New York Times: Biased?

Great Debates
1

Opening paragraph from an article in today’s NYT:

“Facing a record budget deficit, Bush administration officials say they have drafted an election-year budget that will rein in the growth of domestic spending without alienating politically influential constituencies.”
Link to entire article:

I don’t have any problem with the NYT incidentally observing as a matter of historical fact that the announced budget comes in an election year or that the budget itself does not severely disfavor some politically influential segments of the populace. Nor would I mind if the Times integrated into an account of what officials actually announced some “analysis” that sought to draw some connection between these circumstances. But unless the Bush administration officials themselves expressly characterized the package as “an election year budget” or explicitly identified “avoiding the alienation of politically influential constituencies” as one of its purposes or effects, is it really fair to report that those same officials “said” as much?

Could not the same points be made far more fairly like this:

“Facing a record budget deficit, Bush administration officials say they have drafted budget that will rein in the growth of domestic spending. The proposed budget, coming as it does in an election year, seeks to achieve the announced objective without alienating politically influential constituencies”?

I wish to emphasize that my concern is not over the inclusion of “insight” in a news report, but over its misattribution.

2

Well since that’s the way the NYT reported it, we are led to assume that, according to the NYT, the Bush administration did say it. Of course, the chances of it being true are very low, thus leading me to infer that it’s just the writer’s (and possibly the NYT’s) bias showing up.

3

That thought occurred to me too, Sleeping, which is why I included a link to the complete article. If the officials has indeed issued the chartacterizations ascribed to them by the Times, the article would surely include some quotes so demonstrating. It doesn’t, which is what prompted the OP.

4

Well, I took a stand here on behalf of AlJazeera here a few months ago, and now I’ll do the same for The NYT.

This particular error seems to be pretty innocuous, and it is what I feel is an allowable bit of analysis, since the election is clearly what motivated this new little bit of financial sense from our little friends in the Bush Administration.

Since the NYT web site requires registration, I really cannot comment on all of the current stories on its frontpage, but from when I have read it in Starbucks, I have generally found its reporting to be unbiased and it takes very seriously its mandate to print truthful, balanced, accurate stories.

But, just like AlJazeera, the bias of the NYT’s shows in its “non-opinion coverage” of cultural events or books. I really hate to cite Bill O’Reilley to support anything, but failing to do a review of a #1 NYT best seller when reviewing so many other liberal books that reached lesser levels of financial success, and importantly, generally being of the same scholarly integrity, shows some definite bias.

Conclusion: What the reporters, editors, and management of the NYT’s really believes is obviously left, but they do a good job of reporting the serious stories, less so with “softer” subjects.

5

threemae:

As I said, threemae, the analysis itself is entirely allowable. But what about the implication, apparently quite incorrect, that administration officials had somehow “validated” the correctness of the analysis by their own statements?

6

Just to point out, the Left has also had some gripes with the New York Times over the years. They are certainly not perfect but overall, I think the Times covers the news pretty straight, as does the Wall Street Journal despite the fact that their editorial / op-ed page is dominated by the far right / libertarian viewpoints (with a very occasional moderate or liberal voice like Albert Hunt thrown in). As far as I see, the New York Times editorial / op-ed page is certainly left of the American center although not far left.

7

That’s your evidence of bias? They placed a descriptive clause in an inappropriate place?

8

Did they even do that?

9

I fail to see any evidence that the unnamed official didn’t say exactly what the Times says he or she did. Do you think that the official would not discuss the impact on Republican constituencies? Is it not an election year budget? Rmat’s writing is not as tight as the writing quoted also.

threemae - the Times Book Review often does not review best sellers or many campaign biographies. Sometimes I think they deliberately do not review best sellers. Books that are not very timely, or are surprises, may get reviewed later. I don’t remember seeing a review of Michael Moore’s new book. Franken’s book did get reviewed, I think, but it was newsworthy of itself. I really doubt there is any bias (political bias at least) in the Book Review.

10

Voyager:

If the administration officials has said exactly what the Times said they said, it would have made for one juicy (i.e., newsworthy) quote. That the balance of the article contains neither such a quote nor any elaboration in support of such a quote (while it does contain additional details supportive of considerably more innocuous — and thus more plausible — statements by administration officials (e.g., “They said the president’s proposed budget for the 2005 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, would control the rising cost of housing vouchers for the poor, require some veterans to pay more for health care, slow the growth in spending on biomedical research and merge or eliminate some job training and employment programs. The moves are intended to trim the programs without damaging any essential services, the administration said”) suggests that the officials did not make the statements ascribed to them. Any yes, I would find it very odd if administration officials had expressly linked any budget details to a desire to advance the interests of “Republican constituencies” or to any other electoral considerations.

My rewrite, while perhaps not quite as “tight” as what the Times published, is a good deal more precise in identifying what administration officals actually said, and in distinguishing that from the Times’ own insinuations about what motivated the administration’s budget planning

11

Registration at NewYorkTimes.com is free. They don’t even send me email.

As for bias, I did see a piece on their front page a few weeks ago that was written in a very slanted tone… but strangely, it slanted right. It was an article on gay marriage that called 55% “strong support” for banning it. Not at one point did the article have a comment from a solid gay marriage supporter. Nor did it ever indicate that, historically, amendments that have passed have support in the high 80s, nor that 55% is a small number compared to the 67% in Congress needed to amend, or the 75% of states required. There were several quotes, but they skewed (IIRC) almost 2 to 1 towards religious folks who were talking gloom and doom about how despicable gay marriage would be. A very slanted piece. Shockingly shoddy.

On the other side, the opinion page, during the nadir of Raines’s reign, actually held a “party line” stance for columnists, punting and axing columns and columnists who did not support positions taken by the editorial board, a gross violation of the role of the opinion page as a forum for discussion and debate.

Of the two, Raines’s actions were more pervasive and malicious, but neither is very good. I expect such shoddiness from the Kansas City Star, but not the New York Times.

Well, it would be hard to find any liberal or conservative book, aside from the works of Moore or Coulter, as poorly substantiated as a tome by O’Reilley, but I can see a number of reasons why they wouldn’t review his work.

The most obvious reason is simple: He says the same thing in every book, just using different pithy examples and putting the topical chapters in different orders. For god’s sake, this is the man’s third book in as many years. I’ve read all three, being a glutton for punishment, and they’re the same book with different covers. If O’Reilly were to come up with something new to say, or put a little time (and more effort) in between printings, his book would be more newsworthy.

Also, compared to the other political books out this past year, his sold poorly. Al Franken outsold him by a good distance. So, I believe, did Michael (ugh) Moore. Hillary Clinton lapped them all, repeatedly. Perhaps O’Reilly’s constant lies about how well his book was selling turned the book editors off the idea of reviewing it. :wink:

12

Sorry, this is all based from the NPR interview on Fresh Air.

13

Sorry, this is all based from the NPR interview on Fresh Air.

14

Sorry, this is all based from the NPR interview on Fresh Air.

Very interesting point on the gay marriage article.

15

How do you know what the administration officials did or did not say?

16

Gingerly ** Rmat** asked…

Is the New York Times biased?

Opening paragraph from an article in today’s NYT:

Ha!
Is the Pope old?
Can John Lee Hooker boogie?

Of course the New York Times is biased. Come let us parse together…

Facing a record budget deficit…

Oh yes New York Times, a record budget deficit, thank you for kindly reminding us. Now what was it that you wanted to say?

** Bush administration officials say they have drafted an election-year budget **…

Oh, I get it, an “election year budget”. How refreshingly honest for the administration officials to tell you as much.

** … that will rein in the growth of domestic spending without alienating politically influential constituencies.**

Well now I’m mad. Them damn administration offcials are pandering to their damn politically influnential conistituenties and that means taking care of the damn big shots and the Mexicans and forgetting about the average working man.
Thank you, New York Times, your expose of the secret stratigies of them damn Republican administrative officials is worthy of your reputation.

17

Squink

As I was not present at the briefing, I obviously cannot be certain what was said. But as I have explained above, commons sense suggests that adminstration officials themselves would not likely ascribe rank partisan motives to the President, and if by some small chance they actually had, it would have been an event so noteworthy that the Times would have documented it with a direct quote or, at the very least, by providing considerable additional elaboration (as it did with respect to the adminstration’s identification of the targets of the proposed budget cuts).

18

Interestingly, there is an editorial in the Sunday NYT Week in Review section specifically about that article. The editorial calls the NYT to task about the poll, but more so for the selective quote from Bush. He was quoted as saying he would support an anti-gay marriage amendment, but the quote left out the part where he said “if necessary”. The NYT apparently corrected that problem a few days later (but who ever really takes note of those corrections). Anyway, I’m not sure if you can link to that editorial yet, but it’s an intersting read. The NYT calls itself biased. Does that mean it isn’t?:slight_smile:

19

As to the story cited in the OP: in the absence of evidence that “Administration officials” made anonymous or attributable comments about not alienating key constituencies with the budget plan, the paragraph’s language crosses the line from reporting into editorializing. Given the paper’s consistent editorial opposition to the Bush Administration, it is reasonable to view this as evidence of bias.

Overall, I don’t find Times reporting to exhibit consistent bias of this sort.

It’d be interesting to see what their ombudsman might say. Maybe an offended Doper could forward this example for comment.

20

Ahh, that’s where we differ. I don’t see the suggestion that the budget is designed to favor groups that the administration wishes to curry favor with as an admission of “rank partisan motives.” Budgets have always been done with the constituents in mind, and they should be.