MEDIA LIBS: BIASED? YES, BUT IT'S NOT OUR FAULT

The headline at Politico is this: "Journalist consensus: Media lean left" which I would say is just a bit of an understatement.  But I suppose it is helpful that at least the folks in this small group are capable of mustering just enough intellectual honesty to admit that there is a bias:

Top journalists from The New York Times, NBC News and CNN acknowledged Wednesday that, generally speaking, the national media have a liberal bias.

On a Playbook Breakfast panel, the Times' Peter Baker and Mark Leibovich, NBC's Kelly O'Donnell and CNN's Jake Tapper all said "yes" when asked if the news media lean left — though all agreed it was a nuanced issue having more to do with journalists' life experiences than with any particular agenda.

"Most of my colleagues, I have no idea what their politics are. ... But think about it: I live in northwest Washington, none of my neighbors are evangelical Christians, I don't know a lot of people in my kid's preschool who are pro-life," Leibovich said. "When you have conversations, at all the newspapers I've worked at, about politics — it doesn't happen often — but you see clues that there is absolutely a left-wing bias."

Tapper, the CNN host and former ABC News White House correspondent, said the bias was "much more complicated and complex" than "liberal" or "conservative."

I think Leibovich, who gained notoriety this year with the publication of the very revealing book This Town, is being either naive (doubtful) or disingenuous about having "no idea" about the politics of his colleagues.  Of course he knows their views.  What he means is that those views are rarely discussed because...what's to discuss?  They all share the same political views.  That's called groupthink.  It's not a case of him not knowing but rather not noticing.  It would require some diversity of thought for him to notice anything.

While Leibovich is willing to acknowledge a left-wing bias, Tapper apparently sees that as "simplistic."  Without labeling it as such, Tapper argues that the bias is an elitist one, not a political one:

"A certain type of person becomes a reporter, and generally speaking — generally speaking, I'm not saying every reporter in the world — the kind of person who is a reporter in Washington, D.C., or New York City has never worked a minimum-wage job outside of high school, has never experienced poverty, is not an evangelical Christian, like much of the country is," Tapper said. "There are a lot of experiences that the kinds of people who are reporters, editors, producers in Washington and New York City have not had."

"Most publications, you can get a sense of what the editors are thinking — and I would put a lot more on the editors and the senior producers than on the day-to-day reporters," he went on to say. "But you don't see a lot of coverage of poverty, you don't see a lot of coverage of troops, you don't see a lot of coverage of faith. It's simplistic to say it's liberal or conservative; it's about experiences and lifestyle."

Sorry, Jake.  What's shockingly "simplistic" is the pretense that the elitist world you describe is not also thoroughly liberal in outlook.