ABC Admits Reporters Target Republicans

NewsMax.com ^ | 4/23/03 | Carl Limbacher and NewsMax.com Staff

[kattracks]

If you're wondering why the media establishment screams long and hard when Republicans say something politically incorrect but virtually ignores the disgraceful rantings of Sen. Patty "Osama Mama" Murray, Rep. Charlie Rangel, Rep. Marcy Kaptur, Rep. Jim Moran, Sen. Robert "KKK" Byrd and so on, ABC has a confession to make.

Yes, this is the same ABC that pays millions of dollars to its anti-American foreign anchorman, Peter Jennings, so he can drive millions of viewers away to cable news. (For a look at Jennings' astonishingly biased coverage of Operation Iraqi Freedom, check out Media Research Center.)

Here's a fascinating item today on the overhyped Santorum story from "The Note," a column by ABC News' political unit: Mark Halperin, Marc Ambinder, David Chalian and Brooke Brower.

"Could anyone deny that most Washington reporters tend to move more aggressively to bring down Republicans in trouble than Democrats in trouble?

"And could anyone deny that Democratic operatives work harder to build the kind of relationships with journalists that pay off at times like these?

"And could anyone deny the causal connection between the phenomena described in the previous two paragraphs?

"In any event, it's pretty clear that a Democratic party, which still is trying to figure out what it does well with its current array of personnel, is exercising the same muscles that allowed it to score point after point in driving Trent Lott from the leadership," the four reporters write.

If even ABC can't deny that, we certainly can't.

Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:

Media Bias

[Temple Owl]

Sounds like they are all entering the confessional.

[OldPossum]

There is obviously a big audience for unbiased news presentations. Fox News helps satisfy a certain amount of that need but it is a cable/satellite operation and, though I have never seen the data, I would hazard a guess that more than half the TV audience population has access to broadcast TV only.

It would seem to me that if one of the network broadcast networks had any market sense, they would try to fill that void.

The one that seems most likely to do this would be CBS, which traditionally is last in network broadcast news. The biggest obstacle, of course, is Dan Rather. He would resign first (not a bad idea in and of itself), but I would bet that the CBS brass wouldn't mind seeing ol' Dan depart the premises if they didn't have to make a big payout for his leaving.

[2rightsleftcoast]

Isn't Terry Moran with ABC? Every time Ari has a breifing
that AHOLE Moran makes me sick with his questions. Always with a sneer. I think todays started off with his usual,
"what are the American people supposed to believe" yada yada. David Gregory is right up there to IMHO

[alwaysconservative]

I love Perry, too. And what about Dr. David Stolinsky? Or Diane Alden? Barry Farber? If people want good conservative viewpoints, IMHO, they need to look around to all the possible sources, and not just turn up their noses because they don't like the format. There is no site that is a single source for everything I want to read.

[Nick Danger]

You would think someone at ABC would eventually catch on that this left wing tripe doesn't sell

I think it's bigger than that, and I think that somebody does get it... or at least they are worried about it. Hence these comments in Notes. There is not a little "CYA" going on here... just in case.

This might be a really stinky episode for Santorum, but there is at least an equal chance that the outcome will be a huge public backlash against the media.

A whole bunch of people in the media think that they are going to do to Rick Santorum what they did last year to Trent Lott. It will be easy; they will just do the same things they did to Lott. Down goes Santorum. Except that this time, they are in for a fight — and a big surprise.

The public is just coming off the experience of observing the American news media blatantly lie about nearly every aspect of the war in Iraq, on a daily basis, with the clearly apparent purpose of discrediting the President and the military, while lending blatant support to the President's critics and to anti-war activists. It was perhaps more subtle, but no less shamelessly dishonest, than the performance of the Iraqi Information Minister.

People in the media neither know this nor believe it, because they do not associate with anyone who is not also a liberal Democrat. They have no idea how much the public's opinion of their credibility has changed in the last six weeks.

So here they come with "Let's get Santorum." It is quite obviously a partisan political attack, because we can see actual Democratic Party figures participating. Then we find out that the "reporter" who seeded this story is married to John Kerry's campaign manager. The parallels with the attack on Lott are obvious, except that this time it is the media itself that is leading the charge on behalf of the Democrats.

Since the Lott episode, there have been several rather outrageous statements made by Democrats, none of which seemed to interest the media in the least. The contrast could not be more striking. Senator Schumer makes blatantly anti-Catholic remarks, and that is not "news." But now here comes a full-blown media crusade... against another Republican.

And it's the same media that just lied its way through Gulf War II as the advocacy arm of International A.N.S.W.E.R. and the Democratic Party.

The unfairness is apparent. The bias is apparent. A willingness to lie to the public in pursuit of that bias is apparent. The involvement of an Associated Press reporter married to a Democratic Party campaign manager is apparent. And the piling on by the usual suspects, the same people who lied all through the war to discredit the Republican White House, looks more like Witch Hunt II — the Evil Republican, than it does a news story.

I think they have gone to the well one too many times here. It's too soon after the last one. There have been too many intervening similar-but-ignored events involving Democrats in the months since. And the same news organizations that are perpetrating this obviously partisan attack are coming off a performance in the war that was so blatantly biased that it shocked the public.

Somebody might indeed go down here, but it might not be Rick Santorum.

[mhking]

They'll always admit it in a "weak" moment....

[Southack]

Your post #45 gets my vote for analysis of the week.

Nice job.

[azGOPgal]

Ping!

[azGOPgal]

When they say everyone, do they mean Peter Jennings himself and his mom?

[azGOPgal]

Whoops. Meant the ping for you Maigrey.

[RJayneJ]

Thanks for the nomination! };^D)

[ladyinred]

You mean they are biased?
Yikes! What a surprise this will be to them, they think they are objective journalists doing a service to the world! :-)
I can't watch any of them anymore.

[TheLion]

Good points. The leftist media, imo, is so arrogant, they will continue to cram their lies down the throat of the last man listening.

What they fail to understand is the internet and the impact of FOX News and other outlets to come. Rush Limbauh and other radio talk show hosts probably started the whole process in motion. Like radio, television will not favor the lies of the left, when there are alternatives. It will be most exciting to watch it unfold.

[JustPiper]

Is this the lib admission Joe Scarborough covered on his show, will repeat at 3am cst, I think.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

that analysis is remarkably elegant.

I like it myself. I developed it in this thread.

[miloklancy]

It is certainly a good point that the left have suffered for being habitual liars in terms of media coverage. And I hope you are right that the backlash will increase the ranks of conservative voters. Also you are absolutely right in terms of the quality of information the left take in. This I think is largely an effect from their intellectual laziness. Liberals hate to debate, but are always the first to claim they are smarter than anyone else.