Will the mainstream media be the biggest loser in the War in Iraq? 11/1/07
Posted by Steve Boriss in Iraq.trackback
These are dangerous days for the credibility of mainstream media. Things were already looking bad in April of this year when the journalist-respected Pew Research Center revealed some stunning statistics. When asked whether the news media was providing an accurate picture of the Iraq War, those claiming to have a “fair amount” or “great deal” of confidence in them had plunged from 81% to 38% since 2003. Those claiming “no confidence” jumped from a virtually non-existent 1% to 27%. Now that there have been several months of declining casualties signaling a possible U.S. victory, CNN’s Howard Kurtz asked two reporters in the video below why this positive news has been getting so little media attention. Their troubling answers shed a good amount of light on the problems of Modern Journalism.
These reporters are essentially claiming the right to highlight or downplay facts based on how well they fit with their own personal-opinion-templates of how the war is going. Perhaps there is a certain logic to that, but there is no logic for them to be claiming at the same time that they are conducting objective journalism, providing facts that have been scrubbed of opinion. Stranger still has been some recent reporting that acknowledges the positive developments in Iraq, but presents them as bad news, the funniest of which almost reaches the level of self-parody. This McClatchy story bemoans that as casualties have fallen, it is cemetery workers who have been the hardest hit. But, the jury is still out on that — the hardest hit may be mainstream journalists, who are digging their own graves.
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Is it really any different than “Fair & Balanced” Fox and their trumpetting of the war, like every Murdoch outlet on the globe?
They’re biased/opinionated but “Fair” or “Balanced” doesn’t exactly convey that …
Bob, Actually, I do believe that Fox is much more balanced than mainstream media because you can actually hear voices from both sides. Note that even though the CNN clip above used a premise that challenged the mainstream media, both of the guests represented only one side of the argument. In the end, though, I don’t think that any news outlet can be “objective” and we would be better off if they took sides and just tried to be fair to the arguments of the other side.
MSM seems determined to become the biggest loser by acting like neo-copperheads.
Whether Fox is fair or balanced is really meaningless. If there is bias, and I would guess that there is, it is the only outlet biased in the direction opposite the remainder of the media. Fox would have to be biased to the point of parody to balance the universal slant of the lapdog media.
Anyone failing to recognize that a single source is likely to inject their own opinion into coverage is not interested in the news or in the truth. Without digging you will never know how accurate your source is.
These people are scum. QED.
Honestly this midlife crisis masquerading as political opportunism masquerading as “idealism” has got to stop - what the hell are we going to do as a country with you mentally rotting babyboomers inserting your cowardice and vanity into the four corners of the globe for the next 30 years? You people couldn’t even recognize what the Soviet Union and Russia was - a most transparent thing! And now, the Martians have landed, and you stil shriek your idiot pieties! SHUT UP already!
“Fox and their trumpetting of the war, like every Murdoch outlet on the globe”
Wtf does this even mean? Do you even watch Fox News? I think the reigning sentiment is “You should not crap on your country in time of war” - quite a venerable old principle, actually. Or do you actually have footage of anchormen with blood-dripping fangs howling for Arab meat?
That was a rhetorical question, Senile.
The MSM rah rah’ed the war.
Why would they be the losers?
And Dan, your “you should not crap on your country in time of war” line sounds too much like “now is not the time to question your President” line in the run-up to the Iraq War, which is the single stupidest thing said this century.
Robert on the surface you make a good argument. But history supports Dan. What kept the Vietnam war going was our fractured support at home. The people we fight have newspapers and telivision also. Vietnamese generals admitted after the war they were ready to give up several times until watching our media.
They realized if the kept it bloody they did not have to win on the battlefield. So you must ask yourself how many men on both sides died to keep our news bloody after this realization. We all hate war but we must realize vocal dissent against your government during war only prolongs it. And soldiers and civilians in the battle theater pay the price while we sit on our couchs enjoying the first amendment.