« When Free Market Success Funds "Progressive" Activism | Main | Was The Iwo Jima Flag Raising "Faked"? »
October 14, 2005
MRC Documents War News Bias At ABC, NBC And CBS
The Media Research Center has released a detailed study of the broadcast networks' coverage of the Iraq war so far this year. (Link via The Corner). The report, written by MRC research director Rich Noyes, gives solid confirmation to what any intellectually honest observer already suspected: that the war coverage provided by ABC, NBC and CBS 1) places disproportionate emphasis on the graphic results of the jihadists' violent acts; 2) is relentlessly pessimistic about the potential for development of a healthy political culture in Iraq; and 3) consistently fails to report the operational successes of and exemplary individual performances of the U.S. military.
Ever since the United States and an international coalition toppled Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship in the spring of 2003, the Iraq war has dominated network newscasts. Since then, there’s been a lot of undeniably bad news, as terrorists have launched a savage campaign to thwart efforts to establish democracy in a major Arab state. But are network reporters giving the public an inordinately gloomy portrait of the situation, as some critics charge? Are the positive accomplishments of U.S. soldiers and Iraq’s new democratic leaders being lost in a news agenda dominated by assassinations, car bombings and casualty reports?
The answer to both questions is: Yes.
Among the key findings:
■ Network coverage has been overwhelmingly pessimistic. More than half of all stories (848, or 61%) focused on negative topics or presented a pessimistic analysis of the situation, four times as many as featured U.S. or Iraqi achievements or offered an optimistic assessment (just 211 stories, or 15%).
■ News about the war has grown increasingly negative. In January and February, about a fifth of all network stories (21%) struck a hopeful note, while just over half presented a negative slant on the situation. By August and September, positive stories had fallen to a measly seven percent and the percentage of bad news stories swelled to 73 percent of all Iraq news, a ten-to-one disparity.
Here's more from the detailed report:
Terrorist attacks are designed to attract attention and spread fear. The networks’ daily coverage relayed the terrorists’ deeds in gruesome detail. On February 28, ABC’s Nick Watt gave viewers a graphic account of a suicide bombing targeting a medical clinic in the city of Hillah: “Pools of water turned red with blood; buildings scarred by shrapnel and body parts.” Ten days later, Watt told how terrorists had bombed a funeral in Mosul, a city in northern Iraq: “Survivors carried out the bodies of the dead and wept. One of them described a ball of fire and a huge explosion, then, scattered blood and human flesh.”
“It’s been another terrible day in Iraq,” CBS anchor Bob Schieffer typically began as he introduced a May 24 story on a series of car bombings aimed at civilians. From Baghdad, correspondent Mark Strassmann amplified Schieffer’s grimness: “The carnage has been shocking: nearly 600 Iraqis killed in less than a month, attacks that have left this country tilting toward civil war.”
And my overall favorite:
Earlier this year, on NBC’s Today show, co-host Matt Lauer interviewed a group of American soldiers in Iraq. When they all reported that morale among the troops was high, Lauer was incredulous.
“Don’t get me wrong here,” Lauer told the soldiers. “I think you are probably telling me the truth, but a lot of people at home [are] wondering how that could be possible with the conditions you’re facing and with the attacks you’re facing. What would you say to those people who are doubtful that morale can be that high?”
“Sir, if I got my news from the newspapers also, I’d be pretty depressed as well,” replied Captain Sherman Powell.
“We are confident that if we’re allowed to finish the job we started, we’ll be very proud of it and our country will be proud of us for doing it.”
The MRC report does make note of the times when the networks did report good news, and likewise acknowledges the obvious: that there is plenty of bad news to report, too. But any fair-minded observer knows this is not the point--the problem is not that the bad news is reported, but the suppression of the progress in reconstruction and of the heroism of both Americans and Iraqis.
The entire report is a must read.
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.thebernoullieffect.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/377
