November 17, 2007

Criticizing "Clinton News Network."

Outcry noted.

ADDED: About those citizen questioners. There's this. And this.

BUT: Consider the current "media frenzy" over the planted question at the Clinton rally the other day. After the initial story broke, CNN gave it more life by doing an interview with the student (Muriel Gallo-Chasanoff).

24 comments:

rhhardin said...

The media duck comes apart more at the joints if ask who its customers are.

Its customers are advertisers.

The overriding concern is always that viewers not tune away.

Such viewers that they can get, anyway.

knox said...

I'M CURIOUS TO KNOW WHO, IF (oops caps lock) anyone, Kos supports. Interesting that he was critical of CNN's bias. Anyhow, it's just confirmation that the daily kos is ultimately more useful to republicans than democrats.... though it's usually for other reasons, of course.

Brent said...

.
WHAT?!!!

Is it POSSIBLE that a news Organization other than FOX News is . . . BIASED?

Next we'll be finding out that the New York Times only prints positive articles about Hillary on their front page . . . Naw, that couldn't happen.


PS. Ann - you should keep the profile picture in the upper right. It says beauty, mischief and yet gravitas all at the same time.

Swifty Quick said...

It amused me that Blitzer wasn't in the least bit even slightly curious about Hillary's audacious 2-week about-face on the issue of states issuing driver's licenses to illegals. Not even a, "Mrs. Clinton, you are now quite resolute with a 'no' answer, when before you were not so resolute. Why?" They never would've let a Republican, let alone the leading Republican, get away with that kind of lubricated slipperiness. And he didn't mind humiliating Obama either, for that matter. Clinton News Network indeed.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Does CNN and other parts of the MSM have no pride?

That they let the Dem apparatus run over them and stack the audience so that only 100 (5%) of the 2000 attendees were students when the debate was held on a college campus!!

That they stupidly fail to vet at least two "undecided citizens" who it turns out are actually activists and are in effect part of the Dem apparatus.

And lastly , how come the word "activist" is rarely used to describe a conservative ? Perhaps because we are Neanderthals and are trying to drag society back to the 1800's? Yes, answered my own question- that must be it.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Knowwhirled:

Most of the guys here are very curious to know what you are curious to know.

Mortimer Brezny said...

I was an undecided voter before the Democratic debate in Las Vegas, but now I know I will not support Hillary Clinton. She planted questions at the debate, she intimidated the moderator beforehand, she stacked the audience with her stalwarts, and now she is covering up her so-so performance at the sham debate with a whisper campaign against Barack Obama. How hypocritical! Would she like it if the press dug into Bill Clinton’s post presidential sex life? How about using presidential pardons to raise funds? How about the illegal bundling by Norman Hsu? And she has the nerve to accuse John Edwards of throwing mud for talking about fixing health care? God, what is wrong with the news media? Clinton News Network indeed.

Fred said...

There is a difference between blatant media bias and journalists not telling you what you want to hear.

Part of the reason we have "liberal bias" in the media is because of their respective places in society and the business model.

If you are a journalist (like teachers) you are one of two types of people: 1) an idealist -- save the world, help society, type; or 2) ya didn't like school enough to get you in the engineer, doctor, lawyer crowd.

That being the case, there tends to be a strong correlation between idealism and liberalism and 'not liking school' and 'poverty or non-elite lifestyles'. There is also a strong correlation between poor people, non-'elites', and the Democratic party that tends to cater to that subset. (Education, Social Welfare, Tax redistributions downwards, etc.)

If you put it all together, you get a general industry (communications) that tends to be sympathetic towards the plight of Democrats. They don't actively try to be 'liberal' as "media bias" implies, but instead they are liberal because they live and experience the kind of lifestyles that lend themselves to activism. (e.g. poor, having less assets, working harder for less return, greater indirect taxation due to lesser piece of the pie --food, shelter, clothes)

Conversely, I remember listening to Robert Novak's assessment of the decline of conservatism and the problem with media bias. He basically used an inverse argument, suggesting that because the socially affluent and wealthy tend towards conservatism, they buy into capitalism more. They want to make money more than the idealistic types that 'influence society' in journalism and therefore it's tough to find good conservative journalists.

To B: you mention Fox, and the sarcasm doesn't surprise me, but consider the reasons why bias exist. Fox News actually makes an effort to hire people who would promote a conservative agenda. They have a wide reach through mass media and seek to influence. So in that sense, it is an unnatural media bias attempting to push an agenda.

The other reason that "liberal" bias exists is the business model that news networks use. Sex, drugs, and controversy sell and in order to make a buck most of these companies will "sell out" to sensationalism, if you will. What that does is creates a news environment that isn't consistent with conservative values, hence 'the liberal media', hence "the Clinton News Network" and much in the way that talk radio allows conservative slop to flourish, the media (broadcast and print) allow liberal slop to do the same.

Daryl said...

It's obvious what happened to CNN: Hillary threatened to insult them if they didn't work everything in her favor, because she was scared of losing her lead. And CNN complied--out of fear, or perhaps because it wanted to.

This is the Hillary Clinton who wants to run the country: a small, petty person who will trample the media when it suits her, threaten perceived enemies (i.e., anyone not sufficiently in her favor, even if they're just playing it straight), and refuse to debate on fair terms out of fear.

She got what she wanted: planted questions, planted questioners, a friendly moderator, etc.

There's a word for this: cowardice. Or, as Hillary Clinton might say: she's "Practicing the Politics of Cowardice"

Prefacing what she says with "practicing the politics of" shows just what a pseudo-intellectual twit she is.

CNN capitulated to her demands. CNN is also practicing the politics of cowardice.

Daryl said...

fred, you left out the number 1 reason for liberal media bias: they don't just have liberal sympathies, they are all liberals, they live in an insular world surrounded by other liberals, they are convinced liberalism is right and conservatism is wrong, they are personally acerbic towards conservatives, and see nothing wrong with insulting someone to their face for being a conservative. They believe conservatism is synonymous with hatred and intolerance, and thus they refuse to tolerate it. They are 90% democrats, most of them liberal democrats, even if they think that they are somehow "centrist" Democrats because of all the hard-left people around them in the newsroom.

Also, newsrooms tend to be much gayer than American society as a whole (at least 25%, if not much more, whereas American society is less than 10% gay).

Titustk said...

How pathetic on CNN's part. If they haven't they should publicly apologize for their error.

I think it was David Geffen who said something like he hated seeing Carville on tv-I agree. I don't know who is worse Carville or his horrible wife, Cruella.

I watched about 15 minutes of the debate and had to turn it off. I felt like I was watching a combo Jeopardy/Wrestling Event with how they introduced the candidates. I was waiting for a loud speaker voice yelling, "let'get ready to rumble".

The worst part was when so called "undecided" voters asked their questions and the CNN moderators rephrased their questions. I did flip back to watch some of the viewer questions. How patronizing and insulting. What she was really asking is....

Fred said...

Daryl: You're spot on... I meant to suggest that fact, but wasn't clear on the point.

John Stodder said...

Evidently, the CNN pro-Hillary plot was poorly executed, because everyone's complaining about it. She should fire them.

Remember when the media's supposed liberal bias was said to be almost subliminal? A raised eyebrow, a brief chuckle? You can see entire episodes of Walter Cronkite's news show in the CBS news web site and it's true. Liberal as he might have been, the broadcast was straightforward and informative, scrupulously giving both sides on each issue raised. It was also incredibly serious. The final "kicker" item concerned a sports figure, but otherwise the entire broadcast was free of any mention of entertainment celebrities. If there was any bias at all, it was the assumption that government should be looked to for solutions to problems, and that any problems in society reflected failure by the government to "do something about" it.

Now broadcast news is a big clump of meta-references, blatant bias, advocates posing as analysts -- not worth anyone's time, really, unless the spin itself entertains you. Diamonds or pearls...indeed. I thought the comedy writers were on strike. I watch TV news when wars start, when there's a natural disaster and on election night. Otherwise, I learn more from a good blog. Even a biased blog presents the spectrum of opinion more fairly, even if their point is to ridicule the side they don't like.

I'm Full of Soup said...

John Stodder is probably the most objective and canny commenter on this blog. He is never predictable or doctrinaire. I think he he has said he is a fallen Dem or an independent and his wife is still a Dem.

Now, if an even-handed person like Stodder can see thru the network news charade, why can't they themselves see what they are doing?

I'm Full of Soup said...

John Stodder is probably the most objective and canny commenter on this blog. He is never predictable or doctrinaire. I think he he has said he is a fallen Dem or an independent and his wife is still a Dem.

Now, if an even-handed person like Stodder can see thru the network news charade, why can't they themselves see what they are doing?

Unknown said...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 17 — Over the past six years, the Bush administration has spent almost $100 million on a highly classified program to help Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s president, secure his country’s nuclear weapons, according to current and former senior administration officials.

But with the future of that country’s leadership in doubt, debate is intensifying about whether Washington has done enough to help protect the warheads and laboratories, and whether Pakistan’s reluctance to reveal critical details about its arsenal has undercut the effectiveness of the continuing security effort.

Unknown said...

Mortimer Brezny said..."I was an undecided voter before the Democratic debate in Las Vegas, but now I know I will not support Hillary Clinton."

B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T...

Unknown said...

rhhardin said..."The media duck comes apart more at the joints if ask who its customers are."

"...the joints if ask who its customers are."???

Unknown said...

CNN is covering this...does anybody here care??

WASHINGTON, Illinois (CNN) -- Ty Ziegel peers from beneath his Marine Corps baseball cap, his once boyish face burned beyond recognition by a suicide bomber's attack in Iraq just three days before Christmas 2004.

He lost part of his skull in the blast and part of his brain was damaged. Half of his left arm was amputated and some of the fingers were blown off his right hand.

But he didn't expect a new battle when he returned home as a wounded warrior: a fight with the Department of Veterans Affairs.

A recent Harvard study found that the cost of caring for those wounded over the course of their lifetime could ultimately cost more than $660 billion.

In Ziegel's case, he spent nearly two years recovering at Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas. Once he got out of the hospital, he was unable to hold a job. He anticipated receiving a monthly VA disability check sufficient to cover his small-town lifestyle in Washington, Illinois.

Instead, he got a check for far less than expected. After pressing for answers, Ziegel finally received a letter from the VA that rated his injuries: 80 percent for facial disfigurement, 60 percent for left arm amputation, a mere 10 percent for head trauma and nothing for his left lobe brain injury, right eye blindness and jaw fracture.

Kel said...

Trying to change the topic, Lucky? Too frigging bad. Everyone on the blogosphere is talking about this pathetic effort by CNN to boost Clinton. If pasting unrelated, off-topic news articles in a comments blog is the best you can do, you might as well admit defeat.

Mortimer Brezny said...

I was undecided. I am still undecided. I have no idea who I will vote for other than Hillary Clinton.

EnigmatiCore said...

What is CNN thinking?

Fred said...

Enig: --All six of CNN's "undecided voters" were Democratic operatives--

Without dismissing the rest of the article, it's an interesting read... remember this is the DEMOCRATIC primary. It makes sense that 'prominent' Democrats would be used as props for CNN's debate. It isn't the national election debate, no matter what Clinton's campaign might have you believe!

Fen said...

Sidenote: AP has been caught printing DNC talking point memo's verbatim.

And why are we surprised by CNN? This is the networked that censored news of Saddam's rape rooms and torture chambers in exchange for "access". My bet is they did not want to report anything that would tilt public opinion in favor of removing Saddam.