It’s true. When you point out their infinite wrongness they gang up and attack you. In lieu of facts, attack is their mantra. Their priorities are also misplaced. As Bob Geiger points out, their “outrage” is directed not at those who commit the wrongs in the world, but the media that has the temerity to refute the propaganda of their leaders on rare occasions.
But what’s more interesting than anything is how much time and energy these guys are spending trying make a story about an atrocity untrue — and it’s an act that was not even alleged to have involved U.S. troops. This is what they go after like little toy pitbulls. This is what they get angry and passionate about.
It’s not our nation being lied into a pointless war that gets their collective goat. It’s not almost 3,000 dead American troops and tens of thousands more wounded physically and/or emotionally for life. Untold thousands of dead Iraqi civilians isn’t enough to make them lose sleep at night. And placing hundreds of billions in debt on our children to make us less safe doesn’t raise their ire and drive them to dig for the truth.
There’s also the matter of just blindly accepting assertions that agree with your world view. Centcom by its very nature produces spin and propaganda. At some level, that’s what they’re supposed to do. The problem is the current incarnation of Centcom under Donald Rumsfeld and George W. Bush doesn’t try and spin a pro-America message to the rest of the world. They spin a pro-Republican message and their target is the American people*. Skepticism is a virtue, folks, you’ll look less like the dummies you are if you remembered that.
* I believe when the history is written we’ll finally learn that the Coalition Provisional Authority run by Paul Bremer in 2003-04 was more focused on tamping down news of Iraqi chaos to help President Bush’s re-election than as any sort of actual organization working to secure Iraq.
There is no question that the Bremer Vice-Regency, and indeed the entire Iraq invasion, was designed to keep George W. Bush in the White House and to keep Republicans in control of the congress.
The Republican Party that came out of the 1960s, the one that gave us Reagan, then Gingrich, then Bush, is primarily concerned with protecting the ruling class. The various foreign policy moves, the constant production of new Hitler-equivalents, are all aimed at domestic political power.
I love the smell of what passes for Democratic bi-partisanship (Conservatives Are Wrong On Everything) in the morning. It smells like — Republican victory (in 2008)…
And JP, can I invoke Godwin’s Law on the 1st Comment?
OW is brilliant. The MSM is not wholly and enthusiastically biased to the left.
But wait a minute I’m a conservative and therfore…..
Fd, Oliver is not the DNC. Dugger, if you think the MSM is wholly biased to the left you’re either a moron or you’ve never actually watched television.
You’re really into the name calling, aren’t you Nimmer?
And yes, I consider the MSM decisively biased to the left (the BBC is leftist too, but you probably know that).
And I consider blue the prettiest color when surely it isn’t. I’m satirising here a trifle ol’ bean, what!
You say name calling, I say flat statements of fact.
Thanks for finally admitting you’re a moron, as well.
And beyond the cold fact that basic foundation of its existence (the licence) is a basically socialist concept, the BBC is not “leftist”. Never has been, never will be. If it even seemed vaguely “leftist” or “rightist” or any other kind of “ist” there would be such a storm. It has to apologise everytime anyone they employ expresses any sort of opinion at all.
If it ever leans anywhere at all, it just tends to play nice with whatever the current Government is, since that Government can kill it at any time. Not that that ever helps them much.
Dugger, please back that up. Demonstrate how the MSM is biased to the left, because while you can say, and I know you will, Rathergate, I can say Swiftboats. I can also say how Gore never said he invented the Internet, never said he discovered Love Canal, and never slaimed to be the basis for Love story, but yet those were the stories that dominated the 2000 election cycle, while Bush getting drunk and behind the wheel of a car wasn’t played up as much, but this discussion wont bear fruit on either side, since in a very real sense, I believe that these stories lpay to sensationalism and the fact that Americans will watch it, and networks can better sell ad time to MetaMucil as a result, so seriously, you tell me, barring anecdotal evidence, what makes you say that the MainStream Media is biased to the left?
Hmm… Rex, care to cite a few examples of where the Swift Boat Veterans were proven wrong? For each, I think I can cite a counterexample where they forced John Kerry to retract some bit of his own personal mythology — the “Christmas in Cambodia,” for one.
Oh, and the beauty of Oliver’s posting such hyperbole — “Conservatives are wrong on everything” — is that it takes just a single counterexample to pull his whole position to shreds.
1) Bill Clinton DID commit perjury by lying under oath.
2) “Accomodation” with the Soviet Union is unacceptable, and confronting them will lead to nuclear holocaust.
3) Terrorism should not be treated as strictly a law-enforcement issue.
4) There was no nefarious Bush/Rove plot to expose Valerie Plame.
5) Cutting tax RATES can quite often increase overall tax REVENUE — the “smaller percentage of bigger pie is a bigger slice” principle. (This was also demonstrated by President Kennedy.)
J.
Basically, everyone’s out to get Dugger and it’s not fair.
“Demonstrate how the MSM is biased to the left”
Here you go -
“I suspected that many media outlets would tilt to the left because surveys have shown that reporters tend to vote more Democrat than Republican,” said Tim Groseclose, a UCLA political scientist and the study’s lead author. “But I was surprised at just how pronounced the distinctions are.”
“Overall, the major media outlets are quite moderate compared to members of Congress, but even so, there is a quantifiable and significant bias in that nearly all of them lean to the left,” said co‑author Jeffrey Milyo, University of Missouri economist and public policy scholar.
http://www.newsroom.ucla.edu/page.asp?RelNum=6664
Nimrod Gently | Dec 1, 2006 10:16:53 AM
“Basically, everyone’s out to get Dugger and it’s not fair.”
More like people dare to disagree with pedugger and that’s blasphemous!!
Rex,
I’m a broken record on this. I could anecdote you to death based on my opinions of what constitutes bias and you could anecodte me to death vice versa based on your opinions.
My own quantified study took all media outlets, weighed them for influence (for instance, bias at CBS is more potent than bias in the NY Times) and concluded about a 2 to 1 liberal/left bias.
It doesn’t prove it because bias is in the eye of the beholder. Enough goes on in this world that I could fill a 24 hr news network show with nothing but bad news for and about the left, and I suspect the reverse could be done about the right – and both might be factually correct – regarding content alone. But either would be hugely biased. It has to boil down to opinion and what do we agree on? Why would we agree about bias?
I’ve had a smattering of training Psy ops and a I know how images and emotions can be manipulated. I know how events can be staged. I know how intelligent people can have huge blind spots. I know that all humans desparately want to believe in something higher that is good and bad, and with God and the Devil gone for many, political ideology steps in. George Bush or Clinton are their devils – in effect.
Sorry for the rambling.
Dugger
Why do you guys fall for this trap? The MSM could fellate Bush on live tv and the right would say it’s still liberally biased. Stop engaging them on this stuff. It’s like trying to talk sense to a cultist.
I also think its funny that the answer to the fact that conservatives are always wrong is that Bill Clinton lied about sex and trickle down economics works (it doesn’t). Thanks for proving my point again guys. You’re what is commonly referred to as a target rich environment.
And yeah, I’d like bipartisanship but as long as George W. Bush is in office we won’t get it. He doesn’t know how. I’m not Howard Dean or Speaker Pelosi or Majority Leader Reid and have no need to publicly talk about something that doesn’t exist under this president.
My own quantified study took all media outlet….
I love this. You think everything in the media is biased and do a study to prove it. I can’t imagine that your results would be any different than what you expected them to be from the begining. Is there a link to this study of yours?
Oh and Jay? You do know the Soviet Union no longer exists, right?
Ok, just checking.
Sorry Ollie…I know that Media Matters teaches you just to repeat things hoping people will believe you, but it doesn’t cut it here.
The supposed VRWC was “out to get” clinton according to the liberals. The conservatives said that clinton was having an affair and that he lied to the authorities about it…they were right. Of course they had to pull out the “smoking gun” blue dress to get them to admit it.
George Bush lowered taxes and tax receipts went UP! All during a time that you were bitching about a lack of job growth and a stagnating economy in the wake of 9/11….again, liberals are wrong, conservatives are right.
These hyperbolic statements are fine for a bumper sticker but not really all the great for a political discussion.
> 5) Cutting tax RATES can
> quite often increase
> overall tax REVENUE …
> (This was also demon-
> strated by President
> Kennedy.)
Kennedy cut the top tax rate for the wealthy significantly AND he eliminated many of the loop holes that kept the folks who were subject to those rates from actually paying them. The net result was a nice increase in collected taxes.
When you point a finger, you’ve got four pointing back at you. The MSM reported any and all rumours about President Clinton as if it were “news” go read Conason, Alterman or Blumenthal or Brock. They accused him of rape, trafficking drugs, a shady land deal and secret FBI files. His big offense was cheating on his wife, they tried to remove him from office and in return the American people removed them from office.
The economy is not strong, our debt is high, job growth has been in the burger flipper segment. We had a referendum on the Republican economy last month, and America voted Democrat.
Republicans need to learn that simply repeating something over and over doesn’t make it true. We cover this at Media Matters all the time, and refute it easily with these things called facts and objective truth.
The conservatives said that clinton was having an affair and that he lied to the authorities about it…they were right.
Authorities? The Affair Police?
George Bush lowered taxes and tax receipts went UP!
The doctor’s innumeracy is on display once again. Allow me:
Peed’, tax receipts almost always go up, year to year. If you look at annual tax receipts since WWII, I think there are about five years when receipts failed to increase over the previous year. (And at least two of those years immediately followed Mr. Bush’s tax cuts!)
Cut taxes? Receipts go up. Raise taxes? Receipts go up. Leave tax rates alone. Receipts go up.
I’m sorry, but you just can’t believe everything Hannity tells you.
wait a second ollie…I never qualified where the job growth was, nor am I all that sure it was all burger flippers….but the good news is, since your ridiculous lede was “wrong on everything”, it doesn’t matter how many “fingers” are pointing back in your view…your argument is deflated.
You can keep pulling out canards like debt is high (as a percent of GDP, not so much), simply stating that our economy “is not strong” flies in the face of many quarters of growth as well as unemployment rates at historical lows.
See I don’t just make statements Ollie, I back them up with fact…thats the difference between propaganda and the truth…
Finally, I thought the republican defeat was a referendum on Iraq? Most of the folks who watch these sort of things for a living felt it was a referendum on republicans not following the basic requirments of the party according to the republican voters.
See I don’t just make statements Ollie, I back them up with fact…thats the difference between propaganda and the truth…
bwahahahahahahah!!!!!
See I don’t just make statements Ollie, I back them up with fact…
Well, how about backing that one up with some facts? Point us to a few recent examples.
“I back them up with fact…”
ROFL … please, stop…you’re killing me…
I am a sucker for quacker’s ploy of always asking a question to deflect the string…but here you go
Facts:
* Real After-Tax Income Per Person Has Risen By 9.8 Percent – $2,660 – since 2001
* Our Economy Has Grown A Solid 2.9 Percent Over The Past Four Quarters – Faster Than Any Other Major Industrialized Country.
* Productivity Has Grown At An Annual Rate Of 3 Percent Since The First Quarter Of 2001, Up From A 2.4 Percent Annual Rate During The Preceding Five Years.
* Employment Has Increased In All But One State Over The Past 12 Months Ending In September.
No cigar, Mr. Reading Comprehension Skills.
See, you went: “See I don’t just make statements Ollie, I back them up with fact…”
And then I was all, “Well, how about backing that one up with some facts? Point us to a few recent examples.”
I meant, point us to some recent examples of statements you made and backed up with facts!
I did NOT mean, just type up some random statistics.
duros
“I love this. You think everything in the media is biased and do a study to prove it. I can’t imagine that your results would be any different than what you expected them to be from the begining. Is there a link to this study of yours?”
Can you read, son? And then do you understand what you read?
I don’t think EVERYTHING in the media is biased.
I have repeatedly said it doesn’t ‘prove’ anything because of peoples’ differing perceptions of bias. On a web site that thinks W is a dangerous right wing zealot and the NY Times and WaPo are conservative, I would not expect agreement with my assessments that they are liberal (SF Chron, for isntance, is left).
Why don’t y’all go bark at Allahpundit for a while?
Leave it to our favorite stateside-deferred Wingnut, Jay Tea..
” Bill Clinton DID commit perjury by lying under oath.”
-Yes, and he was temporarily disbarred. Such is the punishment for trying to conceal an extra-marital dalliance.
Bush on the other hand..
-Would only testify to the 9/11 commission under the condition that he not be sworn in, his testimony would be to a hand selected panel, and that Vice President Cheney be present -none of the testimony would be made public -no transcripts could be taken.
-So much for oversight of the excecutive branch -or just maybe lessons learned.
“Terrorism should not be treated as strictly a law-enforcement issue.”
-Especially on Planet Jay, where the innocent be dammed. EX: Maher Arar, the Tipton Three, Khaled el-Masri, etc.
Those are just little oopsies when they happen to brown people.
“There was no nefarious Bush/Rove plot to expose Valerie Plame”
It’s true! Ken Starr would have found that out! Patrick Fitzgerald is a overzealous moonbat! Umm.., thats of course when Fitzgerald isn’t going after the New York Times!
Doh!
I love Dugger’s reasoning. He believes that the media is bias because of how he defines bias. He, on the other, acknowledges that other people who have different definitions of bias might not see a bias or might see the opposite bias that he sees. Depending on the person asked, the New York Times could be either a left wing rag or a right wing hate sheet.
Not once does any of this shake him from his belief that the media is still biased.
I love it.
I don’t think EVERYTHING in the media is biased.
Dude, you think cheeseburgers are biased.
i’d love to read your study, duggs.
duros
You really wouldn’t, because you would disagree with asssumptions. I freely acknowledge there is a disconnect on the left and right on this and that we talk right past each other. My study documents and quantifies my opinions. Plus it is a few years out of date with Raines at the NYT and Rather still at CBS. Below is a small portion indicating how some of the media are comapratively weighed.
• National Television (3 Factor)
CBS Liberal (Dan Rather, 60 Minutes, Sunday talk show, leans Left)
NBC Liberal (Tim Russert’s influence could create Unbiased lean)
ABC Liberal (Has moved more to Left over last few years)
PBS Liberal (Formerly Left, but has tried to balance a little; still Moyers)
• Major “National” Newspapers (3 Factor)
Washington Post Liberal (Responsible mainstream liberalism)
NY Times Left (Krugman, Kristoff, even their conservative, Brooks, is liberal-ish)
Wall St. Journal Conservative (Not Right due to amt. of dry business analysis, Al Hunt, establishment outlook)
USA Today Liberal (But very “vanilla”, popular liberalism)
Why do you guys encourage him? Garbage In, Garbage Out.
Ollie
Afraid some will actually think? Maybe you can come up with a potty word that rhymes with Dugger. That ought to do it.
There is a huge disconnect in the bias however Dugger. Fox news is blatantly concerned with conservative and republican agendas. NBC has a slight bias in issue reporting. Its like 6 people whispering liberal, 3 people whispering conservative and one guy screaming CONSERVATIVE at the top of his lungs. Yeah, its a 6-4 split liberal but not a 6-4 split noise wise.
Well, of course I disagree with the assumptions. Your assumptions are that the MSM is biased. then you prove it to yourself.
Very scientific.
Dugger, there’s no thinking involved. You make an assertion with no evidence. Someone refutes your assertion and backs it up with facts. You respond by restating your original assertion. It’s like the tar baby from B’rer Rabbit.
Is there a word for that thing where you move your finger up and down your lips and make a “brblrbrbl” noise? Because Dugger always makes me think of that.
“NY Times Left (Krugman, Kristoff, even their conservative, Brooks, is liberal-ish)”
Krugman? Kristoff? Brooks?
What did you do look at the editorial pages to determine which outlest leans in which direction? And Brooks is liberal-ish? And that’s because he lives in New York, right? Are you kidding me? Gawd you’re an idiot.
What a total fugger.
I think this argument will never end because of two things: First, and most important, the left will never concede that a differing or opposing view has any validity or worth. Therefore, they work with the assumption that their beliefs are “truths”. So news slanted to the Left is, to them, simply the truth.
Secondly, they have simply reframed their side of the debate: A conservative points to headline placement, priority of subjects covered, “editorializing” in news items, and says the mainstream media is slanted to the left.
A liberal points to corporate ownership, lip service given to impartiality (how many liberal journalists have you heard say, “I may be a liberal, but I report the news objectively”?), and the careful placement of moderates and conservatives on their staffs, and argues that there is no bias.
In effect the conservative argues A,B, and C; while the liberal argues D,E, and F. Neither refutes the other.
Brooks is as conservative as they come, but there was a time less than 10 years ago when Krugman was considered conservative . I know that will surprise the historically-challenged conservatives here at OW, but he is and always has been a strong proponent of market globalization and trade liberalization. This made him very unpopular with economic nationalists and anti-free traders.
The fact that he has a serious objection to Bush and other authoritarian conservatives doesn’t necessarily make him liberal — it just makes him principled.
“First, and most important, the left will never concede that a differing or opposing view has any validity or worth.”
Where do you idiots get this shit?
A conservative points to headline placement, priority of subjects covered, “editorializing” in news items, and says the mainstream media is slanted to the left.
Yup. That sounds just like Brent Bozell to me.
Note to trolls: The TRUTH has a liberal bias. With that settled, why don’t you nice little boys go play on the freeway.
frame, that statement was irony at its best…
Quaker, Bozell is a commentator — he has never hidden his bias.
mikefromtexas, I think I said that already.
Ideology is a belief and, as such, reflects the viewpoint of the believer. Burnham suggests in “The Suicide of the West” that ideology comes from one’s personal psychology, and thus it is nearly impossible to change your point of view — or anybody else’s
Idieology doesn’t “come from”
one’s personal psychology. It shapes one’s personal pyschology. Why? Because ideology comes from without to within, not the other way around. That’s pretty much implicit in the very definition of ideology. Which is why you guys are probably so stupid. You’re reading idiots.
Gee, frame, I dunno where us idiots get that idea. Perhaps you should ask our gracious host, who opined that “Conservatives Are Wrong On Everything” at the very top of this posting.
J.
Hyperbole for comic effect is clearly something only Conservatives do.
Close, Nimrod. I’d say it’s “something only Conservatives do well.” Because I didn’t see any intended humor in Oliver’s original article — just his standard hyper-partisan bombast and bluster.
The guy has a sense of humor, on occasion. But it’s not in evidence here. If the title was intended for comic effect, it would be the only touch of humor in the whole thing.
J.
“Kennedy cut the top tax rate for the wealthy significantly AND he eliminated many of the loop holes that kept the folks who were subject to those rates from actually paying them. The net result was a nice increase in collected taxes.”
I love this one. The pedophile junkie of the EIB network used this line almost as often as he used hillbilly heroin and banged kids in the Dominican Republic, so his mouth-breather followers feel it bears repeating.
Just be sure to ignore that little short-term economic engine called the Vietnam “conflict.” Rinse, then repeat and you’ve got the Reagan economic “revolution.”
Funny thing is, both were followed by the entirely predictable, inevitable, and unforgivable economic disaster for those too low in the economic pecking order to profit from the bloodshed and wasted money.
Typical wingnut blindsight.
Gee – frameone used the word “implicit”. He must be smart. Try this, numskull: psychology and ideology come from without. Neither is hard wired, genetic, congenital, or instinctual.
Ideology, being a combination of (one’s own and others’) ideas plus (one’s own and others’) mores, comes, perforce, from “without”, as you put it.
Assuming that you were correct in saying that ideology comes from without — and I emphasize that that is irrelevant — that still wouldn’t mean that ideology influences psychology which also comes from without (unless you were born with a fully functioning brain — unlike any other newborn baby on the planet).
One thing I’m absolutely sure of: Anyone who calls James Burnham an idiot has never heard of him, never read him, AND is an idiot.
Quaker, Bozell is a commentator — he has never hidden his bias.
No, he hasn’t. And, ironically, he’s a commentator on the subject of bias! My point is that he does not follow the cool, rational analysis you ascribe to conservatives.
Hey, has the AP come up with the putative police captain yet?
Ollie?
Anyone?
Bueller?
No? But,but,but….Ollie said the conservatives are wrong about EVERYTHING!
Um, FD, did you pay attention to what you were writing when you wrote it? You wrote, “Burnham suggests in “The Suicide of the West” that ideology comes from one’s personal psychology.”
“Come from” implies that personal psychology precedes ideology. You must not have been paying attention when you wrote that because you totally contradicted yourself in your response. We enter into ideology even before we’re conscious of ourselves as children. Ideology permeates language itself and structures our relationship to the world from the very beginning.
If you’re arguing Burnham’s position you aren’t doing a very good job. If you aren’t, Burnham is a reactionary idiot.