[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
You don’t dispute that Fox News has a conservative bias, do you?
[/QUOTE]
I dispute the fact that NPR listeners = liberals. And I dispute the fact the NPR is biased towards the liberal end of things. If we’re contrasting liberal vs conservative media and audience, we need to actually put forth a liberal medium or a liberal audience.
[QUOTE=John Mace]
Yes.
NPR audience: 29% conservative. 31% liberal. 26% Middle of the Road.
There is no margin of error given, but I think we can safely assume that it is at least 2%.
[/QUOTE]
I’m not at all surprised by those numbers. More people identify as conservative than as liberal, so that’s actually a pretty significant skew toward liberal. And even if it weren’t, it is still a much more liberal audience than Fox News.
ETA: If your point is that there is no liberal version of Fox News to compare, you’re not going to get disagreement. That is, after all, our point.
[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
That’s a laugh. We’ve just spent weeks debating how much influence a certain pastor has had on the most liberal candidate in this race. For you to state that liberalism is untainted in this way is just completely false.
Completely.
You do know what today is, don’t you? The anniversary we commemorate is the death of a pretty well known liberal who was also a minister. You ought to keep this in mind as well.
[/QUOTE]
Religionism is not the same as religion. Being religiose is not the same thing as being religious. Nothing Wright said involved magical beliefs being taught to school kids as science. Neither did anything MLK said.
Modern conservatism has a decidedly fantastic, religiose, anti-critical slant to it. Gay people are evil because the magic book says so. Evolution is evil because the magic book says so. Anybody who is predisposed to religious fundamentalism has already abandoned critical thinking. I don’t think there’s any dispute that many aspects of conservative belief are founded on nothing but religious belief. This kind of ideological sloppiness is not found on the left.
[QUOTE=John Mace]
I dispute the fact that NPR listeners = liberals. And I dispute the fact the NPR is biased towards the liberal end of things. If we’re contrasting liberal vs conservative media and audience, we need to actually put forth a liberal medium or a liberal audience.
[/QUOTE]
That’s a good point and I mostly agree- I think you’d find that most Air America listeners (for example) are less well-informed than NPR listeners, NPR being an organization that appears to still practice actual journalism.
I still think it is at least relevant that some huge percentage of Fox News watchers would consider NPR wildly liberal, based on my own exhasutive survey of the sample set of Fox News viewers with whom I regularly interact. In response I think Fox news stories would be much improved with sound effects of banging pots and soft jazz in the background.
[QUOTE=Richard Parker]
I’m not at all surprised by those numbers. More people identify as conservative than as liberal, so that’s actually a pretty significant skew toward liberal. And even if it weren’t, it is still a much more liberal audience than Fox News.
ETA: If your point is that there is no liberal version of Fox News to compare, you’re not going to get disagreement. That is, after all, our point.
[/QUOTE]
No, that is not my point. There may not be a liberal TV version of Fox, but I’ve been spectacularly unimpressed by the internet favorites of this board’s liberals: MediaMatters and ThinkProgess. I’ve seen the same sort of spin and distortion on those cites as you see on Fox, and more to the point, I’ve seen the same circle jerk feedback from the respondents.
Mmmm, no. First off, the Unholy Alliance between the poltical conservative movement and the knuckle-walking Bible thumpers was a marriage of convenience. The tighty rightys exploited them until the Trogs started to catch on that, no, the corporados don’t really care if Bruce marries Bruce. Mr. Dobson wants to ban Britteny’s titties, Comcast wants to sell Britteny’s titties, and money talks. Loud.
In the interest of solidarity, I will nod my head in solemn agreement. Yes. Quite.
[QUOTE=stolichnaya]
That’s a good point and I mostly agree- I think you’d find that most Air America listeners (for example) are less well-informed than NPR listeners, NPR being an organization that appears to still practice actual journalism.
I still think it is at least relevant that some huge percentage of Fox News watchers would consider NPR wildly liberal, based on my own exhasutive survey of the sample set of Fox News viewers with whom I regularly interact. In response I think Fox news stories would be much improved with sound effects of banging pots and soft jazz in the background.
[/QUOTE]
Yes, I think many or most conservatives would consider NPR to be liberally biased. But I’ve seen surveys that demonstrate the exact opposite-- that NPR has more guests who are conservative than who are liberal. And the audience is split pretty much right down the middle.
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
This kind of ideological sloppiness is not found on the left.
[/QUOTE]
People are equal because the Good Book says so?
C’mon. You talk about ideological sloppiness and exhibit some yourself here.
[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
People are equal because the Good Book says so?
C’mon. You talk about ideological sloppiness and exhibit some yourself here.
[/QUOTE]
MLK was a preacher, not a politician, but I don’t see any magical religious assumptions in that speech.
[QUOTE=John Mace]
No, that is not my point. There may not be a liberal TV version of Fox, but I’ve been spectacularly unimpressed by the internet favorites of this board’s liberals: MediaMatters and ThinkProgess. I’ve seen the same sort of spin and distortion on those cites as you see on Fox, and more to the point, I’ve seen the same circle jerk feedback from the respondents.
[/QUOTE]
But the readership of those blogs is a drop in the bucket.
And again, the effort here isn’t to establish whether there is a relative difference.
[QUOTE=John Mace]
And the audience is split pretty much right down the middle.
[/QUOTE]
But that’s a very misleading statistic. If a radio show’s listernership was 35% African-American and 65% white, that would show a significant skew toward African-American listeners. Similarly, you have to look at the overall balance of self-identifying liberals and conservatives to make sense of your numbers. Only a tenth of Republicans and less than half of Democrats identify as liberal, while more than half of Republicans and about a quarter of Democrats identify as Conservative (according to Pew). So a 31/29 skew is significant.
[QUOTE=John Mace]
…MediaMatters and ThinkProgess. I’ve seen the same sort of spin and distortion on those cites as you see on Fox…
[/QUOTE]
Really? Seems rather carefully worded, John. You see “the same sort”. Do you see the same predominance? Are you suggesting an equivalence in terms of the amount of time/verbiage devoted to spin and slant? A tough case to make, in my estimation.
John, I actually haven’t seen much of either of those websites being cited or discussed around here. I certainly don’t seek out those sites and I’m not sure I’ve ever even seen thinkprogress. What makes you call them liberal “favorites” on this board.
[QUOTE=elucidator]
Really? Seems rather carefully worded, John. You see “the same sort”. Do you see the same predominance? Are you suggesting an equivalence in terms of the amount of time/verbiage devoted to spin and slant? A tough case to make, in my estimation.
[/QUOTE]
No, I don’t mean the same predominance because I don’t think that can be objectively measured. I won’t try and prove some sort of equivalence between conservatives and liberals, only that I see similar behaviors in both camps. Is one side worse than the other? Maybe. I just object to the idea, presented above, that liberals are somehow less in need of and less prone to circle jerk in the way that conservatives do.
[QUOTE=John Mace]
Yes.
NPR audience: 29% conservative. 31% liberal. 26% Middle of the Road.
There is no margin of error given, but I think we can safely assume that it is at least 2%.
[/QUOTE]
Here is data from a right wing site.
Here’s another.
From context, this poll was from 2007.
As an example of the difference, consider comics. Doonesbury tends to twit whoever is in power. The closest thing to a conservative strip, Mallard Fillmore, has had almost nothing bad to say about Bush - at least while I was getting the Merc. Exception - when he got too liberal.
But the evidence supports me. Liberal media never attracts the same kind of audiences as right wing media.
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
But the evidence supports me. Liberal media never attracts the same kind of audiences as right wing media.
[/QUOTE]
Maybe the liberal media never found someone who was as skilled at entertaining the listenership.
Who do you think had the most raw talent for entertainment in liberal radio?
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
This board welcomes views from all political stripes and the liberals here actually seek out disagreement and debate. There are no circle jerks here. Look how many lefties in this thread are saying they don’t like Randi Rhodes or Air America. You never find righties stepping out of lockstep like that.
[/QUOTE]
Am I a “righty?”
[QUOTE=Bricker]
Am I a “righty?”
[/QUOTE]
Not a typical one.
[QUOTE=mlees]
Maybe the liberal media never found someone who was as skilled at entertaining the listenership.
[/QUOTE]
Al Franken on his worst day is always more entertaining than Limbaugh on his best, IME.
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
Not a typical one.
[/QUOTE]
He’s not a true Scotsman either!