UCLA study concludes left wing bias in media is legit

[lehighguy]

Most major news outlets have a bias towards missing the point and providing low content. Which side they fall on isn't as important.

The media is not liberal or conservative, it is corporate. They are all owned by huge conglomerates. GE, a major defense contractor owns NBC.

How exactly did they define conservative and liberal anyway?

OMGWTFLOLBBQ!!! The study says the Wall Street Journal is the MOST liberal media outlet. Good bye credibility! The method is obviously flawed.

[BCPVP]

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How exactly did they define conservative and liberal anyway?

OMGWTFLOLBBQ!!! The study says the Wall Street Journal is the MOST liberal media outlet. Good bye credibility! The method is obviously flawed.

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Pretty obvious you didn't read past the first paragraph...

Troll eslewhere, would you?

[JackWhite]

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The media is not liberal or conservative, it is corporate. They are all owned by huge conglomerates. GE, a major defense contractor owns NBC.


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Give me the evidence that these corporations dictate to reporters what they report. Dan Rather said that he reported what he thought was important and that corporate leaders never dictated what he said. Was he lying? I have heard many reporters say the same thing. In fact, WP media critic Howard Kurtz once dismissed this concept as "ridiculous." (the concept that corporate executive dictate what is reported)

[andyfox]

Form the study: "The most centrist outlet proved to be the 'NewsHour With Jim Lehrer'."

I've always felt that show "gets it" and, more often than most, gets it right. I agree with your assessment of most major news outlets.

[BluffTHIS!]

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Form the study: "The most centrist outlet proved to be the 'NewsHour With Jim Lehrer'."

I've always felt that show "gets it" and, more often than most, gets it right. I agree with your assessment of most major news outlets.

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I agree andy, that PBS's News Hour is relatively centrist in their reportage and analysis, though not necessarily in what they choose as topics to report on in depth, although that is just a gut feeling.

And outside of Fox, I do feel most media outlets lean left. The question is why would they? And I think that might have something to do with both the vast majority of university journalism departments themselves being run by left leaning proffessors (no big surprise), and the type of students those programs attract.

Also, I believe Cyrus is very wrong about the legitmacy of the criterion used, namely what type of sources are used. As a conservative catholic, there is one sure tipoff to me of a biased report that intimates that a substantial number of catholics disagree with the church's teaching on abortion. And that is if they quote the lying *@#! that runs Catholics For A Free Choice. This is because that organization is not a membership organization at all, but just a mouthpiece funded by liberal endowments to oppose the catholic church on abortion. So that organization really speaks for no catholics, although there are of course many who do disagree with the church's teaching on that matter.

So when various media outlets over the years have used that as a source, I know that they are left biased to the point of not caring about legitimate sources. The same thing can be said regarding consitutional legal questions whe a media outlet always uses Lawrence Tribe for its analysis.

[Riverman]

The thing that really upsets me is that amid the right's 20 year campaign to hammer away at what it sees as media bias they have scared news organizations into providing "balanced" coverage in cases where there is really no need to "balance" anything. An example:

Valerie Plame case: Bush originally says "Anyone involved in outing an undercover agent will not be a part of my administration." So then it becomes pretty damn clear that Rove was involved, and he changes his statement to "Anyone who committed a crime will not be a part of my administration." There is no liberal element to pointing out that he "flip-flopped," and the facts are not up for dispute. Still, major news will put some republican operative, spewing talking points, on to "balance" the coverage.

Another thing that really bothered me is election coverage. At this point it is pretty clear that both the 2000 and 2004 elections had irregularities if not outright cheating in favor of the republican party in Florida and Ohio respectively. Where is the coverage? The MSM went along with the its over lets move on line, even though there is significant evidence of outright corruption (at least in Ohio). Where was the "balanced" discussion on the legitimacy/wisdom of the Supreme Court stepping in to decide Bush v. Gore, particularly when justices who were on record as being strong supporters of "states rights" usurped the authority to decide the election result in Florida?

[DVaut1]

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Also, I believe Cyrus is very wrong about the legitmacy of the criterion used, namely what type of sources are used. As a conservative catholic, there is one sure tipoff to me of a biased report that intimates that a substantial number of catholics disagree with the church's teaching on abortion. And that is if they quote the lying sl*t that runs Catholics For A Free Choice. This is because that organization is not a membership organization at all, but just a mouthpiece funded by liberal endowments to oppose the catholic church on abortion. So that organization really speaks for no catholics, although there are of course many who do disagree with the church's teaching on that matter.

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I think this is a strong reason as to why I'm NOT in strong favor of using 'think-tank citations' as the matrix by which media sources ought to be rated -- often times journalists won't (through carelessness, ignorance, laziness, etc.) bother doing a thorough investigation regarding who and what they cite...and will often cite any organization interested in providing a quote; does journalist X bother investigating the membership rolls/donation records/lobbying history of Advocacy Group Y, or Think Tank Z? I'd guess that sometimes they do (and some of the best political reporters are of course aware of such things anyway, without a formal vetting) -- but I'd suspect a substantial number don't.

And, as you pointed out - the methodology cited in the study wasn't clear (perhaps I missed it) as to how advocacy groups/think tanks were differentiated, if at all; for instance, I think we can all agree that calling the NAACP a think tank is a stretch -- it's an advocacy group that has a clear agenda; and yet it seems the UCLA study classified the NAACP as a think tank.

Claiming the NAACP is an advocacy group ought to be pretty uncontroversial, as anyone with even a cursory knowledge of the organization knows that it has a point of view -- so when a media outlet cites the NAACP, there is, I believe, the implication that such a cited quote is given by someone who works for an advocacy group, not an unbiased party.

Again, I don't necessarily think "think tank citation" is a useless factor that's not worthy of study -- it should just be one factor, IMO, in a mosaic of factors.

Moreover, none of these problems even begin to scratch the surface of the ADA legislator rankings, which I believe were the control in the study -- the ADA rankings are not the best tool for establishing the median position for the average American voter, for a variety of reasons, IMO.

Again, it's not a completely valueless study, but I certainly wouldn't call it exemplary work, either.

Bias in the media or Bias in the studiers?:

"One of the authors of the study, Groseclose, was a Hoover Institution 2000-2001 national fellow; Milyo, according to his CV, received a $40,500 grant from AEI; and, according to The Philanthropy Roundtable, Groseclose and Milyo were named by Heritage as Salvatori fellows in 1997."

[DVaut1]

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Bias in the media or Bias in the studiers?:

"One of the authors of the study, Groseclose, was a Hoover Institution 2000-2001 national fellow; Milyo, according to his CV, received a $40,500 grant from AEI; and, according to The Philanthropy Roundtable, Groseclose and Milyo were named by Heritage as Salvatori fellows in 1997."

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If you're directing that question at me...it doesn't seem so much a case of studier bias; it seems to be the case of a sub-par study -- or at the very least, a study where the far-reaching conclusion reached by the researchers ("Media bias proven") isn't in fact proven by the study.

I suppose we could invent some agenda on behalf of the researchers, and claim that some right-wing groups paid a couple of UCLA professors to concoct a study that could be cited in numerous times in the media (knowing the public-at-large won't investigate the specious methodology) so that the right could make a circular reference to it, and give some 'scholarly weight' to their claim that the media is inexorably biased against them -- but such a claim is, in my mind, as equally unprovable as the conclusion reached by the researchers in the study themselves.