Posted by
Political Prescience on Monday, October 27, 2008 10:34:44 AM
How far in the tank is the
media* for Obama? We need to
create a new standard. The system can be based on how much in the national
interest a story is, and how far the media tanks for it.
An example:
On scale of one-to-ten, the
Governor Palin wardrobe story was a two (in the national interest) and it
received a medium amount of coverage - in the six range. (2/6)
On the other hand, the
Senator Biden gaffe of stating Obama’s inexperience, and possibly slipping with
national secrets, was clearly a ten, but received coverage of approximately one
(relative to its importance).
(10/1)
Therefore, if the first
number matches the second, or is close, than the press has been even-handed,
otherwise the difference is the quantifiable press bias, hereby named the Shotgun
Scale of Press Bias. A perfectly balanced score of 5/5, 6/6
or 3/3 etc. is what we should demand of non-editorial reporting.
In this particular case the
press bias is a huge factor of 2/6 (-4) negative for Palin and the
inexperience/national calamity story was biased 10/1 (+9) in favor of Senator
Biden. (We must compare apples to apples, so the stories compared should both
be either possibly harmful or possibly helpful.)
It may take some tinkering;
I am looking forward to input.
* http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Story?id=6099188&page=1