Negative, Left-Tilting War Coverage Is As Unappreciated As It Is Obvious
By RAGHAVAN MAYUR | Posted Tuesday, March 13, 2007
First Of Three Parts
Old habits are hard to break — so much so in the case of the national media that their left-slanted reporting may be risking their relationship with the American public.
This is one key finding from our latest IBD/TIPP Poll, suggesting a wake-up call is in order if the media don't want to lose their 'customer base' by consistently disregarding what most people believe to be true.
Like what? How about the military's conduct in Iraq, and what our troops have been doing these past four years?
Beyond eliminating the brutal regime of Saddam Hussein and neutralizing the likes of al-Qaida leaders such as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, they've also been working to improve the daily lives of ordinary Iraqis by building schools and hospitals and cracking down on crime.
But we're much more likely to hear from the likes of New York Times columnist Frank Rich, who recently said the 'actual reality is that we have lost in Iraq,' or Walter Cronkite, who said the war in Iraq is a 'terrible disaster' and that 'the earlier we get out, the better.'
Looking Elsewhere
Those views don't jibe with what troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan said when Fox News recently interviewed them. They said the war was going better than reported, that the image the media are portraying isn't accurate and that, by golly, the war is worth it.
This type of reporting seems too antithetical for media elites such as William Arkin, an NBC News commentator and Washington Post blogger. The interviews, he wrote, were 'just an ugly reminder of the price we pay for a mercenary — oops, sorry, volunteer — force that is doing the dirty work.'
Arkin went on to say that 'through every Abu Ghraib and Haditha, through every rape and murder, the American public has indulged those in uniform.'
But Arkin's views are not those of most Americans, the majority (61%) of whom say the coverage of the war has not been fair and objective.
And make no mistake, the media are not immune to customer dissatisfaction. Like any other industry that fails to deliver the goods, the media risk losing their customer base if they continuously disregard what is self-evident to a majority of the public.
Among those migrating to the 'new media,' the discontent with the old media is high. We found that 73% who say talk radio is one of their major sources of war news, and 69% who say the Internet is a major source, believe media coverage of the Iraq war has not been fair and objective.
Americans are sending a clear message: They want their news fair and honest, and if the mainstream media can't provide it, they'll take their business elsewhere.
If this isn't enough of a wake-up call, here's another finding from our poll: 57% say coverage of the Iraq War has been too negative.
The media's dislike of President Bush obviously has spilled over even to the war in Iraq. Consider that by the time he delivered his 'troop surge' speech Jan. 10, much of the national media had already spent days and countless pundit hours denouncing the strategy before it saw the light of day.
• Tom Brokaw, NBC's longtime news anchor, said that sending more troops to Iraq seemed 'like a folly.'
• Chris Matthews, MSNBC's well-known political analyst, said the American people wouldn't like it.
• Lara Logan, CBS' Baghdad reporter, said on 'The Early Show' that the surge would make no difference.
• NBC's 'Today' show, along with White House reporter David Gregory, suggested Iraq is a lost cause.
Among Americans who believe coverage of the war has been too negative, we find an exodus away from establishment media and toward nontraditional outlets.
The straw that breaks the media's back may not be negativity and lack of objectivity so much as the media's penchant for promoting a liberal ideology. According to our poll, fully 56% say coverage of the Iraq War favors a liberal point of view. Many (28%) of them are taking flight to talk radio, an outlet that has seen little liberal penetration.
Change Ahead?
Even members of the liberal news media admit there's a problem. Here's what ABC News political director Mark Halperin said on the Hugh Hewitt radio show last year:
'I don't know if its 95% . . . but there are enough
liberals in the old media, not just in ABC, but in old
media generally, that it tilts the coverage quite
frequently, in many issues, in a liberal direction. . . .
It's an endemic problem. And again, it's the reason why
for 40 years, conservatives have rightly felt that we did
not give them a fair shake.'
So are the mainstream media running the risk of losing their customers because of their leftward tilt? It sure seems that way. Will things change? Maybe.
Judging from a 2005 study by the Pew Research Center that compared the opinions of 72 top journalists with those of everyday Americans, the gulf may simply be too wide to bridge. Pew found that while the public was split on whether the Iraq War would help (44%) or hurt (44%) the U.S. in the war on terror, journalists by an overwhelming 68% to 22% majority believed the war would hurt.
It also found that while 56% of the public believed U.S. efforts to establish a stable democracy in Iraq would succeed, 63% of media elites thought they'd fail.
As far as opinions about Bush are concerned, the study found that while 40% of the public approved of his job performance, only 21% of the media felt the same.
Mayur is president of TIPP, a unit of TechnoMetrica Market Intelligence, IBD's polling partner.
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