Media Matters' Report on newspaper columnists

[hfojvt]

http://mediamatters.org/reports/oped/report

"CONCLUSION

Conservatives are often heard to complain about the "liberal media," a nefarious cabal of journalists and media owners supposedly endeavoring to twist the news to serve their ideological agenda. Media Matters for America has shown in a variety of ways that the "liberal media" is a myth. Our two reports on the Sunday talk shows showed how those programs are dominated by conservative guests. Our analysis of the coverage of religion showed how that coverage favors conservatives. Analyses performed by other organizations have shown how conservatives dominate talk radio. And this study demonstrates that in yet another key portion of the news media, conservatives enjoy a structural advantage that gives them a leg up in influencing public opinion."


I think that needs to be combined with Alterman who said something like 'the liberals are not nearly as liberal as the conservatives are conservative'. The Daily Howler, which led me to this report, points out that Dowd is mis-classified as a progressive. Somerby calls her an 'apolitical writer of trivia' but he has also pointed out her lead role in the media's 'war on Gore'. Cohen, who is also classified as a progressive is constantly bashing Democrats and promoting right wing spin points. Just yesterday, Somerby was writing about how Cohen was promoting Colin Powell's "great" speech to the UN. http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh091207.shtml And last month, Somerby was complaining about the 'useless Bob Herbert' as he pointed out a Gore-bashing column Herbert wrote in October 2000.

I think Broder is more 'right-leaning' than he is 'centrist', and Hentoff is listed as a progressive, but he also seems to devote alot of columns to bashing Dems. He is featured in my local paper, and I stopped reading him, writing him off as another rightwinger.
Clarence Page is also listed as a progressive, perhaps rightly so, but I remember one column he wrote which I thought wrongly defended the police when they killed a man in Cincinnati.

It's sad that so many newspapers are carrying George Will and Cal Thomas. From the days when my local newspapers carried them I remember that neither of them had any regard for the truth. Nor could they reason their way out of a wet paper bag.

[hfojvt]

1. about Bob Herbert

http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh030107.shtml

"MUD AND (GORILLA) DUST: Bob Herbert doesn’t seem to think well of Bill and/or Hillary Clinton. Here’s how he started a truly remarkable column in Monday’s New York Times:

HERBERT (2/26/07; opening paragraph): If Bill and Hillary Clinton were the stars of a reality TV show, it would be a weekly series called ''The Connivers.'' The Clintons, the most powerful of power couples, are always scheming at something, and they're good at it.

Yikes! That’s a deeply punishing assessment. Herbert takes the idea that Hillary Clinton is “calculating” and he raises it several levels. She’s “always scheming at something,” he says. And he says that she’s a “conniver.”"

snip

"And so, we see again how we Dems and libs are held hostage to the tales that drove the 90s. Plainly, Herbert believes vile things about Clinton—things he doesn’t even feel required to relate. He name-calls her viciously—even as he complains that Ruthless Clinton is the one who is vicious. But then, Herbert has been a victim of the 90s for a very long time—and we all became victims through his sad writing. To all appearances, he has always believed the nasty tales that were told about the Clintons—and then, about Gore. Indeed, here’s the way this useless man began one of his last few columns in Campaign 2000, as George Bush inched ever close to a disastrous reign in the White House:

HERBERT (10/5/00): If he can somehow force himself to stop sighing and interrupting and behaving condescendingly in front of the television cameras, Al Gore may yet get elected president.

Good God! That was the start of Herbert’s column about the crucial first Bush-Gore debate! (Headline: “Gore Piles On.” Good God!) In this column, Herbert piled the insults on Candidate Gore, just as he’s doing this week with Clinton."

[hfojvt]

2. Alterman writing about Dowd

"Speaking of Dowd, to understand how this process works, it is crucial to recognize the influence her Times column wields in determining the substance and contours of the agreed-upon narrative. This is a shame because while Dowd is a wonderfully felicitous writer, she has little interest in ideas and none in policy. Her column frequently reads as if co-written by the Shannen Doherty character in Heathers. Regarding Gore, she complained in 1999 that he was "so feminized...he's practically lactating." She attacked him, baselessly, for having boasted that he was the father of the Internet. She also hyped a false and defamatory version of Gore's role in inspiring the novel Love Story. In both cases, Gore was telling the truth as Dowd and company accused him of lying. But because she was annoyed with the man she termed a "pious smarty-pants," she wrote, "The vice president's campaign woes could make a Nashville country song: 'You've been sighin' and you've been lyin'.'" As my Media Matters colleague Eric Boehlert notes, Dowd's smarmy and inaccurate attacks on Gore predated (and presumably inspired) the Republican National Committee's.

Most recently Dowd's peevishness has been directed toward Barack Obama. She finds the candidate "testy," "irritated," "hung-up," "conflicted" and "self-consciously pristine." Dowd took it personally when he gave a Labor Day speech in New Hampshire taking on business-as-usual Beltway politics. Dowd mocked Obama's "ranting about Washington pundits" by pointing out that he frequently graces the covers of magazines. This is quite a trick when you think about it. The media elite put Obama on magazine covers, and then the same media elite insist he is inauthentic for having appeared on magazine covers."

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20071001/alterman

[calimary]

3. jonah goldberg is in the LATimes on a regular basis. OY!!!!

This thread deserves a kick because this Media Matters awareness project is worth about a THOUSAND kicks. CONSTANT VIGILANCE!!! VISIBLE, ACTIVE, even AGGRESSIVE CONSTANT VIGILANCE.

[Uncle Joe]

4. I would add Frank Rich to this group as well, he did as much as anyone

in trashing Al Gore and enabling Bush to the White House.

http://www.google.com/custom?q=frank+rich+war+against+gore&sa=Google+Search&cof=AH%3Acenter%3BAWFID%3Ac32a032061318778%3B&domains=dailyhowler.com&sitesearch=dailyhowler.com

[hfojvt]

5. another example of a supposed 'progressive' too

Do George Will or Cal Thomas spend much time trashing the Republican nominee? Or are they always on message, relentless in their conservatism? Are they just more totally committed? Do more of the 'progressive' writers really come closer to being moderates? Or do they sometimes just get direct orders from their bosses?

[NNN0LHI]

8. Thank you for mentioning Frank Rich

I know people who cream their jeans over this worthless piece of shit.

Don

[Supersedeas]

6. and the marketeers and auto/petro advertisers love to spread the myth

[bunkerbuster1]

7. I too was surprised about Cal Thomas

Compared to Cal, George Will is a beacon of sanity (and I can't stand that snivelling bow-tied twit.)

Cal Thomas is the classic religious bigot--he's convinced that scary brown muslims are taking over Europe, and want to kill us all, yadda yadda yadda.

He's also a drooling idiot, and he tends to get published in crappy low-circ papers that never provide any kind of balance. In my own shit-hole daily, Cal's columns NEVER draw critical LTEs. (And I gave up trying to write them, myself, since the three I'd sent were ignored.)

[hfojvt]

9. I think I used to see him in the Wisconsin State Journal

of Madison, Wisconsin, of all places. He probably was in the Lincoln, Ne paper as well, but that's not surprising. I don't think I ever wrote an LTTE in response though, although I may have started some.

[AlCzervik]

10. it does in my local paper, thomas's column is printed and within 2 days there

are always letters about what a moronic gas bag he is.