More bad news for right-wingers longing to peddle the myth of liberal bias in the corporate media. Indiana University released a comprehensive study of the visuals used in presidential campaign coverage from 1992-2004, finding that the three major broadcast networks--NBC, CBS and ABC--all favored Republicans in each election. 

The study focused on the visual production of news: where each story was placed in the newscast, editing techniques and manipulations related to camera angles, shot lengths, eyewitness perspectives and zoom movement.  Among the most negative visual representations or "image bytes" is the "lip-flap shot," where a reporter's narration is placed over a candidate talking, which the report calls a "violation of professional television news production standards."

"Not only is lip-flap unflattering for the candidate who appears," the report notes, "but it also distracts from the reporter's narration because viewers focus attention on making sense of what the lip flapper appears to be saying." The technique was found to be used more often with Democratic candidates than with Republicans. A similar partisan bias was found in which candidates were given the last word, which were videotaped in flattering low-angle shots and which were given unflattering extreme close-ups and high angles.

In attempting to account for the pattern of favoring Republicans in four consecutive election cycles (during both Democratic and Republican administrations), Maria Elizabeth Gabe, one of the study's authors explained, "We don't think this is journalists conspiring to favor Republicans. We think they're just so beat up and tired of being accused of a liberal bias that they unknowingly give Republicans the benefit in coverage."  In other words, "working the refs" works.

Leave it to Forbes to get someone from the Hoover Institution to do an "in-depth" feature on "The 25 Most Influential Liberals in the U.S. Media" (1/22/09).

The results are about as bogus as you might imagine, including a number of people who are not only not liberals, but who are actively loathed by the actual left end of the media spectrum--and the feeling is generally mutual: folks like Fred Hiatt, Thomas Friedman, Fareed Zakaria, Christopher Hitchens (did their Nation sub lapse in 1998?), Maureen Dowd, Chris Matthews and Andrew Sullivan.

Then there are some corporate journalists whose "liberalism" seems entirely resume-based: Kurt Andersen founded Spy and does a culture show on NPR! David Shipley wrote speeches for Bill Clinton and works at the New York Times! Gerald Seib works at the Wall Street Journal but doesn't write for the editorial page! Andersen is the kind of "liberal" who writes about "the Democrats' 'mommy party' M.O. of naivete, mollycoddling, and profligacy," Seib does pieces like "Bipartisanship Could Help Victorious Democrats," while Shipley's Times op-ed page has been the object of repeated complaints from FAIR for its right-slanted choices.

There's a couple of people on the list--Jon Stewart and Oprah Winfrey--who are indeed influential liberals who are "in U.S. media"...but if by "media" they don't mean journalism, why not include Steven Spielberg or Bruce Springsteen?  They're "in U.S. media" too.

Then there's the bloggers, who largely define themselves as not being part of the "MSM": Arianna Huffington, Kevin Drum, Glenn Greenwald, Ezra Klein, Matthew Yglesias, Markos Moulitsas Zuniga and Joshua Micah Marshall.

That leaves six people on the list of 25 who actually are liberal journalists with a regular platform in traditional U.S. media: the New Yorker's Hendrick Hertzberg; the Atlantic's James Fallows; Michael Pollan, a freelance writer for the New York Times; Times op-ed writer Paul Krugman; MSNBC's Rachel Maddow; and PBS's Bill Moyers. What does this say about the myth of the liberal media? Maybe the Hoover Institution can study that.

What would a real list of the most important progressive media figures look like? Feel free to leave suggestions in comments.

On Monday (1/19/09), Washington Post media reporter Howard Kurtz took a look at the health of Time and Newsweek, and almost immediately rendered a political judgment:

The rival editors are turning out weeklies that are smaller, more serious, more opinionated and, though they are loath to admit it, more liberal. They are pursuing a more elite audience, in print and on the Web, abandoning the old Henry Luce notion of catering to the masses. It is nothing less than a survival strategy.

Hmm. Maybe those magazine editors are "loath to admit" they publish liberal magazines because, well, they don't? Kurtz sure doesn't offer much evidence to that effect. Here is how he makes his case:

One answer is to jettison the old straddle-the-center formula in which the newsweeklies spoke with an institutional voice rather than publish bylines. Each magazine's lead columnist -- Time's Joe Klein, Newsweek's Jonathan Alter -- is liberal. Newsweek has been running columns by Jacob Weisberg, the liberal editor of Slate, another Post Co. property. Newsweek also ran a controversial cover last month headlined "The Religious Case for Gay Marriage" -- "one of the last great civil rights issues," Meacham says. And its top writers appear regularly on liberal talkshows on MSNBC, with which it has a news partnership.

Time's Joe Klein is not what one would consider a liberal. Alter might be, though he's clearly of the torture-approving, bash-the-teachers-unions, move-the-Democrats-to-the-right model. Newsweek also publishes regular pieces from the likes of Fareed Zakaria, George Will and Robert Samuelson--none of whom could be called liberal.

Kurtz played up the recent pro-gay marriage cover story, but later recalled that the magazine also turned in cover stories about Obama's supposed elitism and the (misguided) notion that the United States remained a center-right nation even after Obama's victory. Kurtz could have also mentioned the magazine's recent attempt to rehabilitate Dick Cheney and torture.

About Time, Kurtz wrote:

Time ran a column last week by liberal academic Jeffrey Sachs titled "The Case for Bigger Government." This week's issue features Obama, Time's Person of the Year, yet again, and the cover headline "Great Expectations," plus a piece on his wife as "America's Next Top Model."

Wait--Time put Obama on its cover? This week? Well, that is curious news judgment.

Kurtz adds:

Stengel's ideal staffer is Mark Halperin, whom he hired from ABC. Halperin created the political tip sheet the Page for Time.com and the magazine, and often appears on television. Both newsweeklies now realize they are competing on the Web as much as on the newsstand.

Halperin is well-known for attacking supposed liberal bias in the media, denounced the supposed pro-Obama media bias as "disgusting,"  and even advocated getting liberals out of newsrooms. This guy is the "ideal staffer" at a magazine Kurtz sees as moving left? Please explain.

The pundit panel from Sunday's broadcast of ABC's This Week, introduced by the host:

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS : And I am here for The Roundtable with George Will as always, Tom Friedman of the New York Times, former Speaker Newt Gingrich and Peggy Noonan of the Wall Street Journal.

Washington Post and CNN media critic Howard Kurtz has been sounding the alarm over pro-Obama bias in the media. On his Reliable Sources program on Sunday, he put this question about coverage of Obama's transition to one guest:

Isn't there a bit of a free ride to Obama right now, since he gets to seize the spotlight and talk about his appointees, to talk about his policies, but he can't really be blamed for any of the problems right now?

So Obama's press conferences are being covered--by the, umm, press--AND reporters aren't blaming him for the problems of the current administration? That is bias.

And last week Kurtz added this snappy item to his column, under the heading, "Obama Adulation Watch:"

Associated Press: "Many women recoil at the thought of baring their arms in sleeveless dresses or blouses, but not Michelle Obama--half of the fabulously fit new first couple."

Someone's suggesting that the Obamas are physically fit? When will it all end!?!?