Gas Prices and the Media Message

As our dominance of world economic activity loosens, so will the US role in determining world energy prices. To the extent that they encourage smarter environmental decisions, high fuel prices are not all bad. Investment in conservation is usually cheaper than investing in more energy, creates more US job and has a long term environmental impact. Pain at the pumps makes one less likely to commute in a 5,000 pound vehicle. Urban planning that encourage public transit, neighborhoods where you can walk, bike and take care of your immediate needs have some advantages to sprawling, disorganized suburbs. Human intelligence will make the world better and smarter it will also require us to change and adapt.
 
Yeah, he has a source for his 85% figure-the Rush Limbaugh show.
Gas is over $5 a gallon right now in Los Angeles, and over $6 in Alaska.
Bush, Obama, Carter...they cannot control the price of gas. Arab and South American cartels jack it up at will, probably when Al Queda needs more cash. And we just bend over and give them our wallets and other assets.
When will we learn and switch to renewable energy and electric commuter cars.
I hope in my lifetime I can own an electric car and drive by every gas station in town and moon them on a daily basis.
 
There have been about 11 surveys over the last 50 years asking the political views of journalists. The answer has usually been about 55% liberal and 17% conservative. The most recent surveys have seen a marked increase in the number of moderates but the ratio of liberals to conservatives have remained constant. Further, when their views are asked, the moderates beliefs closely align with the self-identified liberals.
 
Good post.

Slightly off topic but I believe that a lot of the inherent bias is due to the blurring of the line between news reporting and opinionated writing. Everyone on this board is probably intelligent enough to know the difference between what a news section should be and what an editorial section should be. Unfortunately, you can open up any paper this morning as see news articles editorialized ad infinitum.

When I first moved to Knoxville I religiously purchased and read USA Today. However, I started noticing the news was masked by opinion. If an article had two sides, the paper would generally give the liberal side emotional support in how it presented the news item. The paper almost always attributed an opinion from a right-leaning group as "conservative" but never, ever referenced "liberal", "democrat", or "leftist" when referring to organizations in support of the opposite side.

At times, it was quite comical. I remember one article that labeled John McCain as a conservative but ignored labels for The Ford Foundation and NOW.
 
Pretty good thread for the most part. I lean to a lot of what Deez is saying. I also think it goes deeper than what the professor was saying.

I think most people would agree that college professors and the world of academia has many more dems than repubs. See the following link.The Link

(I just googled and this came up and it is not really important to my point but at least it is something)

According to the study cited 75% of all college faculty identify themselves as "liberals" and 87% of the faculty for english, political science, philosophy etc. The degrees and courses taken by potential journalists.

So it stands to reason that like minded students would gravitate to these degrees. Obviously nothing is absolute, but the strong percentage of students in these degrees are self described liberals. Imagine a strong conservative going to lectures for 4 years by admitted liberal faculty with overwhelmingly liberal classmates. It would be a really rough thing to do. Some certainly do but many do not. So when you examine the potential journalists out there the overwhelming pool of students are self admitted liberals that have spent the past 4 years being taught by self admitted liberals. It is no mystery why the ranks of journalists are dominated by liberals. There is nothing really inherently wrong with this. Ideally, a university would offer more diversity in its ranks but I have no idea how many conservative journalists actually ever apply.

it is insane to act as if there is not a general liberal bias in the media. I do not think it is as bad as most seem to think as I think most journalists try and do the right thing. However, our personal beliefes will always impact our professional lives. It is inevitable. So when the overwhelming majority of journalists are self admitted liberals, there will always be a slight bias. Really, I dont think it is that big of a deal.

Regarding the OP, to me the real issue is the double standard the media has had for BO. I do actually think it might be lessening, but it clearly exists. When the overwhelming majority of self admitted liberals in the media see the first black and liberal President elected, they are going to want him to succeed. This is natural and not at all surprising or controversial. Liken it to Texas football fans (or any big program). A great number of the ranks will drink the koolaid and wear orange tinted glasses. It is actually what would and should be expected. When the heroes then falter, it is very very hard for the diehards to criticize. We want to make excuses for "our guys" and we want to give them every benefit of the doubt. Conversely, if a cocky former Aggy player does something wrong, we will jump all over it. Well BO and GWB are the liberal media's equivalent. They were going to be overly quick to hammer Bush and paint his deeds in as poor a light as they could while still maintaining some integrity. They will bend over backwards to give BO every benefit of the doubt and try and paint his deeds in as positive a light as their integrity will allow them. This is purely human nature at work.

BO openly railed on Bush over high gas prices and called it a "failure of leadership". Now gas prices are higher and BO isn't being asked (I havent seen it) about his prior comments. This is just an example of what I am talking about. There is NO conspiracy imo. It is simply the result of natural human actions. It would be shocking if it wasn't this way.
 
Pretty simple narratives really.

High gas prices during Bush term = Evil Bush and Cheney

High gas prices during Obama term = Evil Oil Companies
 
Given the former president's connection to the oil business, doesn't Evil Bush and Cheney= Evil Oil Companies?

And of course President No hat and No Cattle also talked a mean game about oil prices when he was running for office so if his press coverage after that wasn't favorable....

In reply to:
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good find, Shiner. Fortunately, the media found the real culprits of high oil prices once Obama was in office
rolleyes.gif
 
Wow Shiner - great link!

Anyone want to tell us again that the media is not biased and that we are living in a conspiracy theory world?
 
Facts jhave never mattered to Mich. If the facts don't match his agenda he ignores them
Mich still wants to think Super Pacs existed in 08
 
Yes, I figured the data existed and it would come from the MRC clowns.


As a scientist, you think that by simply counting the number of stories involving oil prices during a particular time period by itself proves a liberal media bias? Wouldn’t you want a little more information in that analysis? February 2011 coincides with the Arab Spring uprisings. Was something similar happening in February 2008? As a result in 2011, did the networks carry more stories about international events than domestic events or was the ratio the same as it was in 2008? Could that be the cause of the supposed “bias?”


In reply to:
Click to expand...
 
Well if you add Fox News you would generally include CNN, MSNBC, Etc. so I'm pretty confident that the liberal bias would remain rather prominent.
 
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