EDITORS' CORNER
OPINION: Experts have concluded that public news is biased, however
A media professor recently said PBS and NPR are “generally unbiased” and “provide key benefits to US democracy.”
She did so by citing two studies, which do not specifically mention the news outlets, and a survey funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which itself funds PBS and NPR with the aid of taxpayer dollars.
Professor Stephanie Martin made the statement recently in The Conversation, a news publication largely written by professors. Congress recently voted to protect the interests of American taxpayers and remove funding from the heavily biased outlets. The Conversation itself receives taxpayer funding via public university subscribers.
“Charges of bias,” she wrote, “rarely survive empirical scrutiny.” She then went on to list studies she claimed supports her viewpoint.
The Boise State University professor (pictured) first cited a study that looked at the political ideology of journalists and reviewed news stories to determine if there was bias. However, the study does not even mention the public news outlets.
Professor Martin then cites another study which also did not look at the public news outlets. Finally, she cites a “poll” that supposedly finds high support for public broadcasting – but it was sponsored by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. (Vice President of Communications Brendan Daly told The Fix on the phone Thursday he would look into how much was spent on it.)
The poll found high support for emergency broadcasts but lower support for public media news coverage, including that “53 percent of voters trust public media networks and local stations.”
Meanwhile, experts have concluded there is bias.
DePauw University Professor Jeffrey McCall, an expert on the media, concluded recently in The Hill: “It’s a ‘water is wet’ statement to say PBS and NPR have leaned decidedly to the left for some time.”
Former NPR editor Uri Berliner also heavily detailed bias at his former employer last year in an essay for the Free Press.
Experts at the Media Research Center have also quantified how public media outlets are heavily biased toward the left.
Furthermore, the White House reminded constituents of clear bias at NPR in recent years, including how the alleged news outlet was quick to dismiss the Hunter Biden laptop story.
“We don’t want to waste our time on stories that are not really stories, and we don’t want to waste the listeners’ and readers’ time on stories that are just pure distractions,” NPR stated.
The outlet also regularly took the latest liberal talking point on hot topics, rushing to squash dissent on the possibility that coronavirus leaked from a lab, for example. Berliner, the former editor for National Public Radio, admitted in his essay: “Persistent rumors that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia over the election became the catnip that drove reporting. At NPR, we hitched our wagon to Trump’s most visible antagonist, Representative Adam Schiff.”
Media experts have concluded, based on careful study, that PBS and NPR push a liberal agenda. The words of insiders are also telling.
Boise State Professor Stephanie Martin, however, could only cite a few sources, none of which directly studied stories at the outlets.
It is clear Congress was right to defund the news outlets and now they must continue on by defunding them permanently in the next budget.
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IMAGE CAPTION: Boise State University Professor Stephanie Martin; Boise State University
