media coverage

Media Bias: The More, the Better

by Ryan Young on August 12, 2009

in Culture, Odds & Ends

David Boaz makes an excellent point about media coverage of President Obama’s health care proposal:

The media tendency to refer to the defeat of a big-government scheme as “failure” reflects a possibly unconscious bias toward government action.

Well put. Why not make it conscious, then? Call it truth in advertising.

An objective media would be nice. But we are unlikely to ever see such a thing. Even the very best reporters are human. And humans are biased. Different people are biased in different ways, of course. But objectivity is still a fiction. Being open about this ugly truth could do much to reduce public confusion.

If readers have a clearer idea of what exactly they’re reading, they can run the articles through their liberal and conservative B.S. filters as needed, and more easily get to the heart of the matter.

Few readers seem to bother so long as the liberal Washington Post and conservative Washington Times continue with their objectivity charades. Bias can be harmful and misleading, true. But denying it only avoids the problem. Let’s tackle it instead.

Why Good Men Don’t Become President Anymore

by Ryan Young on January 20, 2009

in Odds & Ends, Personal Liberty, Politics as Usual, Zeitgeist

President-elect Obama became President Obama today. It is worth taking a minute to reflect on the nature of his office.  Exactly what has he gotten himself into?

Good men rarely become president. Good people don’t even want to be president. Once in a while, one slips through the cracks. George Washington. Abraham Lincoln. Grover Cleveland (not kidding). Maybe Barack Obama will be added to that list some day. It’s too early to tell.

I have some doubts. Here’s why: becoming president requires years of campaigning and fundraising, handshaking and deal-making — no one can possibly endure the modern campaign unless they thirst for power to their very core.

Campaigning for even minor office requires months of the candidate prostrating himself before people he’s never met. Making grand promises he couldn’t possibly keep. The things that must do to his mind. Especially if he starts buying his own hype.

Our candidate must hide his true beliefs. He has to tailor his opinions to match the median voter’s. He dares not follow his own heart or mind. He’d lose for sure.

Good people carry themselves with pride and dignity. The man or woman who voluntarily embarks on the modern campaign has neither.

And the media coverage. The spotlight so bright that it burns. Unkempt reporters always scurrying underfoot. Never a moment to yourself on the campaign trail.

Worse, the strain it puts on your family. Long weeks of separation. Unflattering exposés, revealing your relatives’ personal lives for millions to see.

Good people do not do that to their families.

Nor do good people seek power over other human beings. Morality in politics is that of Thrasymachus in Plato’s Republic; might makes right. No parent would teach that to their child. It is wrong.

Yet it is the morality that men must follow to become president.

Politicians are terrible little creatures. May our children aspire to better things than the presidency.