Big Lies: the Right-wing Propaganda Machine and How it Distorts the Truth

1. Big Lies: the Right-wing Propaganda Machine and How it Distorts the Truth Joe Conason Chapter 2: Peroxide Paradox: The Blonde Misleading the Blind

2. Liberal Media? Liberal Media? Charges that the media is liberal drown out legitimate concerns about: 1. Increasing corporate concentration, 2. Diminishing public service, 3. The narrowing of the spectrum of political discussion in the mass media. (1)

3. Liberal Media? Coulter and Slander: Coulter claims media is liberal, but her own success suggests how “dishonest”her argument is. Slander, for instance was picked up by Crown Publishers, a division of Random House.

4. Liberal Media? Coulter: Embraced by the Liberal Media Little evidence that liberal media has attempted “to suppress Coulter’s ideas”(p. 2) Moreover, the “mainstream newspapers that sit atop Coulter’s fictional leftist ‘propaganda machine’ all treated Slander quite gently.” (p. 4) Coulter Criticized by the Right, not the Liberal Media Instead, it has been conservative publishing houses and magazines that have dumped her books. (p. 3) 1. Coulter was fired from the National Review, 2. Her book was dropped by Rupert Murdoch’s Harper Collins in 2001. 3. One of the few publications to sharply criticized Coulter was the conservative magazine Commentary. (p. 4)

5. Liberal Media? Coulter Criticized by the Right, not the Liberal Media Instead, it has been conservative publishing houses and magazines that have dumped her books. (p. 3) 1. Coulter was fired from the National Review, 2. Her book was dropped by Rupert Murdoch’s Harper Collins in 2001. 3. One of the few publications to sharply criticized Coulter was the conservative magazine Commentary. (p. 4)

6. Liberal Media? Analyzing Goldberg and Coulter’s Analysis: Geoffrey Nunberg : Nunberg found that liberals have “a better than 30 percent greater likelihood of being given a political label than the average conservatives does.” (p. 5) Examples: Barney Frank(D-MA) was identified as liberal “twice as frequently as Dick Armey (R-Texas) was” identified as a conservative. Nunberg also looked how frequently the “media”and “liberal bias”(469 times) occur together compared with “media”and “conservative bias” (17 times) –“a twenty-seven-fold discrepancy” (5) Press has given virtually no attention to the charge of a conservative bias in the media.

7. Liberal Media? Two (2) reasons why conservative criticism dominates media 1. Media is far more sensitive to charges of bias from the Right. (7) 2. Conservatives have a huge financial advantage over their opponents (p. 7)

8. Liberal Media? There are three (3) major conservative media watch dog groups and only one liberal/left group of comparable size. The conservative groups are: Accuracy in Media (AIM) (p. 8) Media Research Center (MRC) (pp. 8-9) Center for Media and Public Affairs (pp. 9) On the liberal side of the spectrum, we have only: Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) (9-10) Both have expanded more recently…

9. Liberal Media? Reporters: More Liberal Center for Media and Public Affairs polls in 1992 and 1996 “purported to show” that a majority of the nation’s reporters voted for Clinton. The poll is frequently cited by conservatives as evidence that the media is liberal.

10. Liberal Media? Editors and Publishers: More Conservative In 2000, just prior to the election, an Editor & Publisherpolled the “nation’s newspaper executives” The results: “the nation’s newspapers editors and publishers believe Texas governor will beat Al Gore…” (12) “By a wide margin, they plan to vote for him themselves.” More Papers Endorsed Bush And, to complete this Republican trifecta, newspapers endorsed Bush by about 2-to-1 nationally.” (12) “Of all dailies, 48% went for Bush, while only 23 % chose Gore.” (12) They “summed up the poll with an obvious question “One has to wonder: whatever happened to the so-called ‘liberal press.’” (12)