for health care reform. One side can honestly say: "Polls show The majority of Americans are in favor of health care reform" but, if that same polling group is asked, "Do you favor ObamaCare," the answer is NO, by a ratio of 2 to 1 There's a lack of intellectual honesty here.

First, I want to state that this discussion is not intened to be about party politics. It is going to talk about <i>some words</i> and media bias.

• Liberal (along with Conservative, Left and Right) are all so often used to suggest bias then do anything meaningful. If I had to pick between Liberal and Conservate for the US mainstream media, I would most certainly pick Conservative. Fortunately, I don't but my reasoning is simple, the US mainstream press is supported by big business and generally supports the status quo.
• ObamaCare seems to be the label assigned to something that in no way represents what Obama attempted to do nor what people want. There was an excellent article in Forbes a few days ago that showed you <i>who won</i>. Namely the medical insurance industry and buf pharma. What we will see is a disaster that will get blamed on Obama.

Mis-representating alternatives is certainly not new. In <u>Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television</u> which was published over 30 years ago, Mander presents an example. It is supposed to be a debate about Vegetarianism. In this theoretical debate, the anti-vegetarianism side is represented by someone in the meat packing industry, the pro-vegetarian side by someone who believes in the ethical killing of animals.

To me, the US mainstream media is a combination of vested interests and laziness. For a simple comparision, when Costa Rica was considering CAFTA membership, newspaper and TV coverage of the issues were excellent. For example, I remember one TV segment (we are not talking a sound bite on the news but more like a 30 minute program) was talking about how CAFTA would change medical treatment including drug proces). It was real information.