The Media and Obama: Reporters or Flunkies?
Coverage of Obama and McCain is so unbalanced that even the NY Times has noticed.
It’s interesting that Obama, who won’t commit to meeting with military members at a town hall event, is happy to travel the globe with an entourage to rival that of Barbra Streisand, meeting the leaders he’ll presumably be working with for the next “eight to ten years.” I guess traveling to Fort Hood, Texas, isn’t as glamorous.
In a book of essays entitled New Media and the New Middle East, edited by Philip Seib, Shawn Powers and Eytan Gilboa write in “The Public Diplomacy of Al-Jazeera”: “Asaad Taha, an investigative reporter for Al-Jazeera, has defended the inflammatory and oftentimes partial nature of his journalism by arguing that he ‘is adamantly against the notion of neutrality. There is no such thing as a neutral journalist or a neutral media for that matter.’”
While I usually have little regard for Al-Jazeera, I must admire Asaad Taha’s refreshing honesty. We all bring our beliefs and experiences to whatever we do, and journalists are no exception. I’d also have less of a problem with media bias if American journalists were as honest as Asaad Taha. Back in the days before “professional” journalism schools and broadcast media, it was not difficult to tell which side of an issue various newspapers supported, and readers could take their reporting with a grain of salt. Nowadays, journalists claim they are unbiased, and yet their biases manage to come shining through despite their protestations to the opposite. And yet media moguls must wonder why less than half of those surveyed trust newscasters and journalists to tell the truth.
“Look, mommy! The emperor is naked!”
He is indeed. But don’t expect him to admit it. In the meantime, don’t expect the coverage of the candidates to change. In fact, as we get closer to November 4, you can expect the SS Mainstream Media to tilt even further to starboard. Hang on to your life preservers — it’s going to be one heck of a trip.
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Pam Meister is the editor for Family Security Matters and a contributor to Big Hollywood. Her work can also be seen at American Thinker. The views expressed here are her own.
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41 Comments
1. thinkingoutloud:I think part of the reason Obama is getting so much more coverage than McCain right now is because he’s just *doing* more and running a more dynamic campaign, which makes him easier to write about. This is aside the bias of some of the press (which is certainly there, though weirdly, I also think McCain has benefited by being over-coddled by the media, which hasn’t given much attention to many of his flip-flops).
The Obama foreign trip is just a glorified photo op, obviously, but, of course, a candidate who goes and does something flashy like that is going to get more coverage than the candidate who gives more or less the same speech over and over again in New Hampshire (which I think is where McCain was today). It’s silly, but it’s how the game is played. If McCain were running a better/smarter campaign, the level of coverage wouldn’t be so uneven.
I mean, even on the PJM home page right now, I count five stories about Obama, and two stories about McCain!
Jul 23, 2008 - 12:47 am 2. Dieter Voigt:Why are yo wondering that Obama gets much more coverage than McCain? In Europe we have the hope that politics in the US will get changed. We have seen for to long an America which is splitting the world to much in categories such as “Old Europe”.
Jul 23, 2008 - 3:42 am 3. Andrew Ian Dodge:We are looking for a leader who is refresing the politics with new ideas, with new spirit and with new trust.
Obama can not solve all the problems in once, he might not even understand all of them. But he can express the hope of change much more then McCain.
Understanding this situation we might see a lot of glorified photos and hand shaking. What’s count is the hope that Obama is changing the direction.
The last time they were this in the tank for someone we got Carter. And that was such a success… in only a deluded mind
Jul 23, 2008 - 3:51 am 4. mark shaw:No kidding!!!!!
Jul 23, 2008 - 4:13 am 5. pashley:Who is McCain ??????
Never heard of him.
So the media falls over and swoons with Obama. Really, so what, this isn’t the 70’s anymore. In a few years the idea of them being neutral and unbiased arbitrators of what is newsworthy is completely dead, and the only watchers left are fanboi’s of their particular slant.
What I do find weird is the Dem’s covering up for their failings by plopping into the middle of the mud puddle. Dukakis sits in a tank, Kerry and his supposed military service with the questionable Purple Hearts, and now here is Obama, jumping on a plane to fly to his weakest flank, military and security. So he is a foreign policy light-weight, in many ways its not the end of the world. Why doesn’t he play to his strengths; urban renewal, a better energy policy, rebuilding the infrastructure, the financial services mess?
Jul 23, 2008 - 5:26 am 6. Die Fledermaus:A vessel’s left in maritime terms is connoted by “port,” not “starboard.” Therefore, the SS Mainstream Media will tilt further to port as election day approaches.
Jul 23, 2008 - 5:31 am 7. TomP:Dieter: There are no new ideas in politics, just different methods of hype and spin. Hope and change? My God man, grow up.
Jul 23, 2008 - 5:48 am 8. Anonymous:this is an only in America storry. You have got the world’s attention. Go on and rediscover the soul of your country. Emma Jime, NIGERIA.
Jul 23, 2008 - 6:44 am 9. John:“So the media falls over and swoons with Obama. Really, so what, this isn’t the 70’s anymore”
“In Europe we have the hope that politics in the US will get changed.”
“What’s count is the hope that Obama is changing the direction”
- That’s just stupid, what counts is that Obama doesn’t destroy this country.
I remember the 70’s real well and the 70’s SUCKED, both parties had a hand in that but if Jimmy Carter, I mean, Barack Obama is elected the 70’s or worse will come back. As far as Europe goes who gives a cr$p what they think? In a couple decades we’ll be calling them European middle easterners anyway.
Jul 23, 2008 - 6:50 am 10. rocketeer:Die Fledermaus – You beat me to the punch on that one.
The mainstreams are on their way into the “completely irrelevant” bin of history. All the major networks and major newspapers are industries in decline without the ability to even be aware of their own impending demise. The most amusing part of their plight is to watch them all deny that they have a bias, after all, everyone that they know thinks like they do…
Jul 23, 2008 - 6:58 am 11. Stop turning a blind eye to what is really going on..get over the pety squables:Driving the surge in gas prices?
The Bush-McCain surge in Iraq
By Greg Palast for TomPaine.com/OurFuture.org
[New York, May 22, 2008.]
I can’t make this up:
In a hotel room in Brussels, the chief executives of the world’s top oil companies unrolled a huge map of the Middle East, drew a fat, red line around Iraq and signed their names to it.
The map, the red line, the secret signatures. It explains this war. It explains this week’s rocketing of the price of oil to $134 a barrel.
It happened on July 31, 1928, but the bill came due now.
Barack Obama knows this. Or, just as important, those crafting his policies seem to know this. Same for Hillary Clinton’s team. There could be no more vital difference between the Republican and Democratic candidacies. And you won’t learn a thing about it on the news from the Fox-holes.
Let me explain.
In 1928, oil company chieftains (from Anglo-Persian Oil, now British Petroleum, from Standard Oil, now Exxon, and their Continental counterparts) were faced with a crisis: falling prices due to rising supplies of oil; the same crisis faced by their successors during the Clinton years, when oil traded at $22 a barrel.
The solution then, as now: stop the flow of oil, squeeze the market, raise the price. The method: put a red line around Iraq and declare that virtually all the oil under its sands would remain there, untapped. Their plan: choke supply, raise prices rise, boost profits. That was the program for 1928. For 2003. For 2008.
Again and again, year after year, the world price of oil has been boosted artificially by keeping a tight limit on Iraq’s oil output. Methods varied. The 1928 “Redline” agreement held, in various forms, for over three decades. It was replaced in 1959 by quotas imposed by President Eisenhower. Then Saudi Arabia and OPEC kept Iraq, capable of producing over 6 million barrels a day, capped at half that, given an export quota equal to Iran’s lower output.
In 1991, output was again limited, this time by a new red line: B-52 bombings by Bush Senior’s air force. Then came the Oil Embargo followed by the “Food for Oil” program. Not much food for them, not much oil for us.
In 2002, after Bush Junior took power, the top ten oil companies took in a nice $31 billion in profits. But then, a miracle fell from the sky. Or, more precisely, the 101st Airborne landed. Bush declared, “Bring’m on!” and, as the dogs of war chewed up the world’s second largest source of oil, crude doubled in two years to an astonishing $40 a barrel and those same oil companies saw their profits triple to $87 billion.
In response, Senators Obama and Clinton propose something wrongly called a “windfall” profits tax on oil. But oil industry profits didn’t blow in on a breeze. It is war, not wind, that fills their coffers. The beastly leap in prices is nothing but war profiteering, hiking prices to take cruel advantage of oil fields shut by bullets and blood.
I wish to hell the Democrats would call their plan what it is: A war profiteering tax. War is profitable business – if you’re an oil man. But somehow, the public pays the price, at the pump and at the funerals, and the oil companies reap the benefits.
Indeed, the recent engorgement in oil prices and profits goes right back to the Bush-McCain “surge.” The Iraq government attack on a Basra militia was really nothing more than Baghdad’s leaping into a gang war over control of Iraq’s Southern oil fields and oil-loading docks. Moqtada al-Sadr’s gangsters and the government-sponsored greedsters of SCIRI (the Supreme Council For Islamic Revolution In Iraq) are battling over an estimated $5 billion a year in oil shipment kickbacks, theft and protection fees.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the surge-backed civil warring has cut Iraq’s exports by up to a million barrels a day. And that translates to slashing OPEC excess crude capacity by nearly half.
Result: ka-BOOM in oil prices and ka-ZOOM in oil profits. For 2007, Exxon recorded the highest annual profit, $40.6 billion, of any enterprise since the building of the pyramids. And that was BEFORE the war surge and price surge to over $100 a barrel.
It’s been a good war for Exxon and friends. Since George Bush began to beat the war-drum for an invasion of Iraq, the value of Exxon’s reserves has risen – are you ready for this? – by $2 trillion.
Obama’s war profiteering tax, or “oil windfall profits” tax, would equal just 20% of the industry’s charges in excess of $80 a barrel. It’s embarrassingly small actually, smaller than every windfall tax charged by every other nation. (Ecuador, for example, captures up to 99% of the higher earnings).
Nevertheless, oilman George W. Bush opposes it as does Bush’s man McCain. Senator McCain admonishes us that the po’ widdle oil companies need more than 80% of their windfall so they can explore for more oil. When pigs fly, Senator. Last year, Exxon spent $36 billion of its $40 billion income on dividends and special payouts to stockholders in tax-free buy-backs. Even the Journal called Exxon’s capital investment spending “stingy.”
At today’s prices Obama’s windfall tax, teeny as it is, would bring in nearly a billion dollars a day for the US Treasury. Clinton’s plan is similar. Yet the press’ entire discussion of gas prices is shifted to whether the government should knock some sales tax pennies off the oil companies’ pillaging at the pump.
More important than even the Democrats’ declaring that oil company profits are undeserved, is their implicit understanding that the profits are the spoils of war.
And that’s another reason to tax the oil industry’s ill-gotten gain. Vietnam showed us that foreign wars don’t end when the invader can no longer fight, but when the invasion is no longer profitable.
*****************
Jul 23, 2008 - 7:15 am 12. Dieter Voigt:Greg Palast is the author of, “Trillion Dollar Babies,” on Iraq and oil, published in his New York Times bestseller, Armed Madhouse.
For John,
I do not think that Europe is called midddle easterners. The US is going before this way, if they not change there aggressive way to dominate the world
Jul 23, 2008 - 7:26 am 13. always right:That is because after 2004 election, media had a collective ‘navel searching’ groupie. They believed IF ONLY they push their candidate JFKerry (btw, did you know he served in Vietnam?) a little more, Ohio would have fallen into their bloc.
This time media has decided NO QUARTERS given! Who cares if their masks dropped, if they achieved their goal.
Jul 23, 2008 - 7:28 am 14. always right:I love it when a european thinks his/her opinion represent the rest of the world, while calling Ameicans arrogant cowboys.
DELICIOUS!
Jul 23, 2008 - 7:32 am 15. always right:pashley:
Now, now, now, there is no way to speak of an ex-presidential candidate and a sitting US Senator.
BTW, did you know JFKerry served in Vietnam?
Jul 23, 2008 - 7:34 am 16. GM Roper:AR and Pashley… Kerry served in da Nam? Whoda thunk it?
Jul 23, 2008 - 7:53 am 17. Oziripus:“If you had any doubt that the mainstream media is gunning for Barack Obama, . . . .”
Pam, you have your introductory colloquialism backwards, which isn’t surprising if you majored in Humanities at college these last 40-some years.
Would that they were gunning for him! (Metaphorically, of course!!!)
Jul 23, 2008 - 8:01 am 18. John:For Dieter Voigt,
Maybe the US should act more like France or Rome or Britain or Spain or Germany did when they ruled the world during their times as Superpowers. How many MILLIANS died because of Europe. I know the US has done some crappy stuff just ask the Indians, if you can find one, but were just amateurs compared to you so please get your hypocritical head out your a$$ and stop blaming the US for all the problems in the world. Maybe if Europe would grow a pair they could try solving some of these problems themselves, maybe even take the lead sometimes. As far as Iraq goes I don’t care if people thinks it’s for oil or whatever. They LOST the first Gulf War by surrendering, Clinton should have attacked the first time they shot at our planes. This isn’t Bush’s War it should have been Clinton’s War.
Jul 23, 2008 - 8:03 am 19. CJ:For Dieter Voigt:
Hope and Change?! what the heck does that mean, hope for what, change to what? For the government in America to be more left wing? I am sure it is awesome in Europe how the EU forces itself into the life of Europeans! GOOD for Ireland spitting on the face of the EU!
Europe is corrupt, it is degenerate, it is without values. Europe is a lost cause. Caucasians in Europe are no longer having children. Middle Easterns are moving into Europe at an alarming rate and they have 3 times more children than Europeans. All major countries in Europe have a negative population growth. The only population in Europe that is growing is the Muslim population.
America is not splitting the world. America has to constantly do what Europe refuses to do. Clean up the mess which in many cases was started by Europeans decades if not centuries ago. Vietnam-French mess, Iraq-English mess, Rwanda-Dutch mess, Phillipines-Spanish mess. I mean really, shall I continue?
Sadly enough, too many Europeans are sad cowards who believe that talking and diplomacy will resolve everything. That work so well for Chamberlin, right?
By the way, Dieter Voigt, do you truly believe that we Americans care what you Europeans think about us? Let me put it this way, we care as much as you care what Americans think about Europe!
I find it amusing that Europeans love to complain about the USA, but they quickly turn to the USA to solve all of their pathetic problems.
And Hope and Change?! what the heck does that mean. Hitler was also for Hope and Change, so was Stalin, so was Hugo Chavez, so was Castro, Mao Tsung.
Jul 23, 2008 - 8:28 am 20. Brad:Hey Dieter, reading crap about dominating the world from a German is beyond ironic. Good lord–you know how many American graves are in Europe that kept German fascists from dominating the world? You’ve not a clue about what we Americans are all about. Now is the time to tune in to “Sprockets” and dance. Yeesh
Jul 23, 2008 - 9:30 am 21. thinkingoutloud:to follow up on my previous comment, McCain just *cancelled* his one scheduled press conference this week:
http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/07/tales_from_the_jv_squad_no_pre.php
It seems weird to complain about Obama getting so much more press coverage when McCain won’t give the press anything to cover. What’s going on?
Jul 23, 2008 - 9:43 am 22. John:Maybe McCain is waiting for the Obama orgy to get over with so they’ll have someone to cover his press confrence.
Jul 23, 2008 - 10:31 am 23. Beth:Did I fall asleep during the coronation or something? This Obamanation thing is driving me nuts and I think he’s shooting himself in the foot. At least one can hope. He is the nerviest person ever to run for President of this nation. This is not even funny. The media is ridiculous, he is acting inappropriately meeting with his mid-east supporters, making it look like he’s already been elected. I mean why doesn’t he just sit on their laps and throw his arms around their necks. One has to wonder why they love him so much. And the media gets one smile out of Petraeus and it’s thrown around like he was smiling like that all the time he was in Obama’s company. Talk about photo opp mania, too! I can’t even stand turning on the news anymore. We used to wonder if there was a slant, now we’re wondering when they’re going to realize how blatantly slanted they all are! Our kids will never see a rational presidential election again. Entertainment has taken over everything.
Jul 23, 2008 - 10:47 am 24. Napoleon:Quit picking on Dieter: our own MSM swoons over Obama like teenagers over the Beatles. Don’t blame an outsider for swooning too.
Dieter’s desire for everyone to “get along” is well-intentioned and I wish Europe and the US did get along better. Especially the Germans and Russians who I respect immensely, and the Brits who are always great.
But Dieter–unlike our own media-has an excuse for thinking its the US that needs to change: lamentably poor and consistently hostile coverage of the US in Europe for decades, and a anti-factual, anti-historical prevailing view there, that if everyone pretends “not to notice bad things”, they won’t happen.
Robustly embracing freedom is not a European tradition: it is here. National pride may be fading there: it not here. (and may not be there if the Irish vote on the Eu is an indication)
The US has also been tone deaf in explaining why it “is” and why it does things. It left the void to be filled by pseudo-intellectuals of all stripes that were and are, apologists for every dictator anywhere that expropriates property, limits press freedoms and enlists the police in search of a “betetr way.”
The US took no colonies, left the field after WWII and all the crabby intelelctuals can look to is Guantanomo. That for them and many like Dieter, is the US. And who can we blame? Hell, we don’t even require our own students to read the federalist appers anymore–who can blame Dieter for not figuring it out?
But Dieter please note: as in 1980 (reagan), 1984, 2000 and 2004, the media here don’t reflect the US voters. They reflect a narrow segment based in Manhattan. Its great to have an Obama running: he seems to be a decent man. But “getting along” with segments in Europe that hate the US no matter what we do is not what most Americans want.
Jul 23, 2008 - 10:56 am 25. deguello:Dieter is right! If you meddling,war mongering Americans had not interfered with my plans for a united europe, and a post capitalist society,there would have been no cold war, no oil crisis,no Thatcher,no arms races,full racial equality(for Aryan europeans),no out of control president Bush,and no US bullying! Adolph Hitler, first circle of hell,inside the european subconscious.
Jul 23, 2008 - 11:18 am 26. Luce Garcia:During the Democrat primary, how could voters have not notice that Hillary would get a minute coverage and the media would give Obama much longer coverage at all times. Please wake up people!! How can you not figure out this Fraud!
Jul 23, 2008 - 11:22 am 27. Tom Brown:Please go to (Just Say No Deal.com) to find that 18 million and more are networking to correct all these propaganda put out by the media.
It sure is funny how McCain never mentioned anything about lack of media coverage/attention when Obama and Hillary were going at it or when Rev Wright couldnt hide under a rock. I got so tired of the media slamming Obama 24/7. What was fair and balanced about that??? As a matter a fact most repubs said it was great for McCain to let the media hang Obama. Now his campaign is “whinning” because Obama’s getting more coverage (I mean positive coverage). Give me a break!!!!!!
Jul 23, 2008 - 11:27 am 28. John:Tom Brown
Fox News reported on it pretty heavy but the rest of the MSM went easy on him. They are still going easy on him. Remember the SNL skit? It was funny because it was true. So give me a break!!!!!
Jul 23, 2008 - 11:58 am 29. huxley:Dieter — Everyone is entitled to an opinion about Obama. The problem though is that the US media claim to present fair, objective, non-partisan coverage of the race, when they are actually functioning in part as a propaganda organ for the Obama campaign. This is dishonest and hypocritical.
Jul 23, 2008 - 12:23 pm 30. Brad:Just don’t need some German, or any European for that matter, telling us who needs to be president of our country–especially after we’ve provided their defense for 60 years. Ungrateful rubes.
Jul 23, 2008 - 12:29 pm 31. kiwikit:Reading this blog’s comments makes me suddenly aware of how horrible the educations system must be overseas as well as here. Does noone know any grammar anymore? The spelling is atrocious and the word selection (e.g. to instead of too) is downright pathetic. No wonder these obamamaniacs can’t reason!
Jul 23, 2008 - 1:01 pm 32. Akatsukami:We needn’t go back centuries or even decades to find a European-caused mess. Remember Bosnia?
Jul 23, 2008 - 4:31 pm 33. AR(NC):thinkingoutloud:
to follow up on my previous comment, McCain just *cancelled* his one scheduled press conference this week:
It seems weird to complain about Obama getting so much more press coverage when McCain won’t give the press anything to cover. What’s going on?
==========
Excuse me (if your thinking at all): If it must be explained to you. Standing in 110 mile an hour winds of hurricane Dolly might make even you cancel a speech.
Jul 23, 2008 – 9:43 am
Jul 23, 2008 - 6:53 pm 34. thinkingoutloud:AR(NC):
I’m going to refrain from lobbing a reciprocal insult at you, but the press conference was to have taken place in Pennsylvana. Very far from Hurricane Dolly.
Jul 23, 2008 - 8:52 pm 35. Jose A. Garcia:When I watch the news, I don’t want it to be about reporters. I want them to report the news, it seems that all of them have an axe to grind and take extreme delight in talking about each other.
If I want silly bickering between rivals, I can get that at work.
Jul 24, 2008 - 3:08 am 36. AR(NC):Jeff Sadosky, a McCain aide, said predictions of rough weather Wednesday night, including strong thunderstorms, led the campaign to cancel the McCain trip to New Orleans. McCain’s camp says they’ll reschedule the meeting with Jindal.
Jul 24, 2008 - 5:15 am 37. GB:======================================
This is from MSNCB article Re: Speech cancellation. I’m not trying to be argumentative, nor would I insult you. Debate is good for the soul.
To Dieter:
Change? You’ve got to be kidding! As far as I can tell politically, he’s pretty much an old time Chicago politician telling the people exactly what they want to hear to get elected (and it changes with the crowd he’s speaking to). That’s old politics at its worst.
He’s a rank and file socialist with European anti-progressive ideas that have crippled the European economies. We may be in a slump, here, but it won’t be long, because hopefully, if we can keep the socialist Democrats from raiding our wallets, the free market will solve the problems — as it always has much more brilliantly than any government.
BTW, speaking of socialism, I hear that France has lifted the restriction on a 35 hour work week. Another socialist entitlement offloaded. Isn’t it amazing — somebody has to work to pay the bills.
Jul 24, 2008 - 7:50 am 38. Martya:The media still has time to crown Hilary. All it need do is find/report on some major blemish in Hussein’s background which, in turn, would convince the super-delegates that Hussein can’t win. What major blemish? I sure there are many but the one I like is his senior thesis at Columbia. Why is he hiding it? Content?
No, a thesis that argued that the US should surrender to the Soviets would certainly endear him to today’s media, neocommunists and democrats.
Jul 25, 2008 - 8:46 am 39. sk:No, he is hiding his thesis for the only reason that is left; he plagiarized it, copied it from somebody else. Columbia and it’s left wing faculty would NEVER have blown the whistle on an articulate affirmative action student and, today, would never help surface the wrongdoing. Honest NYC journalists would probably be able to prove or disprove this theory pretty quickly.
“Look, Mommy, the emperor is naked!”
Jul 25, 2008 - 10:01 am 40. nystink:“Yes, and look at those pecs! Hubba, hubba!”
Once Dieter is finished doing his sieg heils to Obama, he needs to try to understand why europeans have stopped having children. Europe is shriveling away and being replaced by a greater middle east. Why did Obama even bother to go to that wasted land?
Jul 25, 2008 - 3:27 pm 41. Judy, NYC:europeans imagine themselves as quite mannered and aristocratic (what they really want more than anything else, is to once again wear those frilly shirts with the flouncy sleeves and dip snuff). we americans, are considered brash, and ill mannered, money hungry dolts without bloodlines or proper insignia to identify our selves. and war mongers. this is quite funny, coming from europeans, who never passed up a good natural resource they didn’t steal, or an indigenous native they didn’t conquer and enslave. sometimes, doing it just for the thrill of playing cricket on someone else’s lawn. and, how fitting that with all their virulent anti-semitism they are now swamped with hoards of fanatic muslim arabs who they have to grin and bear. we hardly need lectures from any of these dweebs on electing our president.
Sep 2, 2008 - 10:43 pm