Dan Rather says that the Government is part of the reason why he was fired.

[JALU3]

Well . . . Dan Rather has sued his former employer, CBS, for $70 Million US Dollars (now at record lows to other currencies). This follows the successful civil case of Radio Announcer Don Imus, which involved CBS as well. This suit was settled between his former employer and his legal team. Now, one of the reasons why Dan Rather has decided to file suit against CBS is because he believes that he was Scapegoated by his company due to ". . . big government interference and intimidation in the news."
This brings up an interesting topic. It is often argued by Conservatives here in the United States that the mainstream media has a left leaning bias. This ranges from how they report a news story, to which news stories they report, and which they do not. However, it appears that Dan Rather is arguing that the media has a bias towards the government, which is currently under a Republican President (some would argue that he is not conservative). This implies that there is presently a conservative bias in the US mainstream media. Now here are my questions:

• Is there a bias in the US mainstream media?
• If so, does the bias benifit liberals or conservatives?
• Is there a bias towards the US Government in the US mainstream media?
• Does this bias change depending on what political party the President of the United States is part of, and to what degree?

Personally I believe that the media is naturally biased, and that there is no such thing as unbiased media. Due to the increasing liberalizations of our higher institutes of learning here the United States, it is only natural for there to be a left leaning bias in the newsrooms in our country. That is not to say that there is not bias in certain forms of media, such as in talk radio. But this is brought about due to market forces, and not by a giant conspiracy. See the death of Air America for my opinions on that. For instance the Air America Radio Station, and one of the Conservative AM Talk Radio Stations here in San Diego were both operated by the same company.
However, in the United States it is generally assumed that the media which reports the news is a non-biased actor, and is generally honest. This creates a situation where public opinion can be molded by the news, and how it is reported, and what gets reported.

[Skybird]

Not 100% on topic, but running on a parallel track to it, so to speak:

Media views in international relations, and the difference in ways in which European and American medias approach a story.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/...478884,00.html

[sunvalleyslim]

It will be interesting to see how Dan presents his case..............sounds like B.S. to me

[The WosMan]

Dan is full of crap, always is, always has been. This man tried to throw a presidential election with a BS story. He took a pure fictional story and tried to pass it off on the American public one to many times. It may have worked for him in the past and it may have worked for Walter Cronkite but the new media is what caught him with his pants down.

News shows and anchors who have a job to report the news should do just that and not throw an obvious political slant on it. Now if you have political commentary and people who have news shows but admit their bias then that is perfectly okay, as long as people know that is what they are going to get.

[Enigma]

This man tried to throw a presidential election with a BS story.

This is among my favorite of the right wing paranoia points of the last several years. Hand in hand with the myth of the "Liberal Media"

Read this last week....

Book 'em, Dan-O: By Eric Alterman I make it a point not to feel sorry for people who make $8 million a year. (This is especially true in Dan Rather's case because he keeps meeting me and then forgetting he's ever met me ...) But you could tell he got screwed by CBS when they dropped him in response to right-wing-driven hysteria, lest anyone look too carefully into George W. Bush's draft-dodging. Remember, not even the Thornburgh commission ever determined whether those documents were fake, though it is a given of virtually all discussion of the matter that this was somehow proven. What the right has always understood is the fact that the one of the most powerful forces in the universe is the fear of the heads of large corporations feeling themselves to be embarrassed. This is nowhere more true than for the heads of large media corporations.
Rather became an embarrassment for CBS and so he was unceremoniously dumped, just as CNN dumped its producers way back when for a story on the use of nerve gas in Vietnam that may or may not have been true but fell within the radar of the right's minions. Thing is, the producers at CBS needed the money that paid for their silence afterward. Rather, because he'd been netting that $8 mil or so -- and by the way, anchor salaries are one big reason all network news is in such trouble today. How many journalists do you think you could hire at, say, $150K per year with the salaries of Messrs. Williams, Gibson, Russert, Schieffer, Stephanopoulos, and Ms. Couric? The number for Katie alone would be about a hundred. (Remember, Peter Jennings left his family $50 million when he died during the years that ABC News was all but decimated.)
Anyway, Dan-O's big bucks come in handy right about now because he couldn't be bought out with a confidentiality agreement.
According to the suit, Rather contends that the network committed fraud by commissioning a "biased" and incomplete investigation of the flawed Guard broadcast and, in the process, "seriously damaged his reputation," and charges that CBS and its executives made him "a scapegoat" in an attempt "to pacify the White House," though the formal complaint presents virtually no direct evidence to that effect. To buttress this claim, Mr. Rather quotes the executive who oversaw his regular segment on CBS Radio, telling Mr. Rather in November 2004 that he was losing that slot, effective immediately, because of "pressure from 'the right wing.' " Sounds true to me.
And how telling is this? "Instead of directly vetting the script he would read for the Guard segment, Mr. Rather says, he acceded to pressure from Mr. Heyward to focus instead on his reporting from Florida on Hurricane Frances, and on Bill Clinton's heart surgery."
And this: "Under pressure, Mr. Rather says, he delivered a public apology on his newscast on Sept. 20, 2004 -- written not by him but by a CBS corporate publicist -- "despite his own personal feelings that no public apology from him was warranted."

And yet, a few draft dodgers who never went to war for their country get a free pass when tearing down an undisputable war hero and former POW like Mccain, and tarnishing the service of a guy who actually did go to war, in John Kerry. The only reason they never hit Cleeland was because they didnt want to be seen trashing a man who gave up more than his time for his country during Nam.

[The WosMan]

There is no myth in that my friend, the only ones fooling themselves are those that deny it. Also, seeing that my father's friend and co-worker served on swift boats in Vietnam and knew John Kerry, the Swiftboat Vets were exactly right about him. The man was a crybaby who would apply of a purple heart if he so much as scratched his hand.

[geetrue]

Book 'em, Dan-O: By Eric Alterman ... But you could tell he got screwed by CBS when they dropped him in response to right-wing-driven hysteria, lest anyone look too carefully into George W. Bush's draft-dodging. Remember, not even the Thornburgh commission ever determined whether those documents were fake, though it is a given of virtually all discussion of the matter that this was somehow proven.

Proven beyond a doubt due to the letter having been typed on a type writer that wasn't even in military service yet. I'd say that was proof enough.

[The Avon Lady]

Originally Posted by geetrue

Proven beyond a doubt due to the letter having been typed on a type writer that wasn't even in military service yet. I'd say that was proof enough.

What Enigma means is it was fake but accurate.

[SUBMAN1]

How come in this society that it is always someone else's fault but ones own? Could dubious reporting with nothing more than rumors instead of fact happen to be the reason why one would get fired? I remember this - he had an unknown source just call up out of the blue and make accusations that were unverifiable. Something tells me he got a prank call from a 9 year old and made a story out of it. That is pretty sad.

Anyway, being honest will get you far in life. An example is traffic cops - don't deny what you were doing and 9 times out of 10 they will let you off. They are so shocked by the honesty, that they can't handle it and probably feel bad giving you a ticket!

-S