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| Fifth Column |
| Reporters Should Be Upfront About Political Beliefs - Pigs can fly |
| 2009-09-23 |
| By John Stossel When I announced last week that I was leaving ABC for Fox, some readers complained about my "bias." I replied: "Every reporter has political beliefs. The difference is that I am upfront about mine." Look at today's burning issue: President Obama's pledge to redesign 15 percent of the economy. Virtually every reporter calls his health care plan "reform." But dictionaries define reform as "improvement." So before they present any evidence, reporters pronounce Obama's plan an improvement. Isn't that bias? The New York Times took its bias to an absurd length. Its page-one story on the big anti-big-government rally in Washington, D.C., referred to "protests that began with an opposition to health care. ..." Apparently, in the Times reporter's and editors' view, opponents of the Obama health care plan oppose health care itself. (The online article was later changed.) Economic-policy reporters usually present the views of supporters of new regulations as objective and public-spirited. For a contrary view, at best they'll ask a Republican or a representative of the regulated business, who is portrayed as self-serving. (Republicans tend to offer a watered-down version of the Democrats' proposals.) A recent Bloomberg report on President Obama's plans to rewrite financial regulations is typical: "Obama has proposed new regulations overseeing the systemic risk posed by large financial institutions." The reporter quoted White House economic adviser Lawrence Summers in support of the plan. Although there are plenty of reasons to doubt that regulators are competent at judging systemic risk, no skeptical economist was quoted. Readers are led to believe the program is perfectly feasible. Most reporting on the "stimulus" package has the same flaw. Just to call it "stimulus" is to editorialize, since the idea that government spending can truly stimulate an economy is at best doubtful. Many good economists say it can't be done. After all, the money is taken from somewhere else. But the economists rarely are quoted. In addition, reporters seem to think they've done their job if they merely describe the intentions behind the proposed "reform." But the burden of proof should be on the sponsors of regulation and spending. They should have to make a convincing case that their new rules are superior to the free market. Who cares about intentions? Fuel-efficiency standards, intended to save gasoline, give us less crashworthy cars, so more people die. Subsidies to American farmers destroy Third World markets (http://tinyurl.com/l46rd4). Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac encouraged shaky subprime mortgages and helped cause the housing and financial turmoil. The long list of bad results that have emerged from well-intended regulation ought to dim reporters' enthusiasm. But it hasn't. I admit that my guiding political and economic philosophy -- libertarianism -- now shapes my reporting, in this way: It prompts me to ask questions that others don't ask. I don't claim to be the expert. But some of my colleagues who write about business know nothing about economics. Many are comically hostile to profit -- they dismiss it as "greed" (although they bargain for the highest salaries possible). On my former ABC blog, some people called me a biased "conservative." "Your (sic) a shill anyways John. dont (sic) let the door hit you in the you know what." I'm surprised that the self-described enemies of intolerance can't tolerate even one MSM reporter who doesn't share their statist premises. The interventionist state has been the status quo for generations, so I must be something other than "conservative." "Liberal" is what my philosophy used to be called. It's the statists who are the reactionaries. |
| Posted by:GolfBravoUSMC |
| #2 Libertarianism has a huge blind spot - no comprehension of the privileged position corporations hold and of the damage they can do. Oh, and government regulation is always bad and counterproductive. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2009-09-23 13:48 |
| #1 Fox is picking up a lot of talent. For a person who wants to be a journalist at the leading edge of news, it's a much better place to be than the traditional outlets. |
| Posted by: Richard of Oregon 2009-09-23 10:21 |