The Elder Statement: Media Bias: It Absolutely, Positively Influences How We Vote By Larry Elder

By Larry Elder, Apr. 8, 2014

How much does liberal bias in the media affect how we vote? Greatly. Call media bias a game-changer.

Liberal bias also explains why the left wants “campaign finance limits.” Their leftwing message -- pro-Obamacare; pro-raising taxes on the rich; anti-choice in public education; pro-Roe v Wade; pro same-sex marriage; pro-“gun control”; pro-“immigration reform;” etc. -- gets delivered via biased newscast free of charge. Of the top 100 sources for news, almost all are leftwing. They include ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and nearly all the editorial pages of big-city newspapers.

Campaign finance limits will not “level the playing field” when the refs are pulling for the other side. The good news is that most Republicans -- except for John McCain -- know they’re being duped by calls for “finance reform.”

Bias is not merely the way reporters vote compared to non-reporters.

It’s about topic selection, the way things are worded and how issues get ignored that, under a GOP White House, would have become media obsessions. Thus, “Bridgegate” becomes a national issue. Meanwhile Benghazi, the IRS scandal and NSA overreach -- scandals that would rank high under a GOP president -- become afterthoughts.

Because Peter Jennings (ABC), Tom Brokaw (NBC) and Dan Rather (CBS) held their anchor jobs so long, they provide us plenty of examples of liberal bias and double standards.

Check out how the Big Three anchors covered President Bill Clinton’s first day in office versus how they covered George W. Bush’s first day. In Clinton’s case, he reversed a Reagan policy that tied federal aid for international groups to the recipient’s agreement not to use money to fund or promote abortions. In Bush’s case, he reversed Clinton’s reversal.

To the Big 3, however, it’s clear how they felt.

Clinton, all three “reported,” was simply doing the right thing. Bush, on the other hand, was groveling to the dark, sinister anti-abortion forces that course through the GOP:

Peter Jennings, ABC News, 1993: "President Clinton kept a promise (emphasis added) today on the 20th anniversary of the Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion. Mr. Clinton signed presidential memoranda rolling back many of the restrictions imposed by his predecessors."

Peter Jennings, ABC News, 2001: "One of the president's first actions was designed to appeal to anti-abortion conservatives (emphasis added). The president signed an order reinstating a Reagan-era policy . . . "

Tom Brokaw, NBC News, 1993: "Today, President Clinton kept a campaign promise (emphasis added), and it came on the 20th anniversary of Roe v. Wade legalizing abortion."

Tom Brokaw, NBC News, 2001: "We'll begin with the new president's very active day, which started on a controversial note (emphasis added)."

Dan Rather, CBS News, 1993: "Today, with the stroke of a pen, President Clinton delivered on his campaign promise (emphasis added) to cancel several anti-abortion regulations of the Reagan-Bush years."

Dan Rather, CBS News, 2001: "This was President Bush's first day at the office, and he did something to quickly please the right flank (emphasis added) in his party: He reinstituted an anti-abortion policy . . . "

UCLA economics and political science professor Tim Groseclose wrote “Left Turn: How Liberal Media Bias Distorts the American Mind.” It’s not just a BMW (bitch, moan and whine) book about media bias. Groseclose tries to quantify how the advantage bias gives to Democrats.

Groseclose finds that in presidential elections “Washington D.C. correspondents vote 93-7 for the Democrat, while the rest of America votes about 50-50.” Does this kind of lopsided voting preference affect the ability of a reporter to be, pardon the expression, fair and balanced?

Groseclose writes: “[The] average voter received approximately 8.2 percent of his news from Fox, and 79.9 percent from establishment media (defined as all outlets except Fox, the internet and talk radio). Thus, the ‘reach’ of establishment media is approximately ten times that of Fox News.”

Finally, Groseclose says that media bias gives 8 to 10 points to the Democrat right out of the gate in a typical election. But for media bias, the average state would vote like Texas. If not for bias, Groseclose argues “John McCain would have defeated Obama 56-42, instead of losing 53-46.”

Obviously bias is not a death sentence. Republicans control most of the governorships and most to the state legislatures. And despite bias, Republicans do win presidential contests. It it’s a heavy lift to overcome an out-of-the-gate, 8-to-10 point disadvantage given the other side by our objective, nonpartisan news corp.

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