bias media

disambig see LIBERAL MEDIA lamestream

SEE LIBERAL MEDIA BIAS 2 4 25

ALSO LEGACY MEDIA MAINSTREAM

SEE AILES?! BAK

SEE GINGRICH

see myths

see MRC newsbuster bozell

see SOCIAL media bias for de-platform sil vly bs charge

no merri

i need to sep legit claims of corp media sellout vs longtime myth of left liberal bias in media which is BS excuse for why RW ideas do not get traction

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see also bunch of watchdog orgs and/or balancers WND/ world jrnlism ctr?

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aha myth of pinko prof and liberal media// coastal elite, enemy of the ppl thus musk targets, tho free sp absolutist

https://www.mediamatters.org/ben-shapiro/ben-shapiro-elon-musk-suspending-journalists-you-will-get-no-sympathy-me

https://www.mediamatters.org/newsmax/newsmaxs-benny-johnson-people-suspended-twitter-claim-be-reporters-they-are-not

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https://www.alternet.org/todays-real-media-bias-bidenomics/

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tdb 4 25

Trump-supporting podcaster who was allegedly paid massive sums (https://www.thedailybeast.com/doj-bombshell-alleges-maga-media-group-is-backed-by-russian-money/) by Russian state media used his time during Tuesday’s White House press briefing to slam the reporters surrounding him.

Tim Pool, who was added to (https://www.thedailybeast.com/tim-pool-was-paid-by-russia-but-will-joins-white-house-press-pool/) the press pool late last month and opted to wear his signature beanie and a zip-up hoodie to the exclusive affair, introduced his question with a lengthy rant about a number of right-wing grievances concerning the mainstream media.

“Many of the news organizations that are represented in this room have marched in lockstep on false narratives, such as the ‘very fine people’ hoax, the Covington smear, and now what’s being called the ‘Maryland man’ hoax, where an MS-13 gang member—adjudicated by two different judges, I believe—is just simply being referred to as a ‘Maryland man’ over and over again," Pool said.

“Now, in an effort from the White House to expand access to new companies, you’ve created this ‘new media’ seat,” he went on.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt refused to admit any wrongdoing in the deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, even though a Justice Department lawyer admitted in court that his deportation was an “administrative error.”Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images.

“So, I’m wondering if you can comment on following this expansion, you’ve had numerous outlets disparage the companies that you’ve had sit here, as well as the reporters,” he said. “I’m wondering if you could comment on that unprofessional behavior as well as elaborate if there’s any plans to expand access to new companies.”

Leavitt replied that Pool is in the briefing room because the administration “welcomes diverse viewpoints.“

Influencer Paid by Russia Added to White House Press PoolWARM WELCOME (https://www.thedailybeast.com/tim-pool-was-paid-by-russia-but-will-joins-white-house-press-pool/)

Janna Brancolini (https://www.thedailybeast.com/author/janna-brancolini)

(https://www.thedailybeast.com/tim-pool-was-paid-by-russia-but-will-joins-white-house-press-pool/)

“We welcome unbiased journalists who really care about the truth and the facts and the accuracy,” Leavitt insisted.

Leavitt also refused to admit any wrongdoing by the administration regarding the deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, even though a Justice Department lawyer admitted in court that his deportation was an “administrative error.”

“The president was always on the right side of this issue to deport this illegal criminal from our community, and it is despicable to see the media continue to refer to this individual as someone who is just a peaceful man living his life in Maryland,” she said. “This is, was, and always has been an illegal criminal, an MS-13 gang member, and a designated foreign terrorist; and the administration maintains our position to deport these individuals from our community.”

“So, thank you for being here, Tim. It’s great to see you. Thank you,” she concluded.

MAGA Influencers Say They’re the Real Victims of Russia PlotPUTIN’S PAYROLL (https://www.thedailybeast.com/influencers-tim-pool-benny-johnson-and-dave-rubin-say-they-are-victims-in-alleged-russia-propaganda-plot/)

Dan Ladden-Hall, (https://www.thedailybeast.com/author/dan-ladden-hall)Martha Mercer (https://www.thedailybeast.com/author/martha-mercer)

(https://www.thedailybeast.com/influencers-tim-pool-benny-johnson-and-dave-rubin-say-they-are-victims-in-alleged-russia-propaganda-plot/)

Pool was one of several right-right commentators who worked for Tenet Media, which prosecutors say received $10 million from two Russian media executives. According to The Washington Post (https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/media/2024/09/05/tenet-media-russia-rt-tim-pool/), he earned $100,000 per episode for his weekly show. Pool claimed he was unaware of the source of that money, and prosecutors say some employees were misled about the company’s funding.

“Should these allegations prove true, I as well as the other personalities and commentators were deceived and are victims,” Pool wrote (https://edition.cnn.com/2024/09/04/politics/doj-alleges-russia-funded-company-linked-social-media-stars/index.html) last year in a post on X that was later deleted. “The show is produced in its entirety by our local team without input from anyone external to the company.”

===

MSG hATE RALLY

October 28, 2024, edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends

STEVE DOOCY (CO-HOST): It felt a lot like the RNC reunion. You saw a lot of people you saw at the RNC right there.

Of all the comments, however, of the warm-up acts, there was a comic who made some offensive comments about Latinos and Puerto Ricans and African-Americans and others. And he has already been denounced by Republicans and by the campaign.

But unfortunately for the Trump campaign, the Harris campaign has denounced it and mobilized influential Puerto Rican influencers like Bad Bunny, who is very big in the Puerto Rican community and Latino community — he put out something on Instagram. And so did Ricky Martin with millions of followers and he wrote or he said this is what they think of us, vote for Kamala Harris. A Trump adviser said the speaker's remarks were not vetted. We are going to talk to Karoline Leavitt — she's gonna be with us in a moment.

BRIAN KILMEADE (CO-HOST): Part of the pre-show, that was two hours before the president.

DOOCY: Yup, the warm-up.

KILMEADE: It's amazing. The cover of The New York Times, Trump at Garden, a closing carnival of grievances, misogyny, and racism. Only, only somebody who works for the Harris campaign pretending to be a reporter for The New York Times would write something like that if you watched, that three hours or four hours. You had to flip around to get it. We didn't take all of it live. But also — you don't point out that R.F.K. the famous Democratic family actually was one of the featured speakers around the most famous inventor in the world, Elon Musk? That stands out? No, a comedian with a successful podcast said some off-color.

LAWRENCE JONES (CO-HOST): But you lose goodwill when before the rally even started they called it a Nazi rally. Before they even took the stage. They had already said that it was going to be a racist rally.

And so number two, maybe it's just me, Dana, uh Ainsley, I have a dark sense of humor you know? And so I like — maybe this was not the appropriate format for the comedian to be there but it's comedy.

12 23

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Donald J. Trump

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“According to the Media Research Center, 89% of the media’s coverage of our administration has been negative and purposely negative.”

Gov. Ron DeSantis

"No question that media have an agenda, and MRC has pointed this out, I think, very appropriately for a number of years."

Rush Limbaugh

“Brent Bozell and the MRC provide a most precious commodity — a quest for the truth. I can’t possibly expose every example of bias and error that emanates from the national mainstream media, but Bozell and his group come as close as anyone can. MRC is a vital national interest.”

Sen. Ted Cruz

"The liberal media is almost without exception comprised of Democrats who fight for liberal political agendas, and every day for the last 15 years, NewsBusters has doggedly exposed their bias, falsehoods, and inaccurate reporting."

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Fox News Host, Former WH Press Secretary

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===

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Major US newspapers and broadcast TV news outlets often failed to report on Jim Jordan’s role in undermining the 2020 election – and ignored the risk to certification in 2024 if he becomes speaker | Media Matters for America

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1 24 judd ymail

david D. Smith, the executive chairman of Sinclair Broadcast Group (Sinclair), purchased the Baltimore Sun — the largest newspaper in Maryland — for an undisclosed sum. The acquisition means another powerful media outlet will be under the control of a wealthy conservative businessman with a history of using local media outlets to push an ideological agenda.

Smith is the son of Sinclair founder Julian Sinclair Smith and, along with his brothers, controls the company. Sinclair, a publicly traded company, owns or operates 185 local television stations across 86 markets. A 2018 study published in the American Political Science Review found that stations purchased by Sinclair "coverage of national politics at the expense of local politics" and undergo "a significant rightward shift in the ideological slant of coverage."

Sinclair regularly requires its local affiliates to run segments pushing right-wing talking points. In 2018, Sinclair affiliates were required to have local anchors read a script warning views about "fake stories" being published by other media outlets "to push their own personal bias and agenda." The trend was described as "extremely dangerous to a democracy." The argument, which included no actual examples, matched then-president Donald Trump's rhetoric about the media.

When Sinclair faced criticism for puppeteering its local anchors, Trump defended the company. "So funny to watch Fake News Networks, among the most dishonest groups of people I have ever dealt with, criticize Sinclair Broadcasting for being biased," Trump said. "Sinclair is far superior to CNN and even more Fake NBC, which is a total joke."

Sinclair stations were also required to run political commentary from Boris Epshteyn, who previously served as a Trump advisor and surrogate. Sinclair hired Epshteyn as its chief political analyst. Epshteyn's segments for Sinclair were mostly indistinguishable from his work for the Trump campaign. "The American people demand change, and they demand action, and that’s exactly what they’ll get from this administration going forward," Epshteyn declared in one piece.

Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law and advisor, said that in 2016, the Trump campaign provided Sinclair stations with extensive access to Trump in exchange for friendly coverage that did not include fact-checking. "We are here to deliver your message," Smith told Trump in a 2016 meeting. Sinclair executives denied there was anything unusual or unethical about its dealings with the Trump campaign. Sinclair affiliates have also promoted right-wing conspiracy theories, including claims that DNC staffer Seth Rich was murdered by a hitman as payback for sharing sensitive emails to Wikileaks.

The history of using Sinclair-owned stations to push a right-wing agenda predates Trump. In 2004, "Sinclair ordered its stations to broadcast an hour-long documentary — preempting prime-time programming — titled Stolen Honor: Wounds That Never Heal that blamed Democratic nominee John Kerry for the torture of American prisoners of war in Vietnam."

In an interview with the Baltimore Sun, Smith defended Sinclair's news coverage "as balanced and apolitical." According to Smith, Sinclair is "not perfect" but overall is "much better than a lot of folk."

Smith, not Sinclair, is purchasing the Baltimore Sun — although that may be a distinction without a difference. Smith said, "he envisions opportunities for partnerships between The Sun and Sinclair, such as promoting each other’s stories, and other synergies in the future."

The checkered history of Smith's right-hand man

Smith did not purchase the Baltimore Sun alone. He brought along one partner: Armstrong Williams, a right-wing pundit and operative.

:{:{Williams has his own syndicated show on Sinclair stations. His social media accounts are full of incendiary statements about Democrats and liberals. "Each day Joe Biden has sat in office, we have gotten closer and closer to a fascist communist nation," Armstrong wrote on January 10. On January 5, he accused Biden of "destroy[ing] American democracy."}:

On December 19, Armstrong decried "the real time consequences of being infiltrated by radical left-wingers and the acceptance of their insane political agendas." (The issue was the Pope slightly softening his stance on same-sex marriages.) On December 6, Armstrong called Biden "a senile senior citizen" who "barely knows right from left." Armstrong also called the prosecutors pursuing cases against Trump as "terrorists" and promoted false narratives and conspiracy theories about the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.}:

Armstrong served as an advisor to former presidential candidate and Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson. He claims to have paid for Justice Clarence Thomas' wedding reception. In 2005, Armstrong lost his syndicated column after it was revealed that he had been paid $240,000 by the George W. Bush administration to promote their signature education initiative, No Child Left Behind.

Follow the money

Smith has used his vast wealth to support a variety of far-right causes. The Baltimore Banner reports that since 2015, Smith, through his family foundation, has donated large sums to Young Americans for Liberty ($581,000), Project Veritas ($536,000), Turning Point USA ($150,000), and Moms for Liberty ($121,000).

Smith does not support Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott (D), and has sought to recruit opponents to unseat him. Sinclair stations have provided highly favorable coverage to former Mayor Shelia Dixon (D), who is running against Scott this year. Armstrong conducted an interview with Dixon on a Sinclair affiliate last summer that consisted mostly of "praise for Dixon and criticism of current elected officials."

In 2022, Smith backed a successful ballot initiative to impose term limits on Baltimore's elected officials. Currently, Smith is "underwriting Renew Baltimore, a ballot drive to cap and lower the property tax rate."

Now, Smith has a new tool in his arsenal to shape Baltimore's politics: the city's paper of record.

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musk retweet 2 graphs

ref 2 musk

no lnx pix bad code hero date?

https://freebeacon.com/media/yes-the-media-bury-the-race-of-murderers-if-theyre-not-white/

Yes, the Media Bury the Race of Murderers—If They're Not White

Free Beacon analysis shows how homicide coverage downplays the race of minority offenders

Brooklyn shooting suspect Frank James / Getty Images

Charles Fain Lehman

April 14, 2022

Frank James, the man arrested for Tuesday's New York City subway shooting, is a black nationalist and outspoken racist who railed against whites, Jews, and Hispanics. A careful reader of the New York Times could be forgiven for overlooking that. In a nearly 2,000-word article on the attack, James's race is not mentioned. The same is true for the coverage offered up by Reuters; theWashington Post only mentioned James's race in relation to his condemnation of training programs for "low-income Black youths."

Media critics on the right say that the conspicuous omission of James's race from these news reports illustrates a trend among prestige papers, which deemphasize or omit the race of non-white criminals while playing up the race of white offenders. But is it a real pattern?

Yes. A Washington Free Beacon review of hundreds of articles published by major papers over a span of two years finds that papers downplay the race of non-white offenders, mentioning their race much later in articles than they do for white offenders. These papers are also three to four times more likely to mention an offender's race at all if he is white, a disparity that grew in the wake of George Floyd's death in 2020 and the protests that followed.

The Free Beacon collected data on nearly 1,100 articles about homicides from six major papers, all written between 2019 and 2021. Those papers included the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, San Francisco Chronicle, and Minneapolis's Star-Tribune—representatives of each paper did not return requests for commentfor this article. For each article, we collected the offender's and victim's name and race, and noted where in the article the offender's race was mentioned, if at all.

The data suggest an alarming editorial trend in which major papers routinely omit information from news reports, presenting readers with a skewed picture of who does and doesn't commit crime. These editorial choices are part and parcel with the "racial reckoning" that swept newsrooms in the wake of Floyd's murder, which saw journalists dramatically overhauling crime coverage to emphasize the view that the criminal justice system is racist at the root—perhaps at the expense of honesty about individual offenders' crimes.

The chart above indicates that papers are far quicker to mention the race of white murderers than black. (Those two races account for 92 percent of mentions in the data, so others are not shown.) Half of articles about a white offender mention his race within the first 15 percent of the article. In articles about black offenders, by contrast, mentions come overwhelmingly toward the end of the piece. Half of the articles that mention a black offender's race do not do so until at least 60 percent of the way through, and more than 20 percent save it until the last fifth of the article.

Of course, journalists choose not only where in a piece to mention an offender's race, but also whether to mention it at all, and omissions can skew a reader's perspective.

To measure these choices, we identified the race of the offender in roughly 900 stories where his name, but not his race, was mentioned, first by looking at the race of people with the same name in Census data, and then hand-confirming race based on mug shots or other images published in local news stories.

Doing so permits an estimate of how often journalists highlight an offender's race—or don't. Again, the skew is startling: White offenders' race was mentioned in roughly 1 out of every 4 articles, compared with 1 in 17 articles about a black offender and 1 in 33 articles about a Hispanic offender.

This effect is driven in part by a handful of major news stories involving white perpetrators, though the attention paid to these stories is also an editorial choice. But even after omitting reports about white offenders Kyle Rittenhouse, Derek Chauvin, and the killers of Ahmaud Arbery, the race of white offenders is mentioned in 16 percent of cases, two to three times the rate at which the race of black offenders is mentioned. (Middle Eastern offenders were labeled as Asian in this analysis, but labeling them as white results in only a small change to the race mention rate.)

This disparity widened following George Floyd's murder. Before May of 2020, papers were roughly twice as likely to mention the race of a white (13 percent of stories) versus a black perpetrator (7 percent). After May of 2020, the numbers were 28 percent and 4 percent, a ratio of seven to one. Even omitting the above-mentioned stories, papers still mentioned race in 23 percent of stories about white killers post-Floyd, a six-to-one ratio.

It could be that there were more stories in which a white offender's race was relevant after Floyd's death than before. But it is also easy to see how the increased attention to white murderers represents a change in what reporters and editors thought it was, and was not, important for their readers to hear about, particularly after they publicly committed to revamping their crime reporting following Floyd's death.

Newspapers across the country—including the Inquirer—stopped publishing mugshot galleries in part because, two Florida newspapers wrote, they "may have reinforced negative stereotypes." Others committed to overhauling their language, substituting phrases like "formerly incarcerated person" for "felon" to respond to what the Poynter Institute described as an "inextricabl[e]" link between reporting on crime and "race and racism." And the Associated Press amended its style guide to discourage the use of the word "riot," which allegedly has racist connotations.

At the same time, major newsrooms have prioritized"racial justice" coverage, part of a push for what the journalist-cum-activist Wesley Lowery called "moral clarity" over "objectivity": writing news reports that take the sides on contested issues with the goal of advancing a political objective.

Such "moral clarity" may mean downplaying black crime and emphasizing white crime. In the case of offenders like James, it means leaving readers in the dark about an important element of the story—journalistic malfeasance that is, of course, in service of the greater good.

Charles Fain Lehman is a fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal.

Published under:Crime , Media , Media Bias , Murder , New York Times , Racism , The Washington Post , woke

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directv drops oann then newsmax

https://www.mediamatters.org/newsmax/newsmax-host-suggests-viewers-contact-congress-after-directv-dropped-channel

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mma 1 23

SEBASTIAN GORKA (NEWSMAX HOST): Yeah, absolutely stunning. I mean, a more blatant example of politically-motivated censorship is hard to imagine. And this coming as we have all the revelations, thanks to Elon Musk at Twitter, of government-sponsored censorship. Is this something being done in league with the White House, with the DNC? We don't know, but we know the facts of the case, that Newsmax was asking for fair remuneration, which is exactly the same for the top 75 channels on DirecTV, 22 of which, 22 are hardcore left-wing news channels. So, why is it that only Newsmax is treated like this? It's very clear - it's because Newsmax is growing in popularity, it's growing in influence, and they want to shut down a voice that isn't the mainstream lying media, but actually brings the facts to all of our viewers.

...

HOGAN GIDLEY (GUEST): Thankfully, you know, I think people are outraged by it and they can take some action to try and fix it.

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Fox News' Tucker Carlson offered acontradictory stance to explain why the Republican Party failed to meet its own expectations for the 2022 midterm elections.

According to Carlson, Fox News was one of the biggest media influences for members of the political party but he's also attempting to blame the media for the party's lackluster election results.

Per HuffPost, the "anticipated 'red wave' washed out in a trickle, in part because of the losing candidates endorsed by former President Donald Trump, many say."

The far-right primetime host dismissed the argument that “bad candidates” were the political party's issue as he argued that “candidate quality is actually not the most important thing.”

“Access to channels of communication” is a critical path to victory — and in that, Fox News did its part, Carlson claimed.

“You can say whatever you want, but if no one hears you, you’re not really speaking,” the host said. “And that’s the case for Republicans. So often, as of tonight, Republicans can communicate their message unencumbered on a single cable television channel and a handful of relatively low-trafficked websites. That’s it.”

He went on to blame the media for the political party's election results. “The rest of the American media amounts to a gigantic filter designed to distort what Republicans are saying,” Carlson said. “It’s a campaign apparatus and only the Democrats have it.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

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aha note: a la gingrich memo every gop soundbite starts with attack on linked/locked duo dems and lamestream media

A former pilot for the U.S. Navy has publicly criticized Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) for his new campaign advertisement inspired by the 1986 classic film, "Top Gun."

According to HuffPost, the campaign ad featured the Republican governor who "donned aviator shades and a bomber jacket and plopped into what appeared to be the pilot’s seat of a fighter jet as he talked about taking on the 'corporate media.'”

At one point during the ad, he described himself as the"Top Gov." in the ad, and Ken Harbaugh is not pleased. “It’s not just cringy,” said Ken Harbaugh. “It’s literally Navy pilot cosplay.”

Harbaugh, a former member of the U.S. Navy who now hosts the “Burn the Boats” podcast, was featured in a new clip posted to social media by MediasTouch.

In the clip, he displayed his jacket with authentic pilot wings as he offered a comparison of both their roles in the maritime service branch. “Now, unlike Ron DeSantis, I didn’t pick this jacket up at Party City,” Harbaugh said. “These are actual pilot wings.”

He also noted that while DeSantis did serve in the U.S. Navy, he did so as an attorney. While Harbaugh also acknowledged that there is "nothing wrong with that," he did criticize the governor for appearing to embellish his role.

“Nothing wrong with that,” Harbaugh said of DeSantis' work in the Navy. “Until you start strutting around the flight line wearing aviator shades and pretending to be a badass.”

Harbaugh went on to offer a critical assessment of the political ad and the persona DeSantis attempted to portray.

“This tough guy act is pathetic, especially from someone like Ron DeSantis. This campaign ad from Ron DeSantis is just one more example of a Republican politician appropriating the honor of others because he has none.”

To view Harbaugh's full reaction, watch below or at this link.

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https://www.mediamatters.org/tucker-carlson/tucker-carlson-claims-hungary-has-more-balanced-freer-press-we-have

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BS trifecta:

an 721

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) suggested on Sunday that Joe Biden's administration may use "computer-generated graphics" to fake the president's speeches.

Nunes made the remarks during an appearance on Fox News after he was asked about Biden's performance at a recent CNN town hall event.

"You know it's getting bad when the propaganda machine that the Democratic socialists control in this country -- they control 95% of the media or so," he opined. "And then you take the big tech oligarchs that control and censor what we receive via social media. When that poison gets to the average independent American, that propaganda, you know it's bad when they can't even find a 15- or 30-second soundbite out of a full-hour town hall that they can plug into their own propaganda machine."

Nunes added: "I mean, it's getting really bad. It's not just the president. They can't get any soundbites from the vice president either."

The Republican lawmaker claimed that deep state actors are "almost to the point where they're going to have to start using computer-generated graphics in order to give to the propaganda machine because they can't get good clips to sell what they're trying to sell here in Washington, which are policies that are running the country into the ground."

Watch the video below from Fox News.

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an 721 me

While it may appear that Facebook mogul Mark Zuckerberg and former President Donald Trump are often on completely different sides of the fence given the former president's loathing of Big Tech, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd has highlighted a similarity between the two: their "hoary tradition" of "outfoxing history."

As a flurry of new tell-all books are being released, Dowd has managed to connect interesting dots between two of the forthcoming books. In her op-ed piece published by The Times, Dowd outlined the similar professional doctrines that have existed at both the White House and Facebook.

Using the book, "An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook's Battle for Domination," she noted how New York Times writers Sheera Frenkel and Cecilia Kang detailed the unspoken understanding among those at Facebook.

"Don't bring the boss bad news or push back. Exercise willful blindness about the disaster around the corner, and then, once it arrives, manage it badly," Dowd wrote, adding, "Put the syndicate over democracy. Blame others for your mistakes, especially the unfair media. Present yourself as doing good for the world when you're doing bad."

While Facebook is thousands of miles away from Washington, D.C., Dowd noted that the Trump White House operated along the same lines. In the new, highly publicized book, "I Alone Can Fix It," Washington Post reporters Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig explained how Trump also operated in a similar fashion. However, Trump's level of deflecting and control reached new heights when it came to the presidential election.

According to Rucker and Leonnig, even Trump's daughter Ivanka Trump "had become increasingly uncomfortable with efforts to overturn the election results." In fact, she even expressed concern about her father's persistence in pressuring former Vice President Mike Pence to do his bidding.

It would likely be optimistic to think should behavior would wane as time progresses, that does not appear to be the case here.

---

https://www.alternet.org/2021/06/wuhan-lab-leak/

an salon

Last month, seemingly spurred on by this column from a controversial former science reporter for The New York Times, it became suddenly fashionable in some journalistic circles to scold the mainstream press for dismissing or ignoring something called the "lab leak theory" regarding the origins of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

To be sure, the possibility that the coronavirus was released in a lab accident in Wuhan, China, has never been fully discounted by the scientific establishment but long treated as less likely than that it emerged from a purely natural origin. Still, led by Matt Yglesias from his (sigh) Substack blog, a narrative started to form in May that the mainstream media was deliberately ignoring a scientifically valid hypothesis because of a, heaven help us, bias against conservatives. Otherwise reputable opinion writerslike Jonathan Chait of New York, eager to demonstrate that they are Not Biased© and Care About Hearing All Sides©, took up the mantle, scolding the mainstream press for supposedly dismissing the "lab leak hypothesis" out of hand, simply because Donald Trump and Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., were fond of it.

The scolding worked.

As Jon Allsop of Columbia Journalism Review wrote earlier this month, "we've seen a gusher of opinion essays in the same vein, indicting the mainstream press and prominent experts for characterizing a plausible hypothesis as a conspiracy theory for essentially political reasons." This, in turn, resulted in a slew "of news articles asserting that the lab-leak theory has 'gone mainstream,' and is getting a 'second look.'" Here at Salon, we addressed the sudden surge of interest in this theory by highlighting the basic reality: Scientists do not think it's likely, plus there is no new evidence that would suggest that it's become any more likely than it was before the pearl-clutching about "bias" began. Soon, however, President Joe Biden gave in to the pressure and ordered an intelligence investigation into the theory.

The problem with all this moralizing about "bias," however, is that the original reason that the media wasn't doing more to hype the "lab leak" hypothesis had little to do with politics and everything to do with science. As science educator Rebecca Watson explained in a video responding to the controversy last week, "There is currently no evidence that COVID-19 originated in a lab. None." And, as Justin Ling of Foreign Policy argued Tuesday, "Despite proclamations to the contrary, there has been scant new, hard evidence pointing to the lab leak theory," and, in fact, the hype around the idea is literally "just speculation."

Indeed, the finger-waggers had it backwards. The media isn't biased against the right but biased in favor of the right.

If it weren't for conservative pressure, there would probably be no substantive media interest the "lab leak" hypothesis. Typically, news outlets are loathed to publish speculation that emerges from fringe conspiracy theory boards that have offered little in the way of real evidence for their claims. But when the conspiracy theorists are politically motivated right-wingers, they tend to get more of a media hearing than say, Bigfoot enthusiasts.

Wednesday morning, the "why won't the media do more to indulge this evidence-free right-wing speculation" crowd got egg on their face with a new report from the Washington Postthat wreaked havoc on claims that the "lab leak hypothesis" failed to get a fair hearing. On the contrary, there has been "an ongoing, sometimes politicized and so far fruitless effort inside the U.S. government to determine whether the virus, SARS-CoV-2, could be the result of engineering or a lab leak."

The report documents an extensive hunt for evidence of the "lab leak" theory throughout the federal government. Much of it driven by Donald Trump's desire to blame someone else, ideally China, to divert attention from his own failures. But more responsible actors in the federal government, including prominent health officials like Director of the National Institutes of Health Francis Collins and Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony Fauci also gave the "lab leak" hypothesis a good deal of time and attention. But while the White House was heavily pressuring every bureaucrat in sight to give them something, anything, they could use to push this "lab leak" hypothesis, the evidence simply wasn't there.

The report doesn't completely rule out the possibility of a lab leak, to be clear. But it is a reminder that it was incredibly irresponsible of mainstream media to hype an unevidenced theory simply to prove they aren't "biased" towards Republican actors like Cotton, Trump, and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, people who have proven time and again that they will lie through their teeth for political gain.

The people with unsavory political motivations in this situation are not journalists who hesitated to run stories about a theory that has no real evidence to support it. It's Trump and his Republican enablers who, as Lindsay Beyerstein of Alternet explains, feel that if they "can convince his supporters that COVID is China's fault, they'll forget the parts that were his fault."

Attention journalists: The way to avoid political bias in media is to, well, avoid political bias. Which means avoiding giving life to poorly evidenced ideas, simply because they're being hyped by the right. What happened instead is that the press gave into right-wing bullying. In doing so, the press ignored the usual journalistic standards for weighing facts and evidence. Now it's likely most Americans have heard more about lab leaks than they have about the far more plausible theory that the coronavirus pandemic emerged from nature.

To make it all worse, the hyping of the "lab leak" hypothesis meant politely ignoring the fact that Trump, Cotton, and Pompeo were winking at an even less plausible conspiracy theory that holds that China deliberately manufactured the coronavirus as a bioweapon. People who have heard this bioweapon conspiracy theory and see headlines or cable news chryons touting the "lab leak" theory will assume that's what is being discussed, and assume that it's now been proved. And once that kind of misinformation is out there, it's pretty hard to claw it back.

A lot of critics who accused the media of ignoring the "lab leak" hypothesis claim to be interested in putting facts before political bias. They worry that mainstream journalists are disregarding good information simply because the sources are conservative or even because they have a history of lying. (As if credibility isn't an important consideration in sourcing information!)

But what this debacle shows is that the mainstream media has the opposite problem. They all too often give in to Republican bullying and allow themselves to be used as conduits for right-wing disinformation campaigns. Yes, prioritizing truth over politics often leads to news stories that have a "liberal" feel to them. That's because the American right is wholly committed to lying and disinformation. But journalism should put reality before the tender feelings of lying right-wingers. Especially when it comes to scientific disputes where we all supposedly agree it would be better if politics were kept out of it.

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB

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https://www.cjr.org/special_report/right-wing-media-breitbart-fox-bannon-carlson-hannity-coulter-trump.php

date?

no lnx

What if the right-wing media wins?

Conservative critics of the press want more than just a louder voice. They want The New York Times and The Washington Post to go away.

It was a sweltering July afternoon in the swamp, and a small group of well-dressed, conservative college students from across the country—the next generation of Megyn Kellys, George Wills, and Tucker Carlsons—was filing into an auditorium at the Heritage Foundation’s Washington, DC, headquarters. They had come to study at the feet of Breitbart News Washington editor Matt Boyle, a zealous prophet of the new right-wing media. Boyle’s sermon was not about how to break into the mainstream media and steer the national news agenda toward conservative aims—it was about the end days of journalism itself. And he was not about to skimp on the fire and brimstone.

“Journalistic integrity is dead,” he declared. “There is no such thing anymore. So everything is about weaponization of information.” Standing behind a mahogany podium in a baggy dark suit, Boyle preached with the confidence of a true believer. In a stuttering staccato, he condemned the nation’s preeminent news outlets as “corrupted institutions,” “built on a lie,” and a criminal “syndicate that needs to be dismantled.” Boyle and his compatriots were laboring to usher in an imminent—and glorious—journalistic apocalypse. “We envision a day when CNN is no longer in business. We envision a day when The New York Times closes its doors. I think that day is possible.”

Squint at the Trump era, and it’s easy to see a conservative media in crisis. Over the past 18 months, we have witnessed the fall of Bill O’Reilly, the ouster (and death) of Roger Ailes, prominent conservative outlets from Fox News to Breitbart to The Wall Street Journal op-ed page erupt in upheaval and infighting, Milo Yiannopoulos lose his book deal, and Tomi Lahren lose her job at The Blaze (only to land at Fox). Look closer, though, and you’ll see that much of that drama was simply a function of the outlets’ increased political power (and the heightened scrutiny that’s followed)—a bit of routine turbulence accompanying the unprecedented ascent of the right-wing media.

[ICYMI: You might’ve seen the Times‘s Weinstein story. But did you miss the bombshell published days after?

While Donald Trump’s rise may have, as Politico’s Eliana Johnson recently wrote, “scrambled the pecking order” on the right—elevating Breitbartesque populists over the conservative intellectuals at the Journal and The Weekly Standard—the conservative media complex as a whole is bigger, stronger, and more influential today than it’s ever been. And with so many of its most powerful members now pursuing a scorched-earth assault on America’s journalistic institutions, it’s worth considering what they hope it will look like once they’re done burning down our villages, desecrating our temples, and howling at our lamentations.

Boyle said his goal was simple: “The full destruction and elimination of the entire mainstream media.” Breitbart played up his speech on its homepage that day, but the remarks barely registered in broader media circles. The site and its staff have become known for this kind of bluster, and most journalists have taught themselves to tune it out. Maybe we ought to be paying closer attention.

THERE IS A LONG TRADITION in Republican politics of seeking to discredit journalism. During the 1964 presidential campaign, Barry Goldwater’s press secretary distributed gold pins to reporters that read “Eastern Liberal Press.” Richard Nixon’s vice president, Spiro Agnew, in 1969 railed against the “closed fraternity of privileged men” who ran the national news broadcasts. Nixon’s presidency was ultimately felled by reporters, but the critique lived on.

In the decades since, charges of liberal bias (some of them valid, others less so) have practically become an official plank of the GOP platform. The subject has inspired scores of books, countless talk-radio rants, and the creation of an entire cable news empire whose slogan—“Fair and Balanced”—was coined as a condemnation of its competitors.

Crucially, though, for most of that period conservatives maintained a civic-minded rationale for their project. They said they believed in the importance of nonpartisan journalism; in the necessity of a strong, independent press that provided the citizenry with an accurate account of the day’s events. Ultimately, they claimed, they were practicing tough love—offering their criticisms in the spirit of reform.Bernard Goldberg—a CBS News veteran whose tell-all book Bias entered the conservative canon as soon as it was published in 2001—captured this sentiment during a segment on The O’Reilly Factor.“We all know that you can’t live in a free country without a free press,” Goldberg told host O’Reilly. “But you know what else? You can’t live in a free country for long without a fair press. We need a strong mainstream media. That’s why you and I criticize it.”

Of course, some of this stated concern for the Fourth Estate and its lack of objectivity has been disingenuous. But there was value even in the playacting.By paying lip service to the ideal of “fair and balanced” news, conservatives helped sustain the post-WWII consensus that our modern democracy works best with a robust nonpartisan press functioning as the common denominator.

It was Donald Trump who dropped this pretense.Rather than conceal his true meaning with earnest pleas for a fairer press, he fired off tweets casting the media as “enemy of the American people.” Rather than feign reverence for the First Amendment, he promised to “open up our libel laws” to make suing journalists easier. At campaign rallies, he would keep reporters confined to metal press pens, and lead his crowds in a ritualistic booing. As someone who covered dozens of those events, I always thought I could tell when he was going through the motions with his press-bashing, and when he really meant it. During particularly bad news cycles, his voice would take on a growling quality, and he’d punctuate his standard stump-speech line with an extra exclamation: “Absolute scum. Remember that. Scum. Scum. Totally dishonest people.”

Trump’s histrionics were always strategic. He was able to successfully undermine months of critical coverage and dutiful fact-checking by casting reporters as villains. Each time his campaign was in trouble, the candidate escalated the culture war on the press. By the end of the election, we were not just biased or corrupt—we were dangerous, conspiratorial, part of a shadowy globalist cabal. Just days after Trump was sworn into office, chief White House strategist Steve Bannon told The New York Times, “You’re the opposition party. Not the Democratic Party?.?.?.?.?The media’s the opposition party.”

Bannon’s first move after being dismissed from his White House posting was to huddle with the billionaire Republican donor Robert Mercer who has backed his right-wing populist media crusade. On the afternoon of his firing, he said in a statement to Joshua Green, author of Devil’s Bargain: Steve Bannon, Donald Trump and the Storming of the Presidency, “If there’s any confusion out there, let me clear it up: I’m leaving the White House and going to war for Trump against his opponents—on Capitol Hill, in the media and in corporate America.”

IT DOESN’T REQUIRE AN OVERLY ACTIVE IMAGINATION to picture the post-apocalyptic news landscape that so many conservatives seem to be working toward. Media fragmentation accelerates to warp speed. Agenda-driven publishers—be they professionally staffed websites or one-man YouTube channels—churn out narrowly tailored news for increasingly niche audiences. There’s still plenty of factual reporting to turn to when you want hurricane updates or celebrity news, and adversarial investigative journalism doesn’t quite go out of style. But it’s easier than ever for news consumers to ensconce themselves in hermetically sealed information bubbles and ignore revelations that challenge their worldviews. For most people, “news” ceases to function as a means of enlightenment, and becomes fodder for vitriolic political debates that play out endlessly on social media. (Like I said, it’s not hard to imagine.) Inevitably, the rich and powerful—those who can afford to buy and bankroll their own personal Pravdas—benefit most in this brave new world.

This is, of course, a worst-case scenario. But is it really so far-fetched? Already, many of the nation’s most important outlets—the publications and networks that comprise the core of American journalism—have seen their audience shrink and splinter; their credibility plummet among vast swathes of the public; and their financial futures turn bleak. If The New York Times and ABC News were to shut down or, more likely, dwindle into shells of their former selves, would they be replaced with new mega-outlets that share their resources, their reach, and their editorial values? It’s possible. But it seems just as likely that they wouldn’t be replaced at all.

“This whole idea of media objectivity is relatively new,” says Ben Shapiro, a former Breitbart editor at large who founded and runs the right-wing website Daily Wire. Like other conservatives I talked to, he envisions a return to the media conventions of centuries past, when news was delivered largely by the organs of parties and ideological movements. “At the founding, it was a bunch of partisan press going after each other.” If Shapiro had his way, the news would be a polemical free-for-all and media outlets would give up any pretense of non-partisanship. He dismissed the Pulitzer-winning fact-check site PolitiFact as a “leftist outlet,” and generally rejected the idea that any news organizations should be held up as “grand arbiters of truth and falsity.” The very notion, he says, is “anti-democratic.”

“Basically, I think we ought to get away from drawing strict boundaries around ‘journalism,’” Shapiro told me. He pointed to James O’Keefe, a conservative activist who is famous for producing secretly recorded (and often selectively edited) videos that purport to expose the sins of academia, the media, and the government. “Is he an activist?” Shapiro asks. “Yes. Does he commit journalism? Yes. Is he a journalist? Well, it depends on whether he’s committing acts of journalism in that moment.”

Ann Coulter, the vociferously pro-Trump pundit and author, echoed these sentiments in our email exchange. She told me that virtually all news coverage of the president by the “elite” media—a group she says includes not just The Washington Post and NBC, but also many old-line conservative publications—has been dishonest, frivolous, and pack-like. “Chuck Todd agreeing with Jeff Flake about what a barbarian Trump is isn’t news!” Coulter says. “I guess what I’d like, in my ideal world, is that we all start arguing about issues and ideas.”

I asked her if there was any room in that vision for news outlets that play a neutral, referee-like role—contributing to the debate only by adding facts and debunking falsehoods. Coulter seemed uninterested in the question. The publications that have tried to serve that function, she contends, have become “too screechy and inaccurate,” and have rightly lost the public’s trust. “No serious person would trust either the NYT or WaPo’s ‘FACT CHECK’!”

[ICYMI: Former gossip columnist says there’s one fact about his past relationship with Trump that’s tough to admit

The concept of an obstinately objective press has been under assault in America for some time now, of course, and not just from the right. Critics like NYU’s Jay Rosen argue persuasively that news outlets do a disservice to their audiences when they coat their journalism in a sheen of artificial neutrality. Better to aim for transparency, the argument goes—to be honest about where you’re coming from, and to then strive for fairness and open-minded engagement. But there is a considerable difference between the proponents of this theory and those who cynically celebrate the “weaponization of information” and the rise of “alternative facts.”

The so-called marketplace of ideas only works when reality serves as a regulating force. For constructive debates to take place in a society like ours—and for national consensus to emerge on any given question—it’s essential we start from a broadly agreed-upon set of basic facts. Who will provide them if the mainstream media collapses into a melee of warring partisan publications?

LATE ONE AFTERNOON IN JULY, I met withMatthew Continetti, editor in chief of the Washington Free Beacon, in a pizzeria on the ground floor of the Watergate—the DC office complex that stands today as a concrete brutalist monument to the most iconic journalistic triumph of the 20th century. Continetti is not a bomb-thrower by nature. He is polite and cerebral and meticulous about his diction—often pausing for several seconds to consider his words before answering a question. On the day we met, he had just come from George Washington University, where he teaches a class on the history of the intellectual conservative movement.

Continetti grew up in the middle-class suburbs of northern Virginia with parents whom he describes as not “particularly political.” His conversion to conservatism came at Columbia University, while studying Plato’s Republic during an undergrad class on political philosophy. It was around this same time that he decided to pursue journalism, writing articles for the student newspaper as well as for a conservative national magazine called Campus. Aspiring journalists who lean to the right often face a choice as they prepare to enter the industry: try to carve out a career in the mainstream press, or follow the well-trod path into conservative media? Continetti opted for the latter—working as anintern at National Review while he was attending Columbia, and becoming a star writer at The Weekly Standard after graduating. (In 2012, hemarried Anne Kristol, the daughter of Bill Kristol, the magazine’s founder.)

The site Continetti edits today contains a fair amount of trolling—a running series of Kate Upton clickbait; winking headlines like “Greatest Living President Is Also Fantastic Painter”—but it has also earned a reputation for real-deal journalism. Its reporters run down leads, work their sources, call for comment, and issue corrections when necessary. If a partisan press really is the future, we could do worse than the Free Beacon.

I hoped Continetti might have a more optimistic outlook on the world after the mainstream media’s demise. But as we spoke, he was unremittingly bearish on the prospect that any 21st-century outlet could win the trust of a broad, diverse cross-section of news consumers. “One of the reasons there’s no common denominator in media is there’s really no common denominator in American life,” he told me. “As a general rule, we are a divided society. We have very real disagreements about values, about what’s important.”[ --> choice of "facts"]

I couldn’t help but interject: Shouldn’t facts be the common denominator? I asked, painfully aware that I was exhibiting the kind of journalistic sanctimony that the Free Beacon regularly ridicules.

Continetti exhaled, patiently, and shook his head. “I think the problem you describe is unsolvable,” he told me. “People are going to believe what they want. It’s not my job to tell them what to believe. It’s my job to edit a site that provides new information and adds value every day. Certainly, there are many people, like Howard Dean, who say it’s ‘fake news.’ But OK, I’m not going to control what Howard Dean thinks. He has every right.”A smirk appeared on Continetti’s face. “And I don’t believe a word he says, either.”

IN MANY WAYS, Donald Trump was the perfect candidate to channel the conservative media—the talk radio id personified and plopped onto a debate stage. As someone whose status as a perpetually aggrieved media critic long predated his conversion to conservatism, Trump quickly discovered that rank-and-file Republican voters were an enthusiastic audience for his gripes about the press.[recycled newt debate riposte?] And as Trump worked to reinvent himself as a Republican political celebrity, he naturally took his cues from the popular right-wing media. His first major foray into conservative politics was as the world’s most famous “birther,” championing a conspiracy theory that was gaining steam on talk radio and right-wing blogs. Later, as a candidate, he punctuated his stump speeches with stories he’d read on Breitbartand parroted the talking points he’d picked up watching Fox & Friends.

Trump did face real opposition in the primaries from the conservative intelligentsia. Kristol and New York Times op-ed columnist Ross Douthat were early and outspoken critics, while National Review published an entire anti-Trump issue in the run-up to the Iowa caucuses. But those with the loudest megaphones—people like Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity—saw Trump’s affection for them and their tribe, and rewarded it by providing the kind of boosterism that Mitt Romney would have sold one of his sons for.

And so, when Trump won in 2016, it wasn’t just a victory for him and his campaign. It was a coup for the conservative media, whose destructionist attitude toward the mainstream press can now be found at virtually every level—from the hosts of Fox News, to the ascendant internet personalities of the alt-right. “Nothing is grander, nothing is more glorious, nothing is more satisfying, nothing is sweeter, nothing is more validating, nothing is better for America than the death of the mainstream media’s political power,” John Nolte crowed in the Daily Wire the day after the election.

The Gateway Pundit flatly declared, “The mainstream media is your enemy.” And Infowars captured the sentiment by featuring an editorial cartoon depicting right-wing media figures as asteroids hurtling toward earth where news-network dinosaurs await their “extinction.”

In a decidedly dystopian spin on service journalism, some in the conservative media have begun providing their audiences with how-to guides for finishing off the journalistic establishment. Limbaugh told his listeners they should stop consuming news from the mainstream press altogether. “I’ll let you know what they’re up to,” he assured them. “And as a bonus, I’ll nuke it!” Hannity urged his viewers to start targeting individual journalists—and their bosses—on social media. And the alt-right bloggerRoosh Valizadeh has called for a coordinated campaign of bullying aimed at reporters. “Make them appear as ‘uncool’ salarymen in the eyes of the public,” he wrote. “Mock their appearance, their mannerisms, and their weaknesses.”

It would be easy to dismiss all this as performative, and ultimately harmless, trolling. But if the Trump era has taught us anything, it should be that these elements of the conservative media are not to be underestimated. In 2016, they conquered the Republican Party. Now they’re coming for the press.

Mainstream’s right turn

Today’s right-wing media world didn’t surface overnight. Below, a timeline of its development.

—Pete Vernon

Magazine editor William F. Buckley, Jr. (Online Library of Law and Liberty)

1947

Henry Regnery founds conservative book and magazine company Regnery Publishing. William F. Buckley Jr. later advises him: “I would recommend that you state that in your opinion an objective reading of the facts tends to make one conservative and Christian; that therefore your firm is both objective and partisan in behalf of these values.”

Clarence Manion (State Archives of Florida)

1954

Clarence Manion begins the Manion Forum radio show, of which he bragged, “Every speaker over our network has been 100 percent Right Wing?.?.?.?.?You may rest assured, no Left Winger, no international Socialist, no One-Worlder, no Communist will ever be heard over the 110 stations of the Manion Forum network.”

1964

So frequently does Barry Goldwater’s presidential campaign complain about bias in the coverage of his candidacy that his press secretary jovially hands out pins that read “Eastern Liberal [ELITE] Press” to the reporters on the campaign plane.

1969

Vice President Spiro Agnew gives a televised speech complaining about how President Richard Nixon’s Vietnam War policies are covered by the press. “Perhaps the place to start looking for a credibility gap is not in the offices of the Government in Washington,” he says, “but in the studios of the networks in New York.”

1973

Nixon supporters dismiss the Watergate scandal as a witch hunt by a liberal media. “Watergate,” says Senator Jesse Helms, “became the lever by which embittered liberal pundits have sought to reverse the 1972 conservative judgment of the people.”

1988

The Rush Limbaugh Show quickly becomes one of the country’s most popular syndicated radio programs. “In those days the mainstream liberals had a media monopoly,” Limbaugh later says. “Nobody did political talk, let alone conservative political talk.”

1996

Announcing the Fox News Channel, its chief executive Roger Ailes says the 24-hour news network “would like to restore objectivity where we find it lacking?.?.?.?.?We just expect to do fine, balanced journalism.”

2004

Dan Rather steps down as CBS Evening News anchor after memos in a CBS report alleging George W. Bush received preferential treatment while serving in the Texas Air National Guard are revealed by conservative bloggers as fakes.

2009

Andrew Breitbart announces that his eponymous website will launch a “Big Journalism” vertical [?] with the intention to “fight the mainstream media?.?.?.?who have repeatedly, and under the guise of objectivity and political neutrality, promoted a blatantly left-of-center, pro-Democratic Partyagenda.”

2016

Donald Trump makes attacks against journalists a hallmark of his presidential campaign. He bans a number of outlets from attending his rallies and events. Less than a month after taking office, Trump refers to the media in a tweet as “the enemy of the American People!”

[ICYMI: The first reporter to arrive at Vegas gunman’s house has covered the story in many ways–except one

McKay Coppins is a staff writer at The Atlantic. He was previously a reporter for BuzzFeed News, where he covered two presidential campaigns, and before that he wrote for Newsweek. He is the author of The Wilderness, a book about the battle over the future of the Republican Party.

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https://observer.com/2006/10/the-gaud-that-failed-a-tour-of-new-jack-city/

...Mr. Stone mentions these formative political episodes in Mr. Abramoff’s career, but only glancingly: When the future K Street kingpin is dismissed by Citizens for America for misallocating funds, and when he sparks feuds among College Republican leaders over his free-spending ways, it’s merely a foreshadowing of his later adventures. You do get a glimpse of his ideological makeup when he uses his College Republicans office to distribute to American campuses 900 free copies of Target America, a singularly unhinged 1980’s right-wing conspiracy tract positing complete Communist control over the U.S. media. Beyond that, the reader is left to imagine the Reagan-era bull sessions and the vintage Beltway strategizing....

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nina e art'l [gang of 5 bk?]

After purging the moderates in the College Republican hierarchy, Abramoff and his team launched a series of events to build public support for Reagan's foreign policy. The first was its ''Poland Will Be Free" campaign to support the democracy movement then under siege by the Polish communist government.

But in the eyes of the College Republicans, the Polish regime wasn't the only Moscow puppet -- so, too, were liberal student groups, the American media, leftist professors, and nuclear-freeze activists. Abramoff distributed on campuses 900 copies of a book called ''Target America," which posited that the Soviets had planted 4,000 journalist-agents in the American media to pursue a ''massive secret propaganda campaign," according to memos.

A training manual from the period, whichReed helped to write, describedRalph Nader's network of Public Interest Research Groups on campus as ''tyrannical" and ''radical." Abramoff's team accused the United States Student Association -- a 350-chapter liberal campus group that in 1982 protested Reagan's student aid cuts -- of being a ''pro-Soviet, pro-terrorist, Marxist-Leninist organization." The manual advised boycotting ''Marxist" professors, and soliciting support from alumni college donors to oust them.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/going-beyond-fair-and-balanced/

Going beyond Fair and Balanced ; Researchers aim to put more rigor into studies of media bias

By Vivian B. Martin on November 1, 2008

Read Our 175th Anniversary Issue

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Groeling is hoping to advance scientific (and public) knowledge beyond this mush with research he used to demonstrate selection bias in television networks' decision to run or withhold the results of presidential approval polls. For an article appearing in Presidential Studies Quarterly this December, Groeling designed a method to deal with a problem that often besets research on the media: people can identify all the news that journalists saw fit to print, but it's more difficult to determine what they chose to ignore.

To counter the problem of the “unobserved population,” Groeling collected two different data sets: in-house presidential approval polling by ABC, CBS, NBC and FOX News and the networks' broadcasts of such polls on evening news shows from January 1997 to February 2008. Groeling found that, with varying degrees of statistical significance, CBS, NBC and ABC showed what Groeling calls a pro-Democrat bias. For instance, CBS was 35 percent less likely to report a five-point drop in approval for Bill Clinton than a similar rise in approval and was 33 percent more likely to report a five-point drop than a rise for George W. Bush. Meanwhile FOX News showed a statistically significant pro-Republican bias in the most controlled of the three models Groeling tested: its Special Report program was 67 percent less likely to report a rise in approval for Clinton than a decrease and 36 percent more likely to report the increase rather than the decrease for Bush.

Groeling's work is one of the few studies to quantify partisan bias in the media, a subject notoriously difficult for social scientists to research and discuss. These scientists work with theories such as the so-called hostile media effect to predict that ardent supporters of a cause will view media as slanted for the other side, and they have conducted hundreds of studies that have revealed imbalances in the ways journalists frame news on topics ranging from AIDS to the war in Iraq. But there is not a cohesive literature on media bias. Maxwell McCombs of the University of Texas at Austin, who pioneered agenda-setting theory, one of the leading paradigms on news media, says that a researcher would need a few years to make sense of existing data and develop an approach to study media bias. Like many scholars, McCombs sees “bias” as a loaded term, preferring to speak of journalists' “predilections.”

“Scholars hate the word 'bias' because they feel like they're entering the ideological fray,” says S. Robert Lichter, head of the Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA) at George Mason University, who prefers the term “tone.” Despite his efforts, Lichter himself got sucked into that fray. His content analysis of the transcripts of TV news broadcasts at the statement level is a respected and widely adopted methodology.

This past summer, just as the view that journalists were going softer on Barack Obama than on John McCain was becoming widely accepted, CMPA issued a report showing that 72 percent of the statements in TV news reports about Obama in late spring and early summer were negative, whereas 57 percent of the statements about McCain were negative. When Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly attacked Lichter's method during a radio interview, saying it would embolden liberal bias, Lichter responded, “You can take all my studies or none of my studies”—an allusion to past uses of his work to support conservative views.

In recent years disciplines not traditionally interested in media have turned their attention to them. In 2005 the Quarterly Journal of Economics invigorated the debate with a provocative study by Tim Groseclose, a political scientist at U.C.L.A., and Jeffrey Milyo, an economist at the University of Missouri–Columbia. Groseclose and Milyo created a scale and assigned 20 major news outlets and legislators in Washington, D.C., positions based on their citations of think tanks and policy groups labeled liberal or conservative. They also factored in the voting records of House and Senate members.Their measure determined that most of the major media were left of center of the average legislator—even the news pages of the Wall Street Journal were slightly left of the “average Democrat.” The exceptions were the Washington Times and Fox News's Special Report.

Most media scholars do not think the issue of bias can be settled by a formula, though. For example, Groeling observes that the context of news making, including professional definitions of newsworthiness, cannot be ignored when looking at the disproportionate front-page coverage of Obama.

“What more often occurs is this tendency for everybody to start seeing the story the same way,” says Elizabeth Skewes of the University of Colorado at Boulder, who analyzed journalists covering presidential races in her 2007 book Message Control: How News Is Made on the Presidential Campaign Trail. A former journalist herself, Skewes has a view similar to other scholars who have watched journalists work. She says the interplay of campaign logistics, journalistic norms and pressures from competitive editors “make it all but impossible” for different frames of issues and candidates to break into the evening news or the front pages. Journalists may have political biases, but that might not be why the news comes out the way it does.

This article was originally published with the title "Going beyond Fair and Balanced" in Scientific American 299, 5, 24-27 (November 2008)

doi:10.1038/scientificamerican1108-24

---

not exactly punked?

https://www.mediamatters.org/abc/abc-takes-bait-and-suspends-veteran-correspondent-over-bad-faith-right-wing-hit-job

2/26/20

ABC News suspended veteran correspondent David Wright on February 25 after he gave reasonable criticism of the network while being secretly recorded in a video later released by Project Veritas. The organization has a well-known reputation for videotaping media figures and progressive activists and releasing bad-faith, edited videos to push a right-wing agenda.

The video, which Project Veritas on February 26 after teasing it the night before, features Wright offering criticisms of ABC’s coverage of the Trump administration and other political issues. It has clearly been edited to portray Wright’s comments in a negative light.

In the heavily edited video, Wright was critical of the broadcast news business model and suggested that the network still hasn’t figured out how to properly cover Trump. He claimed that ABC fails to give Trump credit for things he does right while also failing to “hold him to account”; chooses more exciting, “TV-friendly” stories over practical issues that matter to voters; takes Trump’s coverage bait in a way that enables him; and overcompensates for the false accusation from groups like Project Veritas that mainstream media pull for the Democratic Party.

Wright also complained that drama surrounding Trump dominates the news cycle and the “voters are poorly informed.” He criticized ABC’s “self-promotional” relationship with Disney, saying that the network often blends news with commercial interests: “You can’t watch Good Morning Americawithout there being a Disney princess or a Marvel Avenger appearing.”

Many of these comments are consistent with criticisms other journalists have made of political media in the age of Trump, and thus there was swift condemnation of ABC for its decision to suspend Wright.

Others were furious that Wright was suspended after he expressed support for progressive policies and said he considers himself a socialist, calling his suspension “absolutely outrageous” given a lack of progressive voices in mainstream media.

Project Veritas, founded by James O’Keefe, has a long history of secretly recording videos and then deceptively editing and releasing them in order to paint its subjects as negatively as possible and catch them in a “gotcha” moment. Veritas targets organizations that it claims have a “liberal” association, and its operatives often approach targets using a false name to coax information from them through casual conversations.

O'Keefe's goal is typically to obtain footage that can be edited in a way that embarrasses or delegitimizes targeted organizations, often seeking to expose “liberal bias” in the media. Past targets have included NPR, The New York Times, and CNN, and as a result, many news organizations are aware of Project Veritas’ motives when these videos are released.

Wright has been a journalist with ABC for nearly 20 years, covering the White House and reporting from the Middle East and Europe. His reporting has earned him an Emmy and a Peabody Awardfor work related to Iraq and the 9/11 terrorist attacks, respectively.

The reasonable nature of Wright’s criticisms of a business model that prioritizes generating ratings over informing viewers, combined with Project Veritas’ well-known reputation and bad-faith tactics, make ABC’s decision to suspend Wright and reassign him from political reporting to “avoid any possible appearance of bias” concerning.

Conservative media outlets like Fox News and The Federalist and figures such as Turning Point USA’s Benny Johnson have already pounced on the footage to advance the right-wing narrative that ABC is a biased source that does a poor job of informing viewers -- and by suspending Wright, the network has fallen for it too.

Update (5:45 p.m.):O'Keefe and Sean Hannity agreed that ABC News should not have suspended Wright[aUDIO]

O'KEEFE: This guy Wright is just being honest. He's just talking about how ABC's pushing Disney products on Good Morning America. He called himself a socialist. He calls Trump a bad name, the d-word, in this tape. He also seems to say that they don't give Trump credit -- they don't give him enough credit. He actually says this about Trump, that they don't give him enough credit for the things that he does right. So he's simultaneously kind of trashing Trump, calling himself a socialist, but also saying Trump does some good things and we don't talk about it, we don't care about voters, we don't cross the Hudson River, this guy says, to look at what voters care about. So he's just being honest, he's been suspended for being honest, and for that I think it was wrong to suspend him. I think he was just telling the truth, Sean.

SEAN HANNITY (HOST): Well, I think so too.

---

https://www.alternet.org/2020/01/major-study-finds-no-liberal-bias-in-media-if-anything-journalists-have-become-too-cautious/

---

https://www.alternet.org/2019/12/why-the-liberal-media-loves-trump-so-much/

no lnx

Why the ‘liberal’ media loves Trump so much

Written by Chauncey DeVega / Salon December 13, 2019

The American mainstream news media made many mistakes in its coverage of the 2016 presidential election.

It treated Donald Trump as a harmless curiosity because he was a reality TV show star and professional (alleged) billionaire.

Hillary Clinton’s shortcomings — both real and perceived — were amplified. Trump’s were downplayed if not largely ignored.

The mainstream media thought Trump was a harmless amusement, and not a demagogue, racial authoritarian or fascist in waiting. He was good for their ratings and profits. This meant the threat he posed to democracy could be overlooked because money apparently matters more than civic duty.

Too many reporters, journalists and other members of the commentariat hoped that Trump would mature into a more “traditional” candidate and then president. Despite all the evidence to the contrary, this foolish hope was the dominant narrative through the 2016 presidential campaign and Trump’s first year in office.

At the end of the third year of Trump’s presidency the American media continues to enable Trump and his party’s assault on democracy and the truth. Few mainstream voices are willing to consistently state the truth that Donald Trump is a fascist, a racist and mentally unwell, and that he is likely beholden to Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

In all, the mainstream media cringes in terror before Trump and his supporters’ threats of violence and other and acts of intimidation. It all too often defaults to “fairness” and “balance” and both-sides-ism, elevating Trump’s most outrageous lies into reasonable opinions about “alternative facts.”

Yes, there have been successes, including important investigative reporting on Trump’s corruption, his abusive treatment of nonwhite migrants and refugees, and, of course, the Ukraine scandal. But overall, the mainstream news media has learned few lessons from the many postmortems on how it failed in its responsibilities as guardians of democracy in the 2016 presidential election. Indeed, it now appears ready to repeat the same errors in 2020.

Eric Boehlert is an award-winning journalist who has written for Media Matters, Rolling Stone and Billboard. He was previously a senior writer for Salon. Boehlert is also the author of the books “Bloggers on the Bus: How the Internet Changed Politics and the Press” and “Lapdog: How the Press Rolled Over for Bush.”

In this conversation he explains how the mainstream American news media helped to elect Donald Trump because of a deep dislike for Hillary and Bill Clinton.Boehlert also warns that the media has helped to normalize and protect Donald Trump because of an unwillingness to explain that he is a true aberration in American history. Under Trump’s regime, Boehlert tells me, the United States really does not have a president.

Boehlert also highlights how the American mainstream news media is both cowardly and complicit with Trump’s assault on democracy because of its unwillingness to tell the truth about the threat he and his regime represent to the country and the world.

This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.

We are now approaching the end of the third year of Trump’s regime. Are things better, worse or about how you expected?

I am not surprised. In fact, I think it was the night of the election or the day after when I put up two tweets that I remember quite vividly. One was, “It is going to be so much worse than anyone can imagine.” I also said that the American press is not going to save us from Donald Trump. Unfortunately, both of those observations were true.

Why were so many people in denial?

There was all that chatter about how America’s political institutions were so strong and they would keep Trump in check. People were also saying that we should have a businessman as a president and Hillary Clinton is so conniving and in the end it will all be fine. That was the Beltway conventional wisdom: Trump won’t be able to break anything, this country has been around for so long, we’ll be fine. And then of course the exact opposite happened.

Given all the evidence to the contrary, how were members of the mainstream media able to tell themselves such a thing? By what logic were they operating?

A lot of it was driven by their contempt for Hillary Clinton. There is a hostility towards Hillary among the news media that goes back to the 1990s. There was an attempt to normalize Trump because the mainstream, inside-the-Beltway corporate media types did not like her. Of course, almost everyone was convinced Hillary was going to win. In the fall of 2016, I believe that the American news media saw its job as to make sure her win was as unsatisfying as possible, that it wouldn’t be historic and she would limp across the finish line.

Ultimately, Hillary Clinton would not be able to take a victory lap andtoo many in the American news media miscalculated in the end. By being so relentlessly negative towards Clinton and letting Trump get away with so much stuff, the news media did not calculate that he could ever win. And in the end, that is what happened.

Given their error of overcompensating against Hillary Clinton why didn’t the American news media go after Donald Trump with more zeal?

One would reasonably think that the press would just be chomping at the bit. Trump is corrupt. He’s dishonest. He lies about everything. In theory one would think the press would have a field day with Trump. This is what the press loves to do. They’re going to knock this guy down, they are going to expose him. But exactly the opposite happened. Why? There are many reasons.

Trump effectively bullied the American news media during the campaign. They were shocked that he won. The press felt like they missed a big story. Because Trump won Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin by 70,000 votes, the American news media felt like there was this huge white middle-class rural movement that they had missed. One fluke election made them feel like they were fundamentally out of touch. The American press is also perpetually afraid of the Republican Party.

The American news media is possessed by a deep fear of Republican hardball. Therefore, they were nervous about being portrayed as out of touch because Trump had won and they missed the story. They’re nervous about being portrayed as part of the “liberal media” and they had never experienced anything like Trump before. They got a taste of it during the campaign with all of Trump’s “fake news” and such things. That knocked the American news media back on their heels and they didn’t have the courage to stand up against Trump. This happened in many different ways and important moments.

The American mainstream press was cowed, and they embraced this timidity. In turn, they decided, particularly the New York Times, that they need to go write a story literally every week for the next two years about white voters in red states and how much they love Donald Trump.

But when Barack Obama was president for eight years, I don’t think there was one story in the New York Times about how black voters in Baltimore love Barack Obama. It wasn’t news. The New York Times didn’t care about love for Obama among black voters. But wow, the New York Times loves to go to those diners and find those white folks who love Donald Trump.

In total, the press has been bending over backwards because they were afraid of Trump. We are almost three years into this administration. Now, recently, the press certainly has shown signs that they’re going to stand up to Trump. This is mostly just because of the facts of the Ukraine scandal — facts which are mind-boggling. Moreover, there is really no other way to portray the facts of what Trump did with Ukraine than as a crisis for Donald Trump. But not calling him a racist, not calling him a liar, not questioning his mental stability? Those should have been basic journalism tasks from March and February of 2017 forward, and it just never happened.

Could it be that there are many people in the American news media, journalists and reporters and others, who have never had to contemplate that their work would put their lives at risk from Trump and his supporters?

Certainly, the American press, for the most part, has never had to deal with this. The American press has no history or tradition of covering authoritarian rule. That is a skill necessary in Eastern Europe and in Third World or developing countries. The idea that the press is under attack in the United States institutionally, by a ruling party or from the president of the United States — and the overall creeping loss of press freedom — has been revelatory for many reporters and journalists.

If you had said four years ago, “There will never be another White House press briefing under the next Republican president,” most people would have looked at you with incredulity. Such a prediction would be viewed as ridiculous.

We’ve been having press briefings televised since the ’90s. We’ve had them at the White House since the Kennedy years.

President Trump is going to come in and cancel the press briefings? The press would never let that happen. That was thought to be inconceivable. But now here we are in America with Trump. It has been almost 250 days since the last press briefing.

Trump hired a new press secretary, and she will likely never host a press briefing in the White House. That is a perfect example of the creep that happened over the first two years of the Trump administration. The press could have done many things in response. To say there was nothing the press could have done is total nonsense. These news organizations did absolutely nothing and they let it happen. These news organizations could have pulled their teams from the White House, for example.

Now we are left with these “chopper talk” sessions where Trump walks from the White House to the helicopter. The blades are whirling, people are shouting questions at him. Trump doesn’t answer follow-ups. That’s the press access. The press in the White House is supposed to be the people’s representative by providing some sort of transparency. Trump has totally rigged the game.

How do we make sense of the dividing line between cowardice and complicity in the press?

Cowardice versus complicity? It’s all the same stew to me. The biggest problem in the last two or three years is just refusing to tell the truth. There are so many examples of Trump and his administration not doing that. There is all this talk about Donald Trump as a “chaos agent” or some type of “disruptor” and things like that. We are so far beyond that description.

We don’t really have a president of the United States anymore.The American press should be talking about that fact. In no traditional or historical sense is Donald Trump filling the role that every other president of the United States has. When America has a foreign policy based on complete incoherence or payoffs to Turkey or Russia, the American press does not really know how to portray those events.

The American press knows that Trump is not a healthy, mentally stable person. The press can see that day in and day out, and yet they are not allowed to put that in their news stories. The news media often has to invent fantasies and narratives to make Trump look cogent.

If we in America were talking about a president being a Manchurian candidate for another county the idea would have been rejected as irresponsible. The president of the United States would never act in the interest of a foreign country. Yet, here we are.

If the American press were to talk about Trump as a racist, a fascist or a pathological liar, or say that he is not mentally well, then it changes the dominant narrative and terrain. Once you start addressing those issues in the news coverage — any one of those — that has to be the only story you cover every day and for the rest of Trump’s presidency. One can’t acknowledge the president of the United States being an open racist and then cover it for two days. It is a defining story in American history.

The press does not want to have to cover those stories every day for the rest of the Trump presidency because they know it would unleash a torrent of attacks from Trump, the Republican Party, conservatives en masse and Fox News and the right-wing echo chamber. The press wants to keep a lid on it all. So the American press says things like “Trump uses ‘racially tinged rhetoric.'” We all know what those euphemisms really mean.

You have had access to editors and newsrooms. How are these decisions being made?...

hmmn

https://www.allsides.com/media-bias/media-bias-ratings

[chart]

https://www.thedailybeast.com/diamond-and-silk-to-testify-before-house-judiciary-committee

4/18

Popular pro-Trump YouTube duo Diamond & Silk will testify next week before the House Judiciary Committee as part of a hearing examining “social media filtering and policing practices.” The flamboyant vloggers became a Republican cause célèbre at last week’s Facebook hearings (receiving more attention than more serious issues) after they claimed they were censored by the social-networking site for their right-wing politics. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg apologized for “an enforcement error” and said the website had reached out to the duo to resolve the situation—a claim Diamond & Silk disputed, despite email evidence proving them wrong. One of the lawmakers who took up the pro-Trump duo’s cause,Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), will testify before the panel. And along with Diamond & Silk, experts from the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the News Media Alliance will testify. The committee also extended invitations for representatives from Facebook, Twitter, and Google to appear.

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/video-fake-trump-mass-shooting-twitter-carpe-donktum-meme-898890/

pro-Trump meme-maker Carpe Donktum, a.k.a. Logan Cook, was suspended from Twitter on Monday following controversy over a video originating from a contributor to his website, Meme World. Following outcry from the right, however, Cook was quickly reinstated on the platform, prompting questions about censorship and Twitter’s response to allegations of political bias.

Cook, who describes himself on Twitter as an “Eternally Sarcastic Memesmith specializing in the creation of memes to support President Donald J. Trump,” is the creator of MemeWorld, a pro-Trump meme site. MemeWorld became engulfed in controversy on Monday following a New York Timesreport that a violent July 2018 video created by MemeWorld contributor TheGeekzTeam was screened at the right-wing American Priority Conference last week. The video, which is essentially a compilation of pro-Trump memes, features an edited version of a clip from the movie The Kingsman,which shows President Trump’s face superimposed onto that of actor Colin Firth as he guns down a crowd full of his critics, primarily members of the media. It was posted on the subreddit r/TheDonald last year and received thousands of upvotes.

How a Government Agency's Offbeat Twitter Memes Landed in the Library of Congress

Off-the-Rails President Takes to Twitter in Anti-Semitic and Racist Rant

In a statement to the New York Times,Stephanie Grisham, the press secretary for the White House, said that while President Trump had not seen the clip, “based upon everything he has heard, he strongly condemns this video.” Yet many interpreted the clip as a casual endorsement on behalf of Trump supporters towards violence against the president’s critics. Critics of the clip also accused Trump supporters of hypocrisy in light of their condemnation of a similarly violent image of comedian Kathy Griffin holding what appeared to be a fake version of the president’s decapitated head. (Griffin is also depicted in the video being mutilated with an axe.)

Initially, it was reported that Cook, who has been lauded as a “genius” by the president and visited the White House as part of a “social media summit” last July, was the creator of the video. While Cook denied this on Twitter, he confirmed that a “friend” who contributed to MemeWorld made the clip, and that that person would continue to be listed as a contributor. He also went on to endorse the message behind the video. “The Kingsman video is CLEARLY satirical and the violence depicted is metaphoric,” Cook said in a statement on MemeWorld that he posted on Twitter, accusing the New York Timesof launching an “outrage campaign” against him.“No reasonable person would believe that this video was a call to action, or an endorsement of violence towards the media. The only person that could potentially be ‘incited’ by this video is Donald Trump himself, as the main character of the video is him. THERE IS NO CALL TO ACTION.”

The defense that violent content is sarcastic or intended in jest is common among right-wing memers, says Jennifer Grygiel, an assistant professor of communication at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. “This is a propaganda technique to avoid detection and removal,” they tell Rolling Stone. “The bottom line is no, maybe they aren’t calling specifically for the president to go out and shoot the media, but these political memes have an indirect effect on our culture, and the political climate, which is already boiling over. In this case, the meme promotes attacks on the media, social movements such as Black Lives Matter, and Trump’s political opponents.”

Shortly after Cook posted his statement, multiple news outlets reported that he had been suspended by Twitter. (The Twitter account for TheGeekzTeam, which posted the video, remains active.) News of the suspension prompted outrage on far-right corners of social media, who argued that Twitter was applying left-wing bias in suspending Cook. Right-wing critics have long accused Twitter of harboring a bias against conservatives,with many on the right arguing that big tech platforms censor or shadow-ban those who espouse conservative views (though there is little evidence to support this claim). Earlier this year, Republican U.S. Senator Josh Hawley introduced legislation advocating for big tech platforms to undergo an audit investigating allegations of left-wing bias, while many on the left have also accused CEO Jack Dorsey and Twitter of bending over backwards to appease conservatives, in part byrefusing to censor right-wing trending topics and hosting dinners with right-wing leaders.

Approximately half an hour later, Cook’s account was reinstated. In a Periscope, he said that Twitter had decided to suspend him based on an unrelated copyright violationin a Feb. 2018 video, and that the suspension had been reversed. In the Periscope, Cook questioned this reasoning, claiming that the video featured no copyright infringement with the exception of a five-second song clip at the end of the video. In response to Rolling Stone‘s request for comment, a Twitter spokesperson says that “per ourcopyright policy, we respond to valid copyright complaints sent to us by a copyright owner or their authorized representatives.”

Aside from Twitter, many big tech platforms like YouTube have been criticized for keeping the video online. Although YouTube, for instance, prohibits content that incites violence, the platform decided to age-gate the video and display a warning on the grounds that it contained “violence that is clearly fictional,” a spokesperson told CNN.

In a statement sent to Rolling Stone,the activist network CREDO Action decried platforms’ willingness to keep the video up. “Hate speech and violent threats must be taken seriously by YouTube, Google, Facebook, Twitter, and the other big tech companies that are letting these messages run rampant across their platforms,” said CREDO Action campaign manager Jelani Drew-Davi. “The #TrumpVideo needs to be taken down immediately, as it actively promotes violence against specific people and members of the media.”

In This Article: Donald Trump,

ref wapo

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/06/27/inside-facebook-twitters-secret-meetings-with-trump-aides-conservative-leaders-who-say-tech-is-biased/

no lnx

Inside Facebook and Twitter’s secret meetings with Trump aides and conservative leaders who say tech is biased

Tony Romm

June 27, 2018 at 10:37 AM EDT

Twitter and Facebook are scrambling to assuage conservative leaders who have sounded alarms — and sought to rile voters — with accusations that the country’s tech giants are censoring right-leaning posts, tweets and news.

From secret dinners with conservative media elite to private meetings with the Republican National Committee, the new outreach reflects tech giants’ delicate task: satisfying a party in power while defending online platforms against attacks that threaten to undermine the public’s trust in the Web.

The complaints have come from the upper echelons of the GOP, including top aides to President Trump, arguably the world's most prominent Twitter user. The chief executives of Facebook and Twitter, meanwhile, have both admitted in recent months that Silicon Valley’s ranks are dominated by liberals, which has only fed accusations of bias from the right.

“It’s no secret that we are largely left leaning, and we all have biases,” Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey wrote in a note to staff on June 7. “That includes me, our board, and our company.”

To address the allegations, Dorsey has tried to break bread — quite literally — with his company’s critics.

The Twitter executive convened a rare private dinner with Republican leaders and conservative commentators in Washington last week at Cafe Milano, a familiar Georgetown haunt for city power brokers, according to four people who participated in the dinner but spoke on the condition of anonymity because it was off the record. The gathering came weeks after Dorsey provoked conservatives’ ire by tweeting a story suggesting voters should elect Democrats in November — and after he made his first official visit to Congress.

Among those attending the June 19 dinner were Mercedes Schlapp, a top communications adviser for President Trump; Grover Norquist, the leader of Americans for Tax Reform; television host Greta Van Susteren, and Guy Benson, a Fox News commentator, according to the people in the room.

Dorsey hoped to use the dinner as a way to build “trust” among conservatives who have long chastised the company, three of the people said. He defended Twitter against accusations that it targeted right-leaning users unfairly but still admitted that the company has room for improvement, according to the attendees.

In response, the Twitter executive heard an earful from conservatives gathered at the table, who scoffed at the fact that Dorsey runs a platform that’s supposed to be neutral even though he’s tweeted about issues like immigration, gay rights and national politics. They also told Dorsey that the tech industry’s efforts to improve diversity — after years of criticism for maintaining a largely white, male workforce — should focus on hiring engineers with more diverse political viewpoints as well, according to those who dined with him in D.C.

A spokesman for Twitter declined to comment on the dinner.

For Dorsey and his peers, the conservative clamor could be more than a public-relations nuisance. It could result in calls for new regulation from Republicans in positions of power and feed doubts in the minds of Web users as to whether their social feeds are subject to secret political engineering — a charge of censorship that tech giants strongly deny.

“When you put these platforms in the context of all the other sources of information available for news … at no other time in history, no other platforms have enabled such huge diversity of voices,” said Michael Beckerman, the president of the Internet Association, which represents companies like Facebook, Google and Twitter in regulatory battles.

Conservatives long have bristled about the politics of Silicon Valley, where many tech executives and engineers supported President Barack Obama, then rallied behind Hillary Clinton’s bid for the White House in 2016. But criticism from the right crescendoed in May, when Brad Parscale, the campaign manager for Trump’s 2020 reelection, joined Ronna McDaniel, the chairwoman of the RNC, and publicly reprimanded the tech industry. The duo slapped Twitter for having “hidden” conservative content “from conservative users' followers.” They also took aim at Facebook, alleging it “has blocked content from conservative journalists.”

For years, conservatives have alleged Twitter and Facebook secretly limit the reach of their content — even though Republicans are some of their most popular users. Twitter, for example, stoked Republicans’ ire last year when it briefly blocked a congresswoman from advertising about abortion. Facebook’s labeling of two pro-Trump video bloggers, Diamond and Silk, as “unsafe” resulted in a Capitol Hill hearing where the duo aired numerous falsehoods. And Google stared down its own controversy: A conservative-leaning engineer, James Damore, penned a memo criticizing the company’s diversity policies, resulting in his firing. In response, he and others filed a lawsuit claiming conservative bias at the company.

Amid the attacks, Dorsey this summer began extending an olive branch to some of Twitter’s leading critics. The entreaty appeared to divide employees: Some at Twitter welcomed Dorsey’s outreach while others privately groused about their boss reaching out to Republicans who had ties to Trump, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.

Along with the gathering in D.C., Dorsey also hosted a dinner in New York City with local conservative media leaders, two attendees confirmed. Dorsey has consulted with Fox News host Sean Hannity, a public ally of Trump. And the Twitter executive has made two trips to assuage Republicans on Capitol Hill during the past two months, including a sit-down last week with GOP Sen. Ted Cruz, who has publicly blasted the tech industry for anti-conservative bias. Cruz’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

Some of the conservative media commentators and political pundits specifically urged Dorsey during their meetings to take a closer look at Moments, a feature that tracks trending national stories and issues. At both the New York and D.C. dinners, conservative participants said they felt that Twitter Moments often paints right-leaning people and issues in a negative light, or excludes them entirely, according to four individuals who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Dorsey said he would look into the issue, the people said, but did not announce specific changes.

Complicating matters is that executives in the uppermost ranks of Facebook, Google and Twitter are some of the most outspoken corporate foes of Trump. That’s led to suspicions among conservatives that tech companies’ efforts to clean up their platforms, by banning hate speech and vetting some content for misinformation, are actually targeting them.

Earlier this month, Facebook dispatched company leaders to the RNC to address complaints of bias levied by party leaders and the Trump campaign. A month after CEO Mark Zuckerberg acknowledged in a Capitol Hill hearing that Silicon Valley is an “extremely left-leaning place” — even as he stressed Facebook applies its policies evenly — Facebook commissioned a full review of its business practices to determine if there’s any conservative bias in how it treats employees or the way it handles content that appears on its News Feed. That team, led by former GOP senator Jon Kyl, has contacted conservative organizations like the Heritage Foundation for early feedback, according to a person familiar with the review but not authorized to discuss it.

Kyl declined to comment. Facebook also declined to comment on the review. In a statement, the company said users’ feeds are a reflection of the pages and people they follow, adding it does not “suppress content on the basis of political viewpoint or prevent people from seeing what matters most to them because doing so would be directly contrary to Facebook’s mission and our business objectives.”

Privately, tech leaders believe the timing of Republicans’ allegations is no coincidence, coming a few months before the 2018 election. It could serve to GOP voters in a contest where the composition of Congress is at stake.

Much as Trump has taken aim at news media, some of his allies have focused their attention on tech platforms that are the conduits for political reporting and opinion. That includes Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California, a beneficiary of donations from Google and Facebook’s political-action committees. In fact, McCarthy’s reelection campaign has run roughly 20 ads over the past month on Facebook about anti-conservative bias, according to the social giant’s transparency hub. Clicking on McCarthy’s ad led to a petition, then a request to donate.

“It’s time to stand up and let online platforms such as Google and Facebook know that we will not be silenced so easily,” McCarthy wrote on the site.

https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/is-a-strange-twitter-glitch-censoring-the-left

mta kaitin

Being “ratioed” is Twitter slang for having negative replies outweigh positive interactions; a “ratioed” tweet is dominated by replies, with few likes and retweets. Some see it as a gauge for a bad post.

While some have speculated the Twitter phenomenon could merely be a glitch, Graziano, who has worked in tech for decades, said this would be a pretty big bug for Twitter to let go unfixed for over a month.

an 919

https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/facebook-removed-doctors-fact-check-of-false-anti-abortion-video-because-ted-cruz-complained

no lnx

Facebook removed doctors’ fact-check of false anti-abortion video because Ted Cruz complained

Written by Igor Derysh / Salon September 14, 2019

Facebook removed a fact-check authored by three doctors rebutting an anti-abortion video’s false claims because Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and other Republicans complained in a letter to CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

Facebook told BuzzFeed News on Wednesday that it removed the fact-check pending a review after Cruz, Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, Sen. Kevin Cramer of North Dakota and Sen. Mike Braun of Indiana accused the social media giant of being biased against conservatives.

The videos in question featured Lila Rose, the founder of the anti-abortion group Live Action. Both videos falsely claimed that “abortion is never medically necessary.”

Three doctors authored a fact-check for Health Feedback, an organization that seeks to debunk misleading medical coverage. The fact-check deemed the video “inaccurate,” noting that “certain medical conditions such as placenta previa and HELLP syndrome can make abortion a necessary medical procedure in order to prevent the mother’s death.”

“Certain life-threatening conditions during pregnancy can make abortion medically necessary in order to save the mother’s life,” the fact-check said. “Preserving both the life of the mother and child by inducing early delivery, as the video suggests, is only possible if the fetus’ gestational age is advanced enough that it stands a chance of survival outside the womb. As this is not always the case, early delivery is not always a suitable alternative to abortion.”

Facebook flagged the videos on Aug. 30, BuzzFeed News reported, adding a link to the fact-check next to the videos and notifying followers of the Live Action page that the videos had been rated as false.

The social network also told Live Action administrators that it would throttle their reach “because of repeated sharing of false news,” according to a screenshot published by the group.

Rose lashed out on Twitter, calling the doctors behind the fact-check liars and “abortionists.”

Two of the doctors have ties to reproductive rights organizations, BuzzFeed News noted. Dr. Daniel Grossman, an obstetrics and gynecology professor at the University of California, San Francisco,sits on the board of the NARAL Pro-Choice America foundation. Dr. Robyn Shickler is a fellow with Physicians for Reproductive Health, which says its goal is to “improve access to comprehensive reproductive health care, including contraception and abortion, especially to meet the health care needs of economically disadvantaged patients.”

Cruz and the other Republican senators cited these affiliations to complain to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg that his social network was behind the “censorship” of conservatives and suggested that doctors who “perform abortions” are not qualified to discuss abortion.

The four Republicans sent a letter to Zuckerberg claiming that the fact-check was “performed by two pro-abortion activists with significant ties to to abortion-rights advocacy organization, both of whom are paid to perform abortions.”

“No reasonable person would describe Grossman or Schickler as neutral or objective when it comes to issues of abortion,” the senators wrote of the doctors, “yet Facebook relied on their rating to suppress and censor a pro-life organization with more than 3 million followers.”

The letter went on to allege that Facebook has been repeatedly “biased” toward conservatives on Facebook, especially when it comes to anti-abortion views.

The senators claimed that the fact-check violated the code of conduct created by the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN), which BuzzFeed News noted had certified Health Feedback’s parent organization, Science Feedback, which relies on scientists and doctors to fact-check media coverage.

Facebook told BuzzFeed News that it took down the fact-check on Wednesday pending a review by the IFCN.

“We have been in touch with the IFCN which has opened an investigation to determine whether the fact checkers who rated this content did so by following procedures designed to ensure impartiality,” a company spokesman told the outlet. “While the IFCN investigates, we are removing the relevant fact checks and have communicated this to the members of the US Senate who brought this specific concern to our attention.”

The IFCN said in a statement that it will review materials related to the fact-check and determine if anything violated its code of conduct. In the meantime, the video pushing false information debunked by actual doctors who are experts in their field will continue to circulate on Facebook without restriction.

Grossman told BuzzFeed News that his work “doesn’t make me biased — it makes me a well-informed expert. If the question were about cardiac care, we would expect the answer to come from a well-respected cardiologist, and this should be no different.”

Schickler told the outlet that she doesn’t have a “political agenda.”

“I’m an advocate because it’s part of a physician’s job to advocate for the health and well-being of our patients,” she said.

Both doctors agreed that removing the fact-check was a dangerous precedent for the social network to set.

“It is very concerning that a letter from a group of senators can silence the voices of medical and scientific experts,” Grossman said. “This sets a precedent where politics matter more than scientific evidence.”

Grossman said in a tweet that it is “reasonable” for the fact-check to be investigated further.

“But in the meantime they should take down [Rose’s] videos, too,” he wrote. “They’re so full of misinformation that they’re really dangerous.”

bktv 9/8/19

https://www.c-span.org/video/?462768-1/american-carnage

JULY 18, 2019

American Carnage

Politico Magazine chief political correspondent Tim Alberta explored divisions in the Republican Party that led to the election of President Trump.

1016 debate newt losing by attacking other cands, so goes after media 2 nuke ["no" i don't want to address current scandal?], won NC primary when he was in single dig?

By the time that Trump tweeted and then told journalists at the White House that Alabama would be hit hard by Hurricane Dorian, it was obvious that he was wrong. Instead of admitting that he was referring to well-out-of-date forecasts, Trump has spent a week insisting he was correct (including changing a map with a marker) and attacking media outlets who point out he was lying. Fox propagandists were the rare allies who leapt to his defense.

Sean Hannity had a full meltdown in defense of Trump, complaining of "psychotic jackasses in the media mob." When his guest - a prominent climate change denier - even said that Trump was wrong, Hannity began speaking over him and said that they were out of time.

Lou Dobbs seemed giddy about Trump continuing to keep pushing the lie, saying of the media: "You mess with the bull, you get the horn.” avoided filming violence from right-wing protesters. Geraldo Rivera said that Trump was "unfairly mugged by the media." Fox News host Howard Kurtz attacked the media for covering Trump's repeated lies about a natural disaster.

At one point this week, Trump even called Fox News' John Roberts into the Oval Office to talk with him about his statements.

This all raises the question of why Trump was relying on days-old information about a natural disaster. And aside from golfing, Trump spent a significant amount of time in the days that Dorian's trajectory turned away from Alabama livetweeting Fox News.

---

mma 919

Fox's Geraldo Rivera: Trump is being “unfairly mugged by the media” for repeatedly lying about Alabama and Hurricane Dorian

09/05/19 9:14 AM EDT

https://www.conservapedia.com/Liberal_bias

quite long, not updated?

Liberal bias is partisan selection or distortion of information to support liberal policies. This bias can be expressed by professors and public school teachers, College Board exams, reporters and other journalists in mainstream media, and any other information source. Typically purveyors of liberal bias falsely present themselves as being objective. Liberal bias includes techniques such as distorted selection of information, placement bias, photo bias and liberal style.

The essence of liberal bias is to dismiss or even to censor opposing views. For liberals, to allow the airing or publishing of an opposing view creates the risk that people might discover errors in the liberal viewpoint. On the other hand,conservatives typically uphold freedom of ideological expression, with many expressing that although they may oppose a liberal view with every fiber of their being, they will defend to the death their right to say it, because they believe that in the marketplace of ideasthe true will always win over the false.(At Conservapedia we are not afraid to mention and even to summarize anti-conservative arguments.)

It is clear that the mainstream media is extremely biased towards the left-wing, and this was the case since at least the 1960s, with a strong leftist monopoly on the news which promotes false conclusions.^[1] In addition, the roots for the left-wing bias may have started as early as Walter Lippmann's book Public Opinion where he essentially advocated for fake news and that universities play a large role in the journalism industry. The 2016 election of Republican businessman Donald Trump prominently displayed the blatant leftist bias of the media.^[1][2][3][4] Trump found a way to get his message out to the public without needing to go through the lens of the leftist media, and some liberals suggested ways in how to force Trump to have to deal with the corrupt media.^[5]

Vision of the anointed

Thomas Sowell

Economist Thomas Sowell, in his 1996 book The Vision of the Anointed, discusses the anointed vision of liberals and liberalism to promote their agenda.

Desperate evasions of discordant evidence, and the denigration and even demonizing of those presenting such evidence, are indicative of the high stakes in contemporary culture wars, which are not about alternative policies but alternative worlds and of alternative roles of liberals in these worlds. Opponents must be shown to be not merely mistaken but morally lacking. This approach replaces the intellectual discussion of arguments by the moral extermination of persons. This denigration or demonizing of those opposed to their views not only has the desired effect of discrediting the opposition but also has the unintended effect of cutting off the path of retreat from positions which become progressively less tenable with the passage of time and the accumulation of discordant evidence. The very thought that those dismissed as simplistic or maligned might have been right–even if only on a single issue–is at best galling and potentially devastating. Their last refuge in this situation are their good intentions.^[6]

Roger Ailes, a GOP political operative who founded and led Fox News Channel, described the liberal media elite:

”They just believe what they believe and they think their job is to drag the rest of the redneck morons toward the light. They don’t understand that the so-called redneck morons, the people they don’t like, are the people that grew up with values, patriotism, all those things. And they hate all those words.[7]

jon Meacham, editor of the overly liberal weekly magazine, Newsweek, in justifying its activist journalism, stated, “Let me say this, I don’t think we’re the only catcher in the rye between democracy and ignorance, but I think we’re one of them, and I don’t think there are that many standing on the edge of that cliff.”^[8]

In March 2010, liberal evolutionary magazine National Geographic postulated that liberals and atheists may be more evolved than conservatives, according to conclusions by Satoshi Kanazawa, an evolutionary psychologist. Kanazawa states "people with higher levels of intelligence are more likely to adopt social values and behaviors that are relatively new to human life—liberalism, atheism, staying up late, and (for men) monogamy, for example." Kanazawa also defines liberalism, in part, as caring about the well-being of vast numbers of people you'll never meet, and states that this "is a very new thing for humans."

However, in response it is argued that such an definition of liberalism would render Jesus Christ a liberal, who clearly taught "love thy neighbor as thyself", and who came to be the Savior of the world - to those who believe and so follow Him - and which obedience is contrary to what liberalism promotes. And that, in contrast to Biblical conservative morality, history shows that liberalism, as overall manifest today, has adopted such "new" but essentially old ways of rebellion against beneficial moral values, promoting Hollywood values, San Francisco values, adultery, anarchy, and atrocities such as are seen by such intelligent atheists as Mao and Pol Pot, whose objectively baseless moral reasoning allowed them to justify their evils, as pragmatically reasonable to achieving their "enlightened" ideals.

In a response to the National Geographic pretensions,James Lewis in the American Thinker notes that the vast majority of "educated people before the 20th century in Western countries were conservatives", but that "IQ doesn't predict street smarts or (obviously) political success on Capitol Hill."

Lewis goes on to ask,

Why has the Left ended up killing 100 million people in the 20th century, according to French Marxist historian Courtois and his team? That's the real question the Left must always be made to answer: Why does its blind "idealism" and its unquenchable power-craving lead to such disastrous results, over and over again?

His conclusions are that

“

The National Geographic headline is therefore characteristically absurd, but it's also typical of the cultural Left today -- and of its hopeless cravings to validate itself as being smarter, better-educated, and of course, more compassionate than those conservative throwbacks to a brute past. Somehow the Left always needs to boast, and like any other compulsive boaster, it is compensating for its own feelings of inferiority...

High IQ is no guarantee of goodness. It's not even a guarantee of common sense, or of genuine intelligence outside a few limited parts of life. It's no protection against evil. ^[9]

”

princeton Theological Seminary theologian and noted Bible commentator Albert Barnes (1798-1870) comments on Romans 1:22, Professing themselves to be wise they became fools, that

this was the common boast of the philosophers of antiquity. The very word by which they chose to be called, “philosophers,” means literally “lovers of wisdom.” That it was their boast that they were wise, is well known..[but] they became really foolish in their opinions and conduct.

The famous Bible commentator Matthew Henry adds, "As a profession of wisdom is an aggravation of folly, so a proud conceit of wisdom is the cause of a great deal of folly."

Ultimately, the function of the so-called liberal press is to dig the grave for the American People and American Values. No mention need be made of the closely associated lying Marxist Press. To them the spreading of falsehood is as much a vital necessity as the mouse is to a cat. Their sole task is to break the national backbone of the people, thus preparing the nation to become the slaves of international finance and its masters, the Liberals.

Liberal bias in media

History

Where does Liberal media bias come from?

Prior to the era of "objective journalism", many journalist and muckraker outlets alike were rather open and known for which side of the aisle that they stood. For example, both Harper's Weekly as well as the Los Angeles Times were considered to be Republican publications.^[10][11] Other papers had a Democrat bent.^[12] During the partisan era, both sides had ample representation. There was no one sided media monopoly and the beliefs of the papers were known.

Bias cloaked as objectivity

...

At the least, Fox News employs the following liberals, among others:

Academia

Lichter has taught political science at Princeton, Georgetown, and George Washington universities, and he was a research faculty member at Yale University andColumbia University. He was also a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow at Smith College and held the DeWitt Wallace Chair in Mass Communications at the American Enterprise Institute. He received his Ph.D. in Government from Harvard University and his B.A., summa cum laude, from the University of Minnesota. He has received a Goldsmith Research Award from Harvard University and the Solimene Award of Excellence from the American Medical Writers Association's New England Chapter.Scholarly work[edit]Lichter has authored or co-authored fourteen books and over a hundred scholarly articles and monographs on the news and entertainment media.

His best-known work, The Media Elite, (written with Stanley Rothman and Linda Lichter) argued that journalists, on average, held more liberal political views than the general public, and that their backgrounds and outlooks affect their coverage of the news.This claim was extended by conservative pundits as evidence for a liberal bias in the media. It also provoked widespread debate among journalists and their critics. The Media Elite was based on interviews with major media journalists and content analysis of their work.

Lichter and his co-authors have also written on the social and political perspectives of popular culture, in books such as Prime Time and Watching America, as well as on news coverage of science and health issues, in Environmental Cancer—A Political Disease and It Ain't Necessarily So. His most recent books (written with Stephen Farnsworth) are The Nightly News Nightmare: Television Coverage of Presidential Elections (2006, 2nd ed.); and The Mediated Presidency: Television News and Presidential Governance (2005). These works use content analysis to examine the media's coverage of government and election campaigns.In 1986 Lichter and his late ex-wife, sociologist Linda Lichter, established the Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA), a non-profit organization that sought to influence public debate on the media by publishing frequent studies of media coverage using the social scientific tool of content analysis. This was the first time this type of academic research was used on a regular and systematic basis to affect the general public's view of the media. Since then other groups have followed suit, including the Annenberg School for Communication and the Pew Foundation's Project for Excellence in Journalism. In 2004 the CMPA became affiliated with the George Mason University.Bibliography[edit]Journal articles[edit]

---

word cloud:

https://books.google.com/books/yup?vid=ISBN9780300076349

Common terms and phrases

activities aflatoxin Agent Orange air pollution Alar American animal tests animals argued asbestos breast cancer Bruce Ames cancer agents cancer causation cancer epidemic cancer experts cancer policy cancer rates cancer researchers cancer risks carcinogens cause cancer causes of cancer cinogens concern Congress conservation controversy critics dangers debate deep ecology Delaney clause diet dioxin disease Doll and Peto drugs earth ecofeminism ecological environment environmental activists environmental cancer environmental groups environmental issues environmental leaders environmental movement environmentalists estimates example factors federal food additives growth hazards human ideological increased industry journalists legislation Lichter lung cancer major media coverage ment mental National Cancer nature nuclear power organizations percent perspective pesticides political population potential problems public policy radiation regulation Rothman sample scientists smoking social sources species stories substances sunlight survey tion tobacco tobacco smoke United views vironmental Whelan Wildavsky women

About the author (1999)

S. Robert Lichter is president of the Center for Media and Public Affairs in Washington, D.C., and adjunct professor of political science at Georgetown University. He is the author of many books and articles on the role of news and entertainment media in American society. Stanley Rothman is Mary Huggins Gamble Professor of Government Emeritus and director of the Center for the Study of Social and Political Change at Smith College. His numerous books include American Elites, published by Yale University Press.

---

ACORN wiki

...{long list of orgs thaty cleared acorn]

Investigation by the U.S. Government Accountability Office

On June 14, 2010, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) released its findings on ACORN, by then disbanded. It said that there wasno evidence that the group, or any of its related organizations, mishandled any of the $40 million in federal money that they had received in recent years.^[14][108]

Media controversy

The right-wing media complained about alleged media bias throughout the weeks as the ACORN video controversy developed.^[109] For instance, on September 15, Joshua Rhett Miller of Fox News accused the "mainstream media" of purposefully ignoring the story, and said that it was favoring the political left.^{[29][110][111][112]}

Andrew Breitbart wrote in an article in The Washington Times that he had counseled Giles and O'Keefe to "... offer Fox News the full footage of each video before each was released".^[113] Breitbart said he developed a strategy to counter such presumed liberal media bias by courting the Fox News Corporation:"We had to devise a plan that would force the [other news] media to see the evidence before they had enough time to destroy these two idealistic 20-something truth seekers."^[113] Giles interviewed exclusively with Fox commentator Glenn Beck on the day of the first video's release.

CNN began coverage of the story as early as September 9.^[114] CBS began to cover the story on September 11,^[115] the day after the story aired on Fox News.^[116]Breitbart and reporters of Fox News stayed on message, complaining that the "mainstream media" did not respond promptly or cover the story in sufficient depth.^[110][111] On September 11, 2009,Glenn Beck was reported to have said, "FOX has had 133 reports on it, CNN, 90, MSNBC, 10. How's that possible? Hey, ABC, how's it working out for you with two?"^[117]

Breitbart and O'Keefe on September 11 announced thatO'Keefe would not agree to be interviewed by CNN staff.^[118] They said that CNN favored ACORN in its coverage. But, CNN had reported on ACORN-related issues of alleged voter registration fraud (which were not substantiated).^[119][120] O'Keefe said he felt CNN's early coverage had been slanted in favor of ACORN, because CNN had interviewed both ACORN staff members and defenders.^[121]

FOX News said that, as late as September 15, the ABC anchor Charlie Gibson was unfamiliar with the story.^[122] It did not report that ABC's Jake Tapper had been covering the issue since September 11.^[123][124] In a September 15 interview with Sean Hannity of FOX News, Breitbart said that O'Keefe and Giles "... have been impugned in the media".^[125] Hannity said they had been "excoriated".^[125]

On September 17, 2009, Turner.com posted a list of all CNN transcripts covering the ACORN scandal, from the day the story was first released.^[114] The transcripts showed there was no evidence that Giles or O'Keefe had been "impugned" or "excoriated" by news commentators.^{[126][127][128][129][130]} The listed transcripts include extensive, objective coverage and discussion by CNN reporters Abbie Boudreau, Wolf Blitzer, Candy Crowley, and others.^[130] Lou Dobbs (then still at CNN) had offered an impassioned statement in support of Giles and O'Keefe on September 10, the day on which the videos were first aired.^[131]

The journalist Mark Bowden of The Atlanticsaid about the case in an interview September 18, 2009, with Alexandra Fenwick of the Columbia Journalism Review, "The young woman and filmmaker who visited those ACORN offices were political activists, and they put together what is, in essence, a very effective political protest against an organization they would like to damage. And they've done a very effective job of doing that. But I think they're clearly not journalists."^[132]

The next spring, on March 20, 2010, Clark Hoyt, public editor of The New York Times, wrote an op-ed column conceding some errors in the paper's reporting. ACORN and its supporters had complained "that The Times got the story wrong and, by failing to correct it, has played into the hands of a campaign that has pushed the group near extinction."

Hoyt acknowledged that it was by then known that it was not likely that O'Keefe went into the ACORN offices dressed as a pimp, as at the beginning and end of most of the videos. O'Keefe had presented himself "as a clean-cut young man, sometimes a college student, trying to rescue his girlfriend and under-age girls from an abusive pimp".^[133] But, Hoyt wrote, "ACORN's supporters appear to hope that the whole story will fall apart over the issue of what O'Keefe wore: if that was wrong, everything else must be wrong. The record does not support them. If O'Keefe did not dress as a pimp, he clearly presented himself as one: a fellow trying to set up a woman — sometimes along with under-age girls — in a house where they would work as prostitutes."^[133]

His article appeared before the release on April 1, 2010, of the California AG Report, which found that O'Keefe's videos had all been heavily edited to misrepresent the ACORN workers and present them in the worst possible light. The pair had set up the workers rather than doing investigative journalism.^[12] Investigations by the California AG, Brooklyn U.S. Attorney and the U.S. GAO found that ACORN workers had not participated in criminal activities.

Criticisms of the undercover videos

...

https://www.alternet.org/2019/08/right-wing-media-outlets-are-booming-in-the-trump-era-report/

no lnx

Right-wing media outlets are booming in the Trump era: report

Written by Alex Henderson August 26, 2019

Right-wing media outlets have traditionally experienced their biggest growth when a Democrat was in the White House. Many far-right outlets knew how to turn fear-mongering over President Bill Clinton in the 1990s or President Barack Obama in the late 2000s/early 2010s into major advertising revenue. But in a report for Axios, Sara Fischer explains that some right-wing outlets have been enjoying substantial growth under a Republican president: Donald Trump.

Citing a Columbia Journalism Review analysis of right-wing websites using Comscore data, Fischer reports that RedState, the Washington Times and the Washington Examiner are among the outlets that have been thriving during the Trump era. Those sites, Fischer notes, “are experiencing major growth by widening their coverage. Their goal is to cover whatever is capturing the world’s attention that day, from human interest stories to trending entertainmentdevelopments.”

Fischer notes that although the right-wing Weekly Standard folded in late 2018, other websites on the right continue to “rank high” in terms of “engagement on Facebook” — and Fox News, according to Fischer, remains “the #1 news site on Facebook” in 2019 “in terms of reader engagement,” according to the analytics company Newswhip.

Podcasts that have been thriving in the Trump era, Fischer reports, include “The Joe Rogan Experience” and “The Ben Shapiro Show.” Shapiro, she points out, has “built a megabrand aimed at targeting younger conservatives.”

Fischer stresses, however, that although “conservative media remains strong across most major media platforms,” some “left-leaning outlets” — including HuffPost— “rank highly” in the Trump era. But Trump’s presidency and the 2020 election, she writes, continue to benefit right-wing media.

“Typically, the opposition party has a media explosion in response to whichever political group is in power,” Fischer reports. “But the economic stress of the media industry, combined with the Trump-driven conservative strategy of broad messaging, has upended that dynamic.”

Facebook's "right-wing bias" report is gaslighting all of us

This week, Facebook released a report in relation to claims of anti-conservative bias on the platform. Both the report and a subsequent WSJ op-ed were authored by for former Republican Sen. Jon Kyl. There was no real evidence of conservative bias on the platform, because it doesn’t exist.}:

The majority of complaints from conservatives derive from specific instances of content restrictions that can often be explained away by technical limitations, algorithm changes, or terms and conditions of the platform. We have looked into this in great detail with a series of studies (http://click.e.mediamatters.org/?qs=f4f191a8d9da2f934afdb819046e64b0dddff82e33d26ca5400a79ed03a142f71f17fd632017384feebece1f95021dc77f1878c0cbbaed0f) on hundreds of Facebook pages dating back to 2018, and there is no evidence to suggest there is bias or censorship on the platform. In fact, some data suggests that right-wing media outlets outperform mainstream and left-leaning outlets on topics like abortion (http://click.e.mediamatters.org/?qs=f4f191a8d9da2f93a8f4b0d294a3b41a03ea49616e2eefca51db5c084ef8a01720a09d406777473668825c5873ee1fb9e2beb4625afeb0a0) and immigration (http://click.e.mediamatters.org/?qs=f4f191a8d9da2f93c5c10278cd776d981c1b66dc8854a8d78c68abf2da5e6fe17b991838db4ad4e86d667fdc6154bb45a6463305a221c17b).

However, as we have noted (http://click.e.mediamatters.org/?qs=f4f191a8d9da2f93d0a39de68c701de58cae81f436cda99d9f94a308faa58fb70da69737a3e1b4e62ba0e0630b13cfe2f0c6957801a0c098), eliminating anti-conservative bias on Facebook is not the true objective here. It is simply another effort to work the refs. For decades, conservatives have used the same tactic with national newspapers and broadcast networks, all to push a narrative about conservatives that is not actually true; that conservatives are the victims. Facebook’s capitulation to right-wing figures not only allows them to be overrepresented on the platform, but also trivializes the real issues that exist in the tech industry.

As Media Matters President Angelo Carusone said, “Facebook’s impulse to appease right-wing cries of bias, despite all evidence to the contrary, is yet again putting Facebook in a position where it'll be amplifying lies and enabling extremists, white supremacists, and Proud Boys at the expense of American democracy and with great risk to our safety.”|

However, as we have noted, eliminating anti-conservative bias on Facebook is not the true objective here. It is simply another effort to work the refs. For decades, conservatives have used the same tactic with national newspapers and broadcast networks, all to push a narrative about conservatives that is not actually true; that conservatives are the victims. Facebook’s capitulation to right-wing figures not only allows them to be overrepresented on the platform, but also trivializes the real issues that exist in the tech industry.

https://www.alternet.org/2019/08/heres-the-bizarre-truth-behind-the-study-trump-is-using-to-claim-google-manipulated-2-6-million-votes-in-hillary-clintons-favor/

nolnx

Here’s the bizarre truth behind the study Trump is using to claim Google ‘manipulated’ 2.6 million votes in Hillary Clinton’s favor

This article was paid for with reader donations to Alternet 2020.

Written by Alex Henderson August 20, 2019

On Monday morning, President Donald Trump tweeted that according to a “report just out,” Google “manipulated” millions of votes in favor of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election. But according to a report by Nick Bastone for Business Insider, Trump’s claims are misleading for a number of reasons.

In his tweet, Trump posted, “Google should be sued. My victory was even bigger than thought!” Bastone, however, reports that the study Trump appeared to be referring to on Twitter was a 2017 study by San Diego-based psychologist Robert Epstein — who, in July, testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee during a hearing with the theme “Google and Censorship Through Search Engines.”

During his testimony, Epstein (who described himself as a Democrat) asserted that at a “rock-bottom minimum,” Google swayed 2.6 million votes in Clinton’s favor.

On Monday, however, Epstein told CNN that Trump misrepresented his findings, which he said did not show that Google actively “manipulated” millions of voters. Moreover, Bastone reports, the methodology in Epstein’s 2017 study is questionable.

Wow, Report Just Out! Google manipulated from 2.6 million to 16 million votes for Hillary Clinton in 2016 Election! This was put out by a Clinton supporter, not a Trump Supporter! Google should be sued. My victory was even bigger than thought! @JudicialWatch

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 19, 2019

“The study — which was based on 95 participants in 24 U.S. states — stated in part that when extrapolating from a 2015 study also authored by Epstein, at least 2.6 million votes might be ‘shifted’ in favor of Clinton because of bias in Google’s search results,” Bastone explains in his Business Insider piece. “But the 2015 study’s findings were based on asking U.S. residents to cast hypothetical votes for candidates in Australia’s 2010 prime ministerial election based on information they saw in Google search results.”

Business Insider interviewed Dr. Michael McDonald, an associate political science professor at the University of Florida, to discuss Epstein’s research — and McDonald expressed doubts that Epstein’s findings in the 2015 study were relevant to the United States’ 2016 election.

“I’m not sure if this really applies to U.S. elections where we have partisan politics going on and lots of other information that people have,” McDonald told Business Insider. “You don’t need to look at the top of Google search results for your information about how you’re going to cast your vote for president.”

Rick Pildes, a law professor at New York University, told Business Insider that while tech companies have the ability to sway elections, that doesn’t necessarily mean they have the ability to shift millions of votes as Epstein alleges in his 2017 study.

Pildes told Business Insider, “We absolutely have to worry about the social-media giants manipulating election-related information, whether intentionally or not. But it’s massively irresponsible to claim to know anything this specific and concrete about what information moved millions of voters to cast votes as they did.”

https://www.mediamatters.org/facebook/despite-bias-claims-facebook-not-censoring-conservatives

Despite bias claims, new data shows that Facebook is still not censoring conservatives

On average, right-leaning pages consistently get more weekly interactions than left-leaning pages

WRITTEN BY NATALIE MARTINEZ

PUBLISHED 08/13/19 10:46 AM EDT

A new 20-week Media Matters study on Facebook pages that regularly post about American political news again found that right-leaning pages and left-leaning pages have nearly identical engagement rates, while right-leaning pages on average earned more weekly interactions than left-leaning pages.

## Top lines
- Right-leaning pages on average earned more interactions per week than left-leaning pages.Between March 18 and August 4, right-leaning Facebook pages earned on average about 45,000 more interactions (reactions, comments and, shares) per week than left-leaning pages.
- Right-leaning and left-leaning pages had the same engagement relative to page size and posting frequency, and they outperformed pages without political alignment. Right-leaning and left-leaning pages had the same overall interaction rate (a metric measuring the performance of a page relative to the number of page likes) during our 20-week study, at 0.15%. Pages without political alignment had an overall interaction rate of 0.08%.
- This study’s overall findings on engagement are consistent with two previous Media Matters studies. In our initial 2018 study, Media Matters reviewed political engagement on Facebook between January 1 and July 1, 2018, and found that left-leaning and right-leaning pages on average had virtually the same interaction rate. A follow-up study published earlier this year of engagement between July 2, 2018, and March 17, 2019, also found that right-leaning and left-leaning pages had the same average interaction rate.
## Executive summary
Last week, CNN reported that President Donald Trump's administration was drafting an executive order calling on the Federal Communications Commission to develop new regulations “clarifying how and when the law protects social media websites when they decide to remove or suppress content on their platforms.” Trump’s order, which specifically targets Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, is intended to address claims of “unproven systemic bias against conservatives by technology platforms.” Trump’s actions come after years of baseless claims from conservative politicians and right-wing media personalities that social media platforms actively suppress and censor right-wing accounts.

Media Matters has previously published two other studies on political engagement on Facebook that debunked allegations that Facebook was censoring right-leaning pages. The first study reviewed engagement data between January 1 and July 1, 2018, and the second, follow-up study spanned July 2, 2018, and March 17, 2019. Both studies found that right-leaning and left-leaning pages had virtually the same engagement overall and that, on average, partisan pages outperformed pages without political alignment.

A new Media Matters study of 385 Facebook pages that regularly post about American political news found that between March 18 and August 4, 2019, right-leaning and left-leaning pages had virtually the same engagement numbers relative to page size. Media Matters also found that right-leaning pages on average earned more interactions per week than left-leaning pages and pages without political alignment.

## Key Findings
Right-leaning pages earned more interactions per week than left-leaning pages. Over our 20-week study, right-leaning pages earned on average almost 348,000 interactions per week, while left-leaning pages earned on average just over 302,000 interactions per week. Pages without political alignment earned on average over 329,000 interactions per week....

https://www.mediamatters.org/donald-trump/timeline-how-baseless-right-wing-claims-about-tech-bias-led-trump-drafting-executive

no lnx many

Media Matters

RESEARCH/STUDY

Timeline: How baseless right-wing claims about tech bias led to Trump drafting an executive order

WRITTEN BY CRISTINA LÓPEZ G.

PUBLISHED 08/15/19 2:39 PM EDT

President Donald Trump is reportedly planning to move forward with an executive order compelling the Federal Communications Commission to regulate how social media sites Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube moderate the content that users put on their platforms. As CNN reported, with this order, the Trump administration is seeking to combat “alleged but unproven systemic bias against conservatives by technology platforms.”

The order is just the next step in the yearslong self-victimizing crusade in which Trump, his campaign, right-wing media figures, and Republican lawmakers have been pushing baseless claims of tech censorship to “work the refs.” And while hard evidence of actual bias against conservatives has still not been presented (even Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas acknowledged it is anecdotal), tech companies have nevertheless shown a pattern of caving to the pressure in efforts to appease conservatives.

Here is a roundup of the major moments that got us here.

2016

April 2016: Trump campaign’s Brad Parscale repeatedly brags about access to tech platform executives. On April 20, 2016, Parscale -- then digital director for the Trump presidential campaign and co-founder of the digital marketing firm Giles-Parscale -- tweeted that he had “spent the day with the Google politics team. I love the insight and access GP now has. Tomorrow Twitter, next week Facebook.” The following day he tweeted that he was “having dinner with Twitter talking about Twitter.” [Twitter, 4/20/16, 4/21/16]

May 18, 2016: Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg appeases conservatives by meeting with a Trump campaign representative. Zuckerberg and Facebook’s other top executives met with a Trump campaign representative, right-wing politicians, and conservative media pundits to defuse right-wing backlash following a Gizmodo report that claimed “news curators” had conspired to suppress conservative news from the platform’s trending topics section. [The New York Times, 5/19/16]

September 26, 2016: Trump surrogate Charlie Kirk pushes baseless claims of censorship. Kirk, executive director of the pro-Trump Turning Point USA, tweeted, “Conservatives are targeted, blocked, and silenced on social media. The left runs social networks with a political, leftist, agenda.” [Twitter, 9/22/16]

October 30, 2016: Then-candidate Trump baselessly accuses tech platforms of giving his opponent preferential treatment. [Twitter, 10/30/16]

November 13, 2016: Parscale pivots toward attacking Twitter, claiming the platform “restricted” the Trump campaign. Shortly after the presidential election, Parscale wrote that Twitter “clearly has problems. Twitter restricted us during campaign. Now they let @MELANIATRUMP be openly attacked. #DishonestTwitter.” He also claimed that “Twitter changed rules to block us from doing things” and that the platform “restricted the use of their advertising tools that would negatively affect” Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. [Twitter, 11/13/16, 11/13/16, 11/13/16]

December 2016: Parscale declares that Facebook was fair to the Trump campaign. Parscale tweeted that out “of all platforms,” Facebook “was the most fair” to Trump and provided “the best” return on investment. [Twitter, 12/3/16]

2017

August 2017: Right-wing media and far-right figures seize on Google's firing of James Damore for his claim that men are “biologically” better suited than women to climb the corporate ladder. Far-right media figures lashed out at Google after the company fired Damore. Damore had argued that there are biological differences at play behind gender gaps within the tech industry in an internal memo criticizing the company’s diversity initiatives. While the firing was based on Damore’s sexist claims -- which violated Google's code of conduct -- far-right media figures latched onto his argument that Google does not entertain conservative viewpoints and used it to validate a broader narrative about supposed tech censorship. [Media Matters, 8/8/17]

2018

March 1, 2018: Trump taps Parscale as his 2020 campaign manager. During Trump’s 2016 campaign, Parscale worked alongside Cambridge Analytica to exploit Facebook’s ad platform to help propel Trump to victory. He has also been vocal in exploiting bogus right-wing cries of bias and has called on Facebook and Twitter not to censor conservative content even though social media companies aren’t actually engaged in such practices. [CNN, 3/1/18; Media Matters, 7/5/18; NBC News, 4/15/18]

March 7, 2018: Parscale turns on the three big tech platforms in the runup to the midterm elections. Parscale tweeted: “Hey @facebook @Twitter @Google we are watching. ... This is your opportunity to make sure the playing field is level. #MAGA” [Twitter, 3/7/18]

April 26, 2018: A GOP-chaired U.S. House Judiciary Committee puts together a hearing titled “Filtering Practices of Social Media Platforms.” The Republican Party used the legislative hearing to give online MAGA personalities a platform to make their baseless claims of censorship, with YouTubers Diamond and Silk as protagonists. [U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, 4/26/18; Media Matters, 4/27/18]

May 2018: Facebook appoints anti-Muslim former Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) to lead a “liberal bias audit.” Facebook caved to right-wing pressure and agreed to undergo an audit to assess whether its algorithms and policies carry bias against conservatives, tapping Kyl to lead it. [Vice, 5/4/18]

May 17, 2018: Parscale and GOP officials pen open letter to Facebook and Twitter CEOs declaring they needed to “stop the bias” against conservatives. Parscale and Ronna McDaniel, chair of the Republican National Committee, penned a letter to Zuckerberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey in which they elevated unproven claims of platform bias against conservatives and demanded a response from the platforms by June 18, 2018. [Twitter, 5/24/18]

May 24, 2018: Parscale and RNC chair go on Fox to make debunked claims about conservative censorship on social media. Parscale and McDaniel appeared on Fox News’ Fox & Friends to advance bogus claims of platform bias against conservatives. [Media Matters, 5/24/18]

June 15, 2018: Facebook caves to pressure and its executives meet with Parscale and top GOP election officials about alleged “bias” against conservatives. Axios reported that “following complaints about censorship of conservatives,” four Facebook executives met with Parscale, McDaniel, and then-House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) to discuss their complaints. [Axios, 6/15/18]

July 17, 2018: GOP-chaired U.S. House Judiciary Committee hosts another hearing focused on alleged bias. During the hearing, titled “Facebook, Google and Twitter: Examining the Content Filtering Practices of Social Media Giants,” tech platform representatives repeatedly denied Republican lawmakers’ accusations of bias against conservatives. [U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, 7/17/18; The Washington Post, 7/17/18]

July 26, 2018: Trump accuses Twitter of “shadow banning” prominent conservatives. Trump tweeted: “Twitter ‘SHADOW BANNING’ prominent Republicans. Not good. We will look into this discriminatory and illegal practice at once! Many complaints.” [Twitter, 7/26/18]

August 18, 2018: On Twitter, Trump ramps up the rhetoric about bogus censorship. In a tweetstorm, Trump claimed that platforms were “totally discriminating against Republican/Conservative voices” and called for social media sites to “let everybody participate, good & bad.” [Twitter, 8/18/18, 8/18/18]

December 11, 2018: Google CEO Sundar Pichai faces House Judiciary Committee. Pichai testified at the request of Republican legislators in a hearing titled “Transparency & Accountability: Examining Google and its Data Collection, Use, and Filtering Practices.” Much of the questioning focused on alleged anti-conservative bias. [U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, 12/11/18; Media Matters, 12/13/18]

December 18, 2018: Trump baselessly claims Twitter made his account was being made harder to follow. [Twitter, 12/18/18]

2019

January 8, 2019: Report reveals that Facebook and Twitter take advice from extremist right-wing figures on matters of political speech. The Wall Street Journal reported that Facebook sought out advice from right-wing extremist Tony Perkins, president of the virulently anti-LGBTQ Family Research Council, while Twitter’s Dorsey approached far-right figure Ali Akbar as he tried to decide whether conspiracy theorist Alex Jones should remain on the platform. [Media Matters, 1/9/19]

March 27, 2019: Google’s Pichai visits the White House to meet with Trump. Trump tweeted that the meeting had included discussion about “political fairness.” [The Verge, 3/27/19; Twitter, 5/27/19]

April 10, 2019: Senate Judiciary subcommittee hosts a hearing that amplifies debunked claims of censorship from anti-abortion movie makers. The hearing, titled “Stifling Free Speech: Technological Censorship and the Public Discourse,” allowed the GOP to give a platform to anti-abortion media figures, who criticized a ban-evasion feature that negatively impacted the Twitter account for an anti-abortion movie, saying it constituted censorship. During the hearing, Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI) explained that there was no hard data to support claims of censorship. [U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on the Constitution, 4/10/19; Media Matters, 4/11/19, 4/10/19]

April 23, 2019: Dorsey meets with Trump. Earlier in the day, “Trump accused Twitter of playing ‘political games’ and tampering with his nearly 60 million followers.” [The Washington Post, 4/23/19; Twitter, 4/23/19]

May 3, 2019: Trump goes to bat for far-right figures removed from platforms due to violations of hate speech policies. Trump tweeted, “So surprised to see Conservative thinkers like James Woods banned from Twitter, and Paul Watson banned from Facebook!” Woods, however, had merely been suspended for violating rules and chose to leave Twitter in protest, while Watson was banned from Facebook and Instagram for his extremist content. [Twitter, 5/3/19, 5/3/19; Fox News, 5/10/19; Media Matters, 5/2/19]

July 11, 2019: White House hosts “social media summit.” Guests in attendance were right-wing social media figures who have strongly pushed the baseless narrative of anti-conservative tech bias, despite their own history of success on the platforms. [Media Matters, 7/10/19]

July 16, 2019: Senate Judiciary Committee hosts new hearing focused on censorship. During the hearing titled “Google and Censorship through Search Engines,” Hirono again debunked claims of anti-conservative tech bias. [U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on the Constitution, 7/16/19; Media Matters, 7/16/19]

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08/14/19 9:03 AM EDT

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Despite bias claims, new data shows that Facebook is still not censoring conservatives

08/13/19 10:46 AM EDT

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https://www.alternet.org/2019/07/trumps-social-media-summit-was-a-complete-embarrassment-that-did-just-what-trump-wanted/

kos

On Thursday, Donald Trump unexpectedly folded on the question of adding a citizenship question to the census. After warning that he could absolutely put the issue in place with an executive order, Trump hauled out his attorney general and secretary of commerce, set up a podium in the Rose Garden, and did what he always does when not throwing insults—he whined. But Trump had the perfect audience for his “We tried to slip this in at the last minute, then ran out of time, so it’s all everyone else’s fault” complaint. Because on Thursday afternoon, Trump filled the Rose Garden with a collection of villainy and scum that would embarrass any Mos Eisley cantina.

The event was labeled as a “press conference,” but it was a very Trumpian press conference: one at which Trump took no questions, and one where the actual press was made to stand at a distance on the other side of ropes. That’s because all the chairs at this press conference were reserved for the internet’s most hateful: the alt-right pundits that were scraped up to attend Trump’s “social media summit.” That group didn’t try to ask Trump any questions. That’s not their role. Instead, they used this moment of access and historic location to join Trump in attacking the free press.

There was badge-wearing Nazi, and former Trump adviser, Sebastian Gorka threatening reporters. And there was professional 9/11 truther Mark Dice yelling at CNN. There was pundit, songwriter, and congressional candidate Joy Villa—a candidate in California, or New York, or possibly Florida, she hasn’t made up her mind yet—smirking at the media and informing them that their day, the day where people asked questions, expected answers, and checked those responses for truthfulness, is over.

These are the voices that Trump is trying to elevate. Voices that scream racism. Voices that scream hate. And,in the case of Dice, voices that scream that both Hollywood and the music industry are run by a combination of Illuminati and Satanists who hide spells in Super Bowl halftime rituals designed to blind the public to the existence of a worldwide gay conspiracy. And the Starbucks logo features a mermaid prostitute. And Katy Perry is a witch.

But the real purpose of Trump’s “social media summit” wasn’t to promote conspiracy theorists. It was to promote two of his own conspiracy theories.

The primary focus of Trump’s summit on social media was … how awful all the social media platforms are.Despite not just a lack of real evidence, but mountains of genuine counterevidence , Trump continues to push the conspiracy theory that “conservative voices” are being banned from Twitter, Facebook, and other platforms for nothing more than supporting Trump. As The Washington Postreported, Trump spent much of his time focused on telling the alt-right that they were the real victims of one of those conspiracies they love to write about.

“We have terrible bias. We have censorship like nobody has any understanding,” said Trump. This is the reason Trump believes his tweets get much less support than those of Barack Obama, who, three years out of office, continues to have far more followers than Trump. And, in fact, Trump did go on at length about ways in which he believes Twitter has suppressed his followers. But the actual fact is more likely that Trump doesn’t believe it anymore than Mark Dice believes that “monkey bars are racist.” It’s just a handy claim.

It’s handy to Trump in reinforcing his even bigger conspiracy theory. His “They’re all out to get me” theory. That’s the theory in which every honest investigator looking into his actions is part of the “deep state”; any honest reporter showing that Trump’s words aren’t true is spreading “fake news”; any judge following the law is part of the “swamp”; and every torch-carrying white supremacist is “good people.” Anyone, even someone who organized a boycott of a Star Wars movie because it was “feminist propaganda” (and yes, that’s Mark Dice again), is good people, so long as they support Trump.

This is the America that Donald Trump champions, and for a very good reason. Because when there is no authority for truth, the loudest voice wins. It really doesn’t matter if those voices are screaming hate. It doesn’t matter if they’re networks of screaming bots run by the Russian military. All that matters is that they’re screaming loud enough to drown out the press … which has to stand way back there, behind the ropes.

---

THIS IS A VARIANT OF LIBERAL MEDIA MYTH

no lnx

https://www.alternet.org/2019/06/1120326

Republican humiliates himself at Senate hearing as his attempt to nail Instagram for liberal bias falls flat

Republican humiliates himself at Senate hearing as his attempt to nail Instagram for liberal bias falls flat Image via Wikimedia Commons.

written by Brad Reed / Raw Story June 25, 2019

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) on Tuesday fell flat on his face when he tried to get technology experts to admit that major social media platforms were biased against conservatives.

While talking with assorted experts on artificial intelligence and algorithms, Johnson said that he had his staff members go to Politico’s Instagram account and record what other recommendations the app gave to them after following it.

According to Johnson, the vast majority of recommendations that came back were for news websites like the Washington Post or progressive outlets like Huffington Post, and none were for right-wing websites such as Breitbart.

Dr. Stephen Wolfram, the founder and chief executive officer of Wolfram Research, scoffed at Johnson’s claim of bias and said it was more likely that Instagram delivered liberal recommendations to Politico followers because those followers were more likely to follow neutral or progressive political news websites in the first place.

“The thing that will happen is, if there’s no other information, it will tend to be just where the most content that people on the platform in general have clicked,” he said. “It may be a statement, in that case — I’m really speculating — that the users of that platform tend to like those things.”

Johnson also complained that many conservative news groups were having their articles removed from social media feeds — but Ms. Rashida Richardson, the director of policy research at the AI Now Institute, said that research shows most of those removals came because those articles contained demonstrably false information.

“That’s more of a content moderation issue,” she said.

“OK, anyway,” Johnson replied.

Watch the video below.

---

https://thinkprogress.org/trump-believes-google-is-trying-to-rig-the-election-project-veritas-video-cb82f03caee3/

During a 45-minute monologue on Fox Business Wednesday, President Donald Trump vented his concerns about tech companies like Twitter and Google, going so far as suggesting that he believes they are “trying to rig the election.”

Trump complained that Twitter was somehow preventing him from gaining more followers on the platform, including claiming that random people have told him they’re somehow unable to “join” him on Twitter. He made the same claim back in October (even though his follower growth was actually increasing at the time), and this spring, he reportedly voiced his frustration when Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey visited the Oval Office. Dorsey tried to reassure the president that the followers he had lost were bots and spam accounts.

Trump is reportedly preoccupied by the fact former President Barack Obama has more followers on Twitter.

“It’s amazing I won the election, because you saw what happened yesterday with Google,” Trump said on Fox. “Google is totally biased to the [Democrats]."

Host Maria Bartiromo tried to clarify that they were talking about a Project Veritas video, released Monday, in which a “Google insider” allegedly made comments about avoiding a similar situation as what happened in 2016.

“They’re trying to rig the election! That’s what we should be looking at,” Trump insisted.

He went on to suggest “they should be sued” because of their alleged bias, suggesting that a Google executive expressed “hatred for the Republicans” this week.

Like all Project Veritas videos, the latest undercover video is heavily edited, exaggerates the seniority of the target, and distorts her words to try to fit a conservative conspiracy theory. Specifically, the video claims that Google is trying to affect the 2020 elections to “prevent” thenext “Trump situation.” Even with the context left in the edit, it’s clear she is discussing foreign interference in the election.

The target of the video, Jen Gennai, responded to the video in a Medium post. “Project Veritas has edited the video to make it seem that I am a powerful executive who was confirming that Google is working to alter the 2020 election,” she wrote. “On both counts, this is absolute, unadulterated nonsense, of course.” She confirmed that she was discussing Google’s very public work to protect from future election interference.

As U.S. intelligence and special counsel Robert Mueller’s report have made clear, the Russian government interfered in the election to help Trump. The president has welcomed foreign interference in the 2020 election.

Trump says he’d collude to win in 2020, after years of claiming ‘no collusion’

As Google’s “Head of Responsible Innovation,” Gennai explained that she doesn’t even work on any of the products or topics the undercover spy baited her into discussing in a casual conversation held under false pretenses. “I was having a casual chat with someone at a restaurant and used some imprecise language. Project Veritas got me. Well done.”

The Project Veritas video dropped a day before Maggie Stanphill, Google’s director of user experience, testified Tuesday to the Senate Commerce subcommittee on technology. Republicans on the committee grilled her about whether Google uses “persuasive technology” to try to influence users’ political views.Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), in particular, accused Google of censoring conservatives, citing the Project Veritas report. “Do you think it’s Google’s job to ‘prevent the next Trump situation’?” he asked.

Stanphill rejected the various claims from the report. “We build for everyone, including every single religious belief, every single demographic, every single region, and certainly every political affiliation,” she responded. Cruz refused to believe the company was unbiased.

Simultaneous with Trump’s rant on Fox Business Wednesday morning, Fox News was interviewingDennis Prager, founder of the site PragerU. Prager has sued Google,claiming that it has censored its conservative videos on YouTube. Last year, a federal judge tossed out a nearly identical PragerU suit, noting that as a private company, YouTube can make its own decisions about how to regulate content on its site. Prager insisted that all the major tech platforms simply hate conservative content, taking no responsibility for the hateful people and views that have been featured in PragerU videos, including various racist and anti-LGBTQ messages.

What appears to be happening is that some conservatives are massively distorting tech companies’ attempts to protect against foreign election interference or restrict the distribution of hateful views, stirring up conspiracy theories that the companies are demonstrating blanket bias against conservatives. The president then repeats these totally unfounded accusations on national television as if they are fact. They are not.

#BIG TECH, #DONALD TRUMP, #FOX BUSINESS, #FOX NEWS, #GOOGLE, #POLITICS,#PROJECT VERITAS, #TED CRUZ, #TWITTER

fox bs

Recently, an audit study from Northwestern University reviewed over 6,300 unique links from Google's "Top Stories" box in 200 search results during the month of November 2017. Fox News misconstrued much of the study's findings.

The study found that "just 20 news sources account for more than half of article impressions," and the top three sources with the most article impressions (CNN, The New York Times, and The Washington Post)accounted for 23% of all article impressions.

Fox used the findings to claim that left-leaning content media outperformed right-leaning media on Google. Sam Theilman, an editor of CJR's write-up of the study, corrected Fox's misrepresentation.

These claims and mischaracterizations are yet another version of the right-wing effort to brand the mainstream press, and in this scenario big tech, as biased against conservatives in an attempt to "work the refs" and receive favorable treatment.

AN 1/19

While conservatives constantly complain that the mainstream media is deeply biased against their views — often (though not always) when reporters simply report basic facts — they fail to recognize the many ways that supposedly “unbiased” reporting often covertly adopts or assumes fundamental right-wing premises.

A key example of this phenomenon drew criticism Friday when (D-NY) attracted attention for proposing that top tax rates be raised to 60 or 70 percent on the highest income brackets in a “60 Minutes” interview with Anderson Cooper.

Cooper said that she was talking about was a “radial agenda compared to the way politics is done right now” — and Ocasio-Cortez was happy to accept the label of “radical.”

But as she had also noted, top tax rates in the United States were in the range she discussed — or higher — in the decades that many people, even and especially conservatives, nostalgically remember as a period of exceptional economic growth. It’s not clear why returning to these rates should be considered “radical.”

It is clear, though, that planting the idea that such a move would be “radical” — rather than a perfectly sensible idea if one that one that would infuriate the wealthy donor class — plays into the hands of the right wing.

Writing for New York Magazine, Eric Levitz pointed out that another reporter, Josh Kraushaar of the National Journal had what seemed to be a paradigmatic response among mainstream political commentators. “[Calling] for a 70% tax rate on the nation’s most-watched news show a whole lot more politically damaging for” Democrats, he argued, than another congresswoman’s boisterous call for Trump’s impeachment.

But, Levitz pointed out, super high taxes on the wealthy are actually not particularly unpopular. He continued:

And yet, the fact that Susan Collins voted to sharply cut taxes on the rich in 2017 has not led nonpartisan news outlets to describe her as a far-right extremist. In fact, just yesterday, the New York Times referred to her as one of the Senate’s “most moderate members.” (Which is enough to make one wonder whether the overrepresentation of the affluent among national reporters — and the extremely rich, among owners of national media companies — might bias our political discourse in the upper class’s favor.)

All this said, it is conceivable that Kraushaar is correct; advocating for a 70 percent top tax rate could plausibly have political downsides for Democrats. But when journalists respond to Ocasio-Cortez’s proposal by declaring it self-evidently extreme and unpopular — instead of explaining who would be affected by the policy, and what effects economists believe it would have — they are creating such downsides, not neutrally reporting on them.

There are other examples of this phenomenon in which the media often adopts right-wing talking points without acknowledging that it is doing so. Pundits and reporters alike frequently assume for instance, that lowering the budget deficit is always a worthy goal, even when there are good arguments to believe otherwise. By accepting the basic premise, the supposedly neutral reporting can lend more credibility to the conservative ideological desire for slashing government spending than it deserves.

http://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/once-again-congress-entertained-debunked-accusations-that-conservatives-are-censored-online/

Members of the House Judiciary Committee gathered this morning to entertain, once again, the repeatedly debunked accusations that social media websites like Facebook systemically censor conservative viewpoints on ideological grounds.

This morning, Rep. Bob Goodlatte and his colleagues hosted representatives from Facebook, YouTube and Twitter for a public hearing during which it was advertised that company representatives would “answer questions on their content moderation practices and how they can be better stewards of free speech in the United States and abroad.” Although the hearing did include a hodgepodge of inquiries about censorship, algorithm design and suspected Russian meddling in the 2016 election, many GOP members of the committee used their time to hammer tech companies with mythical nonsense (speaking of which, Infowars host Alex Jones has claimednumerous times on air during the last week that the White House and members of Congress have asked him to produce a report on the bias conservatives say they face online.)

In a tweet advertising the public hearing, the House Judiciary Committee posed the question, “So, why am I getting shadowbanned?”:[twit]

:{[View image on Twitter[twit]:{}:

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The House Judiciary Committee hosted a similarly themed meeting in April with pro-Trump video bloggers Lynnette Hardaway and Rochelle Richardson, who are best known by their on-screen personas “Diamond & Silk.” In retrospect, tech companies were wise to decline invitations to attend the April session because it ended up being an unmitigated train wreck.

But for whatever reason, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter decided that this morning they would indulge GOP congressmen, who entered the discussion with claims that conservatives are being filtered off of social media—which is a claim that Republicans and conservatives routinely make in order to justify their never-ending persecution complex and fetish for punishing those who do not bend to their will.

In April, ThinkProgress thoroughly debunked Diamond & Silk’s claims that Facebook was censoring their content. Yesterday, Media Matters released a study of 463 Facebook pages that found partisan pages have almost equal engagement numbers and further put claims of ideological censorship to rest.

Twitter senior strategist for public policy Nick Pickles wrote in prepared remarks to the Judiciary Committee that accusations that Twitter uses policies designed to de-rank “those who are simply looking to disrupt the conversation” on its platform was a plot to censor conservative voices are “unfounded and false”:

Ultimately, everyone’s comments and perspectives are available, but those who are simply looking to disrupt the conversation will not be rewarded by having their Tweets placed at the top of the conversation or search results. Early results demonstrated that this approach has a positive impact, resulting in a four percent decrease in abuse reports from search and eight percent fewer abuse reports from conversations.

Some critics have described the sum of all of this work as a banning of conservative voices. Let me make clear to the Committee today that these claims are unfounded and false. In fact, we have deliberately taken this approach as a robust defense against bias, as it requires us to define and act upon bad conduct, not a specific type of speech. Our purpose is to serve the conversation, not to make value judgments on personal beliefs.

Some tech companies have, however, attempted to curb the spread of deliberately false information and malicious conspiracy theories on their platforms, which may be limiting the conservative movement’s reach given that a significant share of modern conservative media’s messaging relies on outlets that misrepresent and distort the truth.

Goodlatte questioned whether the market share that the three companies hold on the social media industry would make those companies less inclined to listen to concerns about their platforms and suggested that users who believe they are censored don’t believe that they can simply use a competing internet service.

Rep. Steve King (R-IA), who regularly sympathizes with the fringes of right-wing politics, demanded that Facebook’s representative explain why Gateway Pundit and Diamond & Silk saw their web traffic decline on social media sites. [twit]

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) went on the offensive during the hearing and accused the tech company representatives of appearing on Capitol Hill this morning in order to assist Democrats in vilifying Russia. He asked site representatives to name any other countries that used their platforms to interfere with elections, and when representatives told Gohmert that they would follow up with more information, he jeered at them.

“You came prepared to help the Democrats establish about Russia, but you can’t point out any other country? Is that right?” Gohmert said to Facebook’s representative.

“Are you only here to condemn the Russians?” Gohmert asked YouTube’s representative.

“You did not come prepared to answer any question about any other country but Russia, is that correct?” Gohmert asked of Twitter’s representative.

Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) accused social media companies of having “repeatedly censored, removed or shadowbanned conservative journalists, news organizations and media outlets that do not share their liberal political views.” Smith also accused Google of blocking “references to Jesus, Chick-fil-A, and the Catholic religion” and asked, “When will it stop?” Smith then lamented the fact that some social media organizations have received help identifying hateful activity on their platforms from the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Rep. Ted Poe (R-TX)claimed that Facebook and YouTube’s policy of using third-party entities to combat misinformation was “opening up a Pandora’s box” because “what one person may think is fake news, somebody else believes is the gospel truth.” While questioning the authority of these third-party groups, Poe mistakenly referred to the fact-checking site Snopes as “Snoops.”

Tags: Alex Jones Bob Goodlatte Diamond & Silk Lamar Smith Louie Gohmert Steve King Ted Poe Censorship conspiracy theories First Amendment YouTube Gateway Pundit InfoWars

Google News does not deliver different news to users based on their position on the political spectrum, despite accusations from conservative commentators and even President Donald Trump. Rather than contributing to the sort of “echo chamber” problem that critics fear have plagued Facebook and other social media networks, our research has found that Google News algorithms recommended virtually identical news sources to both liberals and conservatives. That’s an important point to keep in mind when evaluating accusations that Google News is biased.

Our findings are part of an ample and growing body of research on this question. Online services – including Google’s regular search function – may provide intensely personalized information. But media scholars like us have found that when it comes to news, search engines and social media tend to lead people not to a more narrow set of sources, but rather to a broader range of information. In fact, we found, Google News is designed to avoid personalized search results, intentionally constructing a shared public conversation based on traditional criteria of journalistic values.

There is, however, one aspect of this lack of personalization that may strike conservatives the wrong way: Established mainstream news outlets strongly dominate the results, regardless of what a user is searching for. Of all the Google News recommendations we collected, a full 49 percent – nearly half – were to just five national news organizations: The New York Times, CNN, Politico, The Washington Post and HuffPost. And those five, much like other mainstream news organizations, tend to be seen as center-left.

In addition, Google News favors sites with original reporting – as well as ones that produce large numbers of articles, respond reasonably quickly to events and have larger staffs. Those criteria, which don’t directly have anything to do with a news organization’s political bent, do appear to disadvantage explicitly partisan right-wing commentary sites, which tend to be small, low-volume and do little of their own on-the-ground reporting. And it’s definitely true that users don’t know how Google News works. The company, like many of its ilk, is tight-lipped about how its news and other algorithms function – at least in part to prevent media companies from gaming the system to favor their own material.

How we tested for echo chambers

Shortly before the 2016 election, we studied what would happen when people searched for news about Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton on Google News. Specifically, we used Amazon Mechanical Turk to recruit a diverse set of 168 people in California, Florida, New York, North Carolina, Ohio and Texas. Participants were of different ages, education levels and political views: 41 percent identified as liberals and 26 percent identified as conservatives. The remaining 33 percent did not declare a political affiliation.

We asked them to search Google News for news about Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump while logged in to their personal Google accounts, and report the first five stories they were recommended on each candidate. We repeated this on two separate occasions, once after a presidential debate and later during a slow news period. Then we compared the stories that people were recommended.

The fact that they were logged in to their Google accounts was important: Google, of course, collects huge amounts of data about each of its users, and could leverage that information when returning search results. Therefore, we expected to find people getting different article recommendations based on their prior search history and online activity, as recorded by Google and applied to the results they got from Google News.

That’s not what we found at all. Instead, liberals and conservatives were recommended virtually identical news sources.

No collusion against conservatives

We found, as have others, no evidence that major technology companies collude against conservatives or tweak their algorithms to return politically slanted search results.

In fact, some have suggested that the opposite may be true. In the run-up to the 2016 election, Facebook was accused of yielding to charges of bias, moving to favor right-wing views by letting leading conservatives investigate its internal biases. Twitter has been similarly accused for protecting InfoWars in 2018.

Further, as tech journalist Kara Swisher has argued, “Mr**. Trump himself is the most voluble politician ever to use digital media, and his entire existence has been amplified, echoed and re-echoed over and over again by the tools that Silicon Valley has let loose on the world over the past two decades.”

Who determines what gets prioritized online?

However, there is reason to understand – even if not to agree with – claims of bias. First,Google News search results do favor legacy news organizations,ones with a long history. In our study, of the 14 news sites that ranked highly on at least one search, only three were newer “digital-first” news organizations. The rest were legacy newspapers, national TV stations and magazines.

Whether this is a problem – and if so, how much of one – is largely up to individual interpretation. For people who care that public discourse is based on a shared set of facts, it’s good news to learn that most people get the same results when they search Google News. And for people who believe that long-standing news producers with proven track records are best equipped to report on current events, our research is reassuring.

Yet across the political spectrum, Americans have far more trust in their local media than in the national media organizations that dominate online – including the results of Google News. It’s especially difficult to trust search engines and social media sites whose algorithms are secret, complex and constantly changing.

Ultimately, the concerns about algorithms and technology boil down to the principles that guide recommendation engines in shaping what reports get the most attention. Should Google News prioritize stories that adhere to traditional journalistic norms? Or should it reflect some other, yet undetermined standard? Trump’s rhetoric resonates with his supporters because, to them and others, the answer is not so clear-cut.

People have different visions of how societies should narrate their shared life. That’s perhaps why concepts of news judgment and balanced coverage largely assume that human editors will be involved. Algorithms can’t solve these quandaries – but they can help bring sharper focus to the public debate of the role news should play in a democratic society.Trump’s latest attacks may forestall that debate, though, by doing to technology companies what he did to the press: convincing many people they are “fake” and thus not to be trusted at all.

Seth Lewis, Shirley Papé Chair in Emerging Media, School of Journalism and Communication, University of Oregon and Efrat Nechushtai, Ph.D. candidate in Communications, Columbia University

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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