From ThinkProgress, about news coverage of Affordable Care Act rulings (click for full size):
That danged liberal media strikes again!
Thanks for the catch! And, I have no idea whatsoever what a rubric's cube would be or would do. But…
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Much as I like the idea of a rubric's cube, it's spelled Rubik's cube. (Now what would a rubric's cube…
Great response to the Mace bill by AOC (video at link).
@bcb: Sometimes I think the whole election was an elaborate murder-suicide plot that the entire country is carrying out.
@Megalodon: They've made it clear that their first target is trans Americans. They'll get to that mass deportation stuff when…
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I’m getting a broken link.
Fixed, I think.
How else would you expect it to look?
Cases holding that federal laws are constitutional are, relatively speaking, in the “dog bites man” category. Cases overturning federal laws–especially ones which were the main focus of the congress and the country–are in the “dog bites man” category.
And this is even more unusual. Judicial review often happens in little steps. It’s a rare for a potential sea change to happen in the courts, like the wholesale potential invalidation of an entire scheme.
It just so happens that this is a law favored by democrats. But you’d see a similar result if any equally important law were found this way.
Yeah, a ruling upholding the act is status quo ante. Status quo ante is not interesting news.
I used to agree. But this new ruling is different, because of the sequencing.
A ruling saying the ACA is constitutional is only status quo until the first ruling finding ACA unconstitutional that makes major news. After that, a new ruling saying it’s constitutional is a reversal.* If the media is unbiased, all reversals of the status quo should be news.
Instead, when a ruling finds the ACA unconstitutional — even if it’s effectively just repeating what the previous ruling finding it unconstitutional already said — then that’s always big news. And if a new ruling comes out, contradicting the prior ruling, then it’s small news. The patter is NOT that “new rulings are news if they change the status quo.” The pattern is that the media, on this issue, is strongly on the right-wing’s side. Which is why total bullshit like “death panels” got reported on every network, but accurate information about the ACA has rarely ever been reported.
* By “reversal,” I don’t mean in the legal sense — obviously, the new ruling isn’t a legal reversal of the other rulings — but in a storytelling sense.
…Nah.
The baseline starting point of the narrative is “ACA has passed.”
Somewhat newsworthy event occurs, “ACA upheld by some courts.” Yawn, but covered.
Super newsworthy event occurs, “ACA overturned by some courts!” Big excitement. Shift of the window of possible outcomes – this whole thing could go down the terlit. The narrative changes – the narrative is now “ACA could be completely overturned in the courts.”
Somewhat newsworthy event occurs, “ACA upheld by other courts.” Yawn, still not important – doesn’t change anything. There were already courts saying this; nothing has changed. The story is still “ACA might go down the terlit”.
Super newsworthy event occurs – another court says it’s no good. Momentum builds for the story – this thing could do down etc.
Fifty events that don’t change status quo ante, they’re all only mildly newsworthy. It’s only things that can change status quo ante that anybody cares about.
Your error comes in this phrase: “And if a new ruling comes out, contradicting the prior ruling, then it’s small news.” (My emphasis.)
Actually, a new ruling that comes out contradicting the prior ruling would be HUGE news – because it would be a higher court overturning the overturning. That will be when the Supreme Court does it (except they won’t, neener neener). New rulings aren’t contradictory; they’re separate.
“Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead.” It’s funny because that ain’t news. “Francisco Franco found alive in Caribbean resort” – huge news.
I’m sympathetic to Robert’s argument here, to a degree at least, but I also think that the media’s bias could be harmful: a recent poll (PDF) finds that 22% of respondents think that the ACA “has been repealed and is no longer law”. The only reason I can imagine that they think that is that they’ve heard about these rulings, and haven’t been properly informed as to what they mean. This seems like a failure of the media – although it could also just be nothing new, “most of the population not well-informed” is pretty “dog bites man”.
Amp,
I don’t agree with Robert’s stance–I hope the Supremes DO uphold the ACA, neener, neener to him–but he’s right about your analysis.
I understand that you’d like to find a bias here, but it’s more than a it of a stretch.
Which is not to say that there hasn’t been bias in the reporting.
I, naturally, would say that there has been a large left-wing bias in that there was an implicit assumption that naturally, health care is something the government can and should do, and the only questions are the partisan ones of which party’s preferred mechanisms will be used to implement it.
A genuinely right-wing media’s initial storyline would have been “Power-Crazed Liberals Insanely Seek Yet More Power For Destructive Communist Agenda”. (That’s basically the headlines you saw at places like NewsMax and other ultra-right sites.)
Robert, the “bias’ you refer to — that health care is an appropriate issue to take up — is one shared by the leadership of the Republican party. It’s an assumption that McCain made during his run for the Presidency, and it’s an assumption that every Republican who has said that their policy should be “repeal and replace,” rather than just “repeal,” shares. I admit, I think many leading Republicans are lying through their teeth and only really intend “repeal,” but that the media refuses to call out the Republicans on their obvious lies is hardly a sign of left-wing bias. Nor is it a left-wing bias for the media to share an assumption with leading Republicans.
So does that mean it’s not a bias? Actually, I’d say it is a bias — but not a left-wing bias. It’s a “the total scope of most issues is defined by what the most prominent members of the two parties say about it” bias. And it’s a stupid bias, which tends to mean (among other things) that views shared by the liberal left and the libertarian right are rarely included in the spectrum of mainstream news opinions (legalizing drugs, for example).
On health care — where there isn’t a liberalaterian consensus — if the media didn’t have this bais, then their reporting would include “the federal government shouldn’t be in the health care business at all” on the right, but would also include “single payer now!” on the left. Cutting both views out is a bias, but not a left-wing bias.
G&W, even if I agreed with Robert, that doesn’t mean there’s no bias here. It just means that the bias is structural, not right-wing, in nature.
There’s no question that the msm has in fact reported far, FAR more on right-wing judge’s rulings than on liberal judge’s rulings on the ACA. (The rulings so far have been straight-up partisan, in that you could have successfully predicted each outcome by just looking at which party’s presidents appointed the judge.) So the question isn’t if the bias exists; it’s whether it exists because of how the news is structured (which is what Robert is arguing) or because the media is systematically right-wing on this issue (which is what I was arguing).
I understand what you’re saying, it’s just that you’re wrong.
The problem is that you seem not to understand the important difference between those rulings, which means that you’re not undestanding the confounding factor that guts your argument.
Do you not get Robert’s response? I’ll try:
You’re suggesting that the opposing rulings are basically the same. So you think they should be getting similar press coverage, and you attribute the difference to bias.
But they’re not the same, at all. In fact, one problem I’m having in countering your argument is that this type of “it’s unconstitutional” rulings are so incredibly rare that there aren’t any good comparisons which spring to mind.
It’s not an attack on a particular limited application of a law, as often happens. (There are challenges to government power all the time, and every now and then some of the people win.) It’s not even an attack on a law for something like overbreadth, where it’s clear that a minor change to the law will make it work.
No, this is a wholesale attack on the entire constitutional foundation for the law, and all laws like it. It may be the biggest case of the century if the ACQA is overturned. It’s fucking HUGE news.
It’s exceedingly rare for these rulings to happen at all. It’s even more rare for them to happen in two courts at the same time. And it’s even MORE rare for the lower court rulings to be considered, by a lot of very well educated legal scholars, as having a LOT of merit.
On the other hand, the “this law is OK” side is everywhere. For every law. If the ACA is upheld–especially if it doesn’t get to the supremes–years from now it won’t be viewed as the biggest case of the century. It won’t even be the biggest case of the decade.
I suppose you could be more condescending, G&W, but it would be really difficult.
You’re interpreting this story as a lawyer. That’s a legitimate means of interpretation, but it’s not the exclusive legitimate means of interpretation.
The people in the MSM aren’t lawyers and aren’t reporting this story just as lawyers. They’re storytellers, and the story they’re in effect telling — which is that the courts have consistently found the ACA unconstitutional and there are no notable dissenting rulings from the “it’s unconstitutional” consensus — doesn’t match reality. There’s a fundamental sense in which, when a MSM narrative contradicts reality, it’s fair to call the MSM take biased.
I agree that this shouldn’t have been much of a story when the first two rulings said the ACA is constitutional, because that was entirely expected. It was a huge story when the ACA was found unconstitutional. And it was even an exciting story when a second court agreed it was unconstitutional.
But I don’t agree that, in the context of two big, well-publicized rulings having made “is this law even constitutional?” into a huge story, a new ruling saying “yes it is” is not a legitimately interesting story. Now that “is it constitutional” is in play, the MSM should be attempting to give a balanced picture of reality. Instead, the picture they’re painting, for anyone not paying close attention, is that all the courts who have ruled on this agree that it’s unconstitutional.
Your tone makes it evident that you think only an idiot could disagree with you. But I understand your argument (with all due respect, I suspect I’ve been following this story at least as closely as you), and even think you might be right (this isn’t an issue I have a strong opinion on — note that I’m not the original poster on this thread). But you apparently feel that the MSM has been doing a good job conveying an accurate impression of what’s been going on; or that it hasn’t been doing a good job, but that failure doesn’t constitute a kind of bias in how they’re telling the story. In either case, I disagree with you.
[Edited to make the wording clearer.]
The information in that graph isn’t sufficient to establish any kind of political bias in media coverage. It’s not enough to just count words. You have to look at what those words are. If (for example) the NYT prints 250 words saying “Sensible and unbiased jurists find the ACA Constitutional” and 1000 words along the lines of “Right-wing nutbags appointed by fascist ex-President find the ACA unconstitutonal against all reason” then you are not looking at an example of conservative bias.
I’m sorry if I come across as condescending. I do think you’re entirely wrong here, both in your analysis and the resulting conclusion. In your most recent post, for example, you’re conflating “bias” and “inaccuracy.”
I share your frustration with the mainstream media, in general. Legal reporting–like science reporting–is often targeted towards sensationalism, and away from accuracy.
But “sensationalism” isn’t bias, or at least it’s not the type of bias you’ve been talking about. Folks seem to be equating this instance of sensationalism with conservatism, merely because that which is sensational happens to be (in this case) aligned with the conservative. If the courts had overturned the patriot act, or concluded that the 14th amendment allowed California to impose its environmental laws on Missouri coal plants, you can bet that THOSE things would be covered more completely. That would no more be evidence of liberal bias, than these things are of a right wing bias.
G&W, I did read your post and appreciate your response, but I’m content to leave our argument at that. As I said, you may be right, and this isn’t an issue that’s important to me. :-)
Robert or Ron, as our resident friendly neighborhood right-wingers, I’d be interested in your take on the idea of “what the leaders of the two parties are saying” bias leaving both the right-conservatives and the left-liberals significantly (but not entirely) cut out of mainstream media debates. Does that seem possibly true to you, or no?
Yes, it seems true.
Posted just “yes” a minute ago, but I think your spam filter ate it for being too short.
Yes, I do. At least from the conservative side. As I’ve said many a time, conservative != Republican. I would not take the Republican party leadership’s position as equivalent to the conservative position.
Speaking of sensationalism; it seems to me that the MSM will gladly publicize a) the political party leaders, and b) nutbags of all stripes, but will not publicize people who don’t have a formal leadership position but do have a well-thought-out position. So the Republican party chair and Rep. Michelle Bachmann or Glenn Beck get lots of publicity, but the late William F. Buckley wouldn’t stand a chance – or get relegated to the Sunday morning news shows that no one watches.
Then there’s the condensation of people’s position. The government of Wisconsin is trying to get a bill passed into law that would restrict the ability of unionized government workers’ collective bargaining rights. I keep hearing the MSM describe this as “remove their collective bargaining rights” – which is not in fact true. Mind you, you may think that it’s the functional equivalent, but to just say that with no explanation is an editorial position, not a reporting one. Note that I make no claim that they’re not doing that to leftist positions either, but I’ll leave it to you to supply examples of such.
Non-leadership, non-nuts on the left mostly don’t even get on the Sunday shows. As of a week ago, no labor leaders had been invited onto any of the Sunday shows, despite the extensive discussion of labor issues in WI.
I think the inaccurate simplification of removal of most collective bargaining rights to removal of bargaining rights is an editorial decision of the “let’s make this simpler and punchier” variety rather than an editorial decision of the “these two things are really the same” variety.
William F. Buckley used to go on TV all the time. Not to argue the specific point, which is true, but the specific example, which is not. He stopped in recent years because he was old and feeble, not because they wouldn’t have him on.
Robert, really? I thought he was visible on tv all the time because he had his own show. One which, incidentally, seemed to feature Left-liberal voices more often than other programs.
Yes. The TV show (Firing Line, for all you young punks who should get off my lawn and get a haircut and a job) certainly helped his visibility, but in fact would be a good example of him having access to mainstream media – he wasn’t funding it, after all, PBS was. He also had columns in mainstream publications, was asked on for TV debates with seminal liberal figures of the day, etc. He was a “thought leader”, as the kids these days call it.
A better example of exclusion of a right-leaning figure would be Radley Balko, who (while not being a figure of universal respect like WFB was) is definitely a modern libertarian thought leader and journalist, but whose TV appearances are rare to nonexistent.
Unlike Robert, who is old old old, I was pretty young when “Firing Line” was on. But it’s my impression that WFB wasn’t anti-authoritarian the way Balko is, and certainly wasn’t angry the way Balko is. Which is perhaps one reason we don’t see much of Balko on TV.
Which is a shame — I’d love it if Balko was a constant talking head on the major networks.
Right-leaning? Kinda. Let’s look at his bio.
and
I don’t think that the left has a monopoly on issues of police brutality, opposition to the drug war, and justice for convicts, but I do think that when there’s a difference, there’s generally a fairly predictable partisan breakdown to these issues.
So yeah, he comes at these issues from a libertarian perspective, which generally gets called right-wing … but ‘libertarian’ generally gets called right-wing because libertarians are free-marketers, which doesn’t seem to be what his primary focus is. And the positions he holds on these social issues seem to be more common on the left than the right.
I’m not arguing that he’s a stealth left-winger, certainly, just that he may not be a great example to use when discussing the right and media access.
—Myca
No, WFB was not angry. But he was definitely anti-authoritarian; there’s no daylight between his recorded positions and Balko’s. He wasn’t anti-Establishment – he was pretty much the definition of Establishment – he just didn’t want the Establishment to have much political power over others.
I think Balko’s a good example for the larger question, Myca, since whether his non-mainstream positions are leftish or rightish, they’re not welcomed on the small screen, which was Amp’s basic point.