Morgan, I see the last part of your statement as the other way around. The dems are not using the media to their benefit so much as the media is using the dems to their benefit.
Or let me put it another way. The dems and the vast majority of the DBM are one in the same. That is why it's so easy for someone like George Stephenopolus to go from political campaign manager for a dem president, to Bimbo Squad goon, and right back into journalism without a single comment form his colleagues as to the propriety of that. And, now, just to say it, I offer a prediction. When the Bush administration is gone and Tony Snow moves on to another journalist job, watch the stink his so-called colleagues will make. What's good for Stephanopolus, Lanny Davis, Paul Begela, Chris Matthews, Tim Russert, Joe Lockhart, James Carville, ad nauseum; will not matter when Tony steps down.
But I digress. My point is that the worldview of the Left, represented by the Democratic Party of the USA, is the same worldview of most journalists (the few that do not share this worldview is minuscule) reporting the political news of the world and our country. Regardless of their attempts to not show bias, it shines through because their very thought processes are filled with this bias. That's how Dan Rather, for example, can get away with calling Ted Kennedy a moderate, or stating on O'Reilly that he thinks Bill Clinton is an honest man.
The major world view of the Left is simple and replete with the anti-establishment screeds of the 1960's era antiwar activists. To wit, this is the worldview we're up against (no particular order):
War is bad, especially if something as mighty and moral as the USA is fighting it.
White, Anglo-Saxon, Christian culture is oppressive and subjagating.
Recreational drug use is cool and no big deal.
If it feels good, do it!
Judge not (leave out the rest). Who are YOU to say what's wrong?
Democrats care about the people and the workers.
Republicans care about money and businesses.
Liberals are non-racist free spirited good hearts who just want to help.
Conservatives are tightwads who are sexually repressed, and only care about themselves.
Conservatives are, at the worst racist, and at the best secretly believe whites are superior.
Religious people are stupid myth believers.
Atheists are people who are smart enough to figure out the truth on their own.
I could go on and on.
It's no surprise then, when an appeal by President Bush, for example, to the country to support our troops and our mission in Iraq, falls on deaf ears and is relegated, if at all, to the back of the newscast. They don't understand. Now Cindy Sheehan crying about people's sons being killed in Iraq for no good reason is intimately understood by them, as this is the view they too share.
In essense, the driveby media are made from the same cloth as the liberal wing of the democratic party. And we allow them to report on the political discourse of this country, continuously misrepresenting our beliefs and positions while fully symphathizing with all that we oppose.
The thing that is most surprising is that there's any Republicans or Conservatives at all!
I still believe Republicans are more loyal to issues than the party but I completely agree with everything else you added.