Bias by Omission

The modern equivalent of a broken record, which used to be a common saying about someone who says the same thing over and over, is the "infinite loop" -- "a sequence of instructions in a computer program which loops (i.e., repeats) endlessly." On Social Security, the establishment press has played a false infinite loop for decades, namely that its "trust fund" contains lots of real assets.…

It's as if these people think that we're still in the era of the Pony Express and passenger pigeons. Both CNN's email alert after the close of the markets today and the Associated Press's post-close report acted as if Monday's stock market gain was due to a positive momentum effect from Friday's splendiforous jobs report, which really wasn't that good at all. CNN's 4:01 p.m. email told…

Well, it looks like Democrats in a Southern state have embarrassed party officials once again. Back in 2010, it was Alvin Greene in South Carolina, whose victory in that state's U.S. Senate primary so infuriated Palmetto State Congressman James Clyburn that he accused Greene of being a plant and called for a federal probe. Greene refused to step aside; incumbent Republican Jim DeMint defeated…

The Associated Press carried two stories on Friday about the attempt by and ultimate failure of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman to avoid going back to prison. In the first, ahead of that day's hearing, AP reporter Bob Johnson failed to mention Siegelman's Democratic Party affiliation. In the second, Johnson managed to get Democratic Party references designed to raise what appear to be…

On the Saturday Washington Post “On Faith” page, columnist and Newsweek religion editor Lisa Miller insisted it was not a news story that black ministers came to the National Press Club and insisted Obama’s support for gay marriage “might cost him the election.” It’s not a story, Miller insisted, because Rev William Owens is “enough to make a cynic blush...He’s a figurehead in what political…

The wire services and other establishment press members appear to be getting more selective in what they will allow into their headlines, particularly omitting items which might hurt Dear Leader. Take the coverage of yesterday's Employment Situation Summary from the government's Bureau of Labor Statistics. The news was a combination of bad and mediocre (though expectations-beating): The…

The Big Three networks largely yawned at Majority Leader Harry Reid's wild charge on the Senate floor on Thursday that GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney hasn't paid taxes in 10 years. ABC, CBS, and NBC failed to mention it on the evening newscasts on Thursday. On Friday morning, CBS This Morning was the lone broadcast morning show to report on Reid's "explosive accusation," as…

General Motors didn't have a very good second quarter, as the Associated Press's Tom Krisher duly noted on Thursday. What Krisher didn't note, and what almost no one in the establishment press ever notes, is the fact that the company doesn't have to pay any income taxes on its U.S. profits until it uses up losses carried forward from before its 2009 bankruptcy filing accompanied by at least $…

On its Wednesday evening and Thursday morning newscasts, CBS didn't file one report or news brief on the controversial federal abortifacient/contraception mandate going into effect. Even worse, the only mention of religious liberty scandal over the regulation was CBS This Morning playing a clip of liberal comedian Stephen Colbert making fun of it. ABC's Diane Sawyer heralded the mandate…

The Big Three networks enthusiastically paid tribute to leftist author Gore Vidal on their Wednesday morning newscasts, but not one mentioned his political ideology. NBC's Today devoted two briefs to the "sardonically witty" Vidal, who died late Tuesday. The morning show also labeled him a "cultural icon." ABC's Good Morning America played up his "outsized personality and scathing wit."…

"Even at the Olympics, athletes in the sport of shooting face questions about gun violence." That's the digital edition headline for Washington Post reporter Katherine Boyle's August 1 story about the "stigma" that American Olympic shooters face for participating in a sport that "requires a machine that, when used maliciously, can kill people." But as Boyle herself makes clear in her story,…

Sunday on ABC, as Rush Limbaugh noted on his show yesterday, Obama campaign senior adviser and former White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs called GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney a "schoolyard bully." Just a couple of hours later (the time stamp is noon on Sunday), what little is left of Newsweek published "Mitt Romney's Wimp Factor." Zheesh -- So which is it?

CBS, which devoted four on-air segments between May 30 and June 1, 2012 to the "hundreds of Catholics" who rallied in support of dissenting nuns, ignored the tens of thousands who came from all over the U.S. to see conservative talk show host Glenn Beck speak on Saturday. In fact, all of the Big Three networks have yet to cover Beck's "Restoring Love" event in Dallas on their morning and…

"There is absolutely no way Barack Obama can win reelection running on his record and the news media know this," NewsBusters publisher Brent Bozell told Fox News's Eric Bolling at the top of today's Your World with Neil Cavuto. Newsweek's current edition, featuring the headline, "The Wimp Factor: Is he [Mitt Romney] just too insecure to be president?" is just the latest example of the media's…