Media bias: Is it real? Does it matter?

As I promised, a few thoughts on media bias. I think whether you can see it or not depends largely on which side of the aisle you sit on. Now, I'm coming at this from a conservative point of view -- which may prompt a few responses along the lines of "Physician, heal thyself." But then, everyone expects blogs, especially blogs run by a single person, to be partisan. Which, of course, raises a question that I've already seen raised a time or two: Can blogs be considered journalism, or are they always editorials/analyses/propaganda (take your pick of terms)? And another question: If the latter, is it justifiable to get the majority of one's news from them?

But that brings us back to my original question. If the mainstream media is biased anyway -- and I think the case of the CBS and ABC memos (with a little work, that might make a good mystery title), as well as the way the network in the first case handled the whole affair, makes a strong argument that it is -- why NOT get your news from an openly partisan source -- as long as you're sure that the partisan source is accurate? That, I think, is the most important point here, and the one that most often gets overlooked. When I go to certain conservative blogs, for instance, I think they take a reasoned approach, and I've seen them report accurately on major stories. Then there are certain others I know I can't trust.

C. S. Lewis -- a man I consider a mentor, even though he died twelve years before I was born -- tells the story in Surprised by Joy of his tutor, a man who, "born a little later . . . would have been a Logical Positivist." This part made a particular impression on me:

"When a very dignified neighbor, in the course of a Sunday call, observed with an air of finality, 'Well, well, Mr. Kirkpatrick, it takes all sorts to make a world. You are a Liberal and I am a Conservative; we naturally look at the facts from different angles,' Kirk replied, 'What do you mean? Are you asking me to picture Liberals and Conservatives playing peep-bo at a rectangular Fact from opposite sides of a table?'"

Above all else, Lewis tells us, Mr. Kirkpatrick desired facts. Yet that desire did not prevent him from taking a certain position, based on the facts that he saw. His Fact on the table is, I think, something to keep in mind as we ponder who to trust, whether bias makes a difference, and what kind of difference it makes.

More later.

Of interest

I'll be discussing media bias, real or alleged, in a day or two. This struck me as a pretty good reason why I lean toward the idea that it's real and not alleged.

Granted, the New York Review of Books is there to, well, review books, not report the news, so you could argue that it's no big deal whether everyone it quotes on politics holds the same view.

On the other hand, you could argue that, since literature does play a crucial role in a society's thinking, for a publication like this to march in lockstep is a very big deal indeed.

Link may be a little wonky -- I'm not used to linking directly to posts on that particular blog -- but look for the post titled "New York Review of Lefties."

Oldies but goodies, part 1

Well, so much for the idea of blogs as up to the minute. (In fact, I may set them back about five years.) I'm about to post a bunch of stuff that's ancient by blog standards -- about a month or so old, to be precise. But it's in keeping with the idea of this particular blog as a sort of storehouse/clearinghouse for all my project research. What happened was that I've been working on this project in my head for a long time, something I have a habit of doing, when I should have been working on it on the computer all along. So this will be a catch-up post; in the future I'll attempt to keep up with things better.

So to start, some articles on one of my biggest case studies: the CBS memo debacle. It may have left Dan Rather spitting mad, but it was perfectly timed for a project on the relationship between presidential politics and the new media. In no particular order:

Jonathan V. Last, "What Blogs Have Wrought," The Weekly Standard, 27 September 2004. A succinct but thorough overview of the affair. An online reprint of a print publication (though as a conservative magazine, the Standard's not considered mainstream media.)

Frederick Turner, "The Blogosphere and the Pajamaheddin," Tech Central Station, 21 September 2004. A comparison of the worldviews of the MSM (mainstream media) and the blogosphere. TCS is an exclusively online publication.

Victor Keegan, "Blogging on," Guardian Unlimited, 22 September 2004. A brief examination of the idea of a "citizens' media." Online reprint from a liberal British newspaper.

Have to take a break -- more coming . . .

Welcome to my blog!

At long last I've got this thing up and running! It's a little (okay, VERY) bare-bones at the moment, but I'm hoping to put in some time on it over the weekend and spruce it up. My purpose for this blog, at least at the moment, is both to use it as a storage area for ideas and links that I'll use for my ENGL 611 project, and to make those ideas and links available to other political animals who are interested in the effect of Internet technology on the current presidential campaign.

More later . . .