What Media Bias?
The recent kerfuffle over the faked Republican Schiavo talking-points memo smacks of liberal media bias. In this case, the media folks have been all about reporting on the content of the memo and they seem not all concerned about the origin of the thing or its provenance as it came to them. They merely treated the memo as fact without bothering to fact-check.
Now contrast this behavior with how the media reported on the Democrat strategy memos from late 2003. These were unprotected documents on the Senate servers that were open for just about anybody on the network to view. They contained some rather damning evidence of Democrats taking marching orders from special interest groups and gaming the judicial confirmation process. One even referred to Bush's judicial nominees as Nazis. If you perused most of the MSM outlets at the time, you found scant little reporting on the actual content of the memos. The media was concerned only with how the things became public and repeated Democrat accusations of hacking and malfeasance. A Republican staffer was eventually canned over the ordeal.
So here's what we have… damning Democrat memos are publicized and the media does not report on their content, but only investigates the leak (it is odd how the media is never concerned about leaks that hurt Republicans or the Bush administration, isn't it?). In fact, the reports talking about the leak only obliquely referred to the documents as Democrat strategy or talking points memos and that's it. Then we have a faked Republican memo that the media have no problem transcribing, quoting, and noting the content, and yet they're not at all concerned about where it came from.
Any bias there?
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[...] Filed under: General — Dangerous Dan @ 11:13 pm
In case you missed it, this post has attracted quite a debate about Terri Schiavo among Burton, Pete the Elder, and myself. Keep [...]
Pingback by Dangerous Dan » Schiavo — 3/30/2005 @ 7:14 am
My question is why so many politicians are that concerned over Schiavo in the first place, particularly the Republicans who had their late-night session about it. And they even got Bush to fly back to D.C. to sign it. Why are they that interested in getting involved in the private affairs of one family? While the memos may have been faked, the Republicans’ actions weren’t, and the motivations seemed crystal clear. They were more interested in politics and looking good than anything else.
For instance, no one batted an eye when baby Sun Hudson was disconnected from life support in Texas. This was over the parents’ objections, as hospital administration decided to unplug. And it was legal, thanks to a law signed by then Governor George W. Bush. According to said law, hospitals can disconnect patients from life support if said patient cannot afford health care.
This is why the Republicans’ actions last Sunday ring hollow. That, and the incredible governmental intrusion from the party that once proclaimed the merits of smaller, less intrusive government. This is making many conservatives nervous.
The memos are hardly the issue.
Comment by Burton — 3/28/2005 @ 6:45 pm
Burton, I’ll respond to this in more detail when I later get the chance. Your claims are actually very similar to somebody else I was talking to about this.
I will briefly say that you’re being absurdly cynical about the motivations of the Republicans. Yes, there is certainly a political motivation there and it would be naive to think that politics aren’t playing a role in… well… politics. But I think you also need to allow that with some of the party, there is a genuine concern there about saving Schiavo, both for her own sake and because of the sort of ethical slippery slope precedent that her death presents for others.
Comment by Dangerous Dan — 3/28/2005 @ 9:00 pm
I agree that I am cynical, but in this case I disagree that such cynicism is absurd. Terri Schiavo is hardly the only person on life support who would have preferred to not be kept alive in this condition. Tom Delay’s father, for example, was in a similar situation, and the Delay family decided to let his father die because his father was not coming back from his injuries. There are others who are disconnected every day, but none of them get media coverage and I don’t see Congress fighting for all of them. I don’t see any proposed laws banning living wills or DNRs. I don’t see anyone willing to spend tax dollars, or anyone willing to raise taxes to pay the medical expenses of everyone in Terri’s condition. And show me a Republican willing to do THAT, by the way, and I’ll show you a Republican with my support. No, all I see are politicians trying to score a victory that costs them nothing.
I do see laws on the books that allow patents to be disconnected by hospitals if that patient can’t pay. (Sun Hudson) And I see no efforts to get rid of those laws. All I do see are politicians, Republicans mainly, who decided that Terri and Terri alone deserved their attention. And this, of course, could have nothing to do with Bush’s falling poll numbers or the Republicans playing to the Evangelicals who helped tip the scales. So again, color me cynical.
The slippery slope is not in Terri and her wishes to not remain in this condition. The slippery slope is hospitals having the power to overide a patient’s desire to remain alive. If the patient cannot pay, the hospital can legally unplug. THERE is the slippery slope. We let a business decide whether you live or die by your profitability, and that is what dehumanizes us all.
Comment by Burton — 3/29/2005 @ 11:31 am
“We let a business decide whether you live or die by your profitability”
But all businesses that perform life saving services do that. If you are starving a grocery store does not have to give you food. If you need medicine the local pharmacy does not have not to give you medicine. Forcing businesses to take care of people without compensation is forcing them into slavery. Should a hospital be forced into bankruptcy and not be able to save any lives in order to save the lives of a few?
This also goes into deeper issues of the purpose of government in the first place. Does the government exist to solve all the world’s problems or only to solve specific problems? Does the government as an institution of acceptable controled violence even have a right to try to solve some problems? Does the government exist to defend negative rights (the right not to be murdered, the right not to be forcefully coerced into labor, etc.) or does it exist to promote positive rights (the right to food, the right to health care, etc.). It can not do both all the time as positive rights inherently infringe on other peoples negative rights (your right to health care infringes on the doctor’s right not to be forcefully coerced into labor).
Comment by Pete The Elder — 3/29/2005 @ 4:32 pm
“Forcing businesses to take care of people without compensation is forcing them into slavery. Should a hospital be forced into bankruptcy and not be able to save any lives in order to save the lives of a few?”
So where does this leave the “culture of life?” (The title adopted by the Republicans who worked the late night session to save Terri.) Because eventually Terri Schiavo would have run out of money and her parents and family and supporters would have run out of money. She could have stayed alive for decades, but someone had to pay for this. When would the hospital been allowed to disconnect her before THEY were forced into slavery and bankruptcy?
Would the Republicans still be clamoring for Terri to be kept alive if she were poor and costing the hospital money? If they were, I could respect that. If not, they are hypocrites. And you will be able to tell if their actions are genuine or grandstanding by whether they fight to keep alive a poor person. Because after this, everyone with a dying relative on life support is going to beg the Republicans to fight for them. And the “culture of life” will have to either live up to their title, or reveal themselves as hypocrites.
Comment by Burton — 3/29/2005 @ 10:38 pm
Actually, in the Terri case there were plenty of people willing to pay for her care along with a trust fund from the malpractice lawsuit her husband won. There are three main reasons why this case is difficult and why it differs from so many other recent ones: No one on either side knows for sure what Terri would have wanted, she is not in any pain, and the only medical care she needs is food and water. This is a case where the only justification for withdrawing food and water is that it would have been Terri’s wishes, which unfortunatle can not be known with anything near certainty.
I for one think that people should be allowed to deny any treatment they want as long as they make some sort of living will while having a sound mind or are of sound mind when they want to remove treatment. However, I think adults should be allowed to do pretty much whatever they want with their own bodies as long no one else is directly harmed, but almost no one else agrees with that position.
Comment by Pete The Elder — 3/30/2005 @ 9:53 am
“However, I think adults should be allowed to do pretty much whatever they want with their own bodies as long no one else is directly harmed, but almost no one else agrees with that position. ”
I’d say that many would agree to an extent, but only about their own actions. We often have different sets of rules for ourselves and for others. When it comes to other people, then they have a problem and don’t like it that certain people two states over are able to say, think, and do things that have no effect on them personally. What we need more of is people willing to disagree and even civily voice their disagreement, but then leave it alone. (And this goes for both sides.)
As for the Terri case, yes it is unique. And that’s why the concern of the politicians, the “culture of life” Republicans and Jesse Jackson, rings hollow. They don’t truly care, they see an opportunity. If there wasn’t already tons of coverage, there would have been no special session of Congress. And you will see the hollowness when an unknown poor person on life support asks for Congressional help and is refused. I see this issue as biting a lot of people in the butt down the road. The wise politicians have stayed out of it.
I think Terri’s wishes are being honored. Her body is going to be autopsied and that will be the definitive word on it, in hindsight though it may be. Hopefully, if it shows what I believe it will show, that there is nothing left of much of her brain, it will give small comfort to her family in that they will know, finally, that there was no way she would have recovered and that she is now at peace with God.
And I think I’m going to let the matter rest there. Good to hear from you and I’ll be sure to check out your blog soon and maybe pester you if I can.
Comment by Burton — 3/30/2005 @ 2:05 pm
I’m a little late to this discussion, but I wanted to add my two cents.
Heh. It’s easy to give someone with whom you agree the benefit of the doubt, to think the best of their motives, and to show no such grace to people with whom you don’t agree, to be cynical about their possible motives. And isn’t it just so much easier to argue, to fight, when you think this way? I say this because it’s a trap I fall in far too easily, and it’s why I’m wary about commenting about politics too much.
For the record, I imagine I’m pretty close to the same point at which Burton is standing (and since I agree with you, let me say that you, Burton, did need to chill out: “They don’t truly care, they see an opportunity. If there wasn’t already tons of coverage, there would have been no special session of Congress.” ). To me, there’s been a disconnect between why this particular case has gotten so much attention and intervention when, I imagine, there are so many similar cases that haven’t reached such a critical media mass. I’m suspicious of the meddlers into this issue on both sides; once one side started gathering forces, the other side needed to begin consolidation its troops in response. And, I’m not fully convinced about the depth of concern for Terry and her famiy from those conscripted political forces.
I do believe the questions surrounding Terry’s case are important, but I wonder how universal such answers to these questions might be. I kinda wish that Terry’s husband and her parents could argue this question for themselves and that the politicians that swooped around this issue wouldn’t think to enforce their answers on the rest of us.
Comment by Lennox — 4/1/2005 @ 1:33 am