What’s next indeed… The media and the Obama Administration seem to be busy trying to dismiss the Tax Day Tea Parties as underwhelming flashes in the pan that didn’t amount to anything and won’t be remembered in a week (plans are already in play for a second round of Tea Parties on July 4. (link) More on that later…)
But I will remember. I will remember what was said about how our President and Congress are running roughshod over the will of the people, passing legislation that will encumber us all with debt for generations. I will remember the reason we ended up with a President who was eminently unqualified for the job and a Congressional majority that does not represent the will of the American people… We ended up with them because of media embellishment, obfuscation, and outright lies. I get so angry about media bias, but there is so little I can do about it other than point out that bias and do what I can to amplify the messages of others doing the same. So, to that end I’ve added a new category on Media Bias, and will use my tiny little soapbox here to point out examples of it when I can.
To get things started, here’s a PajamasTV video that does a good job of exposing the cost of that bias.
It’s a rather long video, so I’ll highlight what I thought was the best part. After pointing out the egregious violation of journalistic ethics displayed by CNN ‘reporter’ wench Susan Roesgen at a Chicago Tax Day Tea Party, PGTV’s Bill Whittle has this to share:
Ok look, where is the harm in all this media bias, why does it really matter? Well, during the 2004 election between George Bush & John Kerry, Newsweek Magazine’s Evan Thomas had this to say; quote: “Let’s talk a little media bias here… They’re going to portray Kerry and Edwards as being young and dynamic and optimistic and there’s going to be this glow about them, collective glow, the two of them, that’s going to be worth maybe 15 points.” And that was in 2004.
Now even though Evan Thomas talked about Kerry and Edwards being portrayed as having a ‘glow’ about them, the media never really fell in love with John Kerry, they just gave him 15 points at the polls because they were the media. It’s what good liberals do. It’s the right thing to do, you know, it’s kind of a sense of duty on their part.
But, but, but… Four years later, the real deal would emerge. Now you wanna talk about a candidate with a glow they could really get behind… Well now! 2004 was nothing, NOTHING compared to the water the media carried lovingly and with wide-eyed admiration for the true messiah, to which candidate Kerry was in retrospect was merely a long-faced John the Baptist. I mean if this guy was worth an additional 15 percentage points at the polls, then who could put a price on this?
But let’s just say that even with the messiah the media bias alone, forgetting the constant throbbing drumbeat from Hollywood, late-night talk shows, the music industry, academia, all the rest… Let’s just say that Obama has the same benefit of liberal bias that Evan Thomas in an unguarded moment was ready to credit to John Kerry. Well if you look at the 2008 Electoral Map, and if you remove 15 points of media bias from Barack Obama, you will get this result… Obama carries Vermont with three electoral votes and DC with three electoral votes and, well that’s all he gets. Because in no other state was Obama’s margin of victory greater than the 15 points of media bias that the press themselves admit that they were willing to give him. And if you take that press bias away, John McCain wins by a score of 532 to 6.
Ladies and gentlemen, we not only have an aristocratic imperial Congress-for-life that no longer represents the will of the American people, we also have in place of the unbiased dispassionate watchdogs that they claim to be, a wildly partisan and utterly unethical press corps who decides over cocktails who should win elections and who should lose them, and then prepares the appropriate narrative, which they sell to you as the unbiased news. But the current products of CNN, Newsweek, and all the rest are as far from actual news reporting as our current congress and federal government are from the ideals our founding fathers had in mind at the very birth of this great nation.
Granted, Mr. Whittle takes some liberties with his source for the numbers he uses for the effect of media, but his point is valid; that the media’s fawning over Barack Obama during the election and their handling of anything that would’ve reflected badly on him gave him a huge boost in the election. I have to add that John McCain didn’t do himself many favors in the election, and the GOP should’ve been able to present a candidate in the first place. A candidate that better represented what most Republican voters wanted in a President. But the fact remains that had the media not been water carriers for candidate Obama, Barack Obama would not be in the White House now, and would instead be at home in Chicago, nursing his wounds.
Media bias matters.
