JohnH3
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@patricksplace Interesting. I'll give you the point on "never".
The part about using The Blaze as a "source" I do find interesting though. Let's talk about sourcing, but first a question: Have any of the Blaze citations I have provided been false?
As I tell my friends, Obama's speech carried live by Fox News or Blaze TV is no less accurate than that same live feed carried by CNN or even MSNBC, is it?
Let's take the AR-15 carried by the black man at the anti-Obama rally. Which do you dispute as truth, the video capture of the MSNBC coverage or the raw video taken at the event used in the MSNBC coverage? Both videos are truth, the video of what MSNBC actually aired is accurate and the unedited video of the event is accurate. The only untruth was in the content of MSNBCs reporting: a rifle carried by a black man is not evidence of white racism against a black president (Ironically a media narrative that Republicans are racist.) Looking at both the edited and raw video, did you yourself not see the 2 edits necessary to remove the race of the man carrying the rifle? Having seen the edits yourself, is the story less true because it was printed in The Blaze or brought to your attention by me?
Let's take the Romney speech on Wawa touch screens. Is the video capture of MSNBCs coverage altered? I've seen it various places captured by various sources and it's exactly the same in each instance. I have also seen, in it's entirety, second source raw video of the actual Romney speech. I have personally noted that MSNBC edited the Romney speech video using 3 selected portions completely out of context to make it appear Romney is saying something that he, in truth and in reality, did not say. It's like cutting up the NY Times to make a ransom note and claiming the ransom note was the work of the NY Times. When you watched the raw video and the MSNBC story, did you not see with your own eyes the multiple edits necessary to create the falsehood that Romney said that it was the touchscreens at Wawa that were "amazing"? Having done your own analysis, is the story that MSNBC edited video to make Romney appear "out of touch", ironically a media narrative of wealthy Republicans, less true because it was originally brought to my attention by The Blaze and to your attention by me? (I was going to side by side the raw and edited videos but just haven't had the chance. Looks like I need to do that.)
Multiple NBC orgs and affiliates edited the George Zimmerman 911 call on multiple occasions. Did these NBC orgs wrongly fire people or was the story brought to my attention by The Blaze accurate and people deserved to be fired?
I never used to have a particular distaste for NBC news. That mistrust has developed in the last year as these incidents have become more blatant.
Just to show you where I am coming from: It has been widely reported in The Blaze and the conservative media that Obama was referring to peoples small businesses when he said, "you didn't build that." I've stated on my Facebook several times that Obama is referring to the US infrastructure in his statement and not the business itself. I'm not a sheep. I look at evidence and draw my own conclusions. I can't help that the MSM can't or won't police itself and that it takes other organizations, typically conservative organizations (for reasons on which we disagree), to be the watchdogs of the MSM who are supposed to be the watchdogs of the Government and not cheerleaders for one side or the other. Don't you find it interesting that these media "mistakes" disproportionately go in favor of the Liberal, Progressive or Democrat candidate, politician or issue? (I used "disproportionately" rather than "always" despite the fact that I cannot recall an incident in which the MSM has erred in favor of a Conservative/Republican person or issue. I'm all ears if you have one.)
I source the folks who report the story. If nobody reports the story except the Blaze and I find the story true and accurate, what do you suggest I do?
@patricksplace @JohnH3 Regarding conflict of interest, I'd go with full disclosure as a start an take it from there. You've piqued my curiosity with the question. I sense another shoe on it's way to the floor. :PI recall NBC news doing all manner of "green" reporting on how wind turbines and some other technologies were going to save the day without ever disclosing that GE, the "parent company of this network", was the manufacturer of many of the technologies the "news" was pushing. NBC did the same all through "green week" with no such disclosure.
@patricksplace :) Sorry, "mistakenly" should have been in those annoying "air quotes". :P :D
@patricksplace Oh. I thought the topic was whether or not the media biased it's news coverage in favor of a particular narrative or narratives. Multiple examples were provided in the article and several more have been discussed in the subsequent discussion. I thought that by continuing to provide further examples as they were committed by the media it would further discussion.
It wasn't my intention to "hijack". I thought of my additional posts as "the next installment in a continuing series of investigative reports", as the news guys would advertise it.
I assume you'd like me to stop posting evidence of news mistakenly being altered to support a liberal narrative? If so, I will comply, sadly, but I will.
Cheers!
@TedtheThird @JohnH3 Hi Ted! Tanks again for the encouragement. I have through about it, mostly due to your guys suggestions (and no, I don't think you are just trying to get rid of me. :) ) Honestly, I do enough "blogging" on facebook and if I started another outlet that took even more time away from other things I think my wife would take my computer away. :P I am still thinking about it though. I do enjoy the discussion.
Part of the reason to return here periodically is just to accumulate incidents in one spot, enough to hopefully, someday, create some kind of critical mass which can no longer be ignored or explained away as accident or mistake. As you see, It's been many months since I've popped in. I've had other problems (darn near got laid off. :( , but, I found another position in the company so I'm ok...for now. :) )
Rest assured, If I start a blog I will let you guys know so you can come torment me. :)
Any thoughts on this latest MSNBC incident?
Cheers!
Hi Patrick! Long time no write. :P New controversy for you, more editing and misrepresentation by MSNBC. Even the NYTimes and Huffington Post are pointing out this one. From the audio and from eyewitness accounts, the crowd is chanting "Romney. Romney", but MSNBC puts "Ryan. Ryan." up on the screen. They then go on to talk about how Romney isn't supported but rather Ryan is garnering the support and Romney is secondary. Here's the Blaze article: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/another-msnbc-scandal-blaze-readers-at-campaign-event-claim-network-misled-in-video-of-rally-chant/ In what is portrayed as an awkward moment for Romney as he allegedly tries to reinsert his name into the chant, it is actually a moment of humility for Romney as he tries to get the crowd to add his runningmates name to the chant. This is a very similar story to that of the black rifle-toting attendee at the anti-Obama rally having his race hidden by MSNBC so they can talk about the anti-black racism of the tea party crowd.This is also a similar alteration of reality as I posted in an earlier comment: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/some-never-learn-msnbc-caught-selectively-editing-romney-video-to-make-him-seem-out-of-touch/And why not air this audio/video after the WH has confirmed it's authenticity? Would it hurt Obama?http://www.theblaze.com/stories/msnbc-host-says-she-wont-air-obama-98-redistribution-audio-because-its-not-confirmed-even-though-presidents-campaign-confirmed-this-morning/
While it remains an arguable point (and heaven knows we've argued it :P) that there is an obvious Liberal bias in the "Main Stream Media" overall, I think we can close the book on MSNBC/NBC, as an individual news entity, as an unbiased source of any factual information?How much evidence does there need to be before we can agree that MSNBC is severely and intentionally biased, is now and has been engaged in altering evidence to support a narrative, and cannot be trusted as a source of news?
@TedtheThird Thanks Ted, and Patrick for the same suggestion. If I didn't know how much you guys appreciated having me comment here, I'd think you were trying to get rid of me. :P :)I've asserted before that the evidence points to a media narrative that the Tea Party is "violent". I think yesterdays example from Brian Ross of ABC News is yet another data point corroborating this assertion.
Think back to the Gabrielle Giffords shooting in Tuscon, AZ and how quickly the media worked to connect the shooter to Conservative Talk Radio and Sarah Palins use of Bob Beckels (D, Walter Mondales Presidential Campaign manager) "bullseyes" on Congressional districts, including that of Ms. Giffords. Despite any supporting evidence and in spite of a plethora of evidence to the contrary, the MSM and the Left continues to spread the myth that the Giffords shooter was somehow afiliated with Conservative groups and/or the Tea Party.
Fast forward to the Aurora, CO shootings of Friday morning. In less than 12 hours ABC News Brian Ross was on the air with ABC's "Chief Investigator" attempting to link the Aurora shooter to the Colorado Tea Party. Armed only with the fact that the names were the same ABC News came out and said that there is a James Holmes who has a webpage on the Colorado Tea Party site though we're not sure if it's the James Holmes who is the shooter.
Really? Less than 12 hours after a massacre that left 12 dead we have at first member of the MSM, with the backing of a National Broadcast news organization, using the incident for political purposes and to further the narrative that the "Tea Party is violent"? Not since the Giffords incident have I seen a more disgusting, repugnant, reprehensible example of the medias attempt to further the narrative they themselves created, which some still deny in the face of overwhelming and ever increasing evidence.
I am very interested to hear the explanation for this latest incident. I understand that a link between the shooter and the Tea Party is news which the country so needs to know that it must be rushed to air with only a Google hit to rely on as "fact". Let's see if ABC News has the integrity to fire the producer, "Chief Investigator" and Brian Ross for this gross abrogation of journalistic integrity. My suspicion is that they will not. They will conduct an internal investigation and declare themselves to have clean hands and that the rush to air was simply an "honest mistake" made in the "heat of the moment".
Your thoughts?
@patricksplace It is a journalists job to be fair and it is their job to leave their bias out of the story. I believe that were the media populated with a balance of left and right, progressive and conservative, that they could significantly reduce bias by being a check/balance to each other. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of the MSM is of a Progressive/left mindset. When they sit to determine bias in their stories/edits, none of them see it simply because none of them see it.
Let me illustrate using the analogy of colorblindness. If I have a room full of colorblind people and they all agree that the red wallpaper is green, the red wallpaper is green. When they go to show the public their green wallpaper, their not intentionally being biased because they all believe that the wallpaper is green. Nobody who is not colorblind is there to tell them otherwise. People watching who aren't colorblind see the red wallpaper and say that their lying about it being green, their not lying, their bias has unintentionally biased their story. I do not believe that all instances of bias are intentional,as in this example. The problem is that there isn't enough diversity in our nations newsrooms to allow for anyone to notice the bias/colorblindness. The left believes that diversity makes everything better. This would be true in the newsroom but that is where the left least wants diversity, especially when it comes to ideology.
You accuse me of believing that every occurrence of bias is intentional, which is not what I believe. I believe that there are where the MSM will put up a colorwheel, spin it so it appears white, then tell the public that the wheel is, in fact, white and has no color on it. Stop the wheel and the color is there, but because it is spinning it only appears white when in fact it is not - and they know it. These are the examples which I believe that I have brought to your attention: rifle toting blacks being spun into rifle toting whites; Romneys speech on governments lack of innovation spun into a mocking of an out of touch rich-guy; a self-defense shooting being spun into a Hunger Games-like hunt for black youth; stories about a Romney-less Bain Capital outsourcing jobs overseas while ignoring $29B in taxpayer dollars which actually went to overseas corporations by a Democrat President. The list goes on and on. Each instance by itself explained away as an oversight or mistake, but when taken as a whole show what analysts call a "trend" or "pattern of behavior".
You would have me believe that Bernie Madoff mistakenly misinvested one guys money. The fact that he made that mistake thousands of times seems irrelevant. All those "misinvestments" were easily explained and completely unrelated. Nothing to see here, move along please. That is why I pop-in every few weeks or months and drop off another piece of evidence, another datapoint which one can used in the determination of a trend. Examine the trend, the pattern, and not the individual datapoints.
Just as the media is the watchdog over the government, the people are the watchdog over the media. I think the latter part of that statement may explain the rise, rather the resurgence of the citizen journalist.
@patricksplace Good find!
Let me clarify: I do not watch the MSM organizations, except for occasionally amusement when there is a big new story and I want to see coverage for myself. Others get paid to do so and I occasionally run across one of their reports when it is posted on Drudge, The Blaze, or brought to my attention from a friend.
I will not stop and I hope that these media-watchers also do not stop keeping watch on the watchers. The "press" is very important to American Democracy and Freedom and it cannot be allowed to become corrupted (too late, many would argue). Just like there are checks and balances within the government, the media is a check on the government and media watch organizations are a check on the media. We, you and I, cannot sit by and let these transgressions go unreported and unchallenged as to do so minimizes the "check" affects that the press has on our government and allows the government to get away with corruption. I point out these instances because it is important to make the public aware of them - but based on the recent polls taken of how much people trust the media, it seems they are figuring out that these MSM organizations are already corrupt and are not reporting the truth.
Let me say that I agree that it is a somewhat misleading edit and I expect better from both Hannity and FNC (and the overwhelming majority of the time i get better), but (and you knew the but was coming. :P ) It doesn't completely is represent Hannity's representation of the first part of the Presidents statement. The point Hannity was making was that the President stated that he couldn't do what he later did. The fact that the President went on to state what he "could" do, which he really can't, is irrelevant doesn't alter the meaning of the original statement except clarify what the President thinks he can do - enforce a law which hasn't yet passed as though it had.
Hannity/FNC/PRoducers would not be in trouble with either you or Stewart had they used either the Presidents address to La Raza in which he made the declaration Hannity showed without the qualifying follow-up, or another address in which the President made a similar declaration.
As far as whether or not this was intentional, I'd have to have the refs go to instant replay and really analyze this one to determine if the edit really altered the overall analysis, especially in light of the President having made the same declaration on at least two other occasions, and whether this was, as you have clearly stated in the past, an edit for time.
The editing of the Romney speech (http://www.theblaze.com/stories/some-never-learn-msnbc-caught-selectively-editing-romney-video-to-make-him-seem-out-of-touch/) is just another example of a completely intentional misrepresentation of the truth for the purposes of continuing the media narrative that Republicans are rich and out of touch with American life. No rational person can look at the editing job, which took seconds from the beginning, middle and near-end of a speech and completely altered the meaning of what was said. The only thing that could have been more egregious would be for them to have taken individual words and assembled them to make Romney say whatever they wanted while arguing that Romney had "actually said those words".
Romneys speech use the example of the Wawa touch screens and an innovation which he found "amazing" that the government has not yet adopted. MSNBC so altered his statement so as to make it look like he thought these newfangled touchscreens were "amazing". Then they laughed at him. Again, the equivalent of editing the fact that a man with a rifle is black out of a video while talking about the racism inherent in gun-toting whites. These are clear examples of intentional and malicious editing and the public is starting to both be aware of these things and to not tolerate them - as evidenced by the ratings drops.
I implore you and your readers, for the sake of freedom from a tyrannical government, restore the integrity of the MSM as the watchdog against government abuse by exposing these mistruths when they occur. The MSM needs to come back to being part of the solution and stop being part of the corruption.
Just stopping in to add another bit of evidence to this neglected thread. Hope all is well in Patrick-land. :)
Nice. :) And no, I'm not here to wreck a nice article. :)
gen·er·al·i·za·tion Noun:A general statement or concept obtained by inference from specific cases
I agree with your friend that every generalization has exceptions because, as defined above, a generalization is inferred. I disagree with your friend when he says that something is fair when we know it's biased. So, if I know that the teacher is going to give the girls better grades than the boys (and I had that teacher in fifth grade) it doesn't make it fair to the boys.
Now, take my favorite generalization: the MSM is biased. Technically that shouldn't be a generalization because all humans a biased because we are flawed and the MSM is made up of humans, therefore, the MSM is biased - both ways, left and right, because the people who make it up are. Now, some in the media try their darndest to overcome and not show their bias. Others try to claim they are unbiased and just can't help showing their bias.
For example: I'm not here to rehash the past but Patrick and I have a disagreement on whether the three separate NBC edits of the George Zimmerman 911 call were intentional or not and whether those edits reflected bias. Patrick made a decent justification for each one being a "mistake" and I made the generalization, the "inference from specific cases" (in this case repeated cases) that they were examples of bias/narrative/worldview, whether intentional or not, altering the facts of a news story to the benefit of the leftist ideology.
Same for the case of the "Tea Party Rifleman" being used by MSNBC as an example of the TP's violent racist tendencies in opposition to a Black President. MSNBC discussed the danger "white men with guns" posed to a black President but had perfectly (and completely accidentally) edited the video to hide the fact the man carrying the rifle was African American. Ooops. I guess the race of the rifleman wasn't important to a story about guns and race.
Today I was made aware of yet another MSNBC "mistake". In an effort to portray Mitt Romney as being "out of touch", MSNBC (weird how "NBC" keeps cropping up) heavily edited a video of Romney talking about using a touchscreen to order a hoagie at a Wawa convenience store (Wawa is the best, btw.). This was to be Romneys "George HW Bush grocery scanner moment". The problem is, as with the African American rifleman, the incident didn't quite happen as distorted MSNBC video showed.
Your honor, may I submit for the record my umpteenth piece of documented evidence of MSM bias, at least as commited by MSNBC: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/some-never-learn-msnbc-caught-selectively-editing-romney-video-to-make-him-seem-out-of-touch/
Again, another "mistake" that works out for those with a leftist ideology. If these edits were all "mistakes" then why aren't they 50/50 in favor of left/right ideologies? Does anyone have any examples of an NBC or MSNBC "mistake" which favored a Conservative view by making a Progressive or a Democrat look bad? I think the folks at the various NBC's are flipping a two-headed coin when it comes to bias mistakes.
Cheers!
John
@patricksplace @JohnH3 Ah, I understand what you were saying now and agree, those facts are insufficient to prove a motivation of racism.
@patricksplace I understand exactly what the article is about and the point you are trying to make. I am confused then. Why did you write, '...because we don’t know if race might have been the motivation that made Zimmerman follow the teen to begin with. What we do know is that when asked what the teen’s race was by a 911 operator, Zimmerman responded that the teen “looked black."' Maybe I misunderstood but it read to me that you were citing Zimmermans statement as something which we "do know" about Zimmermans motivation that night with regard to race.
You rightly ask, "How must a question about race be asked for the question itself to be either racist or not-racist?" as I rightly ask, "what is the non-racial response Zimmerman should have used?" The answer in both instances is that it can't be done because there will always be someone willing to contrive a racist charge out of any statement. This is what has happened in the Zimmerman case.
I did not state that Zimmerman reported any whites along with blacks in his numerous 911 calls. It is a question for which I would like to know the answer though. It is possible that the answer is none simply because there were no whites observed. I'd also like to know if there are other town watch personnel who patrol the community and what calls they made to 911 and what the races of those observed suspicious persons were. I'm sure the data exists but I doubt the Sanford PD has compiled it. It's really not relevant to the case of the shooting itself but it would be relevant if Eric Holder and the Justice Department file hate crime charges against Zimmerman.
The media and political correctness police are all against "profiling" even though profiling is quite often simply good police work. I reference the race of the perpetrators of the previous robberies for one simple reason: A "reasonable person", given eyewitness reports that a series of recent crimes had been committed by blacks should then be more watchful and wary of suspicious blacks in the area of the previous robberies, though not to the exclusion of suspicious persons of other races. That is smart, logical, and not racist.
Zimmerman SHOULD have had the race of the previous perpetrators in his mind that night. To ignore such a fact is just plain stupid, and, ironically "racist" as one would be discounting or ignoring evidence solely on account of race. Had whites been observed in previous crimes it would be just as smart, and just as not-racist, to be wary of suspicious whites and to factor that information in when observing a suspicious white person. A fact cannot be racist, the racism comes in how a person responds to the fact.
If there were no reports of the race of the perpetrators of the previous crimes and Zimmerman had assumed they were black and subsequently went looking for blacks, that would be racist and would be evidence of racism. That does not appear to be the case with Zimmerman.
I think we can both agree with msalakka in his reply that we should not be convicting people because of their thoughts, especially when we can only think what someones thoughts might be or have been. I have never been a fan of "hate crime" legislation. Crime is crime regardless of motivation and the presumption of motivation goes against the legal right of the presumption of innocence.
:) I think we may agree on something!
I'd add a couple things. Your statement, "Democrats insist that even one “lost” vote is one too many." Republicans/Conservatives insist on the same thing but also add that one illegally cast vote is also too many. You cover the illegally cast votes well in subsequent paragraphs but fail to tie it to the Republicans/Conservatives.
My wife worked the polls this last election and did have an interesting instance of an octogenarian who was born at home, had no birth cert, does not drive and never did, the church in which she was married no longer existed and the records confirming her married and maiden names were gone, etc. I think she was permitted to vote in the Primary election but will not be permitted to vote in the general election in Nov if she can't get the problem sorted out. We agree that there needs to be some way through the bureaucracy for her to obtain a photo ID.
Patrick O'Keefe and the Veritas Project have done some good work investigating and exposing the ease with which voter fraud can be committed, even going so far as to have been offered the ballot of US Attorney General Eric Holder in the last election! They didn't take it, of course, but the fact that the election worker argued that "If you are who you say you are you can vote this ballot without the need to go get you photo ID." In another case O'Keefes "poser" offered to go get his "foreign passport" as proof of ID. The election official insisted he didn't need the passport (completely unfazed that it was a foreign passport!) and that he could vote if he just "put an 'X' where his signature should be written. Video of these incidents and more is available on the internet.
Patrick, mostly an excellent article. I agree with your conclusions that we will never truly know if racism was a factor and, regardless the jury decision, there will still be those who won't accept it. (Regarding the non-acceptance, I put forth that if Zimmerman is acquitted there will be violence by those who do not accept it and if he is guilty there will be numerous angry blog and facebook posts by those who do not accept that decision. Even the response to the decision will be polarized with more extreme polarization on one side because one side has been stirred to a frenzy, referencing this article which we are discussing in the other thread. http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/05/trayvon_and_zimmerman_the_structure_and_elements_of_a_disinformation_campaign.html.)
There are couple things in the way you presented your case that I'd like to bring up. While the article is about how we cannot conclude racism or non-racism based on the evidence, you only cite evidence which supports the racism conclusion, influencing the reader to that conclusion. There is significantly more "what we know now..." information that was not included in the article, most likely because you just don't have it to include. I'll discuss that specific information later when we get to the Reuters article.
When you state, "What we do know is that when asked what the teen’s race was by a 911 operator, Zimmerman responded that the teen 'looked black.'", you are making almost the same mistake as was made in the first 911 audio tape edit (http://tinyurl.com/7qp3vsz). "Black" was one of the race choices offered to Zimmerman by the 911 dispatcher, "OK, and this guy — is he black, white or Hispanic?". Your phrasing leaves the reader with the suggestion that Zimmerman is racist because of his "he looks black" response, and I am reasonably certain that is not your intention. I have to ask though, if Zimmermans response is being included as some of the "what we know now" which may lead some to conclude that Zimmerman had racial motivations, what is the non-racial response Zimmerman should have used?
Additionally, the statement referenced above presupposes that Zimmerman observed suspicious non-blacks and did not report them and ignores the history of the robberies in the neighborhood in which witnesses identified the perpetrators as "black". If you are going to use past behavior you should use all past behavior. I suggest reading this Reuters article on Zimmerman (link below). There is very significant evidence in Zimmermans life that he does not engage in negative racist behavior, in fact, Zimmermans past and current behavior indicates that he is both helpful, charitable, and supportive towards African Americans, a stark contradiction of his portrayal in the media. http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/25/us-usa-florida-shooting-zimmerman-idUSBRE83O18H20120425
"And he’d reportedly called police several times before to report “suspicious” people, all of whom were black." ignores that blacks were witnessed in several of the earlier robberies and thefts in the neighborhood (again referencing the Reuters article.) If one suspects that it is the same people who are committing the robberies in the neighborhood then isn't it reasonable to include the description of those prior suspect in ones profile, applying that information to subsequent persons observed behaving suspiciously? Zimmermans gated community is 20% black, did Zimmerman ever wrongly or accidentally follow or wrongly or accidentally report suspicious behavior by one of his black neighbors because his judgement was clouded by racism?
As far as Zimmerman "tracking Martins movements through a gated community", he did attempt to follow Martin, yes, though I believe the motivation for that following came from Zimmerman himself when he said "these assholes always get away" recorded in the 911 call. Zimmerman followed Martin, I think, because he was angry that the robbers were always getting away and wanted to make sure this one didn't, not because Martin was black.
While we will never be able to conclude Zimmermans motivations with 100% certainty, I believe that the preponderance of the evidence of Zimmermans behavior towards blacks over his lifetime more supports the conclusion that the trailing of Martin and subsequent shooting was not racially motivated. We can, as rational people examining evidence, reach such a conclusion with "reasonable doubt" even though we will never be able to know Zimmermans motivation with certainty. I would say that the new evidence doesn't "prove" a lack of racism but that it rather casts significant, and very reasonable doubt on the allegation that Zimmerman acted on a motivation of racism.
@patricksplace Not being a psychologist and never having studied psychology I'd say that the psychological aspects are consistent with things I've heard over the years. I can see the real world examples in friends and associates especially of the point ,"Early and negative information has a disproportionally heavy impact ". Despite the voluminous and exculpatory evidence corroborating Zimmermans story released a couple days ago, I have several friends who are still adamant that this was a racially motivated, vigilante "murder". I do find the psychological aspects both interesting and reasonable.The other point of the article is that there is a methodology that can be employed to, dare I say, "not let a good crisis go to waste". These "events" can be, and I believe in many or most cases are, orchestrated for maximum political or personal gain by a few nefarious people. We've seen it in the past in the examples given in the article and others. People and organizations whose lifeblood literally is racial tension between white and black "gin up" fear and hatred by misrepresenting events, assigning motivation and misinforming the public.
Getting to the point of the original article on the presumption of media narrative, the media is complicit in this disinformation campaign and complicit in the misinforming of he public by both sensationalizing the story and giving heavy weighting and coverage to the "organizers" because most in the media share the world view, the presumptions, of the organizers. While there may be a few rotten apples, I don't believe that members of the media at large are in conspiracy with the organizers. I simply believe that they are reporting heavily on those "facts" with which they are in sympathy and report lightly on "facts" which do not conform or contradict what they personally believe is the reality of the way the world works.
Whether the article is right or wrong in it's conclusion that there is a formula for maximizing the political/personal gain from stories like the Martin-Zimmerman case, it's hard to argue that the result is consistent across stories like Martin-Zimmerman, Rodney King (in which the media consistently showed only the beating and not the 10 minutes of King resisting arrest prior), Tawana Brawley, OJ Simpson and I'm sure there are more which I just can't recall right now.
Was there a specific point on which you wanted me to comment?
Lastly, in the strikingly similar but opposite case from Phoenix. The shooting of hispanic Daniel Adkins by a black man. There is precious little media coverage, even from Phoenix, no civil rights activism, and, as of the publishing of the latest article I could find of the incident, no arrest of the shooter. This is the most recent story I could find on the APR 4 shooting: http://www.kpho.com/story/18340114/family-tired-of-waiting-for-decision-on-deadly-shooting I find it interesting that the media in this case is not identifying the shooter as he has not yet been charged. How much violence could have been avoided if the media were that responsible in the Martin-Zimmerman case? Despite the appearance of a greater injustice in the Phoenix shooting, it's not getting the attention that the fictional injustice in Sanford received. My question is why?
Good piece. Do you find it "coincidental" that the day after Obama came out in support of gay marriage that a the Washington Post released story was released about how Romney was a gay bullier?
To their credit, NBC released a story exposing the fallacy, http://newsbusters.org/blogs/kyle-drennen/2012/05/11/nbc-reports-romney-bully-story-labeled-factually-incorrect-family-alle. While ABC used the incident today only as an example of how bullying was treated differently back then" while slyly noting that the alleged victim "eventually left the school...while Romney was not punished". http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/mitt-romneys-hijinks-bullying-today-16330859#.T62YUsX4IRF No mention of the previous days NBC story about the factual inaccuracies or the mention that one of the "witnesses" cited for the WashPo story has since said that he "wasn't even there" at the time and didn't really know what happened.
What I find most interesting is the reason for Obamas change: his "Christian faith". The same reason he cited for holding his previous position. Have the teachings of Christianity changed?
@patricksplace Thanks for the tip on the new article. I look forward to it.Fair enough criticism of my viewing habits in your second paragraph. I think I pay attention more than most but, since I don't watch the Big Three I do rely on what I Google that hits them or what aggregators pull from them. It's not that I "want Obama skewered", I'd just like some equal reporting. The plight of the homeless seems to be reported far more often and is made-out to be far worse during a Republican Administration than it is under a Democrat administration. Again, a good Lexis/Nexis search would probably be a good starting point, but, I don't have a subscription.
I'm not interested in "hearing an anti-Obama slant on a story AHEAD of a factual account", just surprised that the homeless are doing so well in this bad economy that there are few stories about them. Fewer still if any blaming the President. With gas prices it's interesting. With Obama in the WH the media has a far more "economic" slant to reporting high gas prices, citing economic theories, world conditions, etc. Prices half these under Bush were "his fault" and part of a plan to "enrich his oil buddies". Any economic argument was met with mocking and derision.I stumbled on an excellent article which you will find interesting, though likely wrong. :P http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/05/trayvon_and_zimmerman_the_structure_and_elements_of_a_disinformation_campaign.html
Cheers!
@patricksplace Thank you again for exactly the kind of reply I've come to expect from you - polite - despite the fact that you probably find me more than a little annoying, for which I apologize. I know you can't explain every specific instance, the best any of us can do is to apply our personal knowledge and experience so as to reach a plausible explanation of why something might have happened. And, I'll ask you again for that experience shortly, after I address your questions. I don't think you are "unreliable". Just the fact that you are out here in the blogosphere engaging in the discussion tells me that you are interested in getting to the truth and learning. I think part of the problem in the USA to day is that we are so divided we can't even talk to each other anymore. Quite sad really.So, a long time ago I gave up watching the nightly network news and the local news. 20 years ago I would watch the Big 3 after watching CSPAN and I became quickly aware that what I had trusted for the first 25 years of my life wasn't really trustworthy. I could either trust my eyes and ears or the Network News, but not both. I was a CNN junkie (Crossfire was my favorite show back when it was Buchanan v Kinsley) until Fox came to our cable system (and Fox occasionally says/does/reports something I find not quite right.)
I'm not a masochist and I gave up the frustration of watching the MSM long ago. I do read and listen and occasionally stumble on stories which I identify as suspect or, most often, have those stories brought to my attention by Drudge, Breitbart, Beck, Bozell, other aggregators. If it's interesting to me, impactful or particularly egregious, I'll do some more research (Googling) and determine if there is really something there or someone is just being oversensitive.Which brings me to something I stumbled onto today which I wanted to make you aware of and the second reason why I popped back in this evening: I learned today that there have now been three NBC employees fired in three separate incidents of editing the Zimmerman 911 call! Up until a few hours ago i thought there was only the one incident. Reading this article (http://www.theblaze.com/stories/third-employee-fired-after-another-edited-george-zimmerman-911-tape-surfaces/) I learned that there were two additional cases of edits, both of which were slanted to making Zimmerman look bad. That's 3 for 3, or, rather, 0 for 3 if your looking for truth. The primary reason I came this evening was a thought I had this morning, before I had even seen the article on the 3rd firing and what I really wanted to ask you. I can understand that the original Zimmerman 911 editing case was for time. I honestly understand that. What I don't understand, and you likely won't be able explain because you can't be in that producers head, but I want you to think about this in kind of an academic way is this: If you were editing that tape, for time, and had to keep the most important information, what information would you choose to keep?
The original call, for reference:
Zimmerman: “This guy looks like he’s up to no good. Or he’s on drugs or something. It’s raining and he’s just walking around, looking about.” Dispatcher: , “O.K., and this guy — is he white, black or Hispanic?”
Zimmerman: “He looks black.”
If I were editing that for time, I would likely not do any cut (except to remove a pause) and keep, "This guy looks like he’s up to no good. Or he’s on drugs or something." I think the fact the Zimmerman thought the guys was on drugs is pretty important.
If not the drug bit, I think I'd keep the fact that reporting suspicious behavior to the police. I'd keep the bit about someone walking around in the rain, looking about.
To me, the most irrelevant information for a TV viewer, not for the police but for a viewer, is the race of the suspicious person. It's important to the police for ID purposes when they arrive on scene but not to a TV viewer. Race is entirely and completely irrelevant, yet, this senior producer thought that the race of the deceased Trayvon Martin was the most relevant fact and the fact that, above either of the other items, needed to be communicated to the viewer. I started thinking about why that would be.
My first thought was that maybe the producer was black and, as such, was more sensitive to the race than maybe a white person would be. My next thought was that this producer wanted to sensationalize the story for ratings by making it a white-on-black crime. Next, that the producers worldview, his perception/reality/narrative/whatever we call it, is that the attack was racially motivated just because 'every white on black crime is racially motivated' (I need italics. :) ) and he needed to highlight the race so as to "prove" that viewpoint. I'm sure there are more theories or thoughts.
So then when I discovered this 3rd firing and the content of the edits, naturally I thought that this was 3 datapoints that supported my hypothesis that the cause of media bias isn't conspiracy but, as I have stated before, similar thinking based on similar training and similar ideology. Since the overwhelming majority of the MSM are similarly trained and have similar ideology (typically liberal, left, progressive, Democrat, whatever name we want to put on it) it stands to reason that there would be similar thought processes which manifest, across the MSM, as similar biases.
There were a few who came out initially and stated that there simply weren't enough facts to draw conclusions of hate crime or racism. I saw them on Fox because that is what I watch. I heard that on Conservative talk radio, because that's what I listen to. There may have been others outside of my sphere of information, i don't know, but if the clips of both video and audio from NBCABCCBSCNNMSNBC were any indication, then most (not all) MSM reported the story of the shooting with a racial slant in accordance with their perception.
As always, I'm interested in your thoughts. I'll check back soon.
Cheers!
John
You are correct. It would be absurd to state that the media hasn't mentioned "violence or casualties". The problem is, that isn't what I wrote. What I wrote was that they haven't mentioned the dramatic increase in the casualty rate in Afghanistan in the 39 months of the Obama administration after making it a perpetual story during the Bush administration. PTSD, intentional misdiagnosis and regional security problem were not the story that the MSM harped on Bush about. You're changing the subject.
Ok, you got me. So there was a story on a homeless person. What there are not are story after story after story about the rise in homelessness, the plight of the homeless, how the administration is worsening homelessness. All these stories about foreclosures and I don't hear homlessness. Homelessness is not a political or campaign issue like I recall during campaign cycles in which Republicans were in the White House or during the rare times that R's control the House or Senate. In fact, I'm not so sure that the crackdown by Philadelphia Mayor Nutter against organizations that provide food and assistance to the homeless in PHL made national news. Nutter is a "D".
The CNS story wasn't about bias. It was about casualties. The CNS Story was printed 30 APR and reported "1,844 U.S. military personnel have been killed in and around Afghanistan". This document from the Department of Defense (http://www.defense.gov/news/casualty.pdf) reports 1,834 KIA in Afghanistan and another 111 outside of Afghanistan. CNS closing paragraph states, "Besides the 1,829 American soldiers who have reportedly died on Afghan soil as of the end of April, CNSNews.com’s total count of 1,844 U.S. fatalities in and around Afghanistan includes 12 U.S. troops who died in Pakistan and three who died in the Arabian Sea while supporting Operation Enduring Freedom." suggesting that the timing of the two reporting periods, CNS and DoD, could account for the small difference in the numbers.
So, what's wrong with CNS facts on this story except that they were reported by a self-described "alternative" news source and not one of the MSM gentry? The "alternative" to the MSM are the organizations and individuals who are reporting what the MSM is not.
What I have observed in 10 years is a dramatic shift in the reporting of the MSM with regards to war casualties. I've watched a media which was collectively focused, almost obsessed, with war casualties during a Republican administration shift to a media that is barely interested in those same casualty rates, despite a sharp increase in those rates, during a Democratic administration. As our discussions have focused on the "presumption of media narrative" and MSM bias, I expected an "insider" explanation, whether I would believe it or not, as to the cause of this dramatic shift in focus. In the absence of such an explanation, the only change I observe is from an R to a D after the name of the President. I'm all ears, well...eyes, if there is another causal factor in this change in coverage.
I reject the accusation that I have some kind of "talking points" as everything that I have written in our discussions and the examples I have provided have come from me, my observations, my life experience and my stumbling on various news stories and information. I have asked my questions, and provided my thoughts and opinions honestly. I'm sorry that you find such discussion "pointless".
Whether influenced by a presumed narrative, group think or simple coincidence, it would appear that the initial reporting and conclusions which were broadly and similarly reported across the MSM in the Zimmerman-Martin case, have been proven wrong as facts have come out. I suppose the homogeneity of the reporting across so many MSM outlets was coincidental. You and I agree that it is not the result of conspiracy, but we will continue to disagree that such uniform reporting across such a wide swath of individuals is the result of similar training, thinking, world view and ideological underpinning.
There comes a point at which debate is pointless. You clearly believe what you believe, and no matter how many examples or possible explanations I might offer, you have the next talking point ready to go. It's obvious to me that there's nothing I can possibly say to change your mind. Therefore, furthering this discussion is pointless. :P (Smile to yourself at the irony that we can both write that paragraph. :) ) My goal was to continue to provide you examples of what I perceived as bias or double standard in the hopes that when confronted with enough evidence you might just think twice the next time you noticed something that could perhaps go either way. At the same time I wanted to get some "inside baseball" looks at the inner workings of the newsroom that I might use when looking at coverage as well.I hope you don't mind if I pop in periodically and see what's up on the blog. You may have seen a couple short comments on some other articles which I found interesting.
God bless, continued success and happiness to you!
John