WaPo: Media Infatuation With Obama Unhealthy
The Washington Post’s Robert Samuelson was obviously on another planet last year. He has JUST now discovered this amazing fact:
The Obama infatuation is a great unreported story of our time. Has any recent president basked in so much favorable media coverage?
My snarkiness aside… Samuelson raises a lot of good points in his column.
On the whole, this is not healthy for America.
Our political system works best when a president faces checks on his power. But the main checks on Obama are modest. They come from congressional Democrats, who largely share his goals if not always his means. The leaderless and confused Republicans don’t provide effective opposition. And the press — on domestic, if not foreign, policy — has so far largely abdicated its role as skeptical observer.
That is a pretty damning observation to be printed in the equally complicit Washington Post. But the best part of his column? The facts.
[A] study by the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism… concludes: “President Barack Obama has enjoyed substantially more positive media coverage than either Bill Clinton or George W. Bush during their first months in the White House.”
The study examined 1,261 stories by The Post, the New York Times, ABC, CBS and NBC, Newsweek magazine and the “NewsHour” on PBS. Favorable articles (42 percent) were double the unfavorable (20 percent), while the rest were “neutral” or “mixed.” Obama’s treatment contrasts sharply with coverage in the first two months of the Bush (22 percent of stories favorable) and Clinton (27 percent) presidencies.
Unlike George Bush and Bill Clinton, Obama received favorable coverage in both news columns and opinion pages. The nature of stories also changed. “Roughly twice as much of the coverage of Obama (44 percent) has concerned his personal and leadership qualities than was the case for Bush (22 percent) or Clinton (26 percent),” the report said. “Less of the coverage, meanwhile, has focused on his policy agenda.”
Very dangerous indeed. But there are some signs of good news…..
Another Pew survey shows that since the election the numbers of both self-identified Republicans and Democrats have declined. “Independents” have increased, and “there has been no consistent movement away from conservatism, nor a shift toward liberalism.”
Samuelson concludes:
The press has become Obama’s silent ally and seems in a state of denial. But the story goes untold: Unsurprisingly, the study of all the favorable coverage received little coverage.
If not for the blogosphere and talk radio, many of the critical questions wouldn’t be asked at all. And Democrats want to silence those outlets as well. Stay tuned….
-Bruce (GayPatriot)
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GayPatriot » WaPo: Media Infatuation With Obama Unhealthy…
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Trackback by PunditKix — June 4, 2009 @ 7:40 am - June 4, 2009
Silent ally? Pffft!
more like mouth organ, water carriers, boosters, cheerleaders, propagandists.
The press has gone far beyond positive coverage. They cover FOR him, refusing to report the negative, defending him from criticism and pushing his policies.
When inflation starts skyrocketing, when the recession drags on and on, when his domestic and foreign policies fail even more than they already have, the press must be held accountable too. They were his propaganda department.
Comment by American Elephant — June 4, 2009 @ 8:42 am - June 4, 2009
Samuelson doesn’t detect the slightest bit of irony in noting that the very press he finds idolatrous (and of which he is a part) doesn’t see its faults, let alone admit them, let alone challenge them? Is there a 12-step program for opinionists? Collectivism is a powerful drug and when it concerns the wished-for relief of the imagined collective racial guilt of a nation, we will only begin seeing honest assessments of this administration years after the damage has been done — that is, if those who write our history aren’t among the constituents shielded from the pain of ruinous policy.
Comment by Ignatius — June 4, 2009 @ 10:02 am - June 4, 2009
And Bruce, that’s why Rush is now calling the MSM the “State-Run Media.” They make Pravda and TASS look like the loyal opposition.
Regards,
Peter H.
Comment by Peter Hughes — June 4, 2009 @ 10:48 am - June 4, 2009
Ohn now you are concerned about the press coverage of the President? Where you as concerned when the press became stenographers when Bush was lying us into Iraq?
Comment by NJ Liberal — June 4, 2009 @ 11:05 am - June 4, 2009
Really? When was that?
Oh, that’s right, NJ, when your fellow liberals were telling us that Iraq was pursuing and already had WMDs.
Al Gore (2002) said, “We know that he has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country.”
Senator Ted Kennedy (2002) said, “We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction.”
Senator John Kerry, Democratic presidential frontrunner said (2002), “I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force – if necessary – to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security.” In January 2003, Kerry added, “Without question, we need to disarm Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal, murderous dictator, leading an oppressive regime. . . . He presents a particularly grievous threat because he is so consistently prone to miscalculation. . . . And now he is miscalculating America’s response to his continued deceit and his consistent grasp for weapons of mass destruction. So the threat of Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction is real.”
Your party is so hilarious. It’s one of stupid children like yourself whose parents were so completely incompetent that you grew up thinking that you could actually claim that someone who stated exactly what you were screaming as gospel truth is “lying”. No wonder Obama Party idiots like yourself want to destroy the education system in this country; you can’t handle anyone being able to question you, so you try to lobotomize students and make them stupid. Moron liberal.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — June 4, 2009 @ 11:46 am - June 4, 2009
*yawn* Sources please NJ Bigot.
Comment by The Livewire — June 4, 2009 @ 11:50 am - June 4, 2009
Yeah, NJ Liberal — sources please? You can’t just repeat DNC talking points and think that they are facts.
That’s called ignorance.
But I’d rather not be deflected off-topic like you tried to do. The Pew study clearly shows the pro-Obama State Run Media bias.
Let’s stay OT.
Comment by GayPatriot — June 4, 2009 @ 1:27 pm - June 4, 2009
“Ohn now you are concerned about the press coverage of the President? Where you as concerned when the press became stenographers when Bush was lying us into Iraq?”
Can you show a link to one of these phantom stories? I keep hearing about them but I cant recall ever seeing any sort of evidence of this mythic period where the press was fair to Bush. Not biased towards, such a thing is laughable in the extreme. I haven’t even seen evidence of them being begrudgingly fair to Bush.
Comment by Dark Eden — June 4, 2009 @ 2:14 pm - June 4, 2009
I daresay that NJ Pinko can’t even find ONE sympathetic story about GWB written by a member of the media. I’d put money on it.
Regards,
Peter H.
Comment by Peter Hughes — June 4, 2009 @ 2:50 pm - June 4, 2009
The liberal bias in the media did not start with the Clinton and Bush administration. I know personally that it goes back as far as the early 50s.
John
Comment by John W — June 4, 2009 @ 4:09 pm - June 4, 2009
Ah, name calling. How sophisticated the discourse is here.
Comment by NJ Liberal — June 4, 2009 @ 4:10 pm - June 4, 2009
Ah, childish pouting and posturing. How sophisticated the response is here.
Checkmate.
Regards,
Peter H.
Comment by Peter Hughes — June 4, 2009 @ 4:50 pm - June 4, 2009
I note it is still a dodge & weave with NJL and not actually providing facts to back up his/her wild-eyed memes.
Comment by GayPatriot — June 4, 2009 @ 5:14 pm - June 4, 2009
nope. Nor does he want to accept he’s a bigot by is own definition.
Comment by The_Livewire — June 4, 2009 @ 6:47 pm - June 4, 2009
8: Alrighty, to bring it back to part of the topic and since you brought it up, where exactly is the backup to your statement that “democrats want to silence those outlets?
Comment by Kevin — June 4, 2009 @ 11:56 pm - June 4, 2009
Bing the Fairness Doctrine and Cass Sunstein. Geez, guess you don’t get much news with your nose buried in Chairman Obama’s ass.
Comment by ThatGayConservative — June 5, 2009 @ 2:09 am - June 5, 2009
SFChron Editor Phil Bronstein: “Love or lust: Obama and fawning press need to get a room“
Comment by Jeremayakovka — June 11, 2009 @ 5:15 am - June 11, 2009