Faux News: How the Media Helped Obama Win Re-Election

[sly_wolf 199]

Chris Matthews thanked Hurricane Sandy for Obama's victory, so might as well have been. I mean after all the left blame ####### Cheney's weather machine on Katrina...

####### never give a sh$t about his subjects.

[JohnR! 5,495]

Chris Matthews thanked Hurricane Sandy for Obama's victory, so might as well have been. I mean after all the left blame ####### Cheney's weather machine on Katrina...

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Their. Guy. Lost.

FOX was the first one to call the election for Obama. The decision team wanted to go to bed before midnight. Even Joe Trippi thought that was too early.

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

it's only spin if they are incorrect in their assertion...

Is Mitt not responsible for losing the race? Are the Republicans not responsible for him losing by forcing him so far to the right during the primaries that regular people just couldn't get themselves to support him in the general election? Damn, I gotta become a Republican. Republicans are only responsible if they succeed and always get to blame someone else when they fail.

[We Keep Receipts 9,238]

Never thought I'd see a faux news article that was actually on target.

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http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/11/07/five-ways-mainstream-media-tipped-scales-in-favor-obama/

Fox News and other media outlets have projected that President Obama has been reelected to a second term. If, in celebrating his victory Obama wanted to give credit where credit is due, he might want to think about calling some of America's top journalists, since their favorable approach almost certainly made the difference between victory and defeat.

Reviewing the 2012 presidential campaign, here are five ways the media elite tipped the public relations scales in favor of the liberal Obama and against the conservative challenger Mitt Romney:

1. The Media’s Biased Gaffe Patrol Hammered Romney: The media unfairly jumped on inconsequential mistakes — or even invented controversies — from Romney and hyped them in to multi-day media “earthquakes.” Case in point: the GOP candidate’s trip to Europe and Israel in late July. A Media Research Center analysis of all 21 ABC, CBS and NBC evening news stories about Romney’s trip found that virtually all of them (18, or 86%) emphasized “diplomatic blunders,” “gaffes” or “missteps.”

Conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer blasted the news coverage in an August 2 column, calling the trip “a major substantive success” that was wrapped “in a media narrative of surpassing triviality.”

Similarly, when the left-wing Mother Jones magazine in September put out a secretly-recorded video of Romney talking to donors about the 47% of Americans who don’t pay income taxes, the networks hyped it like a sensational sex scandal. Over three days, the broadcast network morning and evening shows churned out 42 stories on the tape, nearly 90 minutes of coverage. The tone was hyperbolic; ABC’s "Good Morning America" called it a “bombshell rocking the Mitt Romney campaign,” while ABC "World News" anchor Diane Sawyer declared it a “political earthquake.”

None of Obama’s gaffes garnered that level of coverage. After the president in a June 8 press conference declared that “the private sector is doing fine,” the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts gave it just one night’s coverage, then basically dropped the story — nothing further on ABC’s "World News" or the "CBS Evening News" in the weeks that followed, and just two passing references on the "NBC Nightly News."

And, when Obama infamously declared, “You didn’t build that,” ABC, CBS, NBC didn’t report the politically damaging remark for four days — and then only after Romney made it the centerpiece of a campaign speech.

2. Pounding Romney With Partisan Fact Checking: There’s nothing wrong with holding politicians accountable for the honesty of their TV ads and stump speeches, but this year the self-appointed media fact-checkers attacked Republicans as liars for statements that were accurate.

For example, a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter writing for PolitiFact branded VP candidate Paul Ryan’s convention speech anecdote about the closing of the General Motors plant in his hometown as “false,” even though Ryan was correct in all of his details. The slanted review became TV reporters’ talking points; the next day on NBC, correspondent Chuck Todd grumped that while what Ryan said “was technically factual, by what he left out, [he] actually distorted the actual truth.” Matt Lauer greeted Ryan the following week in an interview on Today: “There are some people who are claiming that you played a little fast and loose with the truth....”

The same thing happened when Mitt Romney talked about Obama’s “apology tour” during the final presidential debate. While in 2009 Obama had, in fact, criticized the United States as “arrogant,” “derisive” and having “too often... set [our] principles aside,” the networks said to call it an “apology tour” was “false” because, as CNN’s John Berman tenuously insisted, “even if he was critical of past U.S. foreign policy, he issued no apologies.”

Writing in the New York Times August 31, correspondent Jackie Calmes scolded that “the number of falsehoods and misleading statements from the Romney campaign coming in for independent criticism has reached a level not typically seen.” That’s not true, either; Romney’s team was, at worst, guilty of highlighting those facts that best illustrated their points (something done by all politicians), and the Obama campaign certainly put out their share of tawdry TV ads and dubious campaign claims.

But with “truth cops” who mainly policed just the GOP side of the street, the media used “fact-checking” as another club to tilt the playing field in favor of the Democrats.

3. Those Biased Debate Moderators: Upset liberals scorned PBS’s Jim Lehrer for taking a hands-off approach in the first debate on October 3, with MSNBC analyst Howard Fineman slamming him as “practically useless” for not jumping into the debate on behalf of President Obama.

Such criticism may have encouraged the activist approach taken by ABC’s Martha Raddatz in the vice presidential debate October 11, and by CNN’s Candy Crowley in the October 16 town hall debate, as both of those journalists repeatedly interrupted the Republican candidate and larded the discussion with a predominantly liberal agenda.

Crowley earns extra demerits for taking the media’s penchant for faulty fact-checking to new heights when she jumped into the October 16 town hall-style debate to validate President Obama’s claim that he called the attack in Benghazi, Libya, “an act of terror” the very next morning. Crowley endorsed Obama’s story, telling Romney: “He did, in fact, sir, call it an act of terror.”

Not according to the transcript, which had Obama only speaking generically about how “no acts of terror will ever shake the resolve of this nation,” not assigning that label to the violence in Benghazi.

Wrong though she was, Crowley became a heroine to many in the liberal media; ABC's Matt Dowd, for example, cheered: “What Candy Crowley did, I actually thought, was laudable....I hope we get to do more of that in this discourse.”

Moderators are supposed to ensure both sides get a fair hearing, not pick sides. By leaping into the fray, Candy Crowley epitomized the media’s itch to tilt the scales this year — again, in Obama’s favor.

4. The Benghazi Blackout: Right after the September 11 attack in Libya, the networks proclaimed that the events would bolster President Obama — “reminding voters of his power as commander-in-chief,” as NBC’s Peter Alexander stated on the September 14 edition of "Today." But as a cascade of leaked information erased the portrait of Obama as a heroic commander, the broadcast networks shunted the Benghazi story to the sidelines.

News broke online in late September, for example, that Team Obama knew within 24 hours that the attack was likely the result of terrorism. That starkly contradicted claims from White House press secretary Jay Carney, U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, and President Obama himself that the attack was a “spontaneous” reaction to an anti-Muslim video posted on YouTube. Yet, ABC took nearly two days to bring this story to viewers, while CBS and NBC held off for three days.

This was, shamefully, the broadcast networks’ pattern in October: New developments exposing the administration’s failure to provide adequate security, or contradictions in their

public statements, were either given stingy coverage or buried completely. The puzzle pieces revealed a disturbing failure of Obama’s national security apparatus, but the networks flitted in and out of the story, never giving it any traction.

Instead of an “October Surprise,” the networks engineered an “October Suppression” — keeping a lid on the boiling Benghazi story until Election Day. Who knows how voters might have reacted if the media had covered this story as tenaciously as they did Romney’s “47% gaffe”?

5. Burying the Bad Economy: Pundits agreed that Obama’s weakness was the failure of the US economy to revive after his expensive stimulus and four years of $1 trillion deficits. But the major networks failed to offer the sustained, aggressive coverage of the economy that incumbent Republican President George H.W. Bush faced in 1992, or even that George W.

Bush faced in 2004 — both years when the national economy was in better shape than it is now.

According to a study conducted that year by the Center for Media and Public Affairs, from January through September of 1992, the networks ran a whopping 1,289 stories on the economy, 88% of which painted it in a dismal, negative light. That fall, the unemployment rate was 7.6%, lower than today’s 7.9%, and economic growth in the third quarter was 2.7%, better than today’s 2.0%. Yet the media coverage hammered the idea of a terrible economy, and Bush lost re-election.

In 2004, the economy under George W. Bush was far better than it is today — higher growth, lower unemployment, smaller deficits and cheaper gasoline — yet network coverage that year was twice as hostile to Bush than it was towards Obama this year, according to a study by the Media Research Center’s Business and Media Institute.

When Republican presidents have faced reelection, network reporters made sure to spotlight economic “victims” — the homeless man, the woman without health insurance, the unemployed worker, the senior citizen who had to choose between medicine and food. But this year, with an economy as bad as any since the Great Depression, those sympathetic anecdotes have vanished from the airwaves — a huge favor to Obama and the Democrats.

Given Obama’s record, the Romney campaign could have overcome much of this media favoritism and still prevailed — indeed, they almost did. But taken together, these five trends took the media’s historical bias to new levels this year, and saved Obama’s presidency in the process.

Rich Noyes, is research director for the Media Research Center.

For all of the Obama bashing, the GOP couldn't come up with a single candidate that would stand toe to toe with the President. Wonder why they didn't get Mccain to run again, he would have at least made it interesting.

[^_^ 5,021]

For all of the Obama bashing, the GOP couldn't come up with a single candidate that would stand toe to toe with the President. Wonder why they didn't get Mccain to run again, he would have at least made it interesting.

Those Republicans didn't even bother running in the primaries.

[JohnR! 5,495]

Is Mitt not responsible for losing the race? Are the Republicans not responsible for him losing by forcing him so far to the right during the primaries that regular people just couldn't get themselves to support him in the general election? Damn, I gotta become a Republican. Republicans are only responsible if they succeed and always get to blame someone else when they fail.

Absolutely not. It is all the journalists' fault. Nobody but the journalists are solely responsible for the result of the election. Forget the millions of Americans who went to the polls or mailed in their ballots and actually voted Obama into another term. Forget Obama won the EC and the popular vote. Nothing counts and it is all worth nothing without half a dozen journalists.

[Obama 2012 1,714]

For all of the Obama bashing, the GOP couldn't come up with a single candidate that would stand toe to toe with the President. Wonder why they didn't get Mccain to run again, he would have at least made it interesting.

Perhaps you missed the part where Romney got 57.4 million voters (48% of the vote).... That's standing pretty damn toe to toe.

There could have been a better guy for sure than Mittens, but even with the fact that Mittens had so much going against him, he still got that much of the vote...

[We Keep Receipts 9,238]

[quote name=' timestamp='1352312296' post='5807799]

Those Republicans didn't even bother running in the primaries.

That's the funny part, you listen to some people on here and they swear Obama is hot garbage on his best day. You could see it in Mitt's face at his "party", he knew he was going to lose...

[Penny Lane 8,159]

Perhaps you missed the part where Romney got 57.4 million voters (48% of the vote).... That's standing pretty damn toe to toe.

There could have been a better guy for sure than Mittens, but even with the fact that Mittens had so much going against him, he still got that much of the vote...

The popular vote. Which some Obama supporters (myself included) didn't even think he'd win!

But where it really matters, it wasn't even close. Poor Romney couldn't take any of the important states he needed.

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

Perhaps you missed the part where Romney got 57.4 million voters (48% of the vote).... That's standing pretty damn toe to toe.

There could have been a better guy for sure than Mittens, but even with the fact that Mittens had so much going against him, he still got that much of the vote...

The President earned the support of 60 million voters and captured 332 out of 538 electoral college votes. That's a stronger re-election than Bush was able to pull off in 2004 where he captured merely 286.I mean, Kerry got 59 million votes and 252 electoral votes - that's 2 million more in the popular and 46 more in the electoral vote count than Mittens was able to pull off yesterday. So, would you say that the media was responsible for John Kerry's loss? I don't recall Fox having made such claim in 2004.

[JohnR! 5,495]

Perhaps you missed the part where Romney got 57.4 million voters (48% of the vote).... That's standing pretty damn toe to toe.

There could have been a better guy for sure than Mittens, but even with the fact that Mittens had so much going against him, he still got that much of the vote...

Actually, it seems Fox missed that entirely by attributing Romney's defeat to a bunch of journalists, not to mention that you seem to overlook the EC count was actually 303 to 206....

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

Actually, it seems Fox missed that entirely by attributing Romney's defeat to a bunch of journalists, not to mention that you seem to overlook the EC count was actually 303 to 206....

It will be 332 to 206 once they are done counting the last few votes in Miami-Dade, Broward and Pinellas counties.

[Obama 2012 1,714]

The President earned the support of 60 million voters and captured 332 out of 538 electoral college votes. That's a stronger re-election than Bush was able to pull off in 2004 where he captured merely 286.I mean, Kerry got 59 million votes and 252 electoral votes - that's 2 million more in the popular and 46 more in the electoral vote count than Mittens was able to pull off yesterday. So, would you say that the media was responsible for John Kerry's loss? I don't recall Fox having made such claim in 2004.

I blame the Iraq war and taxes for Kerry's loss.

However the loss was still close and it just goes to show you how truly divided America has become by the corporate system.

The people don't even realize they are being toyed with for the most part and it's quite sad.

This 'pick a side' mentality is what is destroying this country. It's not the homosexual marriage, abortion, or any other social issues. It's the "us vs them" mentality. It's the two-party corporate sponsored election system.

If half of the country is not happy about who's running things, then we have a huge problem. The "nah nah boo boo ha ha we won, you lost, get over it bullshit' from both sides doesn't accomplish a damn thing either and is just childish.

We all know Obama and the Democrats for the most part have zero intention of working with Republicans, just as the Republicans for the most part have zero intentions either. Both would rather cut out their own eye balls than actually do anything that might make the other look good in the coming years. It's why Harry Reid won't bring things for a vote and why the House won't write legislation for the President's ideas. It's all a game, and 'we the people' are the losers.

[JohnR! 5,495]

It will be 332 to 206 once they are done counting the last few votes in Miami-Dade, Broward and Pinellas counties.

The interesting thing is that the GOP representatives are not blaming anyone else. Their comment is that they have to get their act together and learn from these elections.

I think this deluge of excuses is needed for the grieving process of the less aware, as proven by this thread.