Bias Beyond a Reasonable Doubt: Yes, the media are overwhelmingly liberal.

The Weekly Standard ^ | December 13, 2004 | Robert J. Barro

[quidnunc]

The ongoing uproar over Dan Rather and CBS News has intensified concern about whether the mainstream media have a liberal bias. Some analyses, such as those by the Pew Research Center, document the strong tendency of journalists to describe themselves as liberal. This propensity--also prevalent, alas, among professors--is interesting but does not prove bias in coverage. Reporters might maintain objectivity despite their personal viewpoints, or the conservative leanings of most company owners might offset the liberal inclinations of the journalists.

In this spirit, in February 2003, the former New York Times executive editor Howell Raines said at a meeting of journalists: "Our greatest accomplishment as a profession is the development since World War II of a news-reporting craft that is truly nonpartisan." Paul Krugman went further in his New York Times column of November 8, 2002, when he asserted that the media actually had a conservative slant: "Some of the major broadcast media are simply biased in favor of the Republicans, while the rest tend to blur differences between the parties."

The question is, Who is right? Is there a left- or right-wing bias, or have the media actually managed to be objective? A serious assessment requires quantification of the output put forth by the media. The best analysis I know along these lines is the ongoing study "A Measure of Media Bias," by professors Tim Groseclose of UCLA and Jeffrey Milyo of the University of Missouri.

-snip-

[Dog Gone]

Liberal think tanks included the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (88), Citizens for Tax Justice (88), the Consumer Federation of America (82), the Economic Policy Institute (80), the National Organization for Women (79), and the NAACP (75).

You know, I've never considered NOW or the NAACP to be "think tanks."

[AFPhys]

While looking for more articles referencing this study, I came across:
http://www.frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=14020

" Militant Islam is one big counterexample to the Left’s facile belief in the ‘equality’ of all ‘cultural perspectives.’ If the liberal media were to report candidly on the Jihadists, they would have to acknowledge that culture is not airy and light, but serious and heavy and sometimes evil. Such an admission would call multiculturalism itself into question, and the Left can’t do that. Multiculturalism is today a pillar of the liberal faith. And who’s going to knock the faith?"

I think that this article really does a good job of explaining just where some of the media bias stems from.

[HoustonCurmudgeon]

I thought about that when I read it and believe organizations, rather than think tanks would have been a more accurate description.