Good Television

The way that media slants its coverage is rather amazing. If you watch network news uncritically, you are being played.

In the Tea Party movement, if you have 100 protestor signs, which one will be on the news? It will either be the one that is misspelled, the one that shows Obama as the Joker, or the one by the local Nazi crazy. This may not be bias so much as "good television.”

This same kind of thing goes on with the Occupy movement. You cannot trust the images or the interviews. If the nightly news producer has two clips—one of a crazy defecating on the flag, or one of a person with a cogent argument—the crazy is going to get the spot. This may be bias, or just more "good television.”

Readers of this blog will not be surprised that I am no fan of Nancy Pelosi. Yet I still see news bias against her. I have cable news right now because I am in Missouri, and I have satellite there until my contract expires. Twice I have seen Nancy Pelosi accused of saying, "We need to pass the bill to find out what's in it." She is referring to the Obama Health care bill. 

Yes you can see where she said this, in an out of context clip. When she is viewed in context she is saying something different. Pelosi is saying that once the public knows what is in the bill, they will support it. I think she was wrong on this, but she is not a crazy woman. (I will show a clip tomorrow of Pelosi, where she says that Boeing should fire the workers in S. Carolina, realizes that is not what she meant, and corrects it with the change that she wants them to be Union workers. I am not as confident in the veracity of the clip in terms of editing as I was when I put it in my blog queue. But I will leave it there as it does illustrate one point I wanted to make, the Union template.)

The Oakland Police has estimated that there are 100 people at the Occupy Oakland protest that are violent, out of an estimated 10,000 protesters.

So I will leave you with a question. If a news producer has a clip of people throwing rocks (I do wonder who these people really are, are they planted?), or a video of the Occupy protesters locking arms to prevent property damage, which is most likely to be aired-which is "good television”?