People are blaming Republicans in the "Fox Bubble" but the rest of the media

[rurallib]

wasn't much better.
I got to the point where I could hardly listen to NPR because of their citing faulty polls, not following up on insane right wing remarks etc.
I have little idea what the ABCs and CBSs of the world spit out for news as I gave up on them long ago.
CNN has sucked since the day Ted Turner sold it.
My local newspapers have become little more than bird cage liners.

So why wouldn't Republicans not believe they would win. Surely they went to Fox and got stroked, but it wasn't a whole lot better anywhere else in corporate media - and I include NPR in that.

Coming into that last weekend, all I kept hearing was that Romney may win the popular vote. Most of the so-called battleground states were too close to call, especially Ohio.

If you want to talk bubbles, liberals may have been the ones in a bubble. A bubble of truth for sure, but we were the ones getting news differently from most of the rest of the country

[seabeyond]

1. you are exactly correct and they started rewriting history quickly, ignoring their own part.

i can say, that du wasnt a lot better either. i stopped reading threads here about a couple weeks ago. all the hair on fire.

[fasttense]

30. There were some who posted on DU who thought Obama would NOT win.

But I do NOT think they were the majority.

But there were enough of them that I must have posted Nate Silver's predictions and record about 100 times to soothe them.

[seabeyond]

33. ya? i do not know. after a week of the first debate whine, i stopped going into threads.

i read down latest thread. and read enough of them to know it was on du.

[freshwest]

56. Isn't trash thread and ignore great? As was John Lucas's thread. I bookmarked to my browser!

He was 100% correct and answered all the negativity.

[hifiguy]

64. Every time I started getting nervous

I read Nate Silver or Sam Wang. Instant mellowness.

[dchill]

68. +1 - you are correct.

Mathematically correct, in fact.

[Arkansas Granny]

78. I can't speak for everyone on DU, but I worried that without a big lead in the polls,

a stolen election would be a lot easier to pull off. Yeah, I was "concerned".

[yashoo]

2. The MSM

Only served to reinforce Fox's narrative. Because the tea baggers are trained to believe that anything the media says has a liberal bias, when the MSM gave everyone that horse race nonsense in the pursuit of ratings, the tea bagger hive mind thought "If media says Obama is tied, Obama must be losing!"

[Quantess]

24. Not only that, but if media says Obama & Romney are tied...

that means the collective power of teabag prayers could feasibly give Romney the winning edge.

[ceeRoy]

3. Agreed

here here!!...

[nc4bo]

4. You know, you're right. Call them all out while the spotlight is turn on the entire electoral

process.

The entire M$M was dreadful and full of profit driven deceit ~or~ The question should also be asked if M$M was actually a superPAC arm of the GOP.

[Whisp]

5. you speak the truth, rurallib, sing it loud!

for one, MSNBC sounds like they were on the side of truth too! You'd never know they were hijacked with that same nonsense by how they are speaking post election.

Shameful.

[alcibiades_mystery]

7. Indeed...Rachel Maddow should look at her own network while she's laughing at Fox

Morning Joe was a catastrophe of error.

Andrea Mitchell was for all intents and purposes a Romney surrogate.

The entire network gave platform to Chuck Todd, who spent the majority of his time parroting whatever Romney-camp talking point happened to be on the agenda that day.

Oh, no doubt DU's most notorious defender of all things MSM will show up here disputing this and that, but you're quite right. All the networks were doing it. The only way to get out of the bubble was to ignore the MSM completely and work, rather, on the election.

[Kahuna]

18. Exactly! I tweeted as much to mourning joe this am. I said that

they shouldn't point the fingers at "conservative" media, as joe, andrea, todd and brokjaw were all guilty of the same.

[brush]

53. Talk Left on satellite radio was way ahead of TV . . .

. . . in their projections. My wife and I traveled across Las Vegas to a watch party and listened to the "Talk Left" station on Sirius and by the time we got to the party they were projecting that the president had 243 electoral votes versus Romney's 183. When we got inside the party at 6:45 pm they had CNN on (ugh) because they "wanted real, straight, unbiased reporting." I thought to myself at the time that these folks were living in the past when CNN was still owned by Ted Turner and Bernard Shaw was still the anchor. Anyway, their projections were so far behind the radio. They had Romney at 72 electoral votes and the President at 62. And those figures stayed the same for a long time as they drew out their telecast to keep the suspense going I guess. I mentioned to the host and a few people what the radio had reported and to maybe change the channel to MCNBC but to no avail until later in the evening when a TV in the another room was switched to MSNBC. Funny they were also still behind the radio but better than CNN. MSNBC did call the election for the President way before CNN did though at about 8:20 PM. We all started cheering in the one room and rushed to tell the stubborn CNN watchers what they were missing. And CNN didn't declare the President the winner for another few minutes. Even FOX beat them by a couple of minutes. So, as we all know here at DU, CNN and the MSM is wack.

[barbtries]

6. NPRR

national public republican radio absolutely SUCKED with their campaign coverage. never have i driven down the road yelling in my car so much.

on the bright side, i have a lot of good music on CD and i got to listen to almost all of it.

[sendero]

12. I'm glad...

... that more folks are finally noticing how crap NPR has become. They really have tossed their objectivity. I guess that as in everything else, their primary concern is for the people who provide them funding, and it isn't us.

[left lowrider]

55. NPR was horrible

I didn't subscribe this year because I nearly had a stroke listening to their report on how "Mitt was really a good person . . he was just having a problem letting people see that side of him"about 2 months ago. That one gross, un-journalistic report cost them $120 in support.

[barbtries]

59. every time they throw a pledge drive

as long as their coverage is this bad, i just think i support you with my taxes that's all ya get.

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

67. I wrote to them explaining just that. I did not receive a response. No more pledges from my

household. There are still some good programs on NPR, but I just can't send in money as long as they stick with their false equivalency BS and allow RW talking points free range. Where are the freakin' journalists?

[corkhead]

69. I still need something new to go with my morning coffee, but I have completely switched to podcasts

in my car. I don't listen to All Things Considered at all anymore. Rachel Maddow show and Sam Seder's Majority Report podcasts have taken the place of NPR news for me. I still like a lot of other shows NPR has however. Radio Lab and This American Life in particular.

[barbtries]

75. i do too

love this american life. my car's kind of old (2004), so i can listen to radio, CDs or tapes! i love it - i have lots of cassettes and many CDs.

[uponit7771]

72. +1!

[KharmaTrain]

8. Look At It This Way...

I agree that the corporate media was so wrapped up in the bloodsport...horse race politics that they ignored what was a growing wave against the rushpublicans. While polls were close, looking at the state polls...the ones that mattered, the race wasn't...unless, you relied on the "expert poling" of a Rasmussen or Gravis. Then you could justify the meme...and hope that you could amp up enough interest to keep people watching. Shameful? Maybe...but in the end, maybe we should be thankful as the fear of a possible Willard victory surely motivated Democrats in large numbers.

The difference in this election than in past ones was the rift that did develop between the corporate media and the denizens of Bullshit Mountain. In the dubya years the corporates took their marching orders from Rupert, Ailes and Rushbo...witness the ugly night when Florida was given to President Gore and then taken away thank to the power of faux. Ironic that Rove tried the same stunt on Tuesday night and it turned into a joke.

One big difference in this election than the past was having voices on the other side...Rachel, Ed, Lawrence, Martin, Chris et all who called Willard and the rushpublicans on their bullshit and helped to motivate and communicate with Democrats and Independents. Jon Stewart was a bridge to younger voters and this helped expose Willard for being the cold-hearted vulture capitalist as well as other rushpublican losers. They were intrepid and this helped negate faux's influence on the rest of the media.

The corporate media is having its own identity crisis and we may have seen a turning point where outlets like Bullshit Mountain and hate radio turn into liabilities rather than assets. That in itself would be a major and positive change...

[fredamae]

9. The "Mute" button is a God-Send!

I too watched very little in the closing weeks-I think the whole "Sports Game-Score Board" bs takes away from the seriousness of what it means to vote.

I TiVo'd all progs the final month so I could speed through all the Romney Free Ads from all the "OMG! BS Stories" about him-Romney apparently got More air-time-whether the "story" was good/bad/indifferent. I never watched one of Romney's/Kochs/Roves/Adelson ads-all mailers went to the recycle bin w/out having been read.
I refused to be inundated w/BS. I'm a grown human and can make up my own mind based upon a phone call to the candidate and researching their records/history/speeches. They coulda saved a lot of money on flyers and held more forums/town halls.

[Skidmore]

10. Fox is the bubble and the rest of the media are trying to be bubbles too.

As for our liberal politicians who partook of the low oxygen in the bubble, I'm thoroughly disgusted and hope we can break the more entrenched crop of the habit and keep the newer yet unintiated ones from imbibing.

[qanda]

11. I was losing my voice screaming at the TV

Finally, I just turned it off because I couldn't take it anymore.

[uponit7771]

13. I too am disappointed with NPR

[Anthony McCarthy]

17. NPR should be defunded, broken up,

its assets in DC sold and a new and real public radio network based somewhere far away from the DC-NYC Village. It adds hypocrisy and betrayal to the universal sin of the media, selling out.

Viguerie this morning was just a part of NPR's deeply demonstrated concern to revive the Republican Party.

[uponit7771]

73. Unn, maybe not broken up but moved from DC no doubt

[Anthony McCarthy]

14. CBS is only a more genteel version of FOX these days

I've seen Pelley's version of the Nightly News several times and it is, if anything, more obviously biased than Katie Couric's, well, once she stopped asking Limbaugh and the like to do commentary.

I wouldn't trust anything that comes out of CBS.

[spanone]

15. how about some media reform in america?

[Quantess]

27. Ronald Reagan did away with the media regulations. (no text)

[Kahuna]

16. They should have gone by the individual battleground states, PERIOD...

All that national poll noise was ridiculous. Plus if a poll shows a 1 or 2% lead consistently, then that is a legitimate lead. If a poll shows a 5% lead as in Ohio, consistently, that is a legitimate lead. They were trying to pursuade voters towards rmoney. PERIOD. That is why they framed the polling data they way the did.

[Puzzledtraveller]

19. We all have our bubbles, we all want to be reinforced, luckily we

came out on the right side, if we hadnt then we would have blamed ourselves for residing in an echo chamber do you think the republicans will heed that warning? No, but that's not our concern is it?

[CJCRANE]

50. But we don't have an echo chamber in the same way. We look at both sides here plus the numbers

and the statisticians were all saying that Obama had a very high chance of reelection. An Irish betting company even paid out two days early on an Obama win.

The RW believes that "perception is reality" but they take it a step further and think that if you believe something hard enough it will come true. It's an extreme version of positive / wishful thinking.

[ewagner]

20. x-posted...

Several months back I wrote about the insights I found in reading the book, "The Republican Brain"...followed by reading a somewhat less partisan book called, "The Political Mind".

After seeing what happened on election night, e.g. the total surprise of the Republicans of the Democratic win, the so-called "Rove Meltdown", continuing reports that the Romney staff never saw the defeat coming, that they didn't believe any of the polls, that Mitt himself was "shellshocked" by the defeat (he had not even written a concession speech because he didn't believe it could happen)..well..after all that, I was subtly reminded by the spouse that the books were right....when confronted with facts, or empirical evidence that is contrary to their core beliefs, Conservatives, statistically more commonly than liberals, deny the evidence, invent their own facts, dissemble or attack the source of the evidence in order not to be forced to abandon their own position.

Liberals (being wishy-washy) are more likely to re-evaluate their beliefs and change them when confronted with facts. I think all of this is still true....we do think differently and the question of it being environmental or "hard-wired" hereditary is still not clear.

Election night played this theory out on a national stage and plainly enough for all to see. It needs more study if we are going to have good, rational national debates with two parties dealing with real facts on real problems.

[Stargazer09]

21. I agree

The "news" media hasn't been unbiased in a very long time.

I think the 24-hour news channels are partially to blame. You can't support that sort of thing without advertising, and you can't attract advertisers without stirring up the audience.

[Loudestlib]

22. NRP

They had a piece on this morning that talked about the reason why Mitt Romney was disliked so much. And, how he really was a nice guy but the campaign never let him show it. I couldn't believe it.

[MightyMopar]

29. National Propaganda for Republicans and brilliant propaganda it is.

They're the best propaganda in the world more insidious even than Faux, which really is so over the top as to be cartoonish which Daily Show and SNL proves to great effect. No NPR is brilliant propaganda. They make me want to pound the dashboard all the time. The last time they made me crazy is when they interviewed women in Colorado and they set up this false choice whether the Colorado women should vote for the economy with Romney or women's rights with Obama as if there was no case to be made for voting for Obama to help the economy. These guys carried a lot of water for Romney with these subtle narratives of false choices.

[Patiod]

45. Cokie: "Obama off to NJ to look Presidential"

I was yelling at the radio "LOOK Presidential? How about BEING Presidential".

That choice of phrase betrayed her bias.

[MissNostalgia]

23. Absolutely Agreed

Left media are already back to their old ways, Cenk Uygur is actually preemptively whining about Obama not considering the measure of his win an indication of a mandate. This term 'mandate' is just another buzz word that the left and right are bouncing around because Bush said it, and thats it.

I stopped watching MSNBC, and TYT before the 2010 election because of their Obama whining, but gave them a week of my time because of the the 2012 election. They literally took less than 48 hours to get back to trashing the President,anyway Im back to listening to only Randi Rhodes.

[Ed Suspicious]

25. I'm convinced that if Romney were winning, they would have been all over Obama's

jock. I've finally figured out that the MSM is largely non-partisan. They are very pro revenue. I think the right wing slant we saw this election season was an acknowledgement on the media's part that Romney was losing. They NEEDED the horserace. The NEEDED the revenue generated by it. That's why we saw them in full Romney PR mode.

[BREMPRO]

39. this is why romney was reported on MSM as tied w Obama

news is a business... they sell advertising..especially political ads during an election... a close race makes more viewers and more frantic donations to candidates to make more ads....some polls showed the race tied.... the MSM focussed on those to make it interesting/competitive.... it's not a conspiracy, just self interest for the networks..business..MONEY..PROFITS.. !!! Also i believe the candidates promote close races too because they are concerned about turnout and enthusiasm.. so they let the networks call i close even if it isn't...

Nate Silver was dead on 50 for 50 states.... and from now on he'll be my source of objective reporting on the state of a race..

[Ed Suspicious]

52. Mine as well.

[uponit7771]

74. +1! on Nate Silver

[PowerToThePeople]

44. I do not agree.

where is "unrec"?

[AAO]

48. Too bad they are not supposed to be PR reps for either candidate. They're shameful.

[madrchsod]

26. the clear media winner in this election was the social media

[BrainMann1]

28. MSNBC is a great place for political information

and I say this from experience. One thing they are is truthful and informed, which is why everyone else was in a bubble. Go back and fact check their coverage. Start from day one. And subscribe to DU they are fair in their assessment of politics also, you may not agree but you will be informed. Go, Go check it out.

[Egalitarian Thug]

31. Well said, they all lied all the time. I could argue that they nearly destroyed what remains of

the U.S. by creating the horse race out of thin air. Faux News is the only network that is blatantly and consistently partisan, everybody else pushes whatever brings in the most ad revenue.

Have you noted the epiphanies of Andrea Greenspan, Chris Matthews, etc., only happened once it was clear that the President was going to win (once the clown car of republican candidates was settled)?

[Blecht]

32. I'd rec this 1000 times if I could

And, no, MSNBC is not better.

[zentrum]

34. Agreed. But what amazes

...me is how the rest of the country, those not in the liberal bubble, and exposed only to mainstream media---figured it out? Was it just the patent racism and sexism of the Republican party and Mitts 47% remark?

[salinen]

35. Dewey

Wins!

[carolinayellowdog]

36. I turned in my cable receiver on Monday

Even though I remained confident of victory nationally and here in Virginia (thanks Nate Silver), TV isn't worth the measly $20/mo. I was paying for basic service. Morning Edition and All Things Considered have slid into the ditch in recent years, Mara Liasson being one of the worst false-equivalencer Romney-enablers. But NPR isn't totally worthless-- Diane Rehm is every bit as listenable as she has always been. Wait Wait Don't Tell Me remains a bright spot too.

[KurtNYC]

71. I turned mine in during the Bush administration

It is like living in whole different world. I had no doubt that Obama was winning this and thanks to the MSM I was able to place many bets on Obama right up through election day.

TV is just an anxiety machine at this point -- bogus polls, bogus reasons for Romney losing, bogus tropical storms, bogus reality shows, on and on. Even TDS and Colbert are mostly just reacting to, and repeating RW media. Colbert's whole show is a parody of a Fox personality and TDS makes it seem like fun to watch Fox News. TDS is very good at putting RW messengers in front of a left leaning audience.

Some of the best coverage of politics and events in the US comes from The Guardian UK and the CBC and in my experience that is how far you have to go to get outside the bubble.

[hay rick]

37. The media wasn't deluded.

They were paid.

[valerief]

38. They're all right wing except for certain shows on MSNBC and all on Current and Democracy Now.

When I tell people I can't listen to CNN or NPR, because they're too right wing, they think I'm crazy. They just don't know the lies and omissions being perpetrated by these channels thanks to their their sponsors being right wing.

[PowerToThePeople]

40. My local news are even all right wing shills

It makes me sick. On election night all the news people had a sad look. Too bad for you, fascist fucks.

Indy radio and DU news updates for me.

[heaven05]

41. yep

NPR disappointed me 9/11 and aftermath, backing the lies that led up to the war in Iraq.

[MrScorpio]

42. I wasn't surprised by this outcome at all

The signs for the President's victory were everywhere to see, only if you wanted to see them.

Not only that, but the best indicator of voter turnout was the reaction that blacks, Latinos, women, young people, organized labor and just regular people had to the rhetoric coming out of the Romney camp, they were infuriated.

The voter suppression campaign was the most idiotic thing that the GOP ever thought of, that told everyone that the most important thing to do was vote.

There was no freaking way that black community was going to let down the Prez and Joe. It was never about getting "free stuff" like the Romney camp said, it was about basic respect. Just look at how Joe, Bill and the Prez addressed the black community with a respectful tone and the reaction that they got back, versus the bullshit offerred by Romney, Ryan and Sununu.

The entire scenario played itself out before a vote was ever cast, I had no surprises on election night. Only a profound sense of realization that all of my observations were correct.

Never waivered, never doubted.

[beachgirl2365]

43. Here,........ Here!!!

and thank you for including NPR in your post............. I am so tired of their holier than though attitude they sometime display. And especially the citing of incorrect data, giving some of the right wing freaks and misinformed a national platform top spew their twisted rhetoric. Thank God for DU!!!!

[femrap]

46. I followed Nate...

he's smart and understands math.

[oldbanjo]

47. I believe that what caused all the confusion

in this election was caused by MSNBC after the first debate, their actions were sicking to me it appeared they had changed sides, that was what was confusing both parties. The whole thing was blown out of proportion, Obama was in shock by what Romney did, he was lying about everything, that couldn't have been a debate it would have been a fight and Obama would have looked bad. All MSNBC did after that was bring up the first debate every time that they could, they should have reminded voters that Romney lied about everything and said nothing about Obama. All the way until Nov 6th they mentioned the first debate. Fox News and Romney got a impression that they were winning from these comments from MSNBC.

[PossumSqueezins]

49. I was still chewing my nails

Coming to DU is what saved me. I live in Ohio and listen to NPR daily and watched MSNBC and I totally agree. There is NO liberal media.

[Haywood Brothers]

51. All pretty dreadful, agreed.

Thank goodness for Nate Silver. To MSNBC's credit, especially Lawrence O'Donnell's and Rachel Maddow's, Silver's predictions were discussed and highlighted as antidote to the spin-meisters and horse-racers and hacks.

[judesedit]

54. Not to mention the poor military out of country only allowed to hear Rush Lintball on service radio.

Thank God for the internet and cell phones. Hopefully most places let some of them have access so they can spread the truth.

[Dog Gone at Penigma]

57. fear

The media has become stuck in the belief that they can't be critical without being accused of being unfair.

They're wrong - and they get called unfair anyway.

They need to dig down, and just do their jobs to be factual, not political appeasers of the right. It comes down to the media giving in to right wing bullying.

[George II]

58. Hmmm...

So, you don't believe what NPR says, you haven't looked at CBS, ABC, etc. since "long ago", CNN has been useless to you for decades and your local newpapers are bird cage liners.

What's left for you? Oujia board or tea leaves?

[progressivebydesign]

60. I accidentally had NBC and ABC on, for Election night.

Wow. They were as bad as Fox. They used the same exact, FALSE lines that Fox has been pushing. I couldn't tell the difference. They called the President "brutish" in the campaign, they whined about his mean ads that cost Romney the election. They never ONCE mentioned the billion that was spent in Romney's favor. There is no liberal media left, save for some newspaper staffers who are ultimately at the whim of their corporate suits.

Not too many years ago, both Gore and Clinton spoke about the biggest challenge to democracy in America, and it was the consolidation of media by corporate giants. Remember, Bain owns Clear Channel, and has a hand in Gannet, and other places. The right wing billionaires own the media, and it shows. And the "hosts" or talking heads or whatever they are, are a bunch of overpaid elitists who spend their time at cocktail parties with Karl Rove.

[tularetom]

77. Ironic isn't it that Clinton would whine about media cosolidation

It was his doing as much as anybody's.

[nadinbrzezinski]

61. I watched both Current, and MSNBC

And followed polls for the last month.

Here is your problem...it is THE METHODOLOGY STUPID and I hope Gallup finally gets it.

I knew, from all data, that at the NATIONAL level it was a horse race and it got tight...every national election that happens....TRENDS. It was at the STATE level where it wasn't close, except in NC, where I will remind you, Romney actually won.

I even said here, the night before, that all data pointed to an O victory, but do not count chickens...I expected more of a nightmare due to shenanigans. I am happy that did not happen.

I had access to the same info you did. And you know what? People have to get a tad more sophisticated on even how to watch news...and how to read polls.

Oh and bias is as old as the United States.

As to FOX, yes, they are a propaganda channel...and. We need media reform, but not the way you think. (Sherman antitrust). But not just the media, and that is a whole different discussion, nor do I expect either party to go there.

[ErikJ]

62. Over-confidence could have given it to GOP though.

I heard the Obama campaign like to pretend they are down 1% all the time to keep the energy up.

[ieoeja]

63. I blame the Fox Bubble, but not because of the polls.

1. Fox lies.

2. Republican rank and file believes the lies.

3. The other two thirds of the country laugh at the lies at best, or get angered by them at worst.

4. If Republican lawmakers campaign on the lies, they lose the country. If they do not campaign on the lies, they lose their rank and file.

Basically, Clear Channel and Fox News propaganda only works if more people believe than not. That has not happened. The Rightist media is actually killing the Republican Party.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

65. I think everybody knew Mitt sucked....

I think people also knew those long lines were for Obama.

Face it. Mitt was getting numbers from nowhere.

[IADEMO2004]

66. Re: Bird cage liner

I must confess I have carefully located a picture or two this election season in our cages.

[Daniel537]

70. I still remember CNN declaring a 4-point Obama lead in Ohio to be a "tie"

The media was much worse this year with their whole "its a dead heat" nonsense, and they've yet to even acknowledge it. Sickening.

[Bluenorthwest]

76. I do not agree with your last line. Most of the country voted for Obama.

So somehow 'most' cut throught the crapola just like 'we' did. The minority voted for Willard, and expected victory. In politics, the winner is always supported by most of the people, that's why it is called winning.
I just think that our side often gets a tad persnickitty. 'We understand, most don't'. Well. According to the popular and electoral votes, most do understand, most is us. We are the most. They are the least.
Most of the country cut through the bubble and supported Obama. Ohio and Florida did a great job of cutting through that bubble.