Was the Media Anti-McCain?

Recommend (3) Comments (18)

Bethany Stotts, Accuracy in Media

Media coverage is clearly biased against John McCain. An October study by the Pew Research Center found that nearly 60 percent of McCain-focused stories were “decidedly negative” and only 14 percent were positive.

While Pew considered 36 percent of Obama-focused articles “positive,” and nearly the same number “mixed” or “neutral,” our organization has found that the mainstream media have ignored or downplayed several of Obama’s important associations including Frank Marshall Davis, William Ayers, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Rashid Khalidi, and Tony Rezko.

In those cases where Obama’s associations eventually gain the national spotlight, the media have sought a McCain equivalent. This summer, journalists attempted to classify Pastor John Hagee as McCain’s Reverend Wright, even though McCain did not consider Pastor Hagee his spiritual mentor or attend his church.

When Sarah Palin was quoted as accusing Obama of “palling around with terrorists,” columnists highlighted McCain’s involvement with the Keating Five. Never mind that the investigation recommended that McCain be exonerated. Ayers, in contrast, said in 2001 that his domestic terrorist group, the Weather Underground, “didn’t do enough.”

The mainstream media have practically ignored Obama’s flip-flops on very important issues such as his ever-changing tax plan and his decision not to accept public financing.

Not so with Sarah Palin. Her “flip-flop” on funding for the Road to Nowhere was widely broadcast and, in addition, media pundits victimized her Down syndrome baby and pregnant teenage daughter in an attempt to vindicate juicy, baseless gossip bantered around in the blogosphere.