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A couple of Time Warner shareholders went after CNN CEO Jeff Bewkes Thursday in LA at a Time Warner shareholders meeting [...] David Almasi, the Veep of the National Center for Public Policy Research1, a conservative communications and research foundation, is in LA to question Bewkes. Both Almasi and President David Ridenour are Time Warner shareholders.
[...] “Mr. Bewkes, we have urged you many times to make CNN more objective,” Almasi said in his statement. “You have admitted to us in 2014 the need for more balance. We praised you last year after CNN President Jeffrey Zucker also acknowledged this and acted on the need for more diverse views. But bias is apparently worse than ever. As shareholders, we are concerned about the repetitional risk to our investment in Time Warner as CNN appears to be a key player in the war against the Trump presidency.”
Almasi cited a Media Research Center2 study of CNN programing for 14 hours and 27 minutes of news coverage back on May 12. The report concluded that all but 68 minutes were devoted to Trump with 96 guests out of 123 being negative.
[...] “I’m inquiring about CNN’s bias and our return on investment,” Almasi continued in his statement. “Half of the American public – which includes potential and current CNN viewers – voted for Trump last November and supports his agenda. CNN acts as if it is part of the anti-Trump resistance. Are you willing to lose viewers, possibly forever, because of the bias?”
Almasi even threatened Bewkes, saying that Media Research Center plans to alert advertisers about news programs that “peddle smear, hate and political extremism.”
He asked Bewkes, “Are you concerned about advertisers leaving CNN? Will you continue to ignore our appeals for objectivity at the risk to our investment in Time Warner?”
Source: The Daily Caller
1The National Center for Public Policy Research, founded in 1982, is a self-described conservative think tank in the United States. In February 2014, at Apple Inc.'s annual shareholder meeting, NCPPR proposed Apple "disclose the costs of its sustainability programs" was rejected by 97% vote. The NCPPR representative argued that Apple's decision to have all of its power come from greens sources would lower shareholders' profits.
2The Media Research Center (MRC) is a politically conservative content analysis organization based in Reston, Virginia, founded in 1987 by activist L. Brent Bozell III. Its stated mission is to "prove—through sound scientific research—that liberal bias in the media does exist and undermines traditional American values."
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:09PM (20 children)
Yet, its far more objective than the existing system where roughly 100% of journalism professors are registered democrats, roughly 100% of journalism grads are democrats, roughly 100% of TV news readers are registered democrats, etc. Asking when CNN will present balanced news is literally like asking the Democratic National Committee when it will present balanced press releases, because its basically the same people in cooperation.
Which brings up the somewhat serious practical problem of if for decades the establishment has only permitted establishment single party politics in an economic field, you can't just wave a magic wand and staff up 50:50. There are basically no Republican journalists, rounded down as a statistical anomaly. You can't staff up a department if there are literally no people.
The answer seems to be immigration. We can replace our expensive lefty journalists with migrant journalists and H1B journalists, obtaining a better more balanced profit while also reducing expenses.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:35PM (9 children)
Are you saying that Fox News, the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, and the National Review are actually staffed 100% by democrats? That's so devious.
How have they fooled millions of conservatives for so long?
What's a genuine source of conservative news, StormFront?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:59PM
My folks were fans of Mark Koernke [wikipedia.org]. Maybe Liberty Tree Radio [4mg.com] is conservative news?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Tuesday June 20 2017, @06:27PM (4 children)
It's not that hard, they are not too bright.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday June 20 2017, @07:37PM (3 children)
That then begs the question, if it is the case that all journalists and reporters and editors are Democrats and the ones working for Fox, the Wall Street Journal, etc. were only pretending to push a conservative narrative, then why were they doing that? If in fact they're all on the same Democratic team, why would they work at cross purposes by pushing a "liberal" narrative at MSNBC while pushing a "conservative" narrative at Fox? Unless...team red vs. team blue is not their agenda at all but something else, right?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by aristarchus on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:14PM (2 children)
First, Phoenix, never use "begs the question" for "raises the question", or you will get curmudgeons like myself falling all over their selves to straighten you out.
Why? What better way to get rid of the so-called conservative movement in America than to let them win? We might call it the "Kansas strategy". But I prefer to think of it along the lines of what the American economist, Thorstein Veblen, said was the Chinese approach to national defense. Veblen was proposing a similar approach to the Kaiser in WWI, "Let the Germans win." No better way to destroy imperial ambition than to allow, or even abet, its success!
China, being the Central Kingdom 中国 , had to deal with all sorts of barbarians that would raid its borders and generally cause mischief. But much like with the "Ethics of Parasites", if you want to be a raider, it is in your best interest not to threaten the health, and certainly not the existence of your host. Thus China would often buy off barbarians, or co-opt them into being frontier guards against other barbarians.
Of course, the reason this worked was that if a nation of barbarians were to conquer China, they would lose. And certainly this did happen once, with the Yuan dynasty and Kublai Khan, the grandson of Ghengis. But the thing is, once you conquer China, and make yourself the emperor, you really can't be a Mongol anymore. No more hunting on the steppes, there are affairs of state to tend to. And you cannot be emperor of China if you do not both speak and write Chinese! And the Emperor must dress appropriately for mandatory ritual. So the Mongols took over China. But what happened to them? Within two generations, they were just Chinese.
.
So we let the Republicans win. In fact, even force them to elect Trumpf the Khan, a real estate pillager from the North! And then we let them try to govern. Now they actually can repeal and replace Obamacare, and in fact they will have to. But it will destroy them. In the future, only old people will say, "Read my lips, no new taxes." Then we will know they are the ones who used to be Republican.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @04:56PM (1 child)
once you have paid him the Danegeld/ You never get rid of the Dane [wikipedia.org]
Power begets power, especially in politics. It shifts cultural norms, and allows entrenchment. Why do you think there are only 2 major political parties, despite so many people begging for a 3rd or 4th choice?
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Wednesday June 21 2017, @06:02PM
Um, because in China, there is only one party? And no Danes, except Matt Damon, and I am pretty sure that was fiction.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:25PM (2 children)
There has long been an internal battle at Fox over the message.
Fox is in New York. They hire journalists. Nearly all of them are liberal.
Fox leadership, until just recently (due to death), was conservative. Leadership sort of runs the show of course, but underlings subvert the desired message. Fox was slightly conservative as a result.
The new leadership at Fox is at best uninterested in fighting that fight. We now see Fox rapidly moving left.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 21 2017, @01:53AM (1 child)
So instead of Hitler we'll get Carter. I'm OK with this.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Wednesday June 21 2017, @02:44AM
Me too!
https://www.planetclaire.tv/quotes/stargate-sg1/samantha-carter/season-two/ [planetclaire.tv]
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @03:40PM (1 child)
We can replace our expensive lefty journalists with migrant journalists and H1B journalists
Well, we did have Connie Chung...
But seriously, the only person that ever spoke factually on the TV was Julia Child
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:06PM
Even she believed in the seared meat heresy and a couple other oddities.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @04:12PM
Ah, but that's because reality has a well-known liberal bias. I think you can chill, dude.
(Score: 2) by NewNic on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:17PM
Perhaps that's because parroting talking points of the Koch Brothers and their think tanks doesn't require any skills?
Perhaps it is because people that are interested in reporting facts tend to be Democrats?
What your statistic shows is not bias in the media, but the bankruptcy and corruption of views on the right.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 3, Funny) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:21PM
Look, asshole, it's not the Democrats' fault most of you 'cons can't read past the third grade. You're self-selecting out of the job market for journalism.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @05:23PM (4 children)
You are so fucking CRAZY VLM. I really REALLY wish we could have a SoylentNation Meetup just so we can find out who everyone actually is.
From the various times I've actually seen some TV news the "experts" are 99.9% of the time supportive of whatever bias the channel is pushing. There are conservative, liberal, and anarcho/libertarian types all the time! Fox news is almost 100% conservative, along with a bunch of other outlets.
"Roughly 100% of" lololol, come ON. Given the last sentence I actually wonder if you're just trolling, but you say crazy shit so often it is impossible to say.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday June 20 2017, @08:44PM (1 child)
We do every day, right here!
I say crazy shit but usually because its true. I'm not so much crazy, as really really good at finding the craziest shit. I've been a human google-bot for half a century. Some people don't think it thru and think that I can find crazy facts means I'm crazy; not so, its all the worlds fault. I couldn't cut and paste this much craziness without a hell of a lot of help from the world. I'm actually boring as hell rational when I'm talking hard engineering, probably because your average transistor engineering datasheet isn't as batshit crazy as, say, the world, or politics, or journalism, or religion, etc.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2014/05/06/just-7-percent-of-journalists-are-republicans-thats-far-less-than-even-a-decade-ago/ [washingtonpost.com]
OK I call "about zero" what in 2013 was 7%. Of course if you extend trend plots and cut about 1% annually then 2017 would be about 3% predicted.
I'm not even going to listen to outrage posts that I dare call 3% "about zero". Spare me.
http://www.mrc.org/special-reports/liberal-mediaevery-poll-shows-journalists-are-more-liberal-american-public-%E2%80%94-and [mrc.org]
(admittedly maybe not the most unbiased source)
http://www.mediaite.com/online/scathing-report-shows-just-how-many-journalists-have-contributed-to-clintons-campaign/ [mediaite.com]
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/report-journalists-are-miserable-over-educated-under-paid-middle-aged-men-mostly/361891/ [theatlantic.com]
No copy and paste, darn near the entire article. The change over time is amazing.
I will admit this is pretty much a grumpy old man issue. People today accept that journalists are staggeringly overwhelmingly left wing. But when I was a kid (a long time ago) it was actually kinda balanced. I suspect some of the people who disagreed with me without having done any research of their own, are also "older" and relying on life experiences in the 80s or something. Even as late as 1980 you were only twice as likely to find a "D" than a "R" unlike now where its nearly impossible to find an "R" journalist other than specialty venues (like fox news or the economist or whatever).
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 20 2017, @11:01PM
Thanks for actual links, as usual your reporting of "the truth" is quite skewed as to sound very crazy. Stop with the crazy huh? Then you won't get so many "expressions of love".
So, the truth: Republicans lost a lot of journalists over time, Democrats lost a good chunk, while independents and other rose sharply. To me this doesn't scream "all journalists are liberals" it simply shows that party affiliation has rapidly dropped. I am NOT shocked to see that republicans fell faster than democrats, because the GOP is a cesspool of snakes and liars. The democrats still pretend occasionally to take the high road.
So, you're narrative is false and doesn't even mention the sizable drop in Democrat journalists. #FAKENEWS #SAD #OLDMANWALKING
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday June 21 2017, @02:29PM (1 child)
Oh that's easy. VLM would be the one with the toothbrush moustache. Then jmorris would show up with one, too, and they'd joyfully, reflexively salute each other with an 'ave' before self-consciously checking the gesture and morphing it into a motion to slick back their hair. Aristarchus and takyon would generally resemble Radagast the Brown, and azuma and kurenai would be dressed all in rainbows cross-cut with aggressive punk touches like spiked collars. Buzzard would show up in a fishing vest. I would be the one in the corner, snarling at everyone.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Thursday June 22 2017, @03:49AM
I'd actually be wearing what I normally wear, which is black jeans, a black top, steel-toed boots, and some lacy black things under it. Black looks good on me. Trust me, at six feet and with almost knee-length hair I don't need to dress weird to stand out.
I'm almost painfully shy in meatspace. No one would guess I was gay looking at me either. I don't wear pride buttons or anything. Mostly I just want to be left the hell alone, so might not even show up to said meetup. That said, you *might* see me with a handful of Uzzard's teeth and some fragments of that fishing vest of his if he gets uppity.
Ever watch a weird little anime called Azumanga Daiou? Think "early-30s Sakaki, but with a way less privileged upbringing and a grudge against the world."
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...