Defining Bias Downward: Holding Political Power to Account Is Not Some Lib

[housewolf]

Defining Bias Downward: Holding Political Power to Account Is Not Some Liberal Plot

In the wake of the election the bias symphony is reaching for a crescendo. The new refrain goes this way: aside from John Kerry, the election's other loser was mainstream media. George W. Bush, the theory goes, won despite the strenuous efforts of the press to bring him down.

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What's disturbing is not the way that Graham is whining into his champagne but his little two-step away from reality. He and others are defining bias downward, as anything that challenges a GOP point of view.

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Without some rough agreement on what is significant, citizens will not get the intellectually honest debate that citizenship requires. Journalists, whatever their inner political leanings, must work harder at being honest brokers of information, worthy of respect.

Honest conservatives, meanwhile, should consider a pair of New Year's resolutions: first, recognize that challenging political power and holding it to account is the legitimate role of the press in a democracy, not some liberal plot. Second, swear off defining any story that is uncomfortable to you as an example of liberal bias.

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http://www.campaigndesk.org/archives/001217.asp


http://www.campaigndesk.org/archives/001217.asp

[ixion]

1. this begins by simply not allowing them to frame the debate

which is the core problem.

Allowing the rethug 'pundits' to frame the debate using the 'liberal bias' myth means that a real debate never occurs, but a mockery of that debate, which is flawed at the thesis.