Implicit Ideological Bias
In various ways you all argue that the disparity in coverage could at least be driven by the probability that the democratic nominee might be either an African American or a woman. But there is a very real chance this election might see the first Mormon or pro choice conservative nominee. Why should a racial minority or female be more positively covered than a religious minority or atypical conservative?
Arguing that differential coverage exists primarily as a function of the uniqueness of the potential democratic candidates places you in the awkward position of explaining why the unique republican nominees are not enjoying the same kind of positive coverage. This seems to be a rather obvious counter argument begging the question why you commenters were unable to anticipate it.
I suspect the reason is because the underlying assumption that explains your appeal to the race or gender narrative, as opposed to a religious one, probably has something to do with your preference for liberal ideology. The narrative, in this case, is a celebration of the triumph of liberal ideology in overcoming race and gender discrimination. Certainly those are things worthy of celebration but on what grounds are they more praiseworthy than our first Mormon nominee? The press, like you, sees the ascension of a woman or African American as a more positive thing which clearly affects the coverage.
This point is subtle. Your implicit liberal ideology assumes that the excitement of a racial or gender nominee is capable of explaining differential coverage while at the same time ignores that a unique religious nominee should also enjoy that same effect. When arguing with many of you for the first time you were surprised to hear me state the MSM has a bias. At the time you saw the MSM as fair broker of news. This is only because your implicit ideology is congruent with narrative the MSM uses to cover stories which blinds you from seeing its bias. Someone whose ideology is not congruent with the narrative becomes keenly aware of the bias because their expectation of how a news story should be covered is frustrated. You are all very much aware of this when you watch Fox news.
It should be clear that journalist fall victim to their implicit ideology. This is one of the problems with the large news organization packing themselves full of liberals. The institution must lean left kinda like Fox news must lean right. If your ideology is congruent with the institute then you will not perceive the bias. We saw this same mechanism at work when the commentors failed to identify unique achievements if certain republicans become nominated when explaining why the press covers democrats more favorably then conservatives.
November 5th, 2007 at 8:50 pm
I understand what you are saying, but this country has already been through the “uniqueness” of a candidate of a different religion. When John F. Kennedy secured the white house it was news because he was a catholic president. This broke the mold of the protestant stronghold on American politics. I for one am excited about the fact that republican candidates are out of the mold of normal republican candidates. Rudy is pro-choice and mitt is mormon. I just don’t think it is as interesting to the general public as black or female. It’s a subtle difference, but one that is out there.
November 5th, 2007 at 10:29 pm
“At the time you saw the MSM as fair broker of news.” I don’t recall making this claim. I could be wrong, but wasn’t my argument all along that your explanation of the mechanism for MSM bias wasn’t persuasive? Anyway, the study is showing evidence that the MSM has a democratic bias so far this election cycle… although I could poke holes in their methodology such as vague metric and such, let’s take it at face value for the sake of argument. First off, democratic bias and liberal bias are not necessarily synonymous. Maybe there is some other characteristic of the democratic candidates that causes them to be more appealing to the MSM than the republican candidates (for example, perhaps the Democratic campaign donors are more likely to also be advertisers). Also, this is a relatively small sample size, given that it is only a single election. For a study to demonstrate the extent of systematic bias you are suggesting, it would have to cover multiple election cycles.
Basically, I think the conclusion you are drawing is premature from the evidence presented. It’s an interesting line of observation, but more carefully controlled studies would be necessary to broaden the claim to what you seem to be suggesting.
November 6th, 2007 at 1:22 am
Sigh one more person completely oblivious to MSM bias. Man there seems to be another ending flow of you guys.
November 6th, 2007 at 3:59 pm
I resent (not really) the “you all.” I may not comment on everything, but i’m still here i swear.
November 8th, 2007 at 1:15 am
You should post more. I need more libertarian representation on the blog. It gets old having to defend the principle of truth, justice, and the American way all by myself.