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[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

I actually don't disagree with much there. Sullivan is cashing in on a narrative and is sloppy in his cherry-picking of supporting proofs.

But then this author goes on his own cherry-picking expedition, and his selections are cultivated carefully to undo Sullivan's point.

This tennis match of "You're Biased" vs. "No We're Not" could go on endlessly. But I think that tedium could be short-circuited with an easier analysis explaining why the "MSM" is assailed for alleged bias:

Because the "MSM" is read by those who like and those who hate it. And its right-wing competition is not read by anyone (sane).

Do you read the right wing papers? I don't. Other than the National Review, they're just not well written. They're rags. And do you watch OANN? No. No one sane watches OANN.

The Big Three and large cable news outlets (sans Fox), and the Times and similar papers lean left. They admit it. But as the author notes, they also include some right wing voices. But those right wing voices are never the marquis names (Douthat and Bret Stephens aren't massive draws).

The haters need something to hate, they go looking for articles to hate, and they find stuff by people like Krugman or Charles Blow (just to stick with papers) because those articles are the most cited. In the case of Krugman and similar writers, it's because he's a well known brand. His stuff gets widely aggregated and circulated. In the case of people like Blow, it's because they're somewhat mentally unhinged, and so provide a perfect foil for the right (look at what this nutball wrote).

The centrist and right wing voices in the "MSM" universe don't get top billing. In fact, they're billed so low by the algorithms that share articles they often might as well not even exist. And no one with any common sense reads the right wing papers because they're nuts.

So it appears to most people that the "MSM" leans hard left, and the right runs with this argument.

I think you skillfully explain why conservatives (whom you mislabel as "most people") constantly complain about the so-called "MSM." I don't disagree. My point was that a lot of those complaints are tendentious bullshit fueled by grievance and an ideological agenda, and you don't seem to disagree.