The latest US Gallop poll puts US popular support for a military withdrawl from Iraq at 55% (that number is broken down as 19% supporting immediate withdrawl, 36% favouring a dated withdrawl targeted one year down the road).

This number has been fairly consistent (and climbing slowly) for about a year now.

Yet, in the US national media, this information is almost no where to be found. Indeed, the media pundits are still pretending that US popular support for Bush's policy in Iraq is solid and that anyone who even suggests a military withdrawl is committing treason or is a coward or is part of a left-wing lunatic fringe (seems odd to consider 55% of the US population to be a lunatic fringe group).

Now, if the US media is as 'liberal' as all the rightwingers have been carrying on about, how come the 'liberal' mass media is not trumpeting these consistent poll results that fly in the face of the rightwing Republican hegemony in Washington?

Seriously... the US mass media is 'surface' biased towards the Republicans (and have been for about 20 years now). For the mass media, it is all about media consolidation - Democrats oppose it, Republicans generally favour it. Ergo, the mass media favours the Republicans until they get their precious changes to the media ownership rules. The mass media position on the Iraq war shows their obvious bias and favourtism to the Republicans.

Bottom line is, calling the mass media "liberal" is pure rightwing propaganda that has no substantive basis in fact.

P.S. I consider this thread to be about the US media, not the Iraq War.

__________________
[I]Remember what the dormouse said, 'feed your head'. [/I]

I cannot say I agree with you. Have you been able to watch a U.S. newscast when the POTUS's numbers come out?

Ben

__________________
We need two years to investigate..

Give Democrats Congress until 2008

I don't think the Media is really biased towards one end of the political spectrum or another, for the most part. Obviously, there is always going to be some political bias, but I think that is even driven more by profits than politics.

The media is drawn to stories that will get them higher ratings. Sometimes that means being more liberal or more conservative, they don't really care as a long is it gets people to watch. Take Fox News, for instance, the good people at Fox knew that some people thought that CNN was too far left, so they figurred if they set up a news channel that was a little further to the right, they could pick up the Anti-CNN audience, which is what happened. Is this because the people at Fox are conservative? Perhaps that is part of the reason, but I have a feeling that a good part of it is they just found a niche in the market place that they could fill.

All about money, politics is really kind of an after thought.

__________________
Yes, the little green fist up there is a symbol of Earth First! No, I'm not an eco-terrorist, nor do I agree with eco-terrorism...I just thought it looked cool.

Most American media I see may be critical about how the war has been handled and what mistakes are being made but rarely question the war itself.

What conservatives do is pretend that anything moderate or not far to the right is too liberal. In a time that republicans control the senate, the house, the white house, the supreme court, and most state governorships you still hear them bitch about how liberals are fucking everything up.

__________________
Up there in the immensity of the Cosmos, an inescapable perception awaits us. National boundaries are not evident when we view the Earth from space. Fanatical ethnic, religious or national chauvinisms are a little difficult to maintain when we see our planet as a fragile blue crescent fading to become an inconspicuous point of light against the bastion and citadel of the stars. -Carl Sagan

although i used to be the king of the "media bias" theory

you are dead on , come 08 the media will look conservative biased

cause the dems will be in power

will be cause they are for republicans? no, even though polls show 60+ of reporters vote democrat

they will be doing it for ratings , and to sell copy

__________________
[B]Let Valor Not Fail[/B]

Exactly. Because without Liberals, the world would be much, much freer and happier place.

Ben

__________________
We need two years to investigate..

Give Democrats Congress until 2008

Sorry, but the president is a tard and his intelligence will be a joke for the rest of his presidency and a good number of years after.

Hey!!!!

Of course. That is exactly the kind of news the media likes to report. It is "inside the game" - it is one political personality vs another. That is the way the media likes it, thus it is reported. Nothing rocks the boat by reporting on low approval numbers for President Bush.

The fact that a majority of Americans are opposed to that which a majority of the government absolutely (both parties) support (the Iraqi war) is totally "outside the game" (a potential threat to elite control) and thus, is not reported.

The media are allies to the elite consensus. The people are the enemy. They may be permitted to bitch about it publically (give Bush low approval ratings) but they aren't permitted to interfere (the media are the gate-keepers).

And when I say the mass media is pro-Republican, it comparatively little to do with the Presidency and everything to do with control of Congress. It is Congress that is holding up the media consolidation bill, not the Executive. The Executive is apparently quite buyable, Congress is a bit more difficult to control. And the voting habits of a few hundred reporters is irrelevant. Look who signs their paychecks. Always follow the money.

__________________
[I]Remember what the dormouse said, 'feed your head'. [/I]

One night in 1969 Mike Wallace called a meeting of his staff.
He began the meeting by saying "I have some good news and some bad news"..I just came from the producers office and he informed me that 60 Minutes is the now the most watched news show in Television history, and that it is also is the first news show that has made any broadcast network a profit.

After the applause from his staff, he said "And now for the bad news - 60 Minutes is the first news show in the history of television to make a profit".

He then left the room.

In 1969, Mike Wallace may have been the first person in the world to realize that from that day forward television news had forever changed...now it makes money.
He knew now that the stations owners will now EXPECT it to make money.

You can figure out the rest.