Media biased for Gore? Oh, yeah

The

Washington Post ran a story on Monday by Howard Kurtz that attempted to explain away any notion that the establishment press (of which Kurtz is definitely a player) is in any way, shape or form hopelessly biased in its political coverage of Democratic presidential nominee Al Gore.

Forget the fact that major polls in 1996 found that nearly 84 percent of most establishment press editors, senior editors and journalists were avowedly and decidedly liberal in their political beliefs.

And forget the fact that major media watchdog organizations have documented -- for years -- that the big three television news networks, along with most every major daily newspaper in America, have consistently vetted Republicans more thoroughly than any major Democratic candidate or politician, up to and including Vice President Al Gore and soon-to-be ex-commander in chief President Bill Clinton.

Never mind that Kurtz, in his article, quoted top-notch, senior and experienced journalists and political coverage analysts who said that mainstream media coverage of Bush and Gore specifically has been methodically absent when Gore makes "mistakes" but ready to pounce on Bush when he makes them.

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The ultimate conclusion by Kurtz and his employer -- one of the primary conspirators of this "vast left wing conspiracy" -- the Washington Post -- is that it's "ridiculous" to believe there is a concerted effort to give Gore better coverage than Bush.

And if you believe that one, you probably also believe that China is just a misunderstood democracy, or that Clinton really did preside over the "most ethical administration in history."

For starters, let's begin with a

hit piece published by the New York Times in its Sunday edition.

According to a UPI summary of the article, the Times made much of the fact that Bush earned a 2,500 percent profit from his share in a stake of the baseball team he once managed, the Texas Rangers. In other words, he earned about $15 million after investing about $500,000.

To borrow a phrase from the Clinton administration, "So what?" This story has been done -- over and over again -- for months. There is nothing "new" about it so it can't be "news" -- though its rerelease by the Times strangely coincided with Bush's raising poll numbers in a spate of new surveys released this past weekend.

And, at least Bush made a genuine investment -- he didn't get any help from the pages of the Wall Street Journal, nor did he turn a mere grand into $100,000 suspiciously, a la first lady Hillary Clinton.

Then there are the numerous -- numerous -- breaking news stories published by this newspaper that have been nearly totally ignored by the major press.

Our own Washington bureau chief, Paul Sperry, has written extensively on the White House's "Project X" e-mail scandal, despite the absence of the "big boy" media outlets and despite the fact that had this been the Bush, Sr. administration or -- better -- the Reagan White House, Americans would have been treated to ad nauseam hashes and re-hashes of that story until they puked newsprint.

Sperry also broke the White House "porngate" scandal and though some newspapers and agencies begrudgingly picked up on that story -- most likely because it involved sex -- they just as quickly dropped it. Sperry wrote several follow-ups that were all ignored by other "major" outlets.

To pad my own resume, I penned a story that was

published last
weekend that should have gotten some attention from the biggun's but didn't because it involves a controversial campaign issue: the defense budget, military preparedness, and the debate over military funding. In the article I described the "incestuous relationship" between Democratic operatives placed in the Pentagon over the past seven years by the Clinton regime, and who have padded the Department of Defense's budget with lots of non-military related spending items.

One such item was $175 million for -- new fighters? No, breast cancer research. Had the GOP done that -- well, you can imagine.

In his piece, Kurtz tried to vindicate his establishment press pals with this proclamation: "Major newspapers led the way in unearthing a raft of scandals involving President Clinton -- the New York Times broke the Whitewater story, the Los Angeles Times was out front on the 1996 fundraising abuses and The Washington Post broke the Monica Lewinsky story. What's more, the media provided unusually upbeat coverage of John McCain, a conservative Republican, during the primaries."

A few things here come to mind.

First and foremost, Kurtz wishes, perhaps, that the Post "broke the Monica Lewinsky story." No, Mr. Kurtz -- that was the venerable Matt Drudge of the

Drudge Report -- the cyber-sleuth you people love to hate but can't seem to catch up with.

Besides, there are a host of other major scandals that have never received attention from the so-called guardians of the Fourth Estate. If these papers caught a few of them, it is only because they were so huge competition demanded it.

Also, it takes a trained journalistic eye to note that it's not so much what is covered in an initial breaking story but what isn't covered, and the manner in which the follow-ups -- if there are any -- are done.

The major newspapers have omitted so much key information from the coverage of the voluminous Clinton-Gore era scandals there is no way most Americans were ever really completely informed about them. Clinton's impeachment comes to mind; hardly a day went by when some major press outlet wasn't trashing the House Republican managers either in print or on one of the talking head programs at night.

There is also quite a bit to be said about what is not covered by the majors. Alec Baldwin's "let's stone Henry Hyde to death" would have been all over the papers for weeks if Baldwin had been a conservative saying such a thing about a liberal.

Then, there is the "made-up" news which originates from the major outlets. The "rats" GOP political ad was created out of whole cloth by the New York Times a few weeks ago -- which is an accurate characterization, considering the word "RATS" appeared for about 1/30th of a second.

The Associated Press, Reuters, Scripps Howard, Cox -- they all picked up on this pitiful excuse for a "story" -- but none of them felt compelled to report monumental White House duplicity in hiding subpoenaed email, or the absurd non-military uses for the defense budget?

When they aren't playing the role of co-conspirator in advancing non-stories as legitimate news, publications of "record" like the New York Times and the Washington Post are busy re-writing old stories that put candidates they dislike under new scrutiny. Bush's baseball story is a perfect example.

Please, Mr. Kurtz. No liberal media bias?

"People I know covering the Gore campaign, regardless of their personal beliefs, are not enamored with Al Gore the person and show no signs of being motivated to cover the campaign in a way that increases his chances of victory," Kurtz quoted David Corn, Washington bureau chief of the liberal magazine the Nation, as saying, in an attempt to persuade his readers that, see -- even liberals don't think much of Gore.

That may be, but liberal journalists -- who outnumber non-partisan or truly conservative journalists 4-to-1 (by their own admission) -- want Bush and Republicans in charge even less.

And it shows -- which is why the major news outlets and newspapers are losing readers.