BiasAlerts

In a report on the Arizona wildfires on Tuesday's NBC Today, correspondent Miguel Almaguer touted how "The Forest Service says this historic wildfire season is caused in part by climate change." After promoting that politically charged claim, Almaguer declared that Senator John McCain had created a "firestorm" by noting that illegal immigrants have contributed to past wildfires. At the top of the show, co-host Ann Curry proclaimed: "Heated controversy. A debate blows up over John McCain blaming some wildfires in Arizona on illegal border-crossers." Later, she framed an interview with McCain this way: "Now to more on that controversial comment... continue reading

Is this CNN's idea of objectivity? To discuss a gay marriage bill in the New York state senate, openly-gay CNN anchor Don Lemon hosted a Democratic strategist and a pro-gay marriage conservative Sunday. Given the probability that all three would support the legislation, one can only wonder how an honest debate could have transpired during Sunday's 6 p.m. EDT edition of Newsroom. National Review's Will Cain has made frequent appearances on CNN recently, including one week earlier on Sunday night's Newsroom to discuss the validity of socially-conservative positions with mainstream America. Cain is a self-described "pro-gay marriage supporter," and presumably... continue reading

CNN's Fareed Zakaria regurgitated his conservative-bashing Time magazine piece on his Sunday show Fareed Zakaria GPS. He opened up his program with the same barrage against conservatives that he launched in Time on Thursday, namely that today's conservatism is woefully divorced from reality like the Marxists of the 19th century. Zakaria wrote that "conservatives now resemble the old Marxists who refuse to look at actual experience." Instead, he argued, they are hopelessly enamored with "policies that are simply recitations of some free market theory taken out of some book based on no actually-existing national economy." [Video below.] This closed-minded Republican... continue reading

Trying to submerge its own network's 'under God' censorship into a greater narrative, Monday's NBC Nightly News managed to combine into one disjointed story, pegged to 'a tough slog' over the weekend 'when it comes to the campaign to get along in our public discourse,' the NBC Sports decision to remove 'under God' from the Pledge of Allegiance in its opening montage for the U.S. Open golf tournament, 'distress' by 'Republicans at a leadership conference over an Obama impersonator's racially tinged jokes,' how 'on conservative network Fox News, anchor Chris Wallace and liberal comedian Jon Stewart went at it' and... continue reading

New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller's latest column for the Sunday Magazine tackled what the subhead called "Sarah Palin's codependent relationship with the press (and vice versa)." In two contradictory paragraphs, Keller bluntly revealed the liberal media mindset of Palin loathing – then dismissed the idea of liberal media slant as almost entirely mythical. Keller also stated that "a lot of journalists, regardless of their politics, find her confounding and a little frightening." If the 2012 election were held in the newsrooms of America and pitted Sarah Palin against Barack Obama, I doubt Palin would get 10 percent of... continue reading

With Jon Huntsman announcing his presidential campaign on Tuesday, the former Utah governor joins a crowded Republican field. But while MSNBC has put most of the current crop of GOP hopefuls through the ringer, Huntsman has been heralded by the network as Mr. Civility in an otherwise nutty Republican field. MRC intern Alex Fitzsimmons reviewed some of the network's flattering coverage of Huntsman and assembled a video montage of the most gushing moments. On the May 23 edition of Morning Joe, for example, MSNBC senior political analyst Mark Halperin said he was "pretty blown away" by watching Huntsman speak, while... continue reading

In his June 19 appearance on Fox News Sunday , Comedy Central's Daily Show host Jon Stewart fiercely denounced the Fox News Channel as uniquely biased, and slammed those who watch Fox News as 'the most consistently misinformed media viewers....Consistently — every poll.' Unfortunately for Stewart, he was relying on a methodologically-flawed survey from the University of Maryland's Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) that in December trumpeted how 'those who watched Fox News almost daily were significantly more likely than those who never watched it to believe....' and then listed a series of supposedly false statements. But many of... continue reading

Promoting his new book, 'Katrina's Secrets,' on Monday's NBC Today, former New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin stood by his assertion that racism played a role in the Bush administration's response to the storm: "I'm not telling you that President Bush was a racist or what have you. But I think race and class and politics played in just about every aspect of this disaster." Co-host Matt Lauer claimed that Nagin was "very honest and open" in the book, at least in his ability to "blame President Bush, FEMA Director Michael Brown and others for slow federal response." After quoting Nagin's... continue reading

In an interview with the AP , MSNBC President Phil Griffin bragged about life after Keith Olbermann, touting the cable channel as "really the place to go for progressives ." Griffin didn't bother denying the liberal bent of the network. He highlighted left-wing anchor Rachel Maddow, hyping, "She really has elevated the discussion and is in many ways the model that we want for cable news." The MSNBC executive wouldn't discuss Keith Olbermann, who abruptly left the cable network in January. His new show will debut this week on Current TV. The Media Research Center has compiled a list of... continue reading