In fact, as this study reveals, conservative voices significantly outnumber progressive voices on the Sunday talk shows. Media Matters for America conducted a content analysis of ABC’s This Week, CBS’ Face the Nation, and NBC’s Meet the Press, classifying each one of the nearly 7,000 guest appearances during President Bill Clinton’s second term, President George W. Bush’s first term, and the year 2005 as either Democrat, Republican, conservative, progressive, or neutral. The conclusion is clear: Republicans and conservatives have been offered more opportunities to appear on the Sunday shows – in some cases, dramatically so.
Wow, you guys have way too much free time.
Oliver, these results are completely believable, but they will inevitably be dismissed as biased, since MM gets to choose who is “liberal” and “conservative”, and only offers general comments on how they did so.
MM should publish a full list of people who appeared and list how they classified them in the study. I didn’t see anywhere on the site where that was available.
The wingnuts will still scream bias, but you may reach a few semi-reasonable conservatives that way.
Just looking at who has appeared doesn’t give the whole story. It would be important to know (and I haven’t read the report so maybe it is in there) who was invited but would not appear. Maybe the “Conservative” guests are simply more likely to accept an invitation to appear than the “Liberal” guests and thus the skew is not the result of a conscious effort on behalf of the programs themselves.
Well, let’s see: Bill Clinton’s second term (4 years) was shorter than George Bush’s first term plus the year 2005. Right there, the Administration representatives are going to be more probably from the Bush Administration than the Clinton Administration.
Add to that the fact that the Republicans controlled the House of Representatives for that entire nine years, and the Senate for 7½ of those nine years, and you are going to see a conservative dominance, simply because the conservatives have had more power in Washington than the Democrats.
Look at how the Sunday shows do things: they’ll have one Administration representative alone, or two members of Congress together, normally one from each party. Just the normal arrangement is going to favor Republicans — when Republicans are in the positions of power they have now.
If, Heaven forbid, the Democrats were to regain control of the Congress and the White House, you’d see those numbers reverse.
The Sunday interview shows cater to politicians in power, almost exclusively.
Wow, you guys have way too much free time.
Said the conservative who spends his own making superficial jabs on liberal blogs…
They do claim to err on the side of identifying borderline guests as liberal, and offer some examples to substantiate that, but it would be more convincing to have the full list.
Are all the hosts known to be Democrats? At least they try to remain neutral, while if you switch over to Fox their counterparts make no effort whatsoever to do so. That’s the false equivalence behind the alleged “liberal media bias”.
Very good Wilbur. (And I promise not to scream.) A list of those they defined as Liberal, Conservative, and Neutral would do wonders in determining the validity of this study.
Being it’s Media Matters, I would assume those definitions would be VERY loose in favor of their side, just as I would say if the study would have come from the Media Research Center.
Also, it’s obvious that they didn’t account for the hosts of those programs who, while they at times try to remain neutral, are all left/center Democrats.
These numbers are as misleading as a Democratic-commissioned exit poll. For example, John McCain is cited for the most number of appearances. However, many of those appearances were to argue against Bush, Conservatives, & the Administration from everything from detainee treatment to Campaign Finance. So, for the purposes of this study, he should have been listed as a liberal for those appearances.
Well if you actually read it (not that I expect any of you righties to), you’ll see that there were more Repubs on during Clinton’s presidency. Based on your expressed theory there’d be more Dems on now, but there aren’t.
To clarify: the hypothetical conservative above is just that–hypothetical. I’m not referring specifically to McCain.
So, Farris, you contend that:
(a) Bush, Conservatives, and the Administration are one and the same.
(b) If you argue against them, you are not Conservative.
(c) Therefore, there is only one type of true conservative–somebody in lockstep with the administration.
So if you’re somebody who opposes gay marriage, opposes gun control, supports the death penalty, supports the war in Iraq and No Child Left Behind, BUT opposes torture and restrictions on stem cell research, you are NOT a conservative.
Remember when conservativism was a mode of thought, not a mode of obedience?
And if you actually read the report you will see the producer of Face the Nation state that it was difficult to get members of the Clinton Administration to appear.
Without taking into account booking decisions and the results of those decisions (i.e., who agrees to come on and who doesn ‘t) you cannot state that “Republicans and conservatives have been offered more opportunities to appear on the Sunday shows.”
We know that when Dean has been invited to appear with his Republican counterpart, he has refused, agreeing only to appear on the condition that he appear alone. Who knows how such conditions have played into the booking decisions as to when Dean is invited. Others, both Conservative and “Progressive” may have similar conditions that affect booking decisions.
Absent a study of the booking decisions, all this study shows is that there have been more appearances on Sunday Mornings by those that MM labels to be Conservative. Other than drawing its own unsupported inferences, the report does not detail why more Conservatives have appeared.
Typical “research” junk from George Soros and his rocket scientists at MM.
Assume that EVERYTHING they did is absolutely right…you still can’t prove your conclusion…
“Republicans and conservatives have been offered more opportunities to appear on the Sunday shows ”
A completely unproven statement…typical.
Unless you analysed how many OFFERS were made, you cannot make that conclusion.
Here is my conclusion….and it is backed up by as much “fact” as is MM’s:
“The democrats/leftists were given many more opportunities to appear on the morning talk shows, but only the republicans/conservatives agreed to come on…”
It’s always about Clinton with you liberals, isn’t it?
If you argue against Conservatives on a specific issue, you are not Conservative (at least on that issue).
Nice backtracking, Farris. What’s the definition of “is,” by the way?
Using your -err- logic, the French Revolution was a bloomin’ field day for the Royalists. Many more of them on trial and engaging in bon mots with Mdse. Guillotine.
Dugger, Vive la Vendee!
Lots of straw in that last comment, BD.
a) By listing “Bush, Conservatives, & the Administration” individually, I was proffering that they are 3 separate entities. Frankly, I thought you “nuanced” folks would pick up on that.
b) If you argue against Conservatives on a specific issue, you are not Conservative (at least on that issue). I realize that with Republicans this is harder to guage because we have a much bigger tent than Democrats.
c) Nice try. Though believing in that canard would be a pre-requisite in order for this Brock-ified study to have any meaning whatsoever.
And nice evasion. Yet again, you have no ground to stand on, so you resort to sleight of hand.
You called John McCain a liberal, based not on whether or not his views were liberal, but whether or not he disagreed with the Bush administration.
So all those fiscal conservatives who have been grumbling about the spending sprees of the administration are…wait for it…LLLLLIBERALS! Bill Frist changes his mind on stem cell research! LLLLLIBERAL! George Allen speaks out against leaking classified information! You dirty, dirty LLLLLIBERAL!
And you would have me believe the GOP has a bigger tent? It sounds like it gets smaller all the time.
“Are all the hosts known to be Democrats? At least they try to remain neutral, while if you switch over to Fox their counterparts make no effort whatsoever to do so. That s the false equivalence behind the alleged liberal media bias . ”
Russert, Stephanopolous, and Scheiffer- yes. Not sure about Wallace. You would think not, based on his family, but who knows.
Actually, Chris Wallace (Fox News Sunday) does as good or maybe even a better job of remaining neutral as the rest of them. In fact, I would say that he is more likely to ask serious tough questions to Republicans than the others of Democrats. (But he grew up in a Democrat family and may well still be one for all we know.)
Scheiffer and Stepanopolous rarely ask Democrats tough questions- usually it’s a ‘Could you elaborate our your prepared statements?’ kind of question, while challenging anything a Republican says. Russert does have his moments when he will counter with an argument from the opposite side no matter who he is interviewing.
I’d note it’s the same reason Lieberman shows up on the Sunday shows often (as documented by MM): because he is less likely to regurgitate the party’s orthodoxy.
Nice try, but those who bother to read what I *actually wrote* will find something totally different. McCain should have been counted as a liberal because he was espousing liberal positions.
John McCain gets invited to the Sunday shows because A) he’s a glory-loving camera hog in love with the sound of his own voice (otherwise known as Biden-itis) and B) he can be counted on to be more liberal than the Republican platform on the issue of the day. Therefore, in the producer’s eyes, he becomes a “more effective” guest because he’s not just a Democrat reading Dem talking points: he’s a Republican reading Dem talking points.
If you’ve seen any of the Sunday hosts attack tax cuts as “not deep enough”, I haven’t seen it. Could you please forward me the transcript? I usually watch Russert and he was a broken record from 2002-2004 asking Democrat, Republican, Journalist, and Pundit whether the “Bush tax cuts should be rolled back to pay for XXX”.
Good Ol’ MoJoe. You can count on him to hold up the vellum
capitulation while smiling broadly and proclaiming,
“Peace in our time”
John McCain gets invited to the Sunday shows because A) he s a glory-loving camera hog in love with the sound of his own voice (otherwise known as Biden-itis) and B) he can be counted on to be more liberal than the Republican platform on the issue of the day.
Dugger, I can’t believe you said that about the next republican nominee for president.