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On December 07 2008 08:42 L wrote:The idea that both democrats and republicans aren't respectively the real 'left' and 'right' seems to evade everyone. No, you proved that the vocal minority were successful in making 'liberal media bias' a buzzword.
L, don't be stupid. The assertion was: Most people don't think there is a liberal bias.
I showed a survey showing that actually, most people DO think that. The reasons are irrelevant. If you say the majority of people believe this, when polls show the opposite, you are simply wrong. There is no other answer.
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On December 07 2008 08:47 Orome wrote:
I usually don't like posting in threads I didn't fully read, but this thread's way too long for me to read it tonight, so I'll just add my two cents.
Liberal or conservative, what annoyed me when I tried to inform myself about your recent election was that every single article I read was highly opinionated.
Maybe this has to do with the selection of articles of the site I was using (realclearpolitics), and your regular media isn't at all like that, but I thought it was terrible journalism that the writers' goal seemed to be to tell me what I should think and not to inform me about the facts as objectively as possible.
Maybe I'm completely wrong on this, but couldn't it be that the reason most of you seem to think the media's biased (whichever way) is because the consensus among the writers seems to be that it's OK to be opinionated in an article that's supposed to tell the readers what's going on?
We have our fair share of biases in Switzerland, on the whole the media's probably slightly left-leaning (liberal's a term used by the moderate right here :p), but in most newspapers the main article will try to give an objective breakdown of the situation and the writer's opinion is confined to a seperate column.
RealClearPolitics is a selection of op-eds. So it is supposed to be opinionated. So don't feel too bad.
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aww
I have nothing to contribute to the discussion then. 
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On December 07 2008 08:44 L wrote:
Yeah, no, none of the baseline fundamental objections with methodology are serious credible attacks against the only piece of evidence brought up. Totally agree. Not cherrypicking what an 'objection' is at all.
I'll give you another chance, explain you objections. I have read everything you wrote and have only found you assertion that they "didn't take magnitude into account".
As I said, you are essentially arguing that since they didn't do the impossible, the study is invalid. Also, if this were just 1 study from 1 source it may be different, but I have used several data sources.
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You say they should measure the difference between American and European media coverage when the question was never about how the US compares to EU, but rather whether American news sources cover democrats or republicans more favorably.
No, this has nothing to do with political parties, it has to do with airtime given to ideas.
Again, the democrats aren't 'left'. By most foreign accounts they're fairly centrist.
The idea is to normalize for buisness (or other intrinsically linked) interests across the globe to see if there are statistically significant differences which point to a clear effort towards producing biased news. If, for instance, conservative policies by their nature generate more 'pro-news' stories, then they will be displayed more across the world and the controls will eliminate that. By contrast, if the bias is intentional, you'll notice varying levels of significantly non-average bias.
Even then, what I posted was just methodology for instituting controls. When you do controls, you'd be adding known liberally biased media into each of the categories enumerated, then adding known conservatively biased sources into each of the categories at equal magnitude and frequency, then drawing a spectrum between them.
Ie: Marxist post and Libertarian times, for instance. Or Mussolini fanclub fliers v. Italian communist party magazine.
If the bias is intentional, the study can then point to it and determine causes and solutions, or leave that as a topic for a future study. If not, the finger is pointed at a systemic failure which requires substantial reconstruction, or forced second-guessing.
Additionally; Things like 'level of liberalism in journalists' should be controlled against 'level of liberalism in the population with an undergraduate degree as a whole' and cross compare those with levels in other countries to determine if there is an american phenomenon at work.
I'll give you another chance, explain you objections. I have read everything you wrote and have only found you assertion that they "didn't take magnitude into account".
I'm not doing your reading for you. Feel free to go back and read any of your flippant dismissals of evidence being aimed at your claims.
Or make s'more strawmen.
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On December 07 2008 08:58 Savio wrote:Show nested quote +On December 07 2008 08:41 QibingZero wrote:On December 07 2008 08:35 Savio wrote:On December 07 2008 08:07 cz wrote:On December 07 2008 08:03 HnR)hT wrote:On December 07 2008 07:47 cz wrote:On December 07 2008 07:43 HnR)hT wrote:On December 07 2008 07:35 cz wrote:On December 07 2008 07:31 HnR)hT wrote:On December 07 2008 07:10 cz wrote:
[quote]
So you are suggesting that they are pursuing an invalid, unwarranted campaign to change people's point of view? What is your reasoning behind this? I don't know if it can be called a "campaign" and to what degree it is consciously done, but if you watch cnn for a few minutes or read just about any NYT article even tangentially related to a political issue, you'd come across implicit liberal assumptions everywhere, and conservatives constantly portrayed in a negative light. During this past election season you could go to cnn.com and there were *guaranteed* to be a bunch of stories implicitly if not outright pro-Obama. For example, when you write/say "Americans are about to make Historic Decision" (which has become a cliche already) I think it's pretty obvious whose side you are on and which candidate you want your reader/audience to vote for. Well now we're just at step 1. Your subjectively claiming that 1) The media is biased in favor of liberal ideas and 2) That bias is unjustified and not in accordance with reality. You have to establish both of those, and your anecdotal evidence is not enough for #1. You didn't prove that they AREN'T biased, either. I'm not about to conduct a scientific investigation or go digging for examples to justify my own impression, which formed and was reinforced over many years. The studies cited in this thread about journalists' liberal bias is one piece of such evidence, however. Right. So we're at step 1, just like I said. And if you aren't about to objectively substantiate your opinion then it remains just that, anecdotal and subjective. It seems your tactic is to demand that others do the serious homework that it takes to carefully present evidence for every claim that they make (no matter how much time it would take and no matter that it may not be possible under the circumstances), while you just sit on your ass and criticize their lack of proof. There was even solid factual evidence in this thread given by Savio that journalists tend to be largely liberal. What else do you want? Ten more such studies? A case by case analysis of a statistically significant sample of news stories from particular outlets? Yes, I do criticize where I see criticism as valid. Why is that a problem? Do you see this more as an emotional, personal conflict between two people rather than an inquiry into what is happening and whether it is correct and justified? Also Savio's data, if you are referring to his party affiliation of journalists thing, is once again not indicative of your conclusion. It only shows party affiliation, not whether or not that affiliation seeps into reporting as bias registrable to the public. Furthermore it's also out of date, though I'm not sure how important that is. It is up to you, though, to establish that that data given by Savio can be used to conclude that the media is biased. Then you have to establish that that bias is unjustified and incorrect. The data I gave showed 2 things: 1. The media's personal political views are much more liberal than the general public's. That doesn't prove bias in their reporting, but.... 2. Since 1988, the media has given a significantly larger percentage of positive stories for the democratic candidate and negative stories for the Republican. Taken together I think these mean something serious. It could also mean Democrats have done more positive things since 1988 than Republicans, and thus won over more of the people out there who are paid to pay attention to those things! That idea seems to escape you guys every time it's brought up. Thats a possibility. Do you have any data to back it up?
Your assumption from the 'data' is that the media is liberally biased. How is that any different from my assumption? You presented the 'data', and we've reached two different conclusions based on it.
How exactly do I need to back my position up? I mean, it's pretty easy to note Democrats have done more positive things than Republicans since 1988 - I just mention the names 'Bush' and 'Clinton'. It's pretty obvious where things go from there.
Really, you're nitpicking any little thing you can at this point.
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On December 07 2008 09:04 Orome wrote:aww I have nothing to contribute to the discussion then.
ON the contrary, tell us about Switzerland. It seems to me that the "Left" here in America follow the "Left" in Europe with maybe a decade lag.
My personal opinion is that it seems like the "liberal" or "leftist" organizations have been moving more and more into positions in which they can proclaim their viewpoints more loudly such as education and journalism. That may have started in Europe first, then was followed in the States, but I wouldn't know because I have never been to Europe or heard their news.
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L, don't be stupid. The assertion was: Most people don't think there is a liberal bias.
I showed a survey showing that actually, most people DO think that. The reasons are irrelevant. If you say the majority of people believe this, when polls show the opposite, you are simply wrong. There is no other answer.
My assertion is that the 'thinking' that it exists or not is irrelevant, because believing something doesn't make it true, and I've stated this numerous times and added hilarious examples containing moons and cheeses.
If you mount a media campaign to say that dihydrogen monoxide is dangerous, and should be banned, and 99% of people believe you, it doesn't mean that you're 1) correct in saying that it is dangerous, and 2) that it should be banned. The fact that this is actually a REAL example makes it all the more pertinent.
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L, we are not talking about anything globally. We are talking about whether American media is biased towards AMERICAN definitions of Left and Right.
The rest of the world has different views on Left vs Right but that is irrelevant. We are only looking at how American Media treat American candidates measured on the American political spectrum.
What you are suggesting is interesting but answers a completely different question and is not relevant to this discussion.
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On December 07 2008 09:01 Savio wrote:Show nested quote +On December 07 2008 08:42 L wrote:The idea that both democrats and republicans aren't respectively the real 'left' and 'right' seems to evade everyone. I proved it wrong with data. No, you proved that the vocal minority were successful in making 'liberal media bias' a buzzword. L, don't be stupid. The assertion was: Most people don't think there is a liberal bias. I showed a survey showing that actually, most people DO think that. The reasons are irrelevant. If you say the majority of people believe this, when polls show the opposite, you are simply wrong. There is no other answer.
I've yet to see any other mention of that statistic used other than by the Washington Times writer. Every other mention of the data in the Harvard study only compared the actual news coverage between the parties. I did not see a single survey of the public - perhaps you can provide backing for this claim other than some op-ed in an incredibly conservative paper?
However, even if the survey is 100% correct, the question polled was regarding this election specifically. The question was not 'Is there a liberal bias in the newsmedia?'. It was restricted to this election, wherein the Democratic side was clearly more positive than the Republican side to begin with.
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L, we are not talking about anything globally. We are talking about whether American media is biased towards AMERICAN definitions of Left and Right.
The rest of the world has different views on Left vs Right but that is irrelevant. We are only looking at how American Media treat American candidates measured on the American political spectrum.
What you are suggesting is interesting but answers a completely different question and is not relevant to this discussion.
1) thanks for nitpicking
2) No we aren't. This isn't about how the American media treats American candidates based on the American political spectrum.
The way the American media treats candidates is necessarily incidental, but not causal. Your main statement and conclusion is that there is a liberal media bias. If your restrict this to candidates during election time, then half of the argumentation in this entire thread, including yours, is completely out of scope.
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On December 07 2008 09:09 Savio wrote:Show nested quote +On December 07 2008 09:04 Orome wrote:aww I have nothing to contribute to the discussion then. ON the contrary, tell us about Switzerland. It seems to me that the "Left" here in America follow the "Left" in Europe with maybe a decade lag.
I think this is true, too. It takes us about 10 years to convince conservatives that what Europe is doing is working really well before we can get any legislation done.
=P
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On December 07 2008 09:09 Savio wrote:Show nested quote +On December 07 2008 09:04 Orome wrote:aww I have nothing to contribute to the discussion then. ON the contrary, tell us about Switzerland. It seems to me that the "Left" here in America follow the "Left" in Europe with maybe a decade lag. My personal opinion is that it seems like the "liberal" or "leftist" organizations have been moving more and more into positions in which they can proclaim their viewpoints more loudly such as education and journalism. That may have started in Europe first, then was followed in the States, but I wouldn't know because I have never been to Europe or heard their news.
It's hard for me to say anything about trends, I'm 19, but journalism's at least slightly on the left side and from my personal experience, education (at the highest high school level at least, we have 4 different levels for 7-12) is very biased towards the left.
I don't believe this has anything to do with leftist organisations 'moving in to positions of influence', you make it sound like some evil plot to brainwash kids, but rather that university graduates in general lean towards the left (and you need a degree to teach and in most cases to be a journalist too) and that in order to pursue a teaching career you need a good share of idealism, which tends to be a leftist trait, at least here.
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But the US and Switzerland really aren't comparable.
On the one side you have the 'keeper of peace' in the modern world, the biggest economy in the world, an impossibly huge country, on the other a country with 8 million inhabitants that stays neutral in all conflicts. I'd say it's pretty likely our problems are of a different nature than yours. 
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On December 07 2008 09:08 QibingZero wrote:Show nested quote +On December 07 2008 08:58 Savio wrote:On December 07 2008 08:41 QibingZero wrote:On December 07 2008 08:35 Savio wrote:On December 07 2008 08:07 cz wrote:On December 07 2008 08:03 HnR)hT wrote:On December 07 2008 07:47 cz wrote:On December 07 2008 07:43 HnR)hT wrote:On December 07 2008 07:35 cz wrote:On December 07 2008 07:31 HnR)hT wrote:
[quote]
I don't know if it can be called a "campaign" and to what degree it is consciously done, but if you watch cnn for a few minutes or read just about any NYT article even tangentially related to a political issue, you'd come across implicit liberal assumptions everywhere, and conservatives constantly portrayed in a negative light. During this past election season you could go to cnn.com and there were *guaranteed* to be a bunch of stories implicitly if not outright pro-Obama. For example, when you write/say "Americans are about to make Historic Decision" (which has become a cliche already) I think it's pretty obvious whose side you are on and which candidate you want your reader/audience to vote for. Well now we're just at step 1. Your subjectively claiming that 1) The media is biased in favor of liberal ideas and 2) That bias is unjustified and not in accordance with reality. You have to establish both of those, and your anecdotal evidence is not enough for #1. You didn't prove that they AREN'T biased, either. I'm not about to conduct a scientific investigation or go digging for examples to justify my own impression, which formed and was reinforced over many years. The studies cited in this thread about journalists' liberal bias is one piece of such evidence, however. Right. So we're at step 1, just like I said. And if you aren't about to objectively substantiate your opinion then it remains just that, anecdotal and subjective. It seems your tactic is to demand that others do the serious homework that it takes to carefully present evidence for every claim that they make (no matter how much time it would take and no matter that it may not be possible under the circumstances), while you just sit on your ass and criticize their lack of proof. There was even solid factual evidence in this thread given by Savio that journalists tend to be largely liberal. What else do you want? Ten more such studies? A case by case analysis of a statistically significant sample of news stories from particular outlets? Yes, I do criticize where I see criticism as valid. Why is that a problem? Do you see this more as an emotional, personal conflict between two people rather than an inquiry into what is happening and whether it is correct and justified? Also Savio's data, if you are referring to his party affiliation of journalists thing, is once again not indicative of your conclusion. It only shows party affiliation, not whether or not that affiliation seeps into reporting as bias registrable to the public. Furthermore it's also out of date, though I'm not sure how important that is. It is up to you, though, to establish that that data given by Savio can be used to conclude that the media is biased. Then you have to establish that that bias is unjustified and incorrect. The data I gave showed 2 things: 1. The media's personal political views are much more liberal than the general public's. That doesn't prove bias in their reporting, but.... 2. Since 1988, the media has given a significantly larger percentage of positive stories for the democratic candidate and negative stories for the Republican. Taken together I think these mean something serious. It could also mean Democrats have done more positive things since 1988 than Republicans, and thus won over more of the people out there who are paid to pay attention to those things! That idea seems to escape you guys every time it's brought up. Thats a possibility. Do you have any data to back it up? Your assumption from the 'data' is that the media is liberally biased. How is that any different from my assumption? You presented the 'data', and we've reached two different conclusions based on it. How exactly do I need to back my position up? I mean, it's pretty easy to note Democrats have done more positive things than Republicans since 1988 - I just mention the names 'Bush' and 'Clinton'. It's pretty obvious where things go from there. Really, you're nitpicking any little thing you can at this point.
No, your conclusion is both more improbable (have you ever even heard it mentioned anywhere else that the media bias is due to the fact that democrats do good things and republicans bad things?), and has nothing backing it up.
I at least, have in addition to the study we are talking about, evidence that Journalists political views are far more liberal than Americans' in general.
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On December 07 2008 09:15 QibingZero wrote:Show nested quote +On December 07 2008 09:01 Savio wrote:On December 07 2008 08:42 L wrote:The idea that both democrats and republicans aren't respectively the real 'left' and 'right' seems to evade everyone. I proved it wrong with data. No, you proved that the vocal minority were successful in making 'liberal media bias' a buzzword. L, don't be stupid. The assertion was: Most people don't think there is a liberal bias. I showed a survey showing that actually, most people DO think that. The reasons are irrelevant. If you say the majority of people believe this, when polls show the opposite, you are simply wrong. There is no other answer. I've yet to see any other mention of that statistic used other than by the Washington Times writer. Every other mention of the data in the Harvard study only compared the actual news coverage between the parties. I did not see a single survey of the public - perhaps you can provide backing for this claim other than some op-ed in an incredibly conservative paper? However, even if the survey is 100% correct, the question polled was regarding this election specifically. The question was not 'Is there a liberal bias in the newsmedia?'. It was restricted to this election, wherein the Democratic side was clearly more positive than the Republican side to begin with.
We are only talking about one piece of data here. This is it:
"A Harvard University analysis in early November revealed that 77 percent of Americans say the press is politically biased; of that group, 5 percent said it skewed conservative."
Someone said earlier in the thread that only a vocal minority of people believe that the media has a liberal bias. I showed this poll and proved them wrong. That's all there is to it.
I'm not even sure what you are trying to say with your post.
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Can't you harass other communities than TL with this shit? This is like the fourth thread you're trying to convince a young, educated, racially diverse community about the merits of Republicanism. Let me make it perfectly clear that this community is probably 80% or greater Liberal. So stop wasting your time, please.
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HnR)hT
United States3468 Posts
On December 07 2008 10:00 FzeroXx wrote:
Can't you harass other communities than TL with this shit? This is like the fourth thread you're trying to convince a young, educated, racially diverse community about the merits of Republicanism. Let me make it perfectly clear that this community is probably 80% or greater Liberal. So stop wasting your time, please.
Hrm, if only this entire "community" were put on a boat and sent on a one-way trip to Africa, where they could celebrate "diversity" as obnoxiously as they like for the rest of their horrible lives. >
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On December 07 2008 09:47 Savio wrote:Show nested quote +On December 07 2008 09:08 QibingZero wrote:
Your assumption from the 'data' is that the media is liberally biased. How is that any different from my assumption? You presented the 'data', and we've reached two different conclusions based on it.
How exactly do I need to back my position up? I mean, it's pretty easy to note Democrats have done more positive things than Republicans since 1988 - I just mention the names 'Bush' and 'Clinton'. It's pretty obvious where things go from there.
Really, you're nitpicking any little thing you can at this point.
No, your conclusion is both more improbable (have you ever even heard it mentioned anywhere else that the media bias is due to the fact that democrats do good things and republicans bad things?), and has nothing backing it up. I at least, have in addition to the study we are talking about, evidence that Journalists political views are far more liberal than Americans' in general.
That's a conflict of interest. Why would a conservative concerned about liberal media bias admit that the 'bias' in question was actually not bias at all, but just accurate reporting? Not many will, and that's why you don't see that position very often. I like how you say my conclusion 'has nothing backing it up' when I just addressed that very thing, though. Classy.
On December 07 2008 09:52 Savio wrote:
We are only talking about one piece of data here. This is it:
"A Harvard University analysis in early November revealed that 77 percent of Americans say the press is politically biased; of that group, 5 percent said it skewed conservative."
Someone said earlier in the thread that only a vocal minority of people believe that the media has a liberal bias. I showed this poll and proved them wrong. That's all there is to it.
I'm not even sure what you are trying to say with your post.
I'm asking you to substantiate that poll, first of all. You have a single source which is hardly trustworthy.
Secondly, I'm saying that even if the poll in question exists and is 100% accurate, the question the Harvard study was worried about was the news coverage for this election. They were not asking 'Does the newsmedia in America have a liberal bias?' Is it really that hard to understand?
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I'm only posting in this thread to clear something up, you're all misusing the term "free lunch." The Friedman quote, "there is no such thing as a free lunch," means at its most basic level that if someone gives you a "free lunch," there is still an opportunity cost associated with eating it. i.e., the time it takes you to eat it (and the benefit of whatever alternative activity you could be doing), the required time and money investment in transportation to get to this "free lunch" etc.
The idea is just that no matter what you do, there are always economic costs (the implicit cost of sacrificing the next best alternative you could be doing) associated with it, so nothing is "free."
So please stop debating what "free lunch" means, because in this context, it has only one meaning.
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EPT
