So now the only question is: How will the Usual Suspects try to spin this so that it’s a negative for Clinton and/or Obama?
PAD
So now the only question is: How will the Usual Suspects try to spin this so that it’s a negative for Clinton and/or Obama?
PAD
• 
Obama has taken his share of lumps, true, but the media coverage has still been overwhelmingly positive. It mirrors his poll numbers. 70%+ view him favorably right now. Those numbers WILL go down as he implements policy, but right now he has the honeymoon benefit.
So, the Democrats love him and the moderates are willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Even many Republicans who didn’t vote for him (myself among them) are willing to see what he can do.
There are some hard-core conservatives trying to stir things up (Rush, Hannity), but I don’t think they represent as large a population as people believe. I understand the criticisms, but they take it too far. You don’t wish for a president to fail. Too many Democrats pounced on every minor Bush misstep whether it was deserved or not.
An example of warranted criticism: when the CBO’s initial scoring of the stimulus package shows only 10% spent this fiscal year, and only 25% by the end of next year, there is GOOD reason to be concerned. Much of the criticism is being pushed aside as standing in the way of reacting to the recession. Not all reactions are good ones, though, and a bit more time to straighten this out would seem to be a worthwhile endeavor.
Bill Mulligan: “Plus, there can be no circumstance where advocacy groups like most prominent feminist groups can express satisfaction with The Way Things Are.”
I forgot to add that this is a good observation, Bill. 🙂
Mark L: “Obama has taken his share of lumps, true, but the media coverage has still been overwhelmingly positive.”
The coverage became overwhelmingly positive when things started going overwhelmingly well for Obama. For the media to have done otherwise would have been, well… biased.
I’m waiting for a bumper sticker or State of the Union Address which states, “Yes, Wiccan!” 🙂
Ow. OW.
I’m not sure which I find more annoying — the pun, or the fact that I didn’t think of it first. 🙂
This principle is not afforded in the Muslim countries or in traditonal atheistic countries.
The Mohmedans don’t come ’round here wavin’ bells at us! We don’t get Buddhists playing bagpipes in our bathroom! Or Hindus harmonizing in the hall! The Shintoists don’t come here shattering sheet glass in the shithouse, shouting slogans — !
I’ve never suggested that liberals and/or democrats don’t get criticism. I don’t think they are held to the same standard that Republicans are.
I believe that if A- Christopher Dodd was a Republican and B- republican Dodd promised to release mortgage documents regarding his friendly treatment from a major player in the mortgage industry he oversees and C- it was now 183 days since that promise and the documents have not surfaced it is quite likely that D- the MSM would be holding his feet to the fire at every opportunity. I could be wrong.
I think that if Charles Rangel was A- a republican and B- republican Charles Rangel had as many ethics problems as the one in our timeline does then C- republican Charles Rangel would be lucky to still have his job. He would have long since been bumped off the committee he chairs. And the MSM would be (quite rightly) be congratulating itself on successfully rooting out a corrupt politician and making him take responsibility for his corruption. I could be wrong.
I think that if President Obama were president Mccain, ther ewould be more made about the reports that the predator strike on Pakistan is said, by the Pakistanis, to have killed 22 civilians. I may be wrong (And, as will often be the case, in this instance the bias of the MSM works in favor of my position so hey, go MSM!)
(I also think that Code Pink, Not In Our Name, International A.N.S.W.E.R etc etc would be critical of this strike against a soveriegn nation but I don’t pretend that these groups represent the MSM or anyone else beyond their membership. It is amusing to note the silence though)
Bias does not equal a blanket press boycott and/or 100% positive press, no exceptions. If that’s the definition then you win, there is definitely no bias at all. If you take my definition–that the MSM will, overall, report the news but place special emphasis and coverage on the stories that advance the political opinions of the majority of the reporters, well, then you have an argument. An unwinnable one–we will both come up with examples to support our view and it depends on one’s opinion of the amount and quality and veracity of those examples as to who makes the best argument but even that does not prove the point one way or another.
But I would submit that anyone who think that the MSM is biased toward one political view or another and that this bias manifests itself in the way news is covered has an argument that cannot simply be dismissed by examples of coverage that simply reports the truth.
I forgot to add that this is a good observation, Bill. 🙂
So I’m batting 500? Boyah! Personal best!
I’m waiting for a bumper sticker or State of the Union Address which states, “Yes, Wiccan!” 🙂
For that you should come to great bodily harm.
That’s a fair criticism.
It’s not a fair criticism to continue to bring it up if the legislation is changed in reaction to it, or if the analysis was done on only part of the stimulus package, so it’s incumbent on us to keep up on events….
It’s obvious to me that our new leader is in fact a SubGenius. Give the man some Slack!.
All hail Bob.
PS Have a happy Feast of Klaatu everyone.
Bill Mulligan: “Bias does not equal a blanket press boycott and/or 100% positive press, no exceptions. If that’s the definition then you win…”
Bill, in fairness I don’t think I’ve said anything close to that. On the other hand, perhaps I haven’t been making a good faith effort to understand your position, either. We both feel strongly about this, and when strong feelings are involved sometimes even friends can have trouble hearing each other.
I used to be a reporter, Bill. I was involved, first-hand, in deciding not only how to report the news but in some cases whether or not to report something as news. There are criteria that can be applied to help avoid the possibility of bias, but ultimately it’s not an exact science. It’s a judgment call, and people are fallible. That doesn’t mean they have a political agenda, though.
I think part of the reason that I bristle at your remarks about the “MSM” is that it doesn’t match my personal experience. I worked for a public radio station, and half the people in the newsroom were conservative republicans — including the news director. I knew reporters at other outlets, and in my experience there were just as many conservatives in the local media as there were in the general populace.
You’ve said that your argument cannot be disproven by simply pointing out “examples of coverage that simply reports the truth.” Fair enough. As you said, we could both throw individual examples at each other all day without either of us proving anything. So, in the spirit of fairness, let me do my best to understand what you’re trying to say and address you in a reasonable way.
If you take my definition–that the MSM will, overall, report the news but place special emphasis and coverage on the stories that advance the political opinions of the majority of the reporters, well, then you have an argument.
In fairness, Bill, that’s not a “definition,” it’s an opinion backed up by premises for which you haven’t offered any real evidence. For example, how do you know what the “political opinions of the majority of the reporters” are? About a decade ago a news organization conducted a survey of reporters in my hometown of Rochester, N.Y., and found that the percentage of liberals and conservatives in the news media pretty closely matched the percentages in the general population. Have you seen nationwide data that suggests otherwise? If so, who conducted the study? What was the methodology? Were there additional studies conducted to verify the results?
Also, what stories do you feel have been emphasized by the “liberal MSM” to advance their agenda? How do you know that the coverage was biased? How are you ensuring an apples-to-apples comparison?
I realize it may be a bit unfair to ask you to produce demographic data and a content analysis to support your feelings about media bias. On the other hand, please understand that people like me who have been in the news media understandably get a bit irritated when people “prove” their feelings about media bias with nothing more than an assertion that “you just know that the media would report this differently if it had been a Republican.”
I forgot to add one thing: I do believe the media is biased. It’s just not a bias for one political party over another. It’s a bias for the sensational.
Peter David: It’s commonly ascribed to the Hippocratic Oath, but wrongly. It’s not in the oath. It’s a medical aphorism.
Luigi Novi: The Oath, as presented by the National Institute of Health, includes the phrase “do no harm”, and other versions I’ve seen have variations like “never do harm”. (Source: nlm.nih.gov/hmd/greek/greek_oath.html)
The fact that Obama is taking flak for allowing the word “nonbelievers” into his speech in a positive light just shows how much it needed to be said.
I used to be a reporter, Bill. I was involved, first-hand, in deciding not only how to report the news but in some cases whether or not to report something as news. There are criteria that can be applied to help avoid the possibility of bias, but ultimately it’s not an exact science. It’s a judgment call, and people are fallible. That doesn’t mean they have a political agenda, though.
I totally respect your opinion on this and your having been a reporter holds a lot of weight. One thing–much of my disappointment with the MSM is that I think reporters should be and have been among the greatest guardians of our freedoms. Take away a free press from this country and the decent into despotism would be measured in months if not weeks. This is a noble profession and there are still many many members of it that work hard to keep it that way. I would not fream of paining them all with the same brush.
When people criticize teachers for offenses real or imagined I don’t automatically take offense–even though my coworkers include some of the finest people I have known there are certainly more than a few embarrassments to the profession out there.
In fairness, Bill, that’s not a “definition,” it’s an opinion backed up by premises for which you haven’t offered any real evidence. For example, how do you know what the “political opinions of the majority of the reporters” are? About a decade ago a news organization conducted a survey of reporters in my hometown of Rochester, N.Y., and found that the percentage of liberals and conservatives in the news media pretty closely matched the percentages in the general population. Have you seen nationwide data that suggests otherwise? If so, who conducted the study? What was the methodology? Were there additional studies conducted to verify the results?
No and it’s a fair point. And one could also ask what exactly I mean by the Mainstream media in the first place. I’m really not including local papers, which I find can be–many exceptions exist–pretty good at doing the kind of investigative meat and potatoes reporting that used to be the norm.
And they’re dying out, which is a real shame but I think print in general is dying out. I think we’re gonna miss them.
I consider Time, Newsweek, NPR, CBS, MSNBC, CNN, ABC, NBC, USA TODAY, NYT, WASHINGTON POST, WALL ST JOURNAL, and a few select other papers and news services (like AP and reuters) to be the MSM.
As far as evidence of this bias, besides my own observations (which are, of course, biased)here are a few, culled from an extremely biased site–there may be studies and polls that “prove” the opposite, I freely admit.
As part of a larger study of how the views of “opinion leaders” compare with those of the general public, the Pew Research Center for The People & The Press, in collaboration with the Council on Foreign relations, surveyed 72 top journalists in September and October 2005. The study, which was released on November 17, 2005, found that, compared to everyday citizens, journalists were more likely to have opposed the decision to go to war in Iraq, were more pessimistic about the chances of success in Iraq, and were far less likely to see immigration reform as a national priority. Reporters were also more disapproving of President Bush’s job performance.
(The differences were stark–about 2 to 1)
Preparing for a panel discussion on the media, the Annenberg Public Policy Center and the Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands commissioned a poll of 673 journalists, including 424 from newspapers, 48 from broadcast and cable networks, 47 from top-50-market local television stations, 45 from Web sites, 41 from other television stations, 26 from national radio networks, 18 from wire services, 14 from top-50-market local radio stations and 10 from magazines. The surveys were conducted by Princeton Survey Research Associates between March 7 and May 2, 2005, with the results released on May 24, 2005. The poll asked questions on journalistic ethics and about journalists’ views on issues and overall ideology.
A total of 31 percent described themselves as “very liberal” or “liberal” compared to just nine percent who identified themselves as “very conservative” or “conservative,” with 49 percent maintaining they are “moderate.”
In May 2004, the Pew Research Center for The People and The Press (in association with the Project for Excellence in Journalism and the Committee of Concerned Journalists) surveyed 547 journalists and media executives, including 247 at national-level media outlets. The poll was similar to ones conducted by the same group (previously known as the Times Mirror Center for the People and the Press) in 1995 and 1999. The actual polling was done by the Princeton Survey Research Associates.
* Five times more national journalists identify themselves as “liberal” (34 percent) than “conservative” (just 7 percent). In contrast, a survey of the public taken in May 2004 found 20 percent saying they were liberal, and 33 percent saying they were conservative.
* The percentage of national reporters saying they are liberal has increased, from 22 percent in 1995 to 34 percent in 2004. The percentage of self-identified conservatives remains low, rising from a meager 4 percent in 1995 to a still-paltry 7 percent in 2004.
Most national journalists (55 percent) say the media are “not critical enough” of President Bush, compared with only eight percent who believe the press has been “too critical.” In 1995, the poll found just two percent thought journalists had given “too much” coverage to then-President Clinton’s accomplishments, compared to 48 percent who complained of “too little” coverage of Clinton’s achievements.
In the July/August 2001 edition of the Roper Center’s Public Perspective, Washington Post national political correspondent Thomas Edsall summarized the findings of a Kaiser Family Foundation poll of 301 “media professionals,” 300 “policymakers” and the 1,206 members of the public. The media professionals included “reporters and editors from top newspapers, TV and radio networks, news services and news magazines.” The results showed that “only a tiny fraction of the media identifies itself as either Republican (4%), or conservative (6%),” placing reporters far to the left of media consumers.
* Four times as many “media professionals” told the pollsters they considered themselves “liberal” (25%) than called themselves “conservative” (6%). Among the general public, self-identified conservatives outnumbered liberals, 38 percent to 21 percent.
In 1996, as a follow-up to a 1988 survey, the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE) surveyed 1,037 reporters at 61 newspapers of all sizes across the nation, and found that newsrooms were more ideologically unrepresentative than they had been in the late 1980s. While the percentage of journalists calling themselves “Democrat or liberal” essentially held steady (going from 62 to 61 percent of those surveyed), the percentage saying they were “Republican or conservative” dropped from 22 percent to just 15 percent of journalists. The ASNE report, The Newspaper Journalists of the ’90s, also revealed that bigger — presumably more influential — newspapers had the most liberal staffs.
n 1985, the Los Angeles Times conducted one of the most extensive surveys of journalists in history. Using the same questionnaire they had used to poll the public, the Times polled 2,700 journalists at 621 newspapers across the country. The survey asked 16 questions involving foreign affairs, social and economic issues. On 15 of 16 questions, the journalists gave answers to the left of those given by the public.
Self-identified liberals outnumbered conservatives in the newsroom by more than three-to-one, 55 to 17 percent. This compares to only one-fourth of the public (23 percent) that identified themselves as liberal.
Now–even if we accept all these as true it does not automatically follow that this overwhelmiongly one sided population of opinion leads to biased reporting. One could be to the left of Trotsky and have enough journalistic ethics to police ones self for bad reporting. But then we’re back into the pure opinion thing, right? How can we measure bias and be sure that we aren’t letting our own bias’ get in the way of a good analysis?
I forgot to add one thing: I do believe the media is biased. It’s just not a bias for one political party over another. It’s a bias for the sensational.
Sounds good…but then you see stuff like the New York Times writing a front page story that implies McCain had an affair while providing no evidence or even anyone making the claim while everyone but the National Enquirer and a few bloggers ignored the John Edwards sex scandal until they couldn’t ignore it any more. You have to wonder.
And let me finish with something we should both agree on unless modesty gets in your way–it was journalism’s loss that you went into something else.
“Off to grade exams…”
That’s a dirty job, but someone as to do it. 🙂
The new School Year starts here on Wednesday.
I would not fream of paining them all with the same brush.
Wow, have I been stripping furniture in poorly ventilated rooms again?
If he were to try and include everyone, he would still be standing at that podium today and still he would only be on the t’s.
Kudos to aer for mentioning the Church of the SubGenius, led by and worshipping J.R. “Bob” Dobbs. I’d also like to give a shout-out to the agnostics (well, sometimes) and the Discordians (Hail Eris!) for those left out of Obama’s speech.
Speaking as a fundamentalist agnostic (I’m sure I don’t have all the answers), this whole “controversy” saddens me. This nation was designed as a place where all religions are welcome and the government neither requires nor prohibits any form of worship. Unfortunately, there are many who love to trumpet that this is “a Christian nation” and would love nothing more than to make (their version of) Christianity the official religon of America and restrict all other forms of religious worship.
I didn’t expect Obama to list every religion out there — if he had, we’d *still* be listening to the speech. I am glad that, unlike Bush and his first-week “faith-based initiatives,” Obama openly acknowledged that Christianity isn’t the only religion in America. Let’s hope he continues to support all of America, not just folks of one creed or one party.
I, for one, can’t wait to see the new Obama state quarters that are going to be issued starting in 2010.
I understand the motto on the coins will be changed to:
In Obama We Trust
For the past 8 years, this title could have easily been: “Boy, some people will find ANYTHING to complain about with Bush”
Sorry if I don’t have much sympathy for you Obamaites. Get used to it.
Jerry Chandler wrote: “designed to keep the attention off of the fact that Obama was getting his loyal operatives to forge an “authentic” birth certificate and get it to Hawaii before the next lawsuit appeal.”
You know, this tabloid-type of accusation was a bit amusing during the campaign in a sort of “what if?” type of way … but now, even if it was true (which I don’t believe), there is no way I’d want Biden to ascend to the throne … and heaven help up if something happened to him before picking a VP and then it’d be Queen Pelosi as Prez! Even though I think Obama is a green inexperienced lightweight, I guess I’d take my chances over him than Biden any day.
There was an interesting article in the Washington Post about oath taking. Obama is the seventh President to be sworn in twice. Four did it because March 4th or January 20th fell on Sunday. Two were Vice-Presidents after their predecessors died—Arthur and Coolidge. Obama is the only one to have a private swearing-in after a public one.
Obama Isn’t the First President to Retake Oath — or Forgo Bible
Incidentally, John Quincy Adams (or “Q”) was sworn in on a copy of the United States’ laws, and Theodore Roosevelt did not use a Bible when he was sworn in after William McKinley died. (He did use one when he was inaugurated in his own right in 1905.)
(Hi, Queen Anthai—it’s good to see you here! Long time, no see!)
Reverend Snow said:
Jess, I was with you right up until the Cruncberries ban. That stuff is awesome and I just can’t support someone that can’t acknowledge that,I’m sorry. I guess I will have to vote for Captain Crunch in 2012, at least he has some military experience…
I’m not eligible to run at all until 2016.
I think I can compromise with Quaker Oats as long as they do their part to fight ‘Crunchmouth’ the burning of the root of the mouth sensation many young children suffering from when they at a bowl too quickly and they return crunchberries to basic red. The green and purple ones are what make it taste so gross.
Richard: For the past 8 years, this title could have easily been: “Boy, some people will find ANYTHING to complain about with Bush”
Luigi Novi: For the past eight years, we didn’t really need to. Bush gave us plenty of legitimate reasons to complain about him.
Richard: Sorry if I don’t have much sympathy for you Obamaites. Get used to it.
Luigi Novi: What, right wing hatred of whichever Democrat is in power, and of anyone who levels legitimate criticism of people like Bush? Yeah, we’re used to that. We’ve had 16 years of it.
Wow, have I been stripping furniture in poorly ventilated rooms again?
Well, that WOULD explain your persistent claims of MSM liberal bias. 🙂
Wow, have I been stripping furniture in poorly ventilated rooms again?
Well, that WOULD explain your persistent claims of MSM liberal bias. 🙂
Or why I’m one of the 3% who thinks Blagojevich is doing a great job and has awesome hair.
A party to rid the world of the non=red crunchberries. Count me in.
A party to rid the world of the non=red crunchberries. Count me in.
Posted by James at January 25, 2009 12:16 PM
A party to rid the world of the non=red crunchberries. Count me in.
Posted by James at January 25, 2009 12:16 PM
A party to rid the world of the non=red crunchberries. Count me in.
Hey.. Up here in Minnesota, they would let you have both those votes to rid the world of those pesky crunchberries.
I think part of the problem with the MSM(sounds either like a movie studio or a shelled chocolate) is that it’s too aware that it’s THE MSM. I’ve said it before, probably say it again, too many news media types in this country want to be PART of the story, rather than just REPORTING it.
Once you get your blazer badge back from the League, Bill, I AM going to smack you. I’d do it now but I’m at work.
Jess,
I am all for Crunchberies returning to the original red color as nature intended it. As for “crunchmouth”, I would have to say that if we taught more about it in school or if parents would step in and actually help teach their children about such things, this would not be such a problem. As for me, I had to learn the hard way.
The hëll? Crunchberries aren’t red anymore? (I know they have green ones in Christmas Crunch, but that’s not the same thing.)
I am all for Crunchberies returning to the original red color as nature intended it. As for “crunchmouth”, I would have to say that if we taught more about it in school or if parents would step in and actually help teach their children about such things, this would not be such a problem. As for me, I had to learn the hard way.
I still get crunch mouth if I eat too much Cap’n Crunch too fast. It’s not that I forget that doing that can cause problems. Sometimes I go to sleep with my most recent meal being around six in the evening and I’m starving at six o’clock in the morning when I’m ready to eat again.
And then Michael said:
The hëll? Crunchberries aren’t red anymore? (I know they have green ones in Christmas Crunch, but that’s not the same thing.)
I hate to say this but Christmas Crunch was discontinued several years ago. A few years before they did that they added purple crunch berries to the standard box. Then they added more colors to compete with Trix.
I’ve always had a mixed opinion on the discontinuation of Christmas Crunch. On the one hand the green berries tasted a little weird. On the other hand– up until the year they added Jimmy Neutron shapes they had better prizes or games.
If there aren’t anymore Crunchberries, what will I pick out of the cereal to use as dog treats? I won’t share my Lucky Charms – dogs don’t care about magically delicious, and dogs shouldn’t eat CocoPuffs. And the last thing puppies need is the fiber in Grape Nuts.
And don’t tell me I’m killing my dog’s taste buds – anyone who loves Litter Box Crunch that much has no taste buds to start with.
‘If you give me six lines written by the most honest man,
I will find something in them to hang him.’
Cardinal Richelieu
Now, please, everyone who dissects what people say like this (meaning Obama’s speech), give me six written lines.
We were talking about the Latin phrase, “First, do no harm.” The poster said, “I’ve heard it as, “First, do no harm” and ascribed it to the Hippocratic Oath. I said it’s not in the Hippocratic Oath. And it’s not. Halfway down it does say:
“I consider for the benefit of my patient and abstain from whatever is harmful or mischievous.”
That’s not “First, do no harm.” Halfway down and a mention of the word “Harmful” is not “First, do no harm.”
You know why? For starters…
IT’S NOT SMEGGING FIRST.
PAD
Now some black fashion designers are bìŧçhìņg that Michelle Obama used an Asian for her evening gown and a Latino for her inauguration dress. More proof that you can’t…oh do we even NEED any more proof? This has gone from hypothesis to scientific theory.
Bill, I tried to respond to your post but it got caught in the spam filter, probably due to the links it included. It’ll probably show up later, so keep an eye out for it. Otherwise, I’ll e-mail my thoughts to you.
Look forward to it. yeah, it’s become almost impossible to include many links without getting snagged–I try to include complete quotes so that anyone wanting to can google them and get the source.
“As part of a larger study of how the views of “opinion leaders” compare with those of the general public, the Pew Research Center for The People & The Press, in collaboration with the Council on Foreign relations, surveyed 72 top journalists in September and October 2005. The study, which was released on November 17, 2005, found that, compared to everyday citizens, journalists were more likely to have opposed the decision to go to war in Iraq, were more pessimistic about the chances of success in Iraq, and were far less likely to see immigration reform as a national priority. Reporters were also more disapproving of President Bush’s job performance.”
More than indicating the the press is Liberal, this seems to clearly support the idea that they’re psychic.
“I hate to say this but Christmas Crunch was discontinued several years ago.”
Great. Why not just tell me I killed Padme in my anger while you’re at it?
Wow… Will “some people will find ANYTHING to complain about with Obama” this fast? Yeah, and it’s now devolved to blaming Obama for things that neither he nor his people never said.
In a hearing where the stimulus package was being discussed; Robert Reich said that he felt that the package would be best served if it had stipulations that made sure that it was not limited to professionals and “white male construction workers” since it was likely that unskilled laborers and minorities might be in greater need of the assistance. That general notion was itself a part of a larger discussion about the need to help direct some of the funds to those who are likely in the most financial peril.
Not worded very well and not everything he laid out was well thought out, but it was otherwise just his usual fluff. But man has The Right gone into Obama Overdrive on this one.
Cavuto played two sentences out of context on Fox News and then discussed with Michelle Malkin the “facts” about how the Obama administration is trying to turn the stimulus package into a “goody bag” for minorities and ideologically like minded supporters, conservative talk radio has gone nuts over how Obama’s people are planning to withhold stimulus money to white males and direct it towards minorities and conservative blogs and “news sites” are claiming that some of Obama’s people actually said that “white males need not apply” when it comes to the stimulus money.
Seriously, copy and paste into Google either of these lines.
Robert Reich “white males need not apply”
Obama adviser “white males need not apply”
The hilarity in this is that Robert Reich didn’t say that white males should be excluded from the stimulus package and, even if he had said that, Robert Reich is not a member of the Obama Administration. So Fox “News” and others are blaming Obama for playing to the fringe and the minorities while screwing over white males based on something that neither Obama nor anyone in his administration said and something that Robert Reich himself didn’t even say to begin with.
I have no idea why this surprises me in the least. Maybe I just thought that, while I knew that talkers like Rush and Hannity would stoop to any lie on day one, some news organizations like Fox would at least pretend to have standards a little longer than this.
actually, i did a double take on “nonbelivers”…couldn’t he just say “atheists”? Nonbeliever gives this sort of “not one of us god fearing believers” taste. well i’m gonna stop making mole hils out of moutains cause he’s still better than w. goodnight inernet.
I thought nonbelievers sounded odd, too. Then I thought that maybe he was trying to cover atheists and agnostics at the same time. Or maybe he figured that actually saying ‘atheist’ would pìšš øff certain religious people even more than just alluding to them.
Bill Mulligan, sorry I was late in getting back to you. I’ve been busy but your thoughtful post deserves one in return.
You know me well enough to know that I’m always open to reassessing my beliefs when I encounter new information. I’m not familiar with the studies you cited, and would appreciate it if you could e-mail to me a link to the web site you referenced. I’d like to learn more.
Still, the mere statistics alone aren’t enough to sway me in one direction or the other because I don’t know enough about the methodology of the polls you cited. For example, were the demographics of the samples representative of the national news media in terms of age, gender, race, etc.? What was the phrasing of the questions? How were the key variables measured?
In 1992 the Freedom Forum conducted a survey that found a liberal bias in the national news media. As this article (www dot consortiumnews dot com/archive/story21 dot html) points out, however, a failure to include prominent non-profit conservative journals in the survey skewed the results. The journals may not meet some people’s definition of the “MSM,” but many of the journalists involved with those publications appear on national television talk shows, and their opinions are often repeated on conservative talk radio and newspaper columns. There isn’t as distinct a line between the “MSM” and the “non-MSM” as some believe. I realize this study isn’t one of the ones you cited, but I think it illustrates just how difficult it is to truly and accurately quantify “media bias.”
By the way, the web site you used to compile these stats conveniently left out study conducted by the Center for Media and Public Affairs at George Mason University (www dot latimes dot com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-onthemedia27-2008jul27,0,2066363,full dot story) which found that ABC, CBS, and NBC were tougher on Obama than they were on McCain during the 2008 presidential campaign. I’m wary of any source which cites only those facts supporting a specific worldview, which is why I didn’t cite any numbers from the liberal organization known as Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting that “disprove” claims of liberal bias in the media. Advocacy organizations tend to ignore anything that doesn’t support their thesis. After all, as you pointed out, such groups are sometimes more concerned with justifying their existence than serving the cause of truth.
Absolutely. So much of this depends on definitions that are qualitative. What is conservative? what is liberal? The Wall Street Journal did a 50 most influential liberals list recently and some of the winners were apoplectic at being included.
I’ve seen Nat Hentoff described as conservative based solely on his position on abortion, which is a joke to anyone who knows the man and his work. The new senator from new york, Kirsten Gillibrand, is described by some as a conservative because of her NRA support (despite only having a whopping 8% rating from the American Conservative Union compared to a 70% from Americans for Democratic Action). So right off the bat you have to wonder about how things are defined.
That said, were the results the exact reverse–were the polls showing a 4 to 1 advantage of self described conservatives over self described liberals, I suspect that many liberals would take it as prima facie evidence of some kind of media bias and/or pogrom against progressives.
The studies I mentioned were cut and pasted from http://www.mediaresearch.org/biasbasics/biasbasics.asp. needless to say, that site is highly biased in favor of the idea of there being a liberal bias to the media, so I would not expect them to highlight any polls that show the opposite, but I have no reason to believe they made these results up out of whole cloth.
…but I have no reason to believe they made these results up out of whole cloth.
Huh? Who said anything about them making stuff up out of whole cloth?
No, no, I wasn’t implying you did, just justifying my using a website that is so clearly biased.
I believe the Church of Satan uses Alestair Crowley’s line, “‘Do as thou wilt’ shall be the whole of the law.”
If I’m not mistaken, the stance of the Church of Stan is, “An it harm none, get me another beer, long as you’re up.”
The 20th Amendment reads, in its first paragraph, “The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, and the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then begin.”
Note that it doesn’t say anything about when the Oath of Office is administered, or even if it should be. Since amendments to the Constitution are generally taken as overriding the original text (as in the 13th and 15th Amendments overriding the counting of slaves as 3/5 of a person), this therefore indicates that Obama’s term in office began while he was still climbing the stairs into the stand for the inauguration ceremony; it is then obvious that all of his actions that first day were legal, and all subsequent actions would continue to be so even if he chose not to take the Oath at all.
In practical terms, of course, refusal to take the Oath would severely hamper his ability to govern – that is, to persuade others to see his point of view…
The problem with the 20th amendment in this situation is that it doesn’t specifically override or even relate to the oath. The framers did not include the timing of the Presidential term in Article 2 of the Constitution (presumably, it was an act of Congress that determined such before the 20th amendment), so there are two seperate lines in the Constitution that may, at times, conflict. Either interpretation is arguably correct, so until and unless a legal ruling is made, the proper resolution under the law is unclear.
(The 13th amendment didn’t override the 3/5ths compromise, it made it moot. By declaring slaves free, they now were counted as free persons per the original language in the Constitution. The 14th overwrote it entirely, so the 15th had no interaction with the 3/5th compromise.)
Of course, wasting time with a lawsuit over such a triviality would be unlikely to progress very far, probably not even as far as the “natural-born citizen” debate(s) did.
The more important Obama act that should be discussed more is the fact that within a day of saying that (in summary) lobbyists wouldn’t be part of his administration, we were already hearing talk of a waiver for an appointee. Did his team not properly vet his own appointments before they drafted the policy, or was Obama really going off the cuff in his announcement?
Speaking as a Wiccan, Obama would get lynched if he acknowledged we exist publicly. I think “nonbelievers” is as risky as he can get.
So, not offended. I can’t blame him for not going there in this political climate.