I don’t have cable and rarely watch live TV so I have no idea. I’ve heard his supporters claim the media ignores him but don’t know if that is true or not. He sounds like he has been on several interview shows lately though, but I don’t know about the news. What little TV news I watch gives far. More airtime to someone like trump instead of Sanders though.
If they do ignore him, what is the motive? Because his views do not fit within the Overton window that the mainstream considers acceptable? Because his views are hostile to the economic class who owns media outlets?
Is Sanders actually being ignored (again, I rarely watch TV news so I have no idea) and if so why?
I flipped back through a list of Sunday morning talkshows for the last few weeks, and Bernie seems to be on one or the other every week. Obviously that’s not a perfect measure, but the Sunday shows seem to be the most institutional TV news interview shows, so I think its a decent proxy for how much access someone is getting from the traditional TV media.
So claims Sanders are being shut-out seem false.
(After the first debate, a bunch of Sanders supporters were claiming post-debate polling was somehow rigged. A depressing number of Bernie fans seem to be prone to the same mistake Ron Paul fans used to make, interpreting every event as some institutional conspiracy against their guy.)
I think the analogy to the Ron Paul cult is pretty apt. His followers are passionate but not always realistic. He’s a splendid fellow, but he’s not going to win.
I don’t think he’s been shut out at all. He had a long interview with Rachel Maddow last night and makes the regular talk show rounds. Next debate, he’ll get more time to make his case since we won’t have to pretend to care about Webb and Chafee.
There was a point during the campaign where the media tended to dismiss Sanders as “that crazy Socialist”. Then his campaign announced that he’d raised nearly as much money in the third quarter as Clinton, and had received over a million individual donations, nearly all under $200. They’ve taken him seriously since then.
Yes, they’re still treating him as someone who isn’t going to win, because he almost certainly won’t, but he’s no longer dismissed out of hand. As a Bernie supporter, I’m pretty much content with the media coverage he gets these days.
Yes, many of his supporters believe in the conspiracy, as did Ron Paul’s.
Yes, he gets coverage.
Yes, the coverage usually makes it sound inevitable that Clinton will win.
Yes, Clinton and Trump get more airtime because they are better for the ratings, and she is more newsworthy due to her computer server.
Yes, one could detect that many talking heads feel threatened by him because he self-identified as a socialist, and that is a naughty word.
Because that’s what the evidence, the poll data, shows.
I thought it was because they were leading in the polls. Huh, learn something new every day.
On Fox, anyway.
I find I can’t turn on the TV without Sanders being interviewed. Last night on TRMS, last week on Bill Maher. Some other show as well which I just can’t recall at the moment.
I love me some Sanders. I just don’t see him as being presidential material. Speaker of the House, for sure.
I can watch him berate right wingers and Wall Street fat cats on a continuous loop.
He’s that lovable but crazy relative you just love to wind up and let loose.
Sanders seems to be getting plenty of coverage AFAICT. Clinton is likely getting more because as the perceived likely victor she’s under more scrutiny, hence more newsworthy. Trump is probably getting the most by a fair margin because he’s the perfect storm for ratings – he’s the front-runner and he’s crazy! Whereas Sanders is unlikely to win and is boringly sensible. It’s all about ratings.
The idea that Sanders is being purposely ignored by the media because of his views is some sort of conspiracy theory, because the media would much prefer there to be a horserace rather than just Clinton as the inevitable winner. When he first started his campaign, a lot of news organizations were excited, even though he seemed like a super longshot, because it made the Democratic campaign much more interesting.
He seems to get a lot of coverage now. I suspect that for some supporters there would never be enough coverage of him.
Somewhere, Martin O’Malley is reading Bernie supporters complain about their candidate not getting enough media attention and trying not to throw up
He’s a Senator, so that’s pretty unlikely. Technically possible. but unlikely.
I wonder if there’s some degree of embarrassment among media pundits over Sanders. The early consensus was that his campaign would just be a footnote because everyone knew that his views were too far outside the accepted political mainstream. (And I’ll admit I was among those who said this.)
But Sanders’ views are obviously a lot more popular than anyone anticipated. As a result, it’s the pundits who are looking out of touch with political reality.
You have polls from next autumn? :eek: 
Seriously, though, I am gratified that Bernie is being treated pretty well in some media corners. I don’t really watch morning talk shows anymore, so I don’t know about those. I remember that somewhere I saw a clip of him on Late Night, and Seth Meyers was respectful of him.
It seems like the media aren’t all nuts about him (CNN and Time/Warner are apparently Clinton-aligned, if you believe the conspiracy theory). But many recognize that he is popular, he makes it a race, and he’s someone who is willing to share his opinions if asked; all of that makes him a good guest on talk shows. And he’s a hundred times more credible than Ben Carson, anyway.
People who don’t get the mainstream media narrative they think they deserve assume there’s a political agenda at work. On the contrary, the mainstream media covers stuff and people that will sell papers, get ratings and get clicks.
Trump’s getting coverage not because the media wants him to win, it’s because people are interested in him. Obama got coverage not because the media wanted him to win in '08, but because people were interested.
Sanders just isn’t as interesting to mainstream America as Sanders supporters seem to think or hope he is.
No political agenda. Just money.