Wednesday, September 15, 2010

David Catanese: Politico's O'Donnell Hit Man


You have to look closely sometimes. If you blink you might just miss obvious cases of media bias. Particularly when it's online, bunched in the middle of one of thousands of articles on the top news story of the day.

But I tripped over this one and wanted to let you know. It's small but it's a real gem.

In the sixth paragraph of the Politico article entitled "Coons Stays Cautious On O'Donnell" David Catanese wrote:

"But where other eager candidates might have been unable to hold back from knocking O’Donnell’s extreme views, Coons declined."

It's not an opinion piece.

Now, unless you received your journalism degree from Hamburger University you know that it's not appropriate to define anyone's political views as being “extreme" in a hard news piece simply because you are of the opinion that they are. That's not your call to make. Your job description doesn't involve telling us where you think the candidate falls on the ideological spectrum. Even if everyone else in the Poltico newsroom is in agreement with you. It's like the golden rule of journalism. Catanese broke it and tried to sneak his opinion by the reader as news hoping that no one would notice.

Catanese has written five stories on the Castle/O'Donnell/Coons saga in the last 24 hours. None of those other stories contain such blatant attempts to interject his own opinion into the narrative. But as Poltico's O'Donnell point man, he needs to be watched carefully in the coming weeks.

In the wake of the successful media effort to vilify Sarah Palin in 2008, the knee-jerk Liberal media response to a young, attractive, conservative woman is predictable. The Left is going to try to rekindle the anti-Palin magic and destroy O'Donnell in hopes that things play out the same way. Not simply in an effort to discredit her in the lead up to this election, but in order to discredit her forever. Catanese took the bait but mistakenly revealed his own bias in the process. His editors bear much of the blame as well, assuming that he has editors.

- Dan Joseph

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6 comments:

CitizenConservative said...

I too noticed this bias, and posted a comment at the time of reading on Politico's site. Very unprofessional and obviously biased. Keep up the good work!

Simply Jim said...

"Very unprofessional and obviously biased".......?

Wouldn't it have to be.....false......first,
PECKERWOOD?

Simply Jim said...

It's like saying JESUS had to be who he said he was and not just the greatest teacher of morals to walk the surface of this planet; could be neither over one lie, deception, misunderstanding, or dellusion. Assuming we are all sinners, Jesus as just another imperfect man far more likely and just as easily cruxified; still able to be the greatest moral teacher ever to walk the surface of this planet. Someone has to be ......appreciated or not.

Falling Panda said...

No offense Simple Jim, but you need to work on your sentence structure. Only then will I be able to understand what you are trying to convey.

Simply Jim said...

Although I managed to become a veterinarian, I agree, sentence structuring is and has alway been a huge weakness of mine due to my hearing impaiment. However, I refuse to believe you make the effort to understand any point of view as you do discounting the ones disagreeing with yours.

Other than wishing I had your writting skills, found your intelligences far more reactionary than visionary..."conservative".

Do believe Jesus was a liberal; but how would I know, me being a GOD DAMED atheist.

Imagination is more important than knowledge. The important thing is never to stop questioning (as opposed to just complaining).

-Eistein-

Simply Jim said...

For O'Donnel to say, "EVOLUTION is just a myth!"

What was her reason for believing her statment a fact; evolution not even ...."just a theory"?

"...then why aren't monkeys still evolving into humans?"

I don't care how many years ago the statement was made. Old enough to be impossible , not much less clueless now, if even at all, no matter how much believing she's matured.

THAT'S FAR BETTER A REASON FOR LIBERAL MEDIA'S KNEEJERK REACTION THAN YOUR DEVOTION TO A GEM SO SMALL you had to make yourself believe real before almost not tripping over it.


THAT's A FACT!