Bias by Omission

Here's a small window into a journalist's mindset. In a report on how lower gas prices are affecting the companies operating retail gas stations, Associated Press reporter John Fahey revealed his apparent believes that there are millions of us walking around, perhaps including him, obsessed with getting back at gas station owners for charging us so much at fill-up time for years:

Dictionary.com defines "glib" as "readily fluent, often thoughtlessly, superficially, or insincerely so." Jonathan Gruber's apology at his Tuesday congressional hearing included that word. The word, especially the "superficial" element of its definition, applies to how the establishment press covered the hearing. With only rare exceptions, it excluded any mention of what has accurately been…

Friday's CBS This Morning and NBC's Today both spotlighted the walk-out protest on Thursday of a group of congressional staffers, who gave the "hands up, don't shoot" gesture of the groups protesting the grand jury's decision in the Michael Brown case. NBC's Tamron Hall trumpeted the "powerful statement without words" on the steps of the U.S. Capitol. CBS's Jeff Glor noted that the participants "…

Tuesday afternoon, Kyle Drennen at NewsBusters observed that the Big Three networks "Appear Finished With Gruber Coverage," and that their Tuesday morning shows had no coverage of the de facto Obamacare architect and his congressional appearance. One factor likely influencing the nets' posture is how original news sources like the Associated Press and the nation's largest dailies have managed to…

On Thursday night, CBS continued to make no mention of the news that the hacking attack on Sony Pictures has revealed emails between co-chairwoman Amy Pascal and film producer Scott Rudin mocking what they perceived to be President Barack Obama’s movie tastes. The CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley covered continued fallout from the attack, but only in the context of no press being allowed at…

CBS This Morning was the sole Big Three morning newscast on Thursday to report that the police in Hong Kong cleared out the main camp of pro-democracy protestors in the former British colony. Anchor Charlie Rose gave a 20-second news brief on the government's crackdown on the demonstrators. BBC News reported that "more than activists have been arrested...after police cleared the main pro-…

Two recent items in the Washington Post support my contention that the establishment press is currently doing more than anyone besides Lena Dunham and "Jackie," both of whom have been irrefutably exposed as rape story fabulists, to cause victims of sexual assault to be reluctant to come forward (Note: That's not to say that the two women haven't been victims of sexual assault, "only" that the…

Carol Costello, who got a kick out of the assault on Bristol Palin, lamented on Thursday's CNN Newsroom that "the national conversation surrounding sexual assault on campus has taken kind of an ugly turn. It's become this he-said, she-said politically-tinged fight." Costello cited the attention on Lena Dunham's rape claim in her memoir as an example. The anchor also spotlighted how conservative…

St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter Nick Pistor has quite an odd take on Dorian Johnson, the closest eyewitness to the killing of Michael Brown by Ferguson, Missouri police officer Darren Wilson in early August. The occasion enabling Pistor to publicly purvey his perception was news on Monday that Johnson had taken a job with the City of St. Louis. Before getting to those details, let's look at…

The House Select Committee on Benghazi that is looking into the 2012 terror attacks in Libya held another hearing on Wednesday and focused on the lack of sufficient security that was in place in Benghazi which, based on the hearing, remains the case across many State Department facilities. When it came to the major broadcast networks reporting on the hearing, the “big three” of ABC, CBS, and NBC…

The Wednesday editions of NBC Nightly News and ABC's World News Tonight both spotlighted many Democratic lawmakers' objections to portions of a proposed budget compromise in Congress. However, the two evening newscasts couldn't be bothered to mention that many congressional Republicans and their conservative allies also object to parts of the bill, especially on immigration and on social issues.

Nearly six years into Barack Obama's presidency, it's still George W. Bush's fault. Early Wednesday morning, Julie Pace at the Associated Press proved yet again why it is more than appropriate to characterize the wire service where she works as the Administration's Press. The headline at Pace's story tells us that poor President Barack Obama still has to confront the "Bush legacy," and is still…

It's more than fair to wonder why the Associated Press waited until 9:41 p.m. ET Tuesday evening to recognize the existence of Lena Dunham's most recent problems with the truth. The AP's first recognition of the days-old story came roughly two hours after Dunham's first detailed response to convincing allegations that the account in her most recent book of being raped in college by someone named…

On Monday, ABC and NBC's morning newscasts both touted the upcoming congressional report on the CIA's post-9/11 interrogation techniques as "explosive" and "damning." However, neither network pointed out that it was Democratic members on the Senate Intelligence Committee that commissioned the document. By contrast, CBS This Morning reported that "Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee are…