NYT's Harwood equates CNN & MSNBC with Fox News; doesn't bother actually comparing them
November 02, 2009 9:39 am ET by Jamison Foser
Under the header "If Fox is partisan, it is not alone," the New York Times' John Harwood suggests that other cable channels are "partisan," just like Fox. Why does Harwood think this? Because their audiences lean to the left:
Fox News has attracted the most attention because of its "fair and balanced" challenge to its competitors and its success. But the audiences of its competitors have tilted sharply in the other direction.
...
In audience surveys from August 2000 to March 2001, Fox News viewers tilted Republican by 44.6 percent to 36.1 percent. More narrowly - 41.4 percent to 39.4 percent - so did the audience for MSNBC. The audiences of CNN, Headline News, CNBC and Comedy Central leaned Democratic.
By 2008-9, the network audiences tilted decisively, like Fox's. CNN viewers were more Democratic by 50.4 percent to 28.7 percent; MSNBC viewers were 53.6 percent to 27.3 percent Democratic; Headline News' 47.3 percent to 31.4 percent Democratic; CNBC's 46.9 percent to 32.5 percent Democratic; and Comedy Central's 47.1 to 28.8 percent Democratic.
This, it must be said, is inane. Harwood doesn't spend so much as a single word assessing or even mentioning the actual journalism of any of the channels in question. (There's a lot of that going around.) He just looks at their viewership, and concludes that the content of all the news channels is partisan.
That is a ridiculous way to assess whether a cable channel is "partisan." ESPN's audience probably skews Republican, too. Is ESPN a "partisan" Republican channel? Of course not.
Harwood also seems unaware of the possibility that the audiences at CNN and MSNBC are trending leftward for no reason other than that Fox is scooping up all the right wing viewers. If you assume a relatively finite universe of cable news viewers, CNN and MSNBC would see their viewership skew increasingly Democratic as Fox's skews Republican simply as a result of Republicans flocking to Fox.
Finally: Let's say you had three cable news channels. One was a bit to the right of center, one was slightly more to the right of center, and the third was far to the right of center. What do you think their viewership might look like? One would have a very Republican audience, and the other two would probably have audiences that lean Democratic. And John Harwood would tell you those two right-of-center channels were "partisan" because their audiences were disproportionately Democratic.
Well, that's kind of a strange statement...I'd like to see a little more from Foser on that comment.
As usual, Foser takes a pretty reasoned approach to his disagreement on an issue. However, this one falls flat when he leads us to the conclusion by citing the example of "Let's say you had three cable news channels. One was a bit to the right of center, one was slightly more to the right of center, and the third was far to the right of center."
That would be a perfectly reasonable conclusion if the viewers had no choices to choose from except republican programming...which is clearly not the case in cable news programming.
The dust-up between media figures about the political leanings of cable news is nothing more than a hair pulling slap fight between conservative and liberal beltway media insiders...providing them with justification for spilling barrels of ink on the subject.
You can certainly debate the merits of whether a network should skew right or left...but the facts are that they do. FoxNews is definitely a proponent of conservative and/or republican views...just as MSNBC supports liberal and/or democrat views, evidenced by their prime time lineup of liberal advocates.
The cable news networks provide endless hours of partisan programming...there is no debate about that...except among those media members endlessly "debating" what we already know.
It's funny how the "ONLY" people who wants to 'debate' rather or not a Cable Network is Democrat, or Republican when that is "NOT" what the 'debate' should be, or has been, Wink, wink.
When Republicans are caught doing "wrong", then they "cloud-up" the 'wrong-doings' with their "debate distractions", Uh, oh. LOL.
Well, that's kind of a strange statement...I'd like to see a little more from Foser on that comment."
Easy. Men tend to vote Republican more often than women and more men watch ESPN than do women.
This posting is about how it's inaccurate to describe a cable news network by their viewership. Did you miss that? That's why he brought up what he did. Try reading it again without your blinders on.
He's not arguing what the make-up of any cable channel is - he's arguing that one cannot make that determination based upon the viewership!
Who, weaselly? Don't get your hopes up.
He's not arguing what the make-up of any cable channel is - he's arguing that one cannot make that determination based upon the viewership!
Exactly. Weaselly is absolutely notorious for missing the point. And here is yet another example:
For the umpteenth time, it was never about the political leanings, it was about the terrible journalism practiced!
Weaselly, please give us some kind of evidence that you're not an idiot!
I'd like to, but Harwood spent all his time puking logical fallacies all over the page. Even if Harwood's conclusion is right, Harwood himself sure as hell isn't.
"Where was the coverage on Rev. Wright?, Obama's penchant for appointing czars thus avoiding congressional scrutiny?, the ACORN scandal?"
All over the place, vastly out of proportion to their importance.