[conservatism_IS_compassion]

I believe that most who adhere to global warming are merely substituting it for God.

I think the problem is more general than just "most who adhere to global warming." I think that the newswire - AP - functions as an oracle for liberals. If it's not "on the wire", goes the rationale, then it doesn't matter. My tagline puts it a little differently, but it comes to the same thing.

If you think what is not on the wire - at any given time, that would include

• the Bible.
• encyclopedias,
• the whole of the Library of Congress, save only for the newspapers/news magazines (if it has those).
• everything that went as expected yesterday.

Journalists treat the wire, which has everything bad and everything abnormal - to the near-perfect exclusion of anything qualifying for our attention under Philipians 4:8 - as their Oracle. And then people wonder why journalists aren't conservative . . .

Finally, brethren,

whatsoever things are true,
whatsoever things are honest,
whatsoever things are just,
whatsoever things are pure,
whatsoever things are lovely,
whatsoever things are of good report;
if there be any virtue,
and if there be any praise,

think on these things. - Philipians 4:8 (KJV)

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

The point remains: Democratic sexual indiscretions are OK while Republicans' are not. This double standard should not exist in a media that is as fair as it pretends to be.

. . . raising the obvious question as to why anyone would take for granted that "the media" (sic) "is as fair as it pretends to be."

Notice if you will, Gentle Reader, that "media" is a plural noun. Yet it is no accident that the above sentence treats "the media" as a singular entity. We are after all discussing journalism, not publishing/broadcasting "media" in general. Granted that the other entertainment genres ("other" used advisedly) predictably will conform to the topical nonfiction genre known as "journalism."

My point is that although it consists of many nominally independent outlets (ABC News, The New York Times, etc) journalism is so homogeneous that it is proper to speak of "them" as a singular entity. Just as the famously competitive New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox are part of "Major League Baseball" which promotes, and hires the umpires for, their contests. In a similar vein, journalism is all part of the Associated Press, and treats the newswire as their very own Oracle of Delphi.

So journalism is in a very real sense a singular entity with a singular interest - the promotion of journalism. In a usage which is so commonplace as to be scarcely noticed, journalism styles itself "the press" - as if under the First Amendment other genres of nonfiction and even of fiction were not part of "the press," and as if government-licensed broadcast journalism were.

Journalism has the motive and the opportunity to promote itself, and in some ways it does so openly - as with the self-hype of its various organs. But the main way journalism promotes journalism as such, independent of any particular organ, is in the basic rules which all the various organs adhere to. Famously, "If it bleeds, it leads," "'Man Bites Dog' not 'Dog Bites Man'," and "Always make your deadline." And less openly, "Thou shalt not question the objectivity of a fellow journalist." The rules of journalism promote the public image of journalism as "objective" but they do not in fact promote objectivity itself. In fact, self-hype and self aggrandizement are the very definition of subjectivity, not related to objectivity at all. "Objective journalism" is shameless in its self-promotion.

What effect would that have on politics? Quite simply, if you want good PR - and what kind of a politician would not? - then you have to get it from what is effectively a PR monopoly. And the temptation to trim your belief in what constitutes the public good to suit that monopoly is omnipresent. So the obvious question is, "Who panders to the PR establishment the most?" And the answer, just as obvious, is,

• "Who gets the best PR for the worst objective performance?"

• "Who gets credit for being for the little guy no matter how predominantly wealthy they are, while their opponents are criticized for favoring the rich?"

• "Who can openly flout convention, when their opponents are pilloried mercilessly if they are even in morally ambiguous circumstances?"

• "Who can flip-flop on significant issues and be credited with 'good intentions' while their opponents get second guessed even when they are steadfast in their positions?"

Not only are Democrats indisputably the ones who pander most for PR, they generally have no other principle but to go for PR.

Larry Craig and Abuse of Power--By the Media
NewsBusters.org ^ | Matthew Sheffield