To filch a line from F. Scott Fitzgerald, the media are different from you and me.
As we head into a political campaign, we’re going to become more and more aware of this gulf, as the media purveys stories that make us wonder, What planet are they on?
You’ve probably read about the recent Pew study that found that 34 percent of national media call themselves “liberal,” as compared with 22 percent who said they were liberal in 1995.
Pew also found that 7 percent of national reporters identify themselves as conservative, whereas for the general public the political identifications are just the opposite: 33 percent of Americans say they are conservative, while 20 percent call themselves liberals.
‘On social issues,’ writes James K. Glassman in the American Enterprise Institute’s magazine, ‘the gap is even wider. For example, the national press states by a margin of 91 percent to 6 percent that ‘belief in God is not necessary to be moral.’ The general public says, to the contrary, that belief in God is necessary, by a margin of 58 percent to 40 percent.’
‘In recent years the Left has convinced itself that its defeats have been caused by FOX News and conservative talk radio shows distorting national opinion,’ Glassman continues. ‘The truth is that thanks to growing public skepticism of broadcast and print journalism that is often openly biased, and new access to direct news sources through the Internet, people are making up their own minds.’