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Is The Media Biased Against Hillary Clinton?

By Big Tent Democrat

By Big Tent Democrat

My response - is the Pope Catholic? Via Taylor Marsh, I see Eugene Robinson has, an, um, more nuanced view:

The theme of press bias, however, is woven through the Clinton campaign's narrative of the story thus far. There are two basic allegations: that journalists look at Obama uncritically while subjecting Hillary Clinton to microscopic scrutiny; and that we react with hair-trigger reflexes when attacks on Obama have the slightest whiff of racism but don't seem to notice, or care, when Clinton is subjected to rank sexism.

The first charge is just bogus, in my view.

Whatever you say Gene. How's that NBC gig working out for you? More . . .

Robinson continues:

The contention about racism vs. sexism is harder to dismiss out of hand. Being unapologetically racist or sexist is no longer acceptable in this country, at least in most settings. The social censure for being publicly racist, though, is well codified; the perpetrator must recant and repent, and may never completely eliminate the taint. There's also a pretty solid consensus on what's racist and what isn't. The views on sexism are less settled.

Yes, "less settled" is one way to put it. But Gene "concedes" that sexism in Media coverage is an issue in this way:

Is sexism in the coverage of the Clinton campaign excusable? No, and we deserve to be called on it. But it wasn't the media that decided she should take for granted all those states that Barack Obama has been winning.

I am sorry Gene, but why do you belittle the problem of sexism in the Media by arguing about Hillary's campaign problems. Clinton could lose this campaign by 20 points and it would be no justification for the Media's sexism and misogyny. This is just another way in which this issue is belittled. Shame on Eugene Robinson, a fine writer and journalist, for proving that, indeed, there are different standards for overt racism and sexism, and seemingly covert, sexism and racism in the Media. He just provided Exhibit A of that.

Full post as published by TalkLeft on February 17, 2008 (boomark / email).