New York Times unhinged #2

Every once in a great while, The NY Times forgets who it is and actually presents a controversial story in an unbiased manner. For example, on August 26, 2019, its banner headline wrote, “Trump Urges Unity VS. Racism.” Trump was responding to a race-based mass-shooting in El Paso. But Times employees and readers were outraged that The Times would say something so benign about such an evil president. My favorite complaint:

“Headlines like this ignore all the context of #Trump’s actions and past remarks, make him suddenly look presidential,” Jerry Lanson, a professor emeritus of journalism at Emerson College, tweeted. “The Times should know better.”

The immediate widespread outrage prompted The Times to quickly modify the headline in later editions to read, “Assailing Hate, but Not Guns.” The official Times explanation for the modification: “We needed to deliver a nuanced message in a very small space under tight deadlines, and unfortunately, our first attempt at that did not hit it right.” Obviously, the writer of the initial headline had been lazy and failed to appreciate that hatred for Trump can never sleep or even take a breather.

Today’s paper included an unbiased front-page article that appears to have slipped by the editors also. The headline reads, “Israeli Deaths Exposed Rift In Hollywood.” As I read the article, I was stunned to read a story critical of the Left:

“With the exception of the rare conservative, Hollywood has long seemed to exist in an ideological bubble – a bastion of progressive politics, where Jewish people have thrived, Democratic politicians have been celebrated and stars have espoused liberal ideas fro the Oscar stage and rush to support movements like Black Lives Matter. For the most part, people in the entertainment world could trust that they were on the same page.

“That changed abruptly with the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel, reactions to the assault, and Israel’s retaliation, have revealed a schism that many in Hollywood did not realize was there, and it has left many Jews feeling like outsiders in an industry they founded and where they have long felt safe and supported.”

Wow. The Jews founded the entertainment industry? According the ChatGPT, America’s entertainment industry was found be a diverse bunch of people, including African-Americans, but when focused on the movie industry, it mentions the Jews – “a mix of pioneers, including Jewish immigrants.”

More importantly, what prompted The Times to stop its pandering to its liberal readers? Ah, because its progressive readers would be upset with the pandering that irritates conservatives like me every day. So the trick for unbiased NY Times reporting is to have its reader base in both sides of a controversial story.

New York Times bias #1149

At the top of the Business section is a tease for three articles inside the Business section. One of the teases reads, “Last month saw robust spending by American shoppers, while inflation held steady at 3.4 percent.” On the surface that sounds like more good news for Bidenomics, although I thought the government was trying to slow spending and reduce inflation. Hmmm.

The article on page B4 continued to read pro-Bidenomics. The article was titled, “Inflation Stayed Level in September Even as Consumer’ Spending Rose.” The the lede read, “American consumers spent at a robust clip last month as the economy continued to chug along even after more than a year and a half of Federal Reserve interest rate increases. The Fed’s policy moves have been intended to slow demand in order to tamp down inflation. Price increases have been slowing down.”

But finally, buried in the fourth paragraph, The Times gets to the the real story – “Still, Fed officials aim for 2 percent inflation, so the current pace is still much faster than their goal.”

Wow! So all of the favorable news – “robust,” “steady,” and “inflation slowing down” are misinformation. The real story is that inflation is stubborn and remains unacceptably high, but that would hurt Biden’s prospects, so they sugar-coat this information.

New York Times bias #1148

The Business section in today’s paper was dominated by a review of “X.” The banner headline read, “A Year of Musk,” subtitled, “From Twitter’s town square to a spammy, shrinking X.” Three separate stories supported The Times’ attack on Musk and X:

1. Foreign users – a Ukrainian who previously relied on Twitter during the war continues to need X, “But his timeline on the app … was filled with posts from accounts he didn’t recognize and content that had been debunked, he said.” (Selective and anecdotal.)
2. Domestic users – “Now rebranded as X, the site has experienced a surge of racist, antisemitic, and other hateful speech. Under his watch, millions of people have been exposed to misinformation about climate change. Foreign governments and operatives have spread divisive propaganda with little or no interference. Mr. Musk and his team have repeatedly asserted that such concerns are overblown…. Yet dozens of studies from multiple organizations have shown otherwise, demonstrating on issue after issue a similar trend: an increase in harmful content on X during Mr. Musk’s tenure.” (Does The Times endorse censoring so-called misinformation re: climate change? Interfering with divisive propaganda?)
3. Sports fans – “Since Elon Mush bought Twitter last year, many users have abandoned the platform, spurred by a number of unpopular changes. But in the same way many households stuck with cable for game broadcasts, sports fans and sports reporters still find X indispensable because, they say, it remains the go-to place for live updates and hot takes about coaching decisions and umpire calls. For some journalists, abandoning thousands of followers are starting somewhere else from zero was a non-starter.” The NY Times supported this analysis by interviewing some ilk-minded reporters – i.e., those who would love to drop Twitter for political correctness, but as a practical matter can’t. I suspect the vast majority of sports people have no interest in boycotting Twitter/X because the platform serves them well and they are aren’t particularly invested in bringing Musk and Twitter/X down, as the NY Times obviously is.

New York Times bias #1147

Last year, there was a controversy in the NHL when several players refused to wear pro-PRIDE warm-up jerseys. The NHL acted responsibly by banning not only all themed warm-up jerseys, but essentially all on-ice demonstrations in support of anyone and anything. That makes sense. Why court controversy like Bud Light did?

Of course, The Athletic (the sports arm of The NY Times) called this policy “reactionary,” “unenforceable and inadvisable,” and “mind-numbingly dumb.” At issue now was whether this policy applies to the longstanding practice of some players to use PRIDE tape on their sticks, and eventually the NHL backed down and said the rule would be tweaked to allow players to use tape to represent causes dear to them.

Although this exception makes for a slippery slope, it is a practical solution. But The Athletic’s justification for why PRIDE deserves an exception is revealing:

“Hang around hockey people enough… and one of the most frequent phrases you’ll hear is ‘progress isn’t linear.’ Sometimes a prospects meteoric rise flattens out…. Even the greats have setbacks. Social progress is different. We should always become more aware, more educated, more open-minded, more accepting. We should always be getting better, being better. Which makes the NHL’s latest episode of stepping on a rake all the more frustrating and unacceptable.”

There is so much mind-numbingly dumb in that progressive statement that I don’t know where to start.

New York Times bias #1146

Major headline – “New House Speaker Backs Fossil Fuels and Denies Climate Change.” Subtitle on a major nearby headline – “Election Deniers Still Hold a Grip Over the GOP.” Obviously, The Times enjoys characterizing those who oppose two of its favorite issues – climate change and election integrity 2020. What exactly does denialism mean? According to Wikipedia – “Denialism is an essentially irrational action that withholds the validation of a historical experience or event when a person refuses to accept an empirically verifiable reality.” So, according to The Times, the majority of the Republican Party is irrational.

That appraisal is not surprising and seems harsh. But, according to Paul Krugman in an opinion column in today’s paper, it is not harsh; rather, it is generous – “Let me say, by the way, that the widely used term ‘election denial’ is a euphemism that softens and blurs what we’re really talking about. Trying to keep your part in power after it lost a free and fair election, without a shred of evidence of significant fraud, isn’t just denial; it’s a betrayal of democracy.”

This practice of attempting to close a subject from any further discussion is a standard tactic for liberals and progressives who want to prematurely declare victory and move on to another subject.

New York Times bias #1145b

A big article on the Mississippi governor’s race between a Republican incumbent and a bland, nondescript Democrat. According to The Times, “Democrats are trying to harness that energy behind Brandon Presley, the party’s nominee for governor. Mr. Presley, who is white, is seeking to ride his brand of moderate politics and his pledges to expand Medicaid to an underdog victory over Gov. Tate Reeves, an unpopular Republican incumbent who has been trailed by a welfare scandal.”

There is nothing more in the article about the so-called welfare scandal, but it later acknowledges, “The race’s limited polling shows Mr. Presley within striking distance but running consistently behind Mr. Reeves.” That’s the type of “unpopular” most candidates would enjoy. We don’t have to wonder who The Times is supporting.

New York Times bias #1145a

A big article on the Mississippi governors race between a Republican incumbent and a bland, nondescript Democrat. According to The Times, “Democrats are trying to harness that energy behind Brandon Presley, the party’s nominee for governor. Mr. Presley, who is white, is seeking to ride his brand of moderate politics and his pledges to expand Medicaid to an underdog victory over Gov. Tate Reeves, an unpopular Republican incumbent who has been trailed by a welfare scandal.”

There is nothing more in the article about the so-called welfare scandal, but it later acknowledges, “The race’s limited polling shows Mr. Presley within striking distance but running consistently behind Mr. Reeves.” That’s the type of “unpopular” most candidates would enjoy. We don’t have to wonder who The Times is supporting.

Open letter to The Times – Maui fire and Corina Knoll

In Knoll’s first edited response in today’s article, she unabashedly declares that in selecting a victim for her story, “I’m always hoping to illuminate the lives of people of color.”  Such racial bias is surprising, but it is shocking that such an admission survived the editing process.  Surely The Times doesn’t condone such bias, even from such a virtuous reporter who takes an “admittedly not healthy” personal interest in her victims.

Sincerely,

Mike Kueber

San Antonio, TX

mike.kueber@gmail.com

210.380.7436

New York Times bias #1144

Page Two of the Times is titled Inside The Times. A principal daily segment is titled The Story Behind the Story – usually an edited interview of a reporter who covered a major story. Today’s segment was titled A Reporter’s ‘Responsibility’ After Maui Fire. Fahima Haque interviewed Corina Knoll, a reporter based in LA, who is a Korean adoptee raised and educated in MN/IA.

In response to the first question about finding a fire-affected family to profile: “It was also important to me to write about a working-class Pacific Islander family, as I’m always hoping to illuminate the lives of people of color.” I understand her direction toward a working-class family, but the gratuitous comment about people of color reveals a horrible bias that surely infects all her reporting. The comment would deserve a rebuke from most unbiased journalists, but within the NY Times, it would surely pass without notice.

The second question concerned being sensitive to a traumatized family – (Not to rush them), “but we are on the ground for a limited number of days, and are highly aware that the world’s attention soon moves on. I tell people very gently that if they want to tell their story, the timing does matter.” Knoll sounds to have so much virtue. “Very gently”? Ha.

The final question concerned the story’s affect on Knoll – “It can be an all-consuming process because I take stories like this personally, which is admittedly not healthy. But I feel a great responsibility to write something that is worth the trust someone gave me.” So she sacrifices her health to produce great journalism, in her mind. Where does The Times find such great people?