Bias AND Hypocrisy

As you know if you’ve read previous posts, I like to delve into political and “newsy” issues. In fact, I think of myself of something of a news junky. I read my local paper front to back every day, look up alternative news sources for other viewpoints, and have taken to “reading” books by and about newsmakers and reporters themselves (listening to books-on-recorded-media is more true than reading – I have precious little time beyond the paper to sit down and read).

I have just finished the book “Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News” by Bernard Goldberg. His basic premise is that traditional network news (the “Big 3” of the old school – NBC, CBS, and ABC) has a strong liberal bias in their coverage. The bias is ingrained in the way the people who run the networks and the on-air personalities think. Because they cannot see their bias, they are in Mr. Goldberg’s view hypocritical twits. In fairness, I don’t entirely disagree with this assertion, but I tend to think that the bias we see in network coverage nowadays is driven more by trying to boost ratings than anything else (a supporting point made loosely in this book).

The backdrop to this is that Mr. Goldberg wrote an op-ed on this subject back in the 1990s, was called to the carpet on it, and eventually split with CBS when it became clear that what he had irreparably damaged his relationships with others at the network and damaged his career.

However, rather than being an indictment of liberal bias in the media, this book clearly bashes those whom Mr. Goldberg butted heads with, and lost. He quotes statistic after statistic and anecdotal tale after anecdotal tale to support his assertions that network news reporting is so left-wing biased as to be unwatchable. Very little original thinking, just regurgitation of others’ work.

The one assertion that comes out of all this is that no “hard” news stories are done any more. Other than that, get out the bats and bash away.

However, I was taken by the hypocrisy of what was being said and written. Very early in the book, Mr. Goldberg claims to, in the main, be a liberal thinker. He wrote the article to point out what he sees as a fundamental problem in news-reporting. OK, I’m with you so far.
But then, he uses mainly conservative statistics, cites conservative sources, and points to Fox News as being the mainstream news outlet that proves the liberal bias, among many other issues.

All this has led me to several conclusions/observations:

• Don’t be hypocritical pretending to be something you are clearly not. If you are of one political/religious/whatever viewpoint, don’t try to be something you are not. Accept who you are, and move on.
• Be consistent. You cannot have both conservative and liberal views on the same subject.
• Don’t bash others for what you are unwilling to do. (Mr. Goldberg went from a career in “serious” journalism to being a contributor to “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel”. Rather than going out and researching and reporting the “hard” stories on his own, he bashes the networks lacking the courage to do them and now does fluff stories for the HBO series that usually have very little bearing on most peoples’ lives. Some would call them “human interest” stories that need telling; that’s fine, let someone else tell them while you do the hard stories. Or were you just trying to stir up a little controversy in order to sell books? Hmmmmmmmmm………..)
• If you break a contract, legal or otherwise, and get called on the carpet, accept your fate and move on. (Goldberg broke his employment contract that explicitly prevented him from writing the type of article he did without getting approval from his bosses. He tried to justify himself by saying that others had done the same thing with impunity, and he thought he could do the same. Bottom line Bernie – you stepped way over the line and didn’t want to accept personal responsibility).
• And on it goes………

OK – that’s enough “bashing back”, as it were.

Let’s just say that I try listen to all sides in any debate and come to a reasoned conclusion. I have “read” books by both conservative and liberal politicians, and been entertained. I have about driven off the road in a rage with assertions made by both sides in their respective tomes. The one thing about all those books, and the reason you won’t see me go off on a tirade about them, is that they are self-consistent and not hypocritical. The belief system underpinning those writers’ views – right or wrong from my perspective – is self-consistent.

With this book, that self-consistency is not there. The writer is all over the map, depending on what viewpoint supports the point he is attempting to make at the time. And they are sometimes in direct conflict, although the writer doesn’t see it.

That’s why I had to write something about this. It made me see red in ways that I normally don’t. In my own way, writing this lets that out.

In conclusion, I will amend something I wrote very early on – do read, consider, and come to YOUR OWN conclusions on topics you think are important. But be consistent in your views.

For instance, you cannot claim to be liberal and then point to Rush Limbaugh and Fox News for support of your views. NOT CONSISTENT!

Hypocrisy

The Chicago Tribune recently ran a commentary written by Victor Davis Hanson on the "nonsensical" bashing of the Bush administration by pampered actors and entertainers. While there are several points that I don't entirely disagree with, there are several places where this guy is way out there. So, I decided to do a little checking into this guy and learn a little about his special creditials.

He has his degrees (BA and PhD) in "Classical Studies" - whatever that is. He has written or contributed to such scintillating works as Warfare and Agriculture in Classical Greece, Hoplites: The Ancient Greek Battle Experience, and The Wars of the Ancient Greeks. So far, I'm not really impressed.

Before he joined the faculty at Cal State - Fresno, he was a farmer. Nothing against farmers or farming, but still not seeing the connections.

Then I just Googled him and found out he's a darling of the far right. He has published dozens of rants and those extremists love him for it. In one, it was claimed that he is a lifelong Democrat, disillusioned with where the party has gone in recent years. (Can't say I disagree on that point.)

So I came to realize this guy's celebrity came from Limbaugh-esque rants, so it started to make a bit more sense. But why would a Democrat go so completely berserk?

So I dug some more, and found out that he is a Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford. The governing board of this august body included such right-wing luminaries as Edwin Meese and Donald Rumsfeld. So he gets a big paycheck as a Fellow at an ultra-conservative think tank - now his writings and commentaries come into focus. In order to keep his bosses happy - and to keep the big paychecks coming - he has to spout this stuff.

One of the points that he makes often, and which I will take him to task on, is that entertainment celebrities are uninformed and, by virtue of their celebrity, trying to be historical revisionists. Quoting directly from the Trib commentary, but available in nearly identical wording in many places: "The United States took out the Taliban in seven weeks, Saddam Hussein in three. Despite a difficult insurrection, there is a democratic government in Iraq. Yet the movie star George Clooney pontificated, 'We can't beat anyone anymore.'"

NOW who's uninformed and revisionist. Oh, that's right, this administration and its apologists - like you.

We invaded Afghanistan after 9/11 to take out the terrorists that attacked us and its leadership. Al Qaeda was the organization in Afghanistan that we went after when they claimed responsibility. Yet Osama bin Laden, its leader, is still free. And there is enough infrastructure left in that organization to carry out coordinated bombings in London just a week ago. I kinda think we didn't beat THEM. We took out a sympathetic regime harboring them - the Taliban. But the terrorists - our original target if one is truthful about how the invasion of Afghanistan was sold to the American public - is still around. Afghanistan, outside of the major cities, is still largely governed by local warlords and Al Qaeda.

Now let's talk about Iraq. The original justification for war there was Weapons of Mass Destruction. Remember those? I do. The adminstration claimed intelligence that WMD were either in place or so close to being completed that we needed to invade a sovereign nation and prevent their dispersal.

How many WMD have been found?? NONE. ZERO. ZILCH. NADA. The entire premise for war was a fantasy. Asterick went into Iraq to clean up where Daddy didn't finish during his presidency.

Since there are no WMD, there has been a series of deliberate efforts to change the scope and nature of the Occupation. Now we point to the first democratically-elected Muslim government in the region as the Great Accomplishment. In all likelihood at the end of all this, that will lead to further destabilization in the region, not less.

As I said before - now who's revisionist? You with your PhD may be all learned 'n' stuff compared to those entertainment goofs - some of whom haven't even finished an undergraduate degree according to your commentary. So you're obviously SOOO much better by virtue of your "Classical Studies".

But at least tell the truth in your tirades Mr. Hanson. Don't be like the rest of the adminstration pukes. You are - or at least were at some point - an educator and apparently a free-thinker. Continue thinking for yourself. But no, you probably won't. Not with the big paychecks you probably get from the pit bulls on the right. "Don't bite the hand that feeds you".

I do have to ask, though. What do you do for fun? If you can't stand celebrities and their positions, then I am sure you don't listen to much music or watch TV or movies.

Oh, that's right. You're working on your own next blockbuster book - something about Peloponnesian war atrocities or something.

Why don't you just stick to that, since that's where YOUR credentials lie.