As The 2004 Election Campaign Gets Underway...

MRC’s New Study of 2003 Coverage Proves Media as Liberally Biased as Ever

“The Al Frankens And Eric Altermans Of The World Made A Lot Of Money Last Year Selling The Myth That The National Media
Are Not Biased”

     ALEXANDRIA, Va. --- A year-long study of the national media released today by the Media Research Center titled Still Liberal, Still Biased finds that the national media were as liberally biased as ever in 2003.

     “As a new election year begins, the news organizations that truly dominate the media landscape – such as the Big Three networks and influential newspapers such as the New York Times – remain what they have been for decades: allies of liberalism and enemies of conservative policies,” said Brent Bozell, president of the Media Research Center.

     “The Al Frankens and Eric Altermans of the world made a lot of money last year selling the myth that the national media are not biased,” Bozell said. “This month-by-month review lays out in stark detail how wrong they are.”

Key Findings In The Year-Long Study Still Liberal, Still Biased

• Economic Policy: All year, the media waged a campaign against taxpayers while pushing for ever-expanding government spending. The networks gave three times more airtime to liberal arguments against President Bush’s tax cuts than conservative rebuttals, emphasizing how “big” and “huge” those cuts were. But when the subject was a much larger federal handout for senior citizens, the same networks found critics who charged the giveaway of at least $400 billion was “still not enough.”
  
  
• Foreign Policy: The media showered skepticism on the elected defenders of American liberty, not the tyrants and terrorists who threatened us. Before the war in Iraq, journalists such as ABC’s Peter Jennings advertised their open hostility to President Bush’s policies. During the war, NBC had to fire one of its reporters for appearing on enemy-controlled Iraqi TV to declare the “failure” of the American war plan. After the war, journalists equated the alleged “quagmire in Iraq to the failed U.S. effort in Vietnam two generations ago. On the day of Saddam Hussein’s capture, Jennings pessimistically declared that “there’s not a good deal for Iraqis to be happy about at the moment.”
  
  
• Social Issues: The media marginalized believers in traditional values and celebrated the counter-morality of sexual progressiveness. On the 30th anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision, TV virtually ignored the well-attended March for Life. Supreme Court reporters contrasted “conservatives” with those supporting “gay rights,” as if conservatives were against “rights.” The networks also portrayed Gene Robinson, the first homosexual Episcopalian bishop, as a courageous pioneer.
  
  
• Politics: The media showed extreme reluctance to portray liberal Democrats as ideologues and revealed their double-standard on character issues. Although he’s absolutely opposed to the war in Iraq and wants to reinstate the high tax rates of the Clinton era, numerous journalists rejected the notion that Howard Dean is liberal. As the California recall election approached, reporters such as Tom Brokaw – who refused to detail Juanita Broaddrick’s sexual assault charges against President Clinton – hypocritically confronted Arnold Schwarzenegger with last-minute groping allegations.

Related Items:
Complete Special Report: Still Liberal, Still Biased
Executive Summary