The Dangerous Marriage of Politics and Press

     There was a time not too long ago that I can remember believing that CNN was an objective news agency. Understanding that FOX and MSNBC were opinionated news outlets for right and left respectively, I turned to CNN as the middle-ground. It wasn’t until the 2016 election when, to my own chagrin, without hesitation I declared Donald Trump had a less than favorable chance of becoming President—verging on impossible. Like any great catastrophe, I remember precisely where I was and the time (approximately) when I had learned that every single pollster and pundit was wrong about the election. I remember the shock I felt, and still hear stories of the astonishment on my face when I was told that Hilary had lost. From that day forward I have never again trusted CNN, and refrain as best as I can from ever viewing them as an objective news source, boycotting them. It was also on that fateful day, that I began to understand something diabolical about the news in our country—it had become dangerously indiscernible from propaganda.

     During the 2016 presidential election, I didn’t particularly favor either of the mainstream parties, mostly because I distrust the two-party system. With that in mind, I favored the libertarian Gary Johnson if only to see him achieve a high percentage of the vote in order to grant federal funding to that party in the hopes of future libertarian Congressional victories. Nonetheless, I paid close attention to the election, pretty much certain that Hilary was going to win. Informed by “the most trusted name in news” CNN, I felt nearly 99% certain that Donald Trump didn’t stand a chance; and who could blame me? I couldn’t trust FOX or MSNBC because, in my mind, they had overt allegiances to their respective parties; and that I would only receive opinionated conjecture from them. This is the root of the problem in journalism—underscored best by Mark Levin’s recent Unfreedom of the Press.

     I must admit to my conservative leanings upfront—if that hadn’t been obvious by my support for libertarianism. However, I was not always conservative. To avoid this devolving into a personal manuscript, it will suffice to say that through college and until graduate school, I was a devout Bernie Sanders supporting, card-carrying socialist. Once upon a time I had proposed drafting what I unironically called “The Socialist Manifesto.” My conversion began when I read the federal government’s budget and understood governmental budgeting. Thereafter I have been a conservative. But I digress. Understand, dear reader, that I tell you this to convince you that I know how to see things from an objective position. Having been once a socialist and now a conservative, I know the roots of both philosophical positions, and therefore can consider both in my determination of the sources I read—and they are vast.

     Returning to the topic, I have recently discovered the value of Facebook as a news aggregator (laughter to follow). Defibrillation would not save me, however, from the heart attack of my seriousness. When you use Facebook as an aggregator, you can very easily diversify your news sources and on a hot-button item read the same story from diverse perspectives. To give the reader a sample, I follow MSNBC, FOX News, Breitbart, The Daily Wire, The Atlantic, and Washington Post, to name a few. What I have found is that the Washington Post and MSNBC have a tendency to report very favorably on Democrats, and negatively on President Trump, whereas FOX and Breitbart tend to be more critical of Democrats in favor of the President. The Atlantic mostly shares left-leaning perspective pieces and opinion, like the right-leaning Daily Wire. I will say however, that Ben Shapiro (editor-in-chief of The Daily Wire) is at once an opinionated conservative and a critical observer of conservative politicians. I digress.

     The problem that I find is that the news reporting appears to be very much divided by party line. And this has created the possibility for the news to devolve into propaganda—if it has not already. Imagine that Hilary had won. How might CNN, MSNBC, WaPo, HuffPo, etc. report on her first 100 days in office? I would imagine that they would be extraordinarily positive in their reporting. Failing to critically analyze any of her policy ideas as they have with President Trump. They would push opinions of her position as if opinion was fact in what I can only assume to be an attempt to persuade the public of the truth of their opinions. This is propaganda. When the news pushes opinion as fact to convince the population of a particular position that is positive of the party in power, in order to increase the favorability of those positions and the party that espouses them as a means of protecting the party and perpetuating its power and authority—that is propaganda.

     We may not have state run news agencies like in authoritarian societies, but we are not far flung from that with CNN and MSNBC regurgitating without analysis the talking point of the Democratic party; and FOX (although less so) for the Republicans. I know that this appears to be anecdotal, but there is actual data to support this, which I’ll get to. News sources, which were intended to be the bulwark of liberty, have become the fortifications of the parties. And this is increasingly obvious if one even reads the comments on any news source for five minutes. The opinions that the public have become completely one-sided; not to mention vile.

    Gone are the days of objective media coverage. We’ve entered a time in which the media serves as a protector of the party with which they affiliate. When that party is in power, the media sources affiliated with that party push out pieces that are intended not to be critical, but to be defensive. However, I must point out that the political Left in this country is far more dangerous on this front than the right. A recent Pew poll analyzed the media’s coverage of President Trump and found that left-leaning companies had been particularly negative of his administration, while right-leaning companies had been fairly neutral, tending towards negative. This suggests that left-leaning sources are far more biased than those on the right. Thus, there are more left-leaning agencies pushing more articles that are more unfavorable to the right. When the market of ideas is saturated with left-leaning sources, it’s no surprise that the President’s approval rating has decreased. It’s important to ask: what’s the end goal?

    The answer to that question should be rather obvious especially given the tendency of search engines to stifle conservative thought. Recently Project Veritas uncovered emails and statements from Google’s management that Google (subsequently YouTube) had to try and attempt to prevent “the next Trump situation.” I want you to know, dear reader, that while searching for that hyperlink to CBSAustin, in an attempt not to provide a conservative source, I had to go to page 9 of Google search results. Let this sink in. None of the mainstream left-wing sources are reporting on this. And it’s no surprise. They benefit from Google’s algorithmic censorship. I challenge any of you now reading this to Google “President Trump” do not autofill, and see what sources populate the first 3 pages of the results. I just did it, and on page 9 I found Breitbart. Fox appears early in the results, but no other conservative sources appear anywhere until page 5.

     So, we have a news industry that refrains from objective journalism, dominated by left-leaning sources that support the Democratic party and its beliefs, proliferated by a tech industry which stifles competition by burying right-leaning sources or outright eliminating them (as with Project Veritas). I ask the reader to consider how the future will play out. When the next Democrat is elected President, how will the news industry be rewarded? How will the tech industry be rewarded? Will the new Democratic administration give favorable access to left-leaning sources? Will the press continue to cover the Democratic positions positively? I would suggest that we are headed towards a future in which private-owned news agencies will be akin to state sponsored news agencies. That these agencies will push the party line inexhaustibly. That future generations will know only one ideology, and that the goal is to snuff out conservative outlets. With the help of big tech giants like Google, this future seems all too real, and on the horizon. The unholy marriage between politics and press will lead inexorably to a great divide among the American population. And at what cost?