us_ch14_webquest

=**Chapter 14 Web Quest**=


 * Task:** Investigate bias in the media by looking through the history and examples of media bias.


 * Process:** Read the following on history and examples of media bias answering the questions in the reading.

At one time, the news was dominated by the big three - NBC, CBS, ABC - and viewers couldn't tell the personal political beliefs of reporters or journalists. Fast forward to the 2000s and the 2008 (and subsequent) presidential election. The elite media (journalists on the major networks or major newspapers and magazines in the country) was pulling for Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) even in the primaries against Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY). GE (General Electric) owned MSNBC and CEO Jeffery Immelt was Senator Obama's biggest fan. Commentator Chris Matthews said he got a "chill" up his leg when he heard Obama give a speech. The media elites also took part in a character assassination of Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin (Alaska governor) while constantly reporting (still today) that there is a war on women...that women are being held back. Liberal outlets led by the New York Times and MSNBC (which reports on TV what the Times prints) also tried to brand Fox News as ultra conservative (like talk radio) and a lying station since it was the only station that reported both liberal and conservative viewpoints (this is backed up by statistics from the Media Research Center; Fox leans right, but left-wing media portrays them as far right, mostly because America has moved farther to the left - more secular-progressive - while Fox stayed traditional, thus the appearance of Fox moving to the right). As America has moved more secular and more progressive since the 1990s, a news agency that leans conservative but presents liberal and conservative viewpoints gets viewed as radical even though its presentation today would have been middle of the road in the 1990s. Evidence of America's move farther left since the 1990s is that many of the (Bill) Clinton policies are not supported by his party in the 21st century (policies such as tougher border security, tougher sentences on criminals, lowering of the capital gains tax, work requirement for welfare, just to name a few). Candidates (on the left) in 2016 ran against tougher border security, against tougher sentencing, looking to increase taxes including capital gains, and removing the work requirement on welfare. On a larger scale, compare JFK's "//Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country//" vs. what progressives offer today. JFK's quote would not be accepted in his party today.


 * 1. What is meant by "elite media" and how did they show their bias when reporting the news?**
 * 2. What is the evidence of politics having moved more left (liberal/progressive) since the 1990s/Clinton and especially since JFK?**

To understand current media bias, one has to first understand the history behind media bias. Newspapers had biases since Revolutionary times - some papers favored independence while others were loyalist (loyal to Britain). The Civil War brought a revolution in journalism since Americans from both the North and the South wanted accurate information and facts, not propaganda. Americans wanted to know who won battles and where the armies were, not personal opinions about the war.


 * 3. How did the Civil War change media bias in newspapers?**

The new Associated Press used telegraph technology to send reports to all newspapers. The telegraph with Morse Code was used to send the reports. Since typing out reports in Morse Code took a lot of time, transmitting facts over commentary was emphasized. Biased stories fell sharply through the Civil War and into the 1870s. Journalists themselves called for standards after the Civil War. Horace Greeley (New York Tribune) established rules and assured "all sides" to an argument would be in his paper. Adolph Ochs bought the struggling New York Times and wanted objectivity over partisanship. Oswald Garrison (The Nation and the New York Saturday Evening Post) emphasized "reporting both sides of every issue." There would still be those who wantted to sway the public based on their own beliefs - turn of the century Muckrakers pompously saw themselves as the moral voices of society and allowed their activism to report one side of the issue.


 * 4. Which turn of the century writers thrived on exposing scandals, but were biased (only reported one side of the issue)?**

A code of ethics was established by the American Society of Newspaper Editors (ASNE) that the primary purpose of distributing the news is to inform the people and let them make their own judgements. The AP (Associated Press) had its own code: (1) The good newspaper is fair, accurate, honest, responsible, independent, and decent. (2) Truth is its guiding principle. (3) It avoids practices that would conflict with the ability to report and present news in fair, accurate, and unbiased manner. --- Hardly a code that would be recognizable today.


 * 5. Do you like the code of ethics given in terms of reporting both sides of an issue? Why or why not?**

There would be some change in the 1950s - James Reston (Washington D.C. bureau chief for the New York Times) started to write "news" columns in 1953 that clearly reflected his own judgements. Soon, other Times reporters were doing the same. Such columns would reflect the writers' points of view on political issues and candidates. Large journalism schools, like Columbia University (which today is a major Secular-Progressive college), were gaining influence over those aspiring to have a career in the news.


 * 6. How did balanced news change in the 1950s?**

Liberal views began to dominate journalism in the 1960s and into the 1970s as the percentage of media voting liberal was never below 80% - this means at least 80% of journalists voted for liberal candidates running for office. Such views were dominated in New York and D.C. Those who didn't agree with the elite journalists would have trouble breaking through (media elites hung out together, read the same materials, and talked together - those who didn't share their liberal beliefs were excluded).


 * 7. How did a liberal bias expand among journalists in the 1960s and 1970s (why didn't you want to be against liberal views if you wanted to continue advancing in journalism)?**

A study was conducted on the leadership at four major papers (New York Times, Washington Post, Boston Globe, and the Los Angeles Times). Results showed that since the 1960s, biographies (of those newspaper leaders) reveal not a single graduate degree outside of journalism (none had a degree in business) and only a handful had experience outside of reporting and editing. All came from the New York-D.C. corridor with 40% being Columbia Journalism School students. This shows how a liberal mindset got into the major newspapers and in journalism altogether. Liberal journalists claim to have the answers to economic problems, yet none have had education or experience in the world of business. A survey was conducted of Columbia students - from the sample used all supported abortion rights and same-sex marriage. None owned a gun. Only a few had every been in a house of worship. Out of those eligible to vote an overwhelming majority went with John Kerry (D) in 2004 over George W. Bush (R). Here's all you need to know about Columbia University in New York City --- they've invited (several times) Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to come give a speech!


 * 8. What evidence is there that a major journalism college - Columbia - has a major liberal bias?**
 * 9. How would this bias impact journalism once these students graduated?**

In the 1960s, the press loss credibility with the JFK assassination. Most sources immediately said Oswald did it - made this assessment without any interviews of witnesses or gathering evidence. Viewers wanted to see evidence. Change would also take place during Vietnam. The change was a result of the news industry feeling that JFK and LBJ weren't providing honest and accurate information. The media preferred to cover the aspects of the Great Society - liberals favor more government spending and bigger government in general. Television also played a role in Vietnam reporting having an anti-war bias. Remember studying the Tet Offensive? The U.S. all but wiped out the Viet Cong in the South, yet what was shown on the news was U.S. soldiers in body bags. Reporters also began to be more sympathetic to the North Vietnamese. Before Tet, 100% of TV reports on North Vietnam were negative. After Tet, only 29% were negative. After Tet, negative reports about LBJ increased 70% and negative reports about South Vietnam went up 600%. In the1972 election, the elite media favored George McGovern (D) over President Nixon (R). Nixon won big, which upset the elite journalists. Watergate gave these journalists the means to bring down Nixon.


 * 10. How did Vietnam show change in new journalism?**

By 1980, respect levels of the media fell to 16% just slightly ahead of lawyers and insurance salesmen! The assault on Nixon cost the mainstream media trust with the public - the mainstream reporting didn't just tell what was happening with Watergate, it demonized all involved before the evidence was completely presented. Rather than the elite journalists going back to balanced reported, they attacked the public - those who didn't agree with the liberal philosophy were branded as not smart enough to understand - and moved farther left - more liberal.

In a major poll taken by Peter Brown and Bill Hamilton, the study found journalists were more likely to live in upscale neighborhoods, have maids, own a Mercedes, trade stocks, and were less likely to go to church, do volunteer work, or help in their community -> far from average Americans.

Michael Kelly, the late writer and editor for The Atlantic and other publications confirmed the cultural uniformity of journalists especially in D.C. Those journalists went to the same parties, sent their children to the same schools, lived in the same neighborhoods, argued together, married each other, lived and died by each others judgements. Therefore, it's not surprising these elite journalists tend to believe the same thing. Overall, journalists are twice as likely to support abortion, less likely to support school prayer or attend church, and even though they live rich lifestyles, they held a hostility to capitalism and conservative and Christian beliefs.


 * 11. Journalists claim to be looking out for average Americans. How does polling show they didn't live the life of average Americans?**

Eron Shosteck searched an extensive database and on April 27, 2000 wrote a column for the National Journal on the results of the Nexis database search to find out how balanced the political terminology was in journalism over a 3 month span. The word "partisan" means one who only votes by his or her political party. If you were partisan, that means you would only care what your party wanted and would never listen to the other point of view. Right means conservative and left is liberal on the ideology spectrum. The words "extreme, "hard," or "far" are used to mean someone who is more radical in their ideology...more radical than a "partisan." Through searching the database on how often journalists used these terms, the results showed the following: "Partisan Republican" used 85 times vs. "Partisan Democrat" used 58 times "Hard Right" used 683 times vs. "Hard Left" used 312 times "Far Right" used 267 times vs. "Far Left" used 130 times "Extreme Right" - database collapsed because it exceeded 1,000 citations vs. "Extreme Left" used 58 times

These results show that journalists criticized conservative points of view far more than liberal points of views.


 * 12. What did Shosteck's database search in 2000 show about media bias?**

Society's response was a decrease in newspaper sales and a decrease in TV ratings. FoxNews, the only non-liberal station became the most watched cable news station and was even competing against the major networks (difficult since not every family has cable but all can get the network stations (NBC, CBS, ABC). The response by the mainstream media and those in the public who only wanted to hear the liberal side of issues didn't look to compete with Fox News by being fair and balanced themselves and stop their biases, but rather they labeled Fox's audience as "nuts," "crazy," and said "Fox lies." Interestingly, it's the same underlying philosophy that enabled the U.S.S.R. to put any dissenters in asylums or prisons - on the basis that no one in their right mind would dislike communism.


 * 13. How was the Fox News Channel that developed in the 1990s different than the other TV news networks?**

A useful way to understand media bias is to look at the //Time// and //Newsweek// magazines, specifically the images and captions. Liberal actor Paul Newman was celebrated in 1994 as "one of a kind" with a flattering photo; liberal CNN founder Ted Turner was celebreated in 1997 for his $1 billion gift to the U.N.; liberal actor Christopher Reeve was celebrated for his "heroic battle to rebuild his life" with a photo captioned "Super Man;" Democrat ex-governor Howard Dean, known for his angry rants, was depicted in August 2003 the opposite with caption "smiling, feisty...renegade;" liberal musician Bruce Springsteen was depicted with a flattering picture in 2002 with the caption "Reborn in the U.S.A.;" the whole Lewinsky scandal with President Clinton was labeled as a "stinking mess" without ever identifying Clinton as the cause of it; covers of both magazines had headlines that read "Amnesty Makes Sense," which suggests that all illegal immigrants should be given immediate citizenship (notice it takes a position on illegal immigration - not explaining both sides) and "global warming is real;" from 2005 to 2009, Barack Obama was on 41 covers (wasn't running for the presidency until 2008. There's nothing controversial about putting a positive spin on stories or individuals. However, the purpose of this web quest is to show you how there is bias in the media. Sticking with the //Time// and //Newsweek// comparing to stories on conservatives: Pat Buchanan (tried to get Republican nomination for president in 1996 and 2000) was portrayed on a cover with an unsmiling, suspicious face and a caption that read "Hell Raiser" and //Newsweek// portrayed him as "Bully Boy." Newt Gingrich, during the budget battle with President Clinton, was labeled "The Gingrich Who Stole Christmas" blaming him for the government shutdown (both Gingrich and Clinton deserve equal responsibility). Even when //Time// named Gingrich Man of the Year, they used a picture of him not smiling, making him look like a grumpy old man. Radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh was portrayed as breathing fire into a microphone with a banner that read "Voice of America?" Another cover featured him with a blackened gag across his moth reading "ENOUGH." No one was ridiculed more than President Bush (W). He was portrayed as out of his league in diplomacy (little feet under a giant cowboy hat). There was also a cover with a picture of the 9/11 attacks with the caption "What Bush knew." Sometimes the liberal media outlets have to tell bad news about liberals and good news about conservatives, but are more happy to tell good stories about liberals and bad stories about conservatives.

For more statistical data and evidence of media bias, click here


 * 14. How would positive portrayals of liberals and negative portrayals of conservatives on covers of magazines impact peoples' perceptions of an individual?**

Is there anything wrong with this magazines having a bias one direction or another? No...freedom of the press is protected in the Bill of Rights. So why is it an issue? These magazines, like major national newspapers, and TV and cable networks try to sway the public into believing what they believe and demonize opposition points of view. It's good to know what information you're being presented with. If you watch Fox, you'll get a different presentation than NBC, etc. There is nothing illegal or wrong about this, but it's good to "do your own homework" on the issues.

Media analyst Bernard Goldberg (worked at CBS news...wrote a book on the change in media bias in the 21st century called //A Slobbering Love Affair//) showed that the biased media crossed the line in 2008. MSNBC's election coverage - of the stories about Senator McCain (Republican nominee) 73% were negative; of the stories about Senator Obama (Democrat nominee) only 14% were negative. In a 10 day period leading up the the election, the New York Times ran 11 stories on Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin's wardrobe (criticizing costs of her wardrobe), but in a 2 month span before the election only ran 2 stories examining Senator Obama's close relationship with former unrepentant Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers. A Pew Research Center Poll (Pew Research Center is a non-partisan think tank that shows current attitudes and trends) found that candidate Obama got twice as much favorable press as Bush (W) ever got and 30% more than Clinton. In terms of the network news in the 2008 election: on CBS 73% of Obama stories were positive while 31% of McCain stories were positive; on NBC 56% of the Obama stories were positive vs. 16% positive McCain stories; on ABC 57% of the Obama stories were positive against 42% positive McCain stories.


 * 15. How was media bias shown in the 2008 Presidential election?**

Other examples of bias - the TEA Party rallies in 2009 and 2010 were conservative rallies and overall was a conservative movement for smaller government. The liberal press labeled the group as violent and racist. The 2011 and 2012 Occupy Wall Street protests is a liberal movement against the financial firms and against capitalism. The media portrays the Occupy movement as a positive protest against greed. To compare, the hundreds of TEA Party rallies resulted in 0 arrests and no reports of illegal incidents. The Occupy movements in cities across the nation resulted in over 1,000 arrests and numerous reports of drug use and even rape.


 * 16. How was the media portrayal of the TEA Party different than their portrayal of Occupy Wall Street and what do the comparisons of arrests tell you about the bias reporting?**

Another example is regime change. Not being hypocritical would be either supporting the use of force against harsh/oppressive regimes in the world or not. In 2003, Bush ordered the removal of the ruthless Saddam Hussein. The liberal press, led by MSNBC and the New York Times demonized the war and reported daily casualty counts. In 2011, Obama ordered the U.S. to assist rebels in Libya in the ousting of the oppressive dictator Muammar Qaddafi yet these same media outlets portrayed the nobleness of America.


 * 17. How was reporting by the left wing press hypocritical in its reporting on removing Saddam Hussein vs. removing Muammar Qaddafi?**

Even going into the 2012 election, Mitt Romney wasn't even the Republican primary winner when MSNBC scrutinized Romney's Mormon faith. However, MSNBC failed to scrutinize Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader (most powerful person in the Senate), a Democrat, who is also a Mormon. In addition, there is no mention of President Obama's past with Black Liberation Theology or that his spiritual adviser is Jim Wallis, a man committed to redistribution of wealth.

Even take our local news - WJAC - in 2007 and 2008 (W. Bush still in office) the news did a daily gas tracker stating the price of gas around the area. This was subtle but the news reminded viewers about high gas prices daily. The price got as his as $4.11 a gallon after Hurricane Katrina damaged oil refineries along the Gulf of Mexico. The Bush Administration opened reserves to help out. When Bush left office January 19, 2009 the price of gas was $1.86 a gallon. Can presidents control gas prices? No! But, perception is reality to the public. In 2012, gas prices were high approaching $4.00 a gallon...no gas tracker on WJAC news...no mention of gas prices...coverage that the national networks do cover is not the price of gas or lack of drilling or the veto of the Keystone Pipeline, but rather how America needs alternative sources of energy like solar or wind. These same networks fail to report how solar energy companies around the nation that were given tax dollars in the stimulus packages are all going bankrupt!

Even in the Election of 2016 when WikiLeaks released emails showing the Democratic National Committee worked behind the scenes to keep Bernie Sanders from defeating Hillary Clinton, it was downplayed by the main stream media. WikiLeaks also released information showing the CNN gave the Clinton Campaign advanced knowledge of debate questions. This matters since it would give the candidate the opportunity to prepare the perfect answer and not have to answer spur of the moment. By 2016, media outlets weren't denying or trying to hide their biases. Whether they were right or wrong, they (media) felt that Donald Trump should not be president and so actively and openly oppose his positions. They even stated this. On various college campuses conservative speakers were protested against and in several cases violence by anti-conservative groups aimed at stopping such speakers, which they were able to do in some cases. This got ignored by the media. Oddly and ironically, the far left anti-conservative groups that shout down and use violence to stop conservative speech on campuses aim to paint the conservatives as fascists or neo-nazis...it's ironic because it was the fascists and Nazis in the 1930s who were the ones shutting down speech that opposed them!


 * 18. How was there bias in 2012 and 2016?**

There are plenty of examples. The bias is more obvious at the national level with national news. Even TV shows tilt more liberal (Hollywood is ground zero for the liberal mentality in terms of drug use and sexual freedom - very much secular/non-religious). There is a double standard on the issue - shows are willing to mock Christians and Jesus yet go out of their way to avoid reference to terrorism being an Islamic issue. A major reason for the liberal and secular bias out of Hollywood is because that city is ground zero for self-destruction - specifically drug abuse, but also glorification of sexual related activity. Pay attention when you watch movies and TV shows - you'll see that more often than not a message will be there that's anti-business, pro-choice, anti-oil or pro-Green/environmentalism, anti-high income earning, and/or anti-conservative and anti-Christian values. This web quest isn't aimed at stating these biases are bad (it's all a matter of your personal preference), but is aimed to show the crystal clear evidence. It's a paradox. Conservatives favor the free market system and Constitutional freedoms, which allow freedom of the press (whether biased or not) while liberals are skeptical of the capitalist system and want much more government involvement. The paradox is that many of the most outspoken liberals - journalists, movie and TV producers/writers, and college professors have made their bucks in - the free market system! A big example - Michael Moore, a staunch Secular-Progressive Liberal movie producer who made millions going after the capitalist system...one who went to the Occupy Wall Street protests to criticize the top 1% income earners in the nations....and he's in the 1%! Or, Rev. Jeremiah Wright who's Liberation Theology sermons were how blacks were being held down by whites, while he's a millionaire! Then there's Bernie Sanders, a socialist, who made a major run for the presidency and became a media hero speaking out against the rich in favor of higher taxes for more to go to the poor. This, while Sanders owns three homes...no media outlet asked him if he'd give one of those three homes to a homeless person!

Pew research did a study of media coverage for the first 3 months of the Obama Administration vs. the first 3 months of the Trump Administration. The first three months are transition periods in which a new president sets up the cabinet, ambassadors, other appointments, and especially the White House office, meets with Congressional leaders, and foreign ambassadors. So, the first three months there typically isn't a lot of partisan politics. The first three months of the Obama presidency saw 42% positive coverage vs. 20% negative with the rest being neutral. The first three months of Trump's presidency saw 5% positive coverage vs. 62% negative.

Even in Feb. 2017 when ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) conducted raids to round up and deport illegal immigrants with felony records who defied deportation (were deported and came back illegally), the media falsely reported that the Trump Administration was breaking apart families, when in reality the Trump Administration and the Obama Administration did the same type of raids. [|Click here]

It shows how divided our country has become...one either supports illegal immigration or not regardless of who is president (many were okay with it under Obama but demonize Trump and vice versa - happens on both sides)...but we expect the media to do accurate reporting...they do not as the evidence shows.

Graph showing positive vs. negative stories about Donald Trump in his first three months of office (way to early to determine if his presidency will be successful or not)

In the 2016 election, news that was detrimental to both candidates hit the news. A tape surfaced from 2005 about Trump talking vulgarly in terms of women and Clinton's emails showing her and the DNC (Democrat Party leaders) worked together to sabotage the Bernie Sanders campaign and also that CNN leaked debate questions to her, along with other information that the Clinton Foundation benefited financially from her term as Secretary of State. However, the major news outlets spent a disproportionate amount of time on each story.

Pic showing that liberal media tries to not call terror acts Islamic terror acts. At a shooting in Fresno, CA in April 2017, the shooter was Muslim and yelled Allahu Akbar ("Glory to Allah" or "Allah is Great"), which is what terrorists yell right before an attack. Notice the AP made sure not to make that reference. Might seem subtle, but when most Americans hear "God" they think of the Biblical God, not Islam as the god of Islam is always called Allah.

Harvard study confirms media bias. [|Click here] Chart from the Harvard study:


 * 19. How do the photos show media bias?**
 * 20. Give your reflection on the evidence provided in this web quest on media bias.**

Overall, the networks (NBC, CBS, and ABC), cable networks CNN and MSNBC, and the major newspapers in the nation (led by the New York Times) have a major liberal bias with hardly any conservative voice. Talk radio is dominated by conservative voices. Fox News is the fairest and most balanced (based on statistics from the Media Research Center, an independent watchdog group on media). Fox does lean conservative (Fox is center-right...talk radio is more farther right), but gives far more voice to liberals than liberal networks give to conservatives. The Internet Drudge Report is known to be the most balanced source of getting news and unbiased reporting.

**Bias at the New York Times**
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For even more evidence, go to the [|Media Research Center]. The Media Research Center is a watchdog group on the media and points out biases in the media. You'll notice a lot more liberal bias than conservative bias.

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