Journalism and the Left

There has always been concern among fiscal conservatives that their common sense approach to government expenditures never receives a fair representation in the mainstream media. Even when their ideas are enacted and prove to be very successful, they are derided by the news media. The policies enacted by the Reagan Administration produced a decade of economic growth and ended many years of uncontrolled inflation, yet those policies were labeled as “trickle down economics” by the left and the news media.

The left tries to invoke egalitarianism when discussing their policies, however in the words of Winston Churchill, “The inherent vice of Capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of Socialism is the equal sharing of miseries”. This may explain the reasons for media bias better than any thoughts of egalitarianism.

The left has been described as a “coalition of competing parasites”. For trial lawyers, labor unions and investment banking firms, the close association of their groups with a left leaning government means that they can circumvent the invisible hand of free enterprise to obtain greater financial rewards for their members.

For others in the left, it is the fact that they spend many years in academia that makes them arrogant enough to believe that the average citizen should be allowed to make decisions that affect his or her future. They believe that the enlightened few, not “we the people” should make policy decisions for the country. The fact that the enlightened few will enjoy elevated social status and financial rewards also motivates to this group.

For the news media, the situation is slightly different. The members of the news media have spent years in college generally far removed from quantitative subjects such as math, science and economics. In the words of one reporter discussing perceived media bias, “if we enjoyed math, we would have gone to school for engineering not for journalism”.

Of the competing parasites that comprise the left, journalists share many of the ideas from the enlightened few, however they can not translate their promotion and support for a leftist government into financial gain the way that labor unions, investment banks and trial lawyers can. The media still needs to sell advertising to pay the employees of newspapers, magazines and television networks.

Thus for many in the news media, the support for the left is based upon envy not egalitarianism. Journalism is a demanding profession with long hours, oppressive deadlines and relatively low pay. Those that did study math and science in college go into professions where the starting pay may exceed the median earnings for an experienced journalist.

Just as the college professors in FDR’s cabinet resented that the economic growth of the 1920’s allowed industrials to earn far more than their years of education afforded them, the real issue of many on the left is just envy that society values the products and services of others more than the particular skills that they possess.

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Posted by John Ray (M.A.; Ph.D.). For a daily critique of Leftist activities, see DISSECTING LEFTISM. To keep up with attacks on free speech see TONGUE-TIED. Also, don't forget your daily roundup of pro-environment but anti-Greenie news and commentary at GREENIE WATCH . Email me here

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