I often don’t express my ideas as clearly as I would like. Let me try again.

Many people refer to the MSM as the “liberal” media e.g. the liberal New York Times. I understand people who say this to mean that those in charge have a liberal bias in politics and they then hire reporters who also have this same liberal bias. As a result the news gets reported with a liberal slant as liberal reporters try and please their liberal bosses. In short, the MSM is controlled by Democrats and they attempt to help Democrats with their reporting.

I assumed (wrongly) that you believed the MSM was operating with this type of liberal bias and that this was the reason why Obama was not being investigated properly by the MSM.

I, also, reject this view.

Instead, I believe all the factors I put in list form in post #10 (titillation, laziness, etc..) have more to do with the bias we see in everyday reporting than a reporter or his bosses party affiliation or personal beliefs.

I was then trying to say there are a category of news outlets that are an EXCEPTION to this rule. (see post #10, paragraph 6) These outlets willfully bias their news either to the left or to the right, in my view, to gain market share. As I said, they make their living by preaching to the choir. This category of reporting is on the rise especially in non traditional media.

I do think both parties try to manipulate the press at every opportunity and that they are often successful. My poorly expressed point was that news reporting is not influenced by a reporters INTERNAL biases as much as all of these EXTERNAL factors.

So, yeah, reporting will be influenced by external factors, including politics (left and right), but not so much by reporters own personal political bias.

Sorry, but you cannot have it both ways. You start your argument by stating the bias has nothing to do with right or left, but then ‘prove’ your contention by asserting the MSM is willfully biased in their preaching to their respective choirs. You further support this by stating that they (the MSM) is being intentionally manipulated by both the right and the left and that journalists aren’t even smart enough to realize that they have been manipulated into supporting one side or the other in their reporting. So, is their reporting biased (by right and left politics) or not? You have argued it both ways.

The bigger picture, in my opinion, is that mainstream journalism has become infotainment. The titillation and teasing that used to be the forte of such rags as the National Enquirer have now become completely accepted forms of journalism. Most every night anymore you get tweaked throughout prime time with such come-ons like ‘Water, why is killing you’ and ‘Breathing and why you shouldn’t do it’. Just tune it @ 11pm and we’ll give you all the details. I put the blame as much (if not more) though on the audience and not the MSM itself. This is seemingly what the majority or our American Idol loving population wants to see. Oh please, do not try and educate me during the news, just give me more entertainment. War, don’t want to hear no more … but who is JLo dating this week, all the details please.

In regards to this specific thread, the reporting has been and will continue to be completely biased by politics. To make it worse race will also be a factor just as it was throughout the presidential election.

I agree with you that the MSM is completely incompetent, but not (if I understand you) in the way way you suggest.

In my view the bias has little to do with right or left. Here is a list of some things
that influence or bias reporting in general:

reporter laziness e.g., wrong facts, relying on same sources
titillating stories e.g., sex, drugs, homosexuality, race
A “strange” or “crazy” or “New” personality e.g., Blago, Palin, Obama
butt kissing the powerful i.e., don’t embarrass/contradict the president
don’t shake things up i.e., support the status quo
contempt for ordinary people by oversimplifying stories
Don’t jeopardize the parent companies interests e.g., housing bubble? what’s a housing bubble? What unintended consequences of two wars in Muslim nations at the same time?
conformity (don’t get out in front of other reporters. No reporter wants to “break” a real story.)

All of these factors and others determine what gets reported and how it is reported in the MSM. What makes the reporter’s calculus so dangerous is that very few of them are aware they are making it. The whole process is internalized and happens (with rare exception) outside the reporters conscious awareness.

What makes this even more dangerous is that Both parties understand how the simpletons in the MSM operate and Both parties do the best they can to manipulate All political coverage to their advantage.

Sure there are exceptions. I believe most of Fox news reporting is willfully biased. I believe most of MSNBC reporting is willfully biased. These networks are attempting to fill a niche in the marketplace. They are there to preach to their respective choirs.

We must abandon both Fox And MSNBC to get a clear picture of what is happening in our complex world. We should be checking wingnut and moonbat websites, if we want to form a clear picture of what is happening in the world.

I agree this applies to American politics in general, but would contend that Chicago (amongst others) is politics on steroids. Yes there may be guilt by association in Mather’s post, but I think you miss his bigger question. The question is not specifically why won’t/didn’t the MSM investigate his ‘Chicago corruption’, but why won’t they investigate him at all. This despite the fact (to quote MSM’s Tom Brokaw) “We don’t know a lot about Barack Obama or what his world view is”. Please tell why this is? The MSM was literally tripping over themselves to get any story about Sarah Palin to the presses, but was unusually silent about the utter dearth of information available about Mr Obama prior to his arrival on the national scene. To illustrate my point, do you know (and this is something that pretty much no one I ask knows the answer to) how many truly contested elections that Mr Obama won prior to be elected President?

Increase Mather,
Your post seems to be based on guilt by association and innuendo. Your logic goes like this:

Chicago has a history of corrupt politicians.
Obama is a Chicago politician.
Therefore, Obama is a corrupt politician.
The liberal media will not investigate Obama’s Chicago corruption, because the MSM is in the tank for Obama.

Just for fun…
Jack Abramoff is a corrupt politician.
Jack Abramoff is a Republican.
Therefore, Republicans are corrupt.

I personally do not accept either argument because the logic does not hold in either case. If Obama is a suspected of corruption, he needs to be indicted. If Obama is found guilty of corruption in a court of law, he needs to be impeached. Implying he is dirty simply because he is from Chicago does not wash.

if the then-governor had the right to appoint burris, then did the us senate have the legal power to not accept a legally-appointed senator? suppose burris had paid off blago [not saying he did], does bribery and accepting a bribe strip the governor of his appointment power?

Why is that do you suppose?