Like many liberals, I favor news sources that don't reflect the corporate biases of what is often referred to as the "traditional media" (read: corporate media). But I also don't believe in living in an echo chamber, so I consume those sources as well (often, when fact-checking news I read in the leftosphere). And in both spheres, but particularly in the "traditional" media, there is a distinct pattern of the presentation and coverage of news that has transformed what once was an important means by which citizens are informed to one which serves little purpose.
This phenomenon extends to the leftish side of the "traditional" media as well -- outlets like NPR, PBS, or MSNBC -- who are every bit as guilty of this flawed presentation and coverage as their counterparts on the right. So hop over the clever-euphemism-for-the-divider-doodle and I'll detail them.
One: Confusing "Balance" for Objectivity.
This is the most insidious pathogen infecting the newsrooms of America today. All too often, when a story is being presented, a news media outlet will seek out a Democrat, and a Republican, get their points of view on the subject, and present them without any analysis. The reporter -- and media outlet -- thusly position themselves as in the middle of the two, and thus in the center of the Overton Window, wherever it may be at that point in time.
But the Overton Window is relative. It's a reflection of attitudes among the people, and to a greater extent among the most powerful political factions of our country. That has precisely squat to do with objectivity.
Objectivity in journalism is taking the issues and sifting out the facts from the falsehoods and presenting those facts. Those facts may lie on one side or the other of the Overton Window, or they may lie outside the window altogether. Objectivity does not examine whether an idea is popular, or whether a spokesman for this party or that think tank is willing to express it.
Objectivity says "Go where the facts lead." It doesn't question whether the facts favor one side or the other of the political spectrum. (Or neither!) But it also means work. It takes work to analyze a situation and to actually go where the facts lead. It requires inquiry, investigation -- you know, journalism. Seeking "balance" is much easier -- all it takes is finding a couple political animals who want to see their name in print or their face on television. So the appeal is obvious, even if the value of the product is greatly diminished.
But mostly, objectivity is indifferent to the backlash from those who prefer news that fits their personal narratives to news based in fact. And after years of screaming about "the liberal media", and the much younger counterbellowing about "the right-wing media", the producers have chosen rather than to ignore or even confront that criticism, to simply bow to it, and to do what they can to delegitimze such criticism. And journalism has suffered for it. So, in fact, has our political discourse, because as our media have been declawed and defanged, it is rare when actual journalistic fact-checking impedes a politician or political group presenting a false narrative to the news audience. (Case in point: Candy Crowley correcting Mitt Romney was so extraordinary that it created an uproar for days.) This reluctance to "correct the record" allows misinformation to flourish within the media, and those pundits and pols who habitually recite prepared talking points or even deal in misinformation are shielded from consequence (see Three, below).
Two: Presenting Important Events Only in Terms of the Political Impact
This is much more insidious than the practice of trading objectivity for so-called "balance" because even if the story is presented with actual facts, the
focus of the story ignores the real impact of the events in favor of analyzing the (usually potential) political fallout.
Take this recent NPR story. It's ostensibly about the President's options in dealing with the crisis of refugee children crossing the border and overwhelming the resources we have in place to deal with them. But the story analyzed the political impacts of his options, and the prospects for 2014 and 2016.
I heard this story on the radio (yes I listen to NPR -- don't judge me) and were I not a responsible driver keeping my eyes on the road I would have been staring slack-jawed at the radio wondering why in the name of the Flying Spaghetti Monster that a story about how to deal with this humanitarian crisis completely ignored the fact that this is actually a humanitarian crisis.
Now, it's true that there are political angles to this problem, and political consequences, but these are so much less important than the actual issues of children fleeing war and poverty, border security, the positive and negative impacts of legal and illegal immigration on our country, and did I mention children fleeing war and poverty?
Yesterday, NPR published an interview with Marco Rubio where the same immigration issue featured prominently. Maddeningly, even though Rubio wanted to actually talk about the real-world consequences of our immigration issues and how he would want to resolve that problem, the interviewer, Steve Inskeep, consistently tried to steer Rubio toward focusing on the political impact of his plans and such fluff as whether one group of refugees was the 'moral equivalent' of another -- indeed, the entire interview was framed as presenting Rubio as a Presidential candidate (which, to be fair, he may well be). Even when the interviewee wants to talk substance, interviewers far too often want to steer the interview in political directions.
By focusing on the electoral impact, public opinion polls and political gamesmanship between the houses of Congress and/or the White House, all the facets of this crisis that have direct immediate and long-term impact, both on the audience and on the immigrants and refugees, are put to the wayside. The politics are given elevated importance, the real-world impacts are given lesser importance. This not only reflects seriously misplaced priorities on the part of NPR, but combined with many other stories, analyses and editorials exclusively focused on the political angles of important issues, they help push our national discourse in a decidedly unhelpful direction where politics is an end in itself, rather than a means toward the end of people living happier, longer, more fulfilling lives.
Yes, politics is often something of a game, and one that political animals play to win. But those who are political animals, and particularly those in the media, need to remember that politics is not played to win for its own sake. The news media, to varying degrees, seem to have forgotten this.
Three: There Is No Accountability for Being Wrong
This is most apparent in the caste of our news media that deals in analysis, opinion and punditry, but also manifests in the arena of "hard news", that is to say, formal reporting of serious topics.
A media personality presented as an "expert", or even a news outlet, that frequently or even consistently provides factually false "analysis", wildly inaccurate predictions or even actively coordinating with political campaigns to present talking points on behalf of candidates are not only permitted to continue, year after year, to publish columns, sit at roundtables, and be interviewed to provide analysis of a news story, but rarely see their records publicly challenged by anyone else in the media class.
Most of us remember Karl Rove's meltdown on Election Night 2012 when he, along with much of the right side of the pundit class, had been insisting the polls that consistently showed President Obama would coast to reelection were 'skewed' and that 'unskewed' polls would show anywhere from a tight to a landslide Romney victory. And Karl Rove barely had to brush the dirt off his shoulders before he went to his next pundit gig, and he's still granting interviews and analysis on conservative and mainstream media alike to this day, with only the most perfunctory challenge to his spectacularly wrong poll analysis for the 2012 cycle. And that's completely ignoring his past track record of being wrong.
We also know Bill Kristol, much derided in these pages for always being wrong about everything. Yet Kristol remains a favorite on the Sunday talk show circuit, regularly appearing on ABC's This Week With George Stephanopolous.
And "news" outlets like FOX, who have long since abandoned any pretense of being beholden to fact and who have in fact so misinformed their viewers that studies show that FOX viewers are even less informed about current events than those who don't follow the news at all. Yet FOX has a seat at the table of the major news organizations no less prestigious than that of CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, or PBS, as if FOX's product is no less legitimate than any of theirs.
With any semblance of real consequence for being so wrong (even willfully wrong) so consistently, there's little incentive for media outlets to pursue accuracy or integrity in their journalism -- and with the phenomenon of market share going to news outlets who present stories and analysis that reflect their audience's biases, this gives the media strong pecuniary disincentives to promote the values of fact-based reporting and instead to pander, irrespective of whether that pandering is grounded in reality.
In conclusion...
Between the shifting of reporting to pursue "balance" rather than objectivity, the greater focus on politics rather than real-world issues, and the absolute lack of accountability for media outlets and media personalities alike, there are few, if any, extrinsic forces driving media outlets to report important news with accuracy, and many extrinsic and intrinsic forces, some of which I detailed above, driving media outlets to forego adherence to good journalism in favor of ... well, in favor of what the major media have largely become.
I offer little in the way of solutions except to say that it is incumbent upon us, as consumers of news media, to seek out sources of media that practice journalism -- real journalism, that look outside the Beltway when analyzing their stories, and that stop giving credibility to people who present themselves as experts or wonks -- or even current or former officeholders who don't speak the truth about their records. One truth about anything in this capitalist economy is that if there is a demand for it, that demand will be met. And that's especially true for the corporate media.
But ultimately, the press is a vital part of our republic -- and that press needs to be independent, ethical, and fixated on discovering and reporting the truth. And while our press has never been perfect in embodying those qualities, in the 21st century it is drifting farther and farther from that ideal.
9:50 AM PT: Catte Nappe's comment is an excellent addition -- citing the fiasco where the NYT explicitly ceded the ground of 'fact-checker'.