A new study revealed what is obvious to anyone who watches the Sunday shows. Liberal media bias is a myth. According to data collected by American University, conservatives dominate the Sunday shows.
Conservative members of the current Congress have appeared more often on the network talk shows than their liberal counterparts. Senators and representatives from the conservative end of the ideological spectrum have made 57 percent of the appearances, compared with 42 percent for liberals, according to an Upshot analysis of data collected by American University.
This slightly lopsided distribution is primarily the result of three Republican senators’ frequent visits to the network shows: John McCain, Lindsey Graham and Mitch McConnell. Because of the Republican Party’s control of the House during the past three years, its leaders and committee chairmen are presented with more opportunities to discuss the latest political news.
Participants in the 2008 and 2012 presidential nominating contests also helped boost conservative representation: Paul D. Ryan, the Wisconsin congressman who was the G.O.P.’s 2012 vice-presidential nominee, made 46 appearances between early January 2009 and Aug. 3 this year.
The Times tried to explain away the distribution as slightly lopsided, but that was just excuse making for a pattern of systemic corporate media conservative bias. Tim Russert is considered the gold standard among Sunday morning hosts, but during his time at Meet The Press, Republican guests outnumbered Democratic guests by a 2-1 margin.
The idea that Republicans are on the Sunday shows more because they control the House doesn’t wash. Democrats control the Senate, but John McCain has made 97 appearances on the Sunday shows since 2009. While McCain was racking up appearances, Democrats controlled the White House and the Senate.
Mainstream media doesn’t want to discuss the fact that there is an institutional bias in their reporting that has been caused by news being turned into a for profit venture, and the fact that conservative corporations advertise and sponsor the Sunday shows. The Koch brothers ran an ad two weeks ago on Meet The Press.
It makes sense that the corporate owned media would actively promote the interests of the corporate owned Republican Party. The bias isn’t slight. The media towards conservatism is real and pronounced. The United States has been moving more to the left since the economic collapse of 2008, but the media has continued their rightward drift.
According to Gallup, trust in the mass media has hit an all time low. The number of Americans who think the media is too conservative has reached a new high. The myth of liberal media bias has been constantly reinforced by Republicans for more than forty years, but for two decades, the real bias has been against liberals. The mainstream press can try to gloss over it, but more and more Americans are catching on to the problem of conservative media bias.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
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