Why Conservatives Have Such Contempt for the Liberal Media

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Our guest blogger this week is Craig, from Red Satellites. Now, doesn't his job description make you want to ask a thousand questions? If he told you the answers, he'd have to kill you.

Thank you BoP and Zaphriel for allowing me a guest shot on your show. And Mark at Liberty Just In Case for linking us.

I live by the 3 R's: Repub-litarian, Red Sox, & Rand.
Raised a cracker,
Georgia grad,
Live in moonbat LA.
Program manager for a black Space Satellite system.
Fiercely competitive and loyal. In summary: 49 year old, married with a 2 year old.

And now, on with the show:

Once again, it's time to BITCHSLAP the Main Stream Media. Forever full of themselves, they dispense socialism, secularism, and moral relativism each day- all day. When they speak, or for that matter, clear their bilious throats- we, the American public, must immediately lower our eyes,genuflect, and pay homage to their vast and superior intellect and as a token of appreciation- finish with a Broadway flourish- by kissing their ring.

So, having to put up with their pretentious pseudo-perspicacious blather, I feel duty bound to present what WE- the Conservative voice- face every time we pick up a newspaper or logon to a computer.

To prove my point, I recently went online to look at the Boston Globe, the LA Times, the Washington Post, and CNN- and perused the headlines of each.

Hmmm....what do we have:
Front Page of LA Times.com
(under AP News)

Democrat Urges Rove to Quit Over CIA Leak
Beta Sweeps Ashore in Nicaragua, Weakens
Two U.S. Soldiers Charged With Assault
Rice, Admirers Remember Parks' Defiant Act
Militant-Linked Group Claims India Blasts

Front Page of Boston Globe.com
(under world news)

AFGHAN: 2 U.S. soldiers charged with assault
NICARAGUA: Hurricane Beta ravages areas


Front Page of Washington Post.com
(under more headlines)

Marathon Has Record Number of Runners
Malaria Vaccine Aided by Gates Donation
Two U.S. Soldiers Charged With Assault
Gunmen Kill Iraq Vice President's Brother
Kurds Reclaim Prized Territory
Hurricane Beta Hits Nicaraqua's East Coast
Money Woes Undercut Hopes for Great Lakes
More Reconstruction Work Urged for Louisianans

And finally, from the all-time liberal rag of the century (for any century, actually)

Front Page of CNN.com
(under more news)

Hurricane Beta belts Nicaragua
Police look for answers in New Delhi blasts
Brother of Iraq vice president killed
U.S. soldiers charged with assaulting Afghan detainees
Rice, others pay tribute to Rosa Parks
Holy car! 1975 Escort fetches $690,000
Saw II frightens box office on Halloween weekend
Hundreds arrested during Halloween bash
Four fraternity members sentenced in hazing death

OKAY CLASS, let's review!
Those are 4 headline pages of 4 online newspapers. And lo' and behold: there are only 2 headlines that made all four rags.
Hmmmm....let's see the first: Hurricane Beta....okay, considering the fact we've had our share of hurricanes this season and the havoc it wrecked...reporting on this, sounds reasonable to me. Agree?
Now for the second: Two U.S. soldiers charged with assault.
Two soldiers charged with assault in AFGHANISTAN is worthy of headlines in 4 MAJOR American newspapers? Are you kidding me?
Now, let me reveal a story so horrific, so evil that it literally knocks the wind out of you.
(From the NY Post)

SAVAGES BEHEAD 3 SCHOOLGIRLS

JAKARTA, Indonesia — Unidentified assailants beheaded three high-school girls and seriously wounded a fourth yesterday in a rural section of Indonesia about 1,000 miles northeast of Jakarta.

The girls, students at a private Christian school , were ambushed while walking through a cocoa plantation en route to class, police said. The heads were found miles from the bodies.
Did it occur to anyone at the EDITOR'S desk of those 4 newspapers, that maybe, just maybe- this story TRUMPS 2 U.S. Soldiers assaulting someone? Or for that matter (over at CNN), wouldn't it be more important than: "Saw II frightens box office on Halloween weekend"?
To the Liberal Media, of course not!
The tragic story of the schoolgirls is about Muslims psychopaths beheading Christian children. (The murders were in Indonesia: it doesn't take a mathematician to figure out who the suspects are.) But the liberals PANDER to the Muslims and their atrocities- so reporting this, is out of the question.
The liberal media hates the military, hates the US approach to the Global War on Terror, and will do anything to promote their warped agenda. The disconnect between the Media and conservatives is why we are polarized today. They won't let go.
And the GAP grows with every passing day.

Craig H. of Red Satellites

Thank you very much Craig for your contribution to Balance of Power this week! It's great to see so many guest authors and bloggers becoming involved here and certainly gives a well-rounded perspective on today's current issues.

Now... on with the Show!

I found it interesting that from the onset of the article, the word "Media" was polarized between the "conservative" and "liberal". To me, the media is the media. Sometimes its hard-hitting news that is worthy of print, other times it is stuff that really serves only the point of chucklesome reading in the "Throne Room" as the potty is often called around my folks' house! ;0) But I don't know that I completely buy into the notion that there is a wholly "conservative media" or wholly "liberal media". There is media that is filtered through "conservatives" and "liberals", which of course does not necessarily make it either conservative or liberal per se, but makes it a sort of "for your eyes only" for whatever perspective one might be.

While this particular author seems to show an outright contempt for socialism, secularism and moral relativism to others this IS their viewpoint therefore in a media that exists in a country that is diverse as our own, it has the inherent duty to show all the sides of the contemporary issues, irregardless of if there are a few persons that it might infuriate, irritate and otherwise knicker-knot along the way. It's not so different really, then the moments of nausea that I experience when the local news does their broadcast that is decidedly Christian, Conservative and neither "hard hitting" OR "news" to myself.

I have a choice--as an adult viewer of the local news as to if I will sit and watch it--with an eye to informing myself better –or- changing the channel to say oh..."The Simpsons" or "King of the Hill". I don't sit back and rant and rave and gnash my teeth over it (okay, sometimes I do! *grin*) I simply watch the news as it is reported--take what it is, filter it through my own perceptions, keep what is useful and "File 13" the rest.

I for one am glad that the mainstream media does NOT spend an overtly long amount of time on stories that are wholly conservative nor wholly liberal by my standards, though I do feel that there is a great lot of news that is "withheld" for whatever be the reason and find online sites such as "What Really Happened" rather interesting, thought provoking and informative as well. That's the beauty of a Media that is *NOT* wholly Church OR State controlled. If you don't believe me, ask anyone that had to sit through TASS back during Soviet Union time. A media that is not free to report a little of this and a little of that is not media of the people it is merely propaganda dribbled out in the guises of "news".

I completely agree that the savage beheading of three, school girls IS news. Without a doubt! Would I have liked to know about something like that, without a doubt! However, at the same time, there is only ONE headline that will fit on a Newspaper on any given day. For that day, the newspapers evidently felt that the story regarding U.S. Soldiers assaulting persons in Afghanistan was precedent to its readership. If I had to consider the two stories as an Editor of a National Newspaper or Source, I would have to admit that though both stories are very big, I would have gone the way that they did as well. Why? Newspapers are not funded to state the news that a few particular readers want to read on the Headlines. They are funded by subscriptions and sales. Unfortunately, at this point in time, the American public has become so anesthetized to violence that is brutal (ala horror flicks, action films and violent video games) that it is relegated to a lower news status, I feel. A headline that says "American Soldiers Accused of Assault" feeds the public desire at this time to know what is going on behind the scenes and of course given the Abu Ghraib Prison Scandal in the recent past--whether this author feels that it is "news worthy" or not--the Public wants to KNOW THIS STUFF.

Now, since I'm NOT an Editor and do not give one whit about how much the rags earn in a day I can tell you...that of the two stories, *I* would have wanted to know the story behind these brutal acts in Jakarta before reading yet more of the fodder on the military and its inner machinations. But, that's just me. I only spend maybe a buck a month on newspapers.

So while I can totally sympathize with what this Author says in his BoP article--I can also understand that in the high dollar world of Mass Media, what sells--what is contemporary and of interest to the masses--is what is going to be on the Headline of Page One.

Nice thing is-- my knickers aren't knotted up in a bunch over it and I am intelligent and can find the news that I personally seek where I may find it. The LA Times isn't crying because I don't buy it and I'm not crying cause I don't have it.

Nariel of Ancient Eyes for Current Times



Hugh Hewitt, in his seminal book, Blog, said this:

Why a discussion of the Protestant Reformation in a book on blogging? The short answer: because the sixteenth and twenty-first centuries share a dramatic element in common-the birth of a revolution in communication technology.

The invention of the printing press spelled the end for the old keepers of knowledge in the sixteenth century. The invention of the new media of blogging spells the end for the old media in the same way. And the MSM, or Mainstream Media, is just now beginning to realize the shift. The fall of Trent Lott, Dan Rather, Eason Jordan of CNN, and in large part John Kerry occurred because bloggers went around, over and under the established keepers of knowledge at the established jounalistic institutions. The days of The New York Times setting the agenda for the current news cycle are over. As are the days of proclaiming themselves "objective journalists."

Brent Bozell at the Media Research Council has chronicled liberal bias for decades now, with volumes of evidence. Bernard Goldberg's two marvelous books, Bias and Arrogance, are required reading on the ongoing liberal bias within the MSM. And, for those on the left open enough to bother, Ann Coulter's book Slander chronicled in detail,with footnotes, the staggering liberal bias that continues to provide fodder for conservative bloggers like Craig and myself.

Yet, like the Catholic Church's reaction to Martin Luther, the MSM is beginning to fight back against the blogosphere. As I wrote on Gun-Totin' Liberal recently, the Online Freedom of Information Act, with would have protected bloggers on the left and the right, appears to have been defeated in the Republican controlled House. If you haven't written or called your Representative about this bill, you need to. The Reformation of the sixteenth century took time, and had massive casualties on both sides. It's vital that we learn from history, and make sure our freedom to write what we want remains protected from those who wish to stifle it.

Mark White of Liberty Just In Case