I haven't linked to CNN.com as a Resource site for quite a while, mainly because I think they're quite biased. This impression has been reaffirmed by their dismissal of blogging as a significant journalistic development as well as their continuous anti-war/pro-terror spin.
The first story is pretty well-known by now. CNN prominently ran an AP wire article about how few people maintain weblogs, but that number (around 7.3 million) is more than ten times higher than the number of people who watch CNN (450 thousand). Yeah, that's insignificant.
Most interesting to me, however, is instance after instance of biased reporting. It may not be obvious in every piece, but over time CNN makes its political stance clear by the stories it chooses to cover. Ace of Spades has an excellent example up of how the top story on CNN all this morning was an anti-war protest in Washington DC attended by a mere 60 people. He later notes that pro-life marches in the capital that drew upwards of 50,000 were not covered by CNN at all. (Here's the coverage by Fox.)
Fox news coverage is markedly pro-war, so they are biased, too. It is no coincidence that Fox paired the strong and passionate HANNITY with the weak, milquetoast Colmes.
Ted Turner is a self-proclaimed socialist.
Communist News Network indeed.
Full agreement.
That last comment is a prime example of why I sometimes go out of my way to link to a CNN article rather than one appearing on FoxNews, even if the FoxNews article is better (which it usually is). It just takes away one more liberal counter "argument" against the substance of the story.
"That last comment" == the first one, not the one by Achilles that snuck in ahead of mine.
Xrlq: Eh, I'd rather just not give them any attention at all.
So, for all these accusations of bias that have floated around (especially since the war in Iraq started): CNN/BBC/NPR/NYTimes are liberal and anti-war; FoxNews/WashTimes are pro-war - how exactly do you suppose these decisions are made? Are the editors/news execs all co-opted into this particular mindset? Do each have no sense of journalistic ethics at all, or are they all burned out of them by money from the higher-ups?
It just bothers me to assume that such a bias conspiracy can reach across the entire landscape of a network or newspaper, from the reporters to the editors to the copy people to the folks that write the graphics that run across the screen - it sounds like mind control would be the only way to ensure rank and file bias... And that doesn't wash.
I think for the most part people see bias where they want to see bias - I don't, really.
Barry: Conspiracy? Who said "conspiracy"? It's not a conscious conspiracy, if there is one, it's unconscious.
You wouldn't have any doubt that the "liberal media bias" does in fact exist if you''d ever been exposed to j-school students. There's no possible way for a 98% liberal student body to generate unbiased reporting. A conspiracy isn't even necessary, it just happens.
If it's an "unconscious" conspiracy, then all involved would have to unconsciously suspend the journalistic ethics (presumably) taught to them in school, every time they do a story by spinning it left. I find it hard to believe it would happen that way - it's much easier to believe a conscious decision is made to be biased. But even then, I have difficulty believing that many people would buy into it, simply because of the general diversity of people in America - regardless of whether journalists may or may not have a general liberal mindset.
I'm sorry, what is a j-school? I don't recognize the reference...
Barry: j-school is shorthand for journalism school.
And you're missing the point, kinda; because the bias is unconscious they think they are behaving ethically. But they're wrong. I don't think this is hard to believe. I try to be objective and to honestly present the various sides of the issues I write about, but anyone who reads my site will be able to discern my biases pretty easily. I don't try to hide them, because it's impossible to do so. Similarly, the biases of journalists are impossible to hide, and we'd be better off if they admitted them openly.