Opinion NPR Senior Editor Blasts Lack of ‘Viewpoint Diversity’ After Leftward Lurch: ‘Open-Minded Spirit No Longer Exists’

[Jack V Savage]

You're so full of shit it's ridiculous. 87-0 - That's systemic discrimination and we all know it.

So your theory is that disparate impact is proof of disparate treatment? Just want to get you on record here (FWIW, I consistently do not think it is, though certainly it calls for an alternative explanation, which was given here).

Their bias is 100% reflected in their reporting as Uri Berliner stated with their reliance on Adam Schiff as he told these Clowns / Left Cult what they wanted to hear.

Replace Democrat with White/Male/Straight and Republican with Black/Female/Gay and you guys would be losing your minds.

Berliner's post made factual errors that totally undermine his case there. Specifically, the Mueller report did not look into collusion or deliver a finding of no collusion (and despite not looking into it directly, they did report findings of collusion). And the Senate Intelligence Committee did investigate the issue and did find evidence of collusion. So then we have to wonder why A) Berliner got that wrong and B) editors didn't catch his mistake. And the whole thing starts to unravel. Or we can just say "durr, they sold out to the evil left" and not bother thinking.

 

[cottagecheesefan]

Yep. It had nothing to do with the hate Americans have for her.

Did you ever look at the Dale Bumpers' diary excerpts? He met the Clintons and was appalled by their behavior. He said these 2 should never get close to power. He ended up saving Bill from impeachment and I'll always wonder why.

Never heard of this, will have to check it out

 

[Andy Capp]

I'd never heard of this, but I looked it up now and saw this:

Bumpers diary calls Clintons 'obsessive' | Arkansas Democrat Gazette

Former U.S. Sen. Dale Bumpers described Bill and Hillary Clinton as "the most manic obsessive people I have ever known in my life, and perhaps even the most insensitive to everybody else's feelings," according to papers on file at the University of Arkansas library.

www.arkansasonline.com

What do you think? Most reports of people who worked with them that I've seen have been extremely positive, but it's not surprising that rightists would try to smear them.

More excerpts here: https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/03/dale-bumpers-bill-hillary-clinton-diary/

Even the bad stuff, if legit, doesn't really sound bad.

I think this tells the greater part of the story,

Over time, Bumpers’ relationship with Clinton improved. He helped keep candidate Clinton anchored during the 1992 presidential campaign, traveling to New Hampshire to provide moral support, and his diary entries from that year are far more measured in his assessment of the future first couple. After he was elected president, Clinton talked to Bumpers and Pryor daily, and leaned heavily on the two senators for help navigating DC’s political hazards. When Hillary Clinton was elected to the Senate in 2000, Bumpers penned an op-ed in the New York Times defending her on her merits. “[T]hey will be hard pressed to criticize her personally,” he wrote. “She will become a colleague they respect.” Last fall, with Bumpers in failing health, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported that Bill Clinton had taken a break from campaigning to visit with Bumpers for an hour and tell the former senator he loved him.

​

 

[Andy Capp]

Yeah. Not bad at all.

No, but your initial response lets me know where you're standing.


I talk about one man and you blow the whistle on rightists trying to smear Clinton. Is Bumpers considered a rightist now?

"Bumpers was critical of their character and political future, dismissing them as “manic ambitious” and “manic obsessed” and alleging that Bill Clinton’s gubernatorial campaign had resorted to “dirty tricks.”

That doesn't sound bad at all. Insert rolleyes.

“I doubt that I’ve ever known anybody as manicly [sic] ambitious for political office, but who simply doesn’t have the judgment or character to deal with it once he gets it.”

Sounds like a major endorsement.

"Bumpers' diary entry from that September day also notes that his wife Betty, after meeting Bill Clinton for the first time, kept insisting that Clinton "had no character" and was essentially a chauvinist."

Sounds like a great man.

"He's bright, his heart's in the right place, he's energetic, he really wants to make a difference, and he cares deeply about his state."

That's flattering. Until you read the rest of the quote:

"He just simply cannot sort it all out when character is required to make the right decision."

Damn. The word character again. It sure comes up often.

"In response to the Mother Jones piece, the University of Arkansas library has pulled the diary from its collection at the request of Bumpers’ son, Brent."

I'm sure it had nothing with the Clintons' image. It's all a pure coincidence.

So I'll believe what he said Ronal Reagan:

"Unquestionably, Ronald Reagan will go down in history as the worst, or close to the worst, president the United States has ever suffered," according to an April 29, 1982, entry.

But I'll dismiss what he said on the Clintons. It's not that bad anyway.

“the most manic obsessive people I have ever known in my life, and perhaps even the most insensitive to everybody else’s feelings. ... Everything centers around them and their ambitions. It is precisely the reason Bill got beat (when he ran for re-election as governor) in 1980. People felt, and correctly, that they were being manipulated.”

Not bad at all. Good people.

I note you left the part out that I quoted in my post immediately above. Have a look.

 

[Jack V Savage]

I think this tells the greater part of the story,

Over time, Bumpers’ relationship with Clinton improved. He helped keep candidate Clinton anchored during the 1992 presidential campaign, traveling to New Hampshire to provide moral support, and his diary entries from that year are far more measured in his assessment of the future first couple. After he was elected president, Clinton talked to Bumpers and Pryor daily, and leaned heavily on the two senators for help navigating DC’s political hazards. When Hillary Clinton was elected to the Senate in 2000, Bumpers penned an op-ed in the New York Times defending her on her merits. “[T]hey will be hard pressed to criticize her personally,” he wrote. “She will become a colleague they respect.” Last fall, with Bumpers in failing health, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reported that Bill Clinton had taken a break from campaigning to visit with Bumpers for an hour and tell the former senator he loved him.

The thing is, Clinton obsessives will just say that anything positive he said is a lie and anything negative is his true feelings. But it's telling that his own family called that stuff into question. Maybe they're right, maybe they're wrong, but it shows to me that even in private talking to his family, he expressed great fondness for the Clintons. Possible that at different times, he had different feelings. That's pretty normal in general.

Also, it's annoying that I took the time to actually look up @koquerelle's reference (no link provided), read about it, raise some concerns, and then his response was just childish trolling. I had expected more than that.

 

[Whippy McGee]

So your theory is that disparate impact is proof of disparate treatment? Just want to get you on record here (FWIW, I consistently do not think it is, though certainly it calls for an alternative explanation, which was given here).


Berliner's post made factual errors that totally undermine his case there. Specifically, the Mueller report did not look into collusion or deliver a finding of no collusion (and despite not looking into it directly, they did report findings of collusion). And the Senate Intelligence Committee did investigate the issue and did find evidence of collusion. So then we have to wonder why A) Berliner got that wrong and B) editors didn't catch his mistake. And the whole thing starts to unravel. Or we can just say "durr, they sold out to the evil left" and not bother thinking.

No Jack.

You're simply propaganda if:

• You have two major political parties and your "news organization" has zero staff that represent one of those parties (Just like ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, and MSNBC, NY Times, and WaPo)
• Your staff came from a few universities that only have Professors that favor one political party.
• When your staff is married to and relatives of operatives or politicians from just one party.
• Adam Schiff is your primary source for over a year and you seek no opposing views.

We don't have a Free Press with the MSM. We have a corrupt propaganda arm of the Democratic Party. Uri Berliner from NPR finally gets it, but you're a Democratic Party hack and not an honest man. You'll never admit it.

 

[HomeCheese]

Is there a better news cast than NPR? I know none are perfect but I would still trust NPR over just about any other organization.

What do y'all think about Amy Goodwin and the War and Peace Report? He opening is always the most depressing five minutes in broadcasting.

 

[Jack V Savage]

No Jack.

No what? You do or do not think that disparate impact proves differential treatment?

You're simply propaganda if:

• You have two major political parties and your "news organization" has zero staff that represent one of those parties (Just like ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, and MSNBC, NY Times, and WaPo)
• Your staff came from a few universities that only have Professors that favor one political party.
• When your staff is married to and relatives of operatives or politicians from just one party.

We don't have a Free Press with the MSM. We have a corrupt propaganda arm of the Democratic Party. Uri Berliner from NPR finally gets it, but you're a Democratic Party hack and not an honest man. You'll never admit it.

The factual claim in your first bullet is false. But as I've pointed out, we would expect that any job that picks primarily from elite schools would be much less likely to have Republicans. The question is whether there is any benefit in affirmative action for a political party. As I said, part of the problem is that a lot of political debates are presented as relating to differences of factual matters, and the GOP positions on most of them are simply, objectively false. So it's like aiming for diverse views on creation in your biology department (and, in fact, a plurality of Republicans are creationists). Those debates often are masking real differences of opinion, and I can see some merit in trying to get people with rightist opinions on board, but the problem is that if you have rightist opinions and don't promote factually false positions, you're still not going to be accepted as a mainstream Republican (no one thinks that Frum or Douthat types provide true partisan diversity). There is a problem you're stumbling up against, but the solution really should be on the other end (that is, the GOP should develop a platform and messaging that doesn't repel educated people).

And of course we have a free press. Attempts to force "viewpoint diversity" would reduce the freedom of the press. The issue is that free people acting according to their choice leads to results that some people don't like. That is a thing that happens sometimes. Sometimes calls for regs, but not in this case. You can say it calls for private action, but that action has been taken, and there is a whole alt media sphere that tells Republicans what they want to hear.

And of course I'm an honest man. You being mad about me not blindly agreeing with GOP propaganda doesn't equate to me being dishonest. Knock that shit off if you want to be taken seriously.

 

[ferrisjso]

No Jack.

You're simply propaganda if:

• You have two major political parties and your "news organization" has zero staff that represent one of those parties (Just like ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, and MSNBC, NY Times, and WaPo)
• Your staff came from a few universities that only have Professors that favor one political party.
• When your staff is married to and relatives of operatives or politicians from just one party.
• Adam Schiff is your primary source for over a year and you seek no opposing views.

We don't have a Free Press with the MSM. We have a corrupt propaganda arm of the Democratic Party. Uri Berliner from NPR finally gets it, but you're a Democratic Party hack and not an honest man. You'll never admit it.

The Democrats believe the same thing as the Republicans. The reason capitalist institutions favor Democrats is Republicans are associated with problematic social views not because they aren't hard right wingers.

 

[koquerelle]

I note you left the part out that I quoted in my post immediately above. Have a look.

He became friend with them and changed his tunes. It doesn't change anything about the perception he had of the Clintons for many years. His neutral opinion far outweighs his opinion after he became their friend.

 

[Jack V Savage]

The Democrats believe the same thing as the Republicans. The reason capitalist institutions favor Democrats is Republicans are associated with problematic social views not because they aren't hard right wingers.

The GOP as an institution is almost solely dedicated to lower taxes for rich people and reduced benefits/higher debt/higher taxes on non-rich people to pay for it. They definitely don't agree about that stuff.

He became friend with them and changed his tunes. It doesn't change anything about the perception he had of the Clintons for many years. His neutral opinion far outweighs his opinion after he became their friend.

Er, this seems like you obviously have the causation backwards. He became their friend as he got to know them better and liked them. He didn't start liking them because he became their friend.

 

[brothir]

He became friend with them and changed his tunes. It doesn't change anything about the perception he had of the Clintons for many years. His neutral opinion far outweighs his opinion after he became their friend.

That's not true at all. All of his opinions were subjective, so any modulation in his subjective evaluation is relevant to every other previously held. Your attempted claim is that he was objective at one point and then became subjective, but that has to be demonstrated. You seem to follow the obvious bias fallacy of "when he agreed with me he was right but when he disagreed he was wrong, in spite of it all being subjective". You're obviously going to favor opinions that agree with yours, but that has no bearing on correctness.

 

[Andy Capp]

He became friend with them and changed his tunes. It doesn't change anything about the perception he had of the Clintons for many years. His neutral opinion far outweighs his opinion after he became their friend.

You deserve a reply but I have nothing to add to the two posts following yours, honestly.

 

[Islam Imamate]

Not exactly. Leftists exclude others once they have the power in their hiring practices. We see it in the News Media, Higher Education, and Bureaucracies as a rule.

Idk if I believe that. I think in general once a given personality type comes to dominate a given field it will become easier to break into that field if you have that personality type but I doubt there's overt political discrimination like you're talking about happening as a rule and not as isolated exceptions. This is with the exception of institutions that are overtly or covertly partisan like think tanks but in those cases there's also lots of right wing alternatives.

I think @Islam Imamate underrates the impact of general educational polarization. Educated people in general (not just in any particular field) are increasingly rejecting the GOP, and the effect is stronger at more elite institutions, which is where the top media orgs get the vast majority of their talent. And in turn, they create a product that appeals more to more-educated people. And, again, it doesn't require CTs about evil donors or anything.

There's that too but there are many selective fields with high educational standards that lean Republican and in some cases heavily. Petroleum engineers are one such group but there subfields of medicide that do as well.

Unlike right wingers radicalized into echo chambers those more educated right wingers probably listen to the mainstream media sources like liberals but with a more critical eye.

 

[Jack V Savage]

There's that too but there are many selective fields with high educational standards that lean Republican and in some cases heavily. Petroleum engineers are one such group but there subfields of medicide that do as well.

Unlike right wingers radicalized into echo chambers those more educated right wingers probably listen to the mainstream media sources like liberals but with a more critical eye.

Do you have recent data on this? Educational polarization is a pretty recent thing. White college grads were a 50/50 group just 10 years ago and are more like 60/40 now, though the numbers are more extreme for people with advanced degrees and at more elite institutions. They're now so extreme that I'd be surprised if there were a large group of recent advanced-degree holders that leans Republican unless it was specifically selected for that or (as with petroleum engineers) there were policy-related reasons.

 

[HereticBD]

Do you have recent data on this? Educational polarization is a pretty recent thing. White college grads were a 50/50 group just 10 years ago and are more like 60/40 now, though the numbers are more extreme for people with advanced degrees and at more elite institutions. They're now so extreme that I'd be surprised if there were a large group of recent advanced-degree holders that leans Republican unless it was specifically selected for that or (as with petroleum engineers) there were policy-related reasons.

If he posts data that you don't like, are you gonna call him "too emotional" to debate the topic?

 

[Jack V Savage]

Good thread that pretty much puts this whole thing to bed:

 

[RoastBeast]

When all the leftists on this forum are defending a news media outlet, you can be sure that the news media outlet is left wing propaganda.

I think we had this same argument a couple years back about NPR. I took a screen shot of their front page and 8 out of 10 articles were pro left, anti right.

 

[Andy Capp]

When all the leftists on this forum are defending a news media outlet, you can be sure that the news media outlet is left wing propaganda.

I think we had this same argument a couple years back about NPR. I took a screen shot of their front page and 8 out of 10 articles were pro left, anti right.

Who is defending what, exactly? Please use specific examples so we can point and laugh.

 

[Jack V Savage]

When all the leftists on this forum are defending a news media outlet, you can be sure that the news media outlet is left wing propaganda.

I think we had this same argument a couple years back about NPR. I took a screen shot of their front page and 8 out of 10 articles were pro left, anti right.

I don't think it's about left/right as much as honest/not.

Kind of like what Zank was getting at by mocking the idea of basing opinions on reality. Of course everyone knows that rightists have different goals and values, but they don't think that their views are popular so they have to dress them up in lies, and then the actual arguments that people end up having really are just about objective reality, which then puts rightists in the position of A) having to say things they know aren't true and B) having to try to discredit all neutral sources of information (even as those sources bend over backward to accommodate them and address the attacks).