Politico Co-Founder: Most Journalists I've Known Are Democrats
In one of the more honest admissions of the obvious, Politico co-founder Jim VandeHei has admitted that the majority of the journalists that he's known in his career at a variety of publications "vote Democratic."
"If I had to guess, if you put all of the reporters that I’ve ever worked with on truth serum, most of them vote Democratic," VandeHei said during the March 13th edition of C-SPAN's "Road to the White House" program. Video follows.
Thanks to the Washington Free Beacon for the catch.
This wasn't the first time that VandeHei has told the truth about what reporters think about Republicans and Democrats. Last year, he stated that he didn't think there were "any" reporters working in the business who believed that former Alaska governor Sarah Palin should become president of the United States.
While he is now more willing to talk about the Democratic dominance of the media industry, VandeHei's remarks contradict his earlier expressed belief that the news media favor "centrist" politicians and policies. Several months before his admission that the media dislike Palin, VandeHei wrote with his fellow Politico co-founder John Harris that the national political press is against "ideological zealoutry" and is "centrist:"
Conservatives are convinced the vast majority of reporters at mainstream news organizations are liberals who hover expectantly for each new issue of The Nation.
It’s just not true. The majority of political writers we know might more accurately be accused of centrist bias.
That is, they believe broadly in government activism but are instinctually skeptical of anything that smacks of ideological zealotry and are quick to see the public interest as being distorted by excessive partisanship. Governance, in the Washington media’s ideal, should be a tidier and more rational process than it is.
Assuming he hasn't come to a different opinion and that the infamously liberal Harris didn't write the above paragraphs, it appears VandeHei believes the media are biased in favor of centrist Democrats.
Unfortunately, as NewsBusters has persistently demostrated, liberal Democrats are far less likely to be labeled or be perceived as such by the national press. That makes sense, since one is less likely to perceive as extreme one's ideological fellows. While VandeHei may believe his colleagues favor moderate Democrats, in reality, this translates to a bias in favor of Democrats generally.
So while we can give kudos to VandeHei for admitting what surveys of journalists have consistently shown (see our recently released Media Bias 101 for full details), it looks like he may still have a ways to go before he can admit that liberal Democrats dominate the elite media, not centrist ones.
- Matthew Sheffield's blog
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Comments
HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA
Submitted by liberalsarefunny on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 12:36pm.
Really??
Jeez...I'm shocked.
It's all perspective from a vantage point
Submitted by neutron on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 4:30pm.
VandeHei believes that he an his fellows are centrists, because they deny the legitimate existence of conservatives and our thoughts. If conservative thought is excluded from the media, then folks like VandeHei are the middle of what is left -- the liberal left -- and so they think they are centrists.
I heard years ago that at the
Submitted by ForeverOnTheRight on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 12:43pm.
I heard years ago that at the Republican convention that 60% of the reporters where Democrats. I would not be suprised if the convervative reporters are assigned to "backwater" stories of little importance or non-political stories.
And?
Submitted by HockeyKid on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 12:53pm.
This falls into the "No sh**, Sherlock" category.
"Beauty is only skin deep, but liberal's to the bone." - me
just another loony lib from LA..
Submitted by MacWell on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 12:55pm.
When I first joined Politico to comment, I sent an email to Jim. I thanked him for allowing we the people a platform for real debate. I also warned him about becoming another liberal rag good only to wrap fish. I received a reply from him saying he would try to be as unbiased as he could. That was then, now is now and politico turned into, * "just another liberal rag from LA"
The press in America should be ashamed of being called journalists. There is no journalism going on in the media today. The same media that many people get their only news from, are doing them the gravest disservice by lying to them and keeping them strung out on their brand of bias. I'm pretty sure if these people's grandfathers could see what they done by selling their soul for an ideology, they wouldn't be too happy. We have no main stream media, they're frauds, deceivers, liars. What's worse, is now they don't try to hide it, it's as if they're proud of being hypocrites.
* borrowed from Frank Zappa's "Just another band from LA" and a great album it is.
In other news: A dog bites a man
Submitted by gopcongress on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 1:01pm.
In other news:
"Dog Bites Man"
"Sun rises in East, sets in West"
"Sky color: BLUE!"
"Clippers lose"
"The news and truth are not the same thing." -Walter Lippmann (1889-1974) FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER
Truth serum
Submitted by diskinetic on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 1:23pm.
Of course, because if you ask a journalist straight up, they'd naturally lie about everything. I have a (completely unused) degree in journalism, and if I remember my classmates correctly back in the college days, I wouldn't trust any journalist as far as I could one-arm toss them.
Who'd a thunk it?
Submitted by iamsaved on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 1:25pm.
Saying most journalists vote Democrat is like stating that Obama really does tell lies. Talk about stating the obvious...
Now an update regarding a related newsflash......
Submitted by thescoots on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 1:45pm.
Man lands on moon....
yep a good amen to that one..
Submitted by jkwtrading on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 2:41pm.
yep a good amen to that one..
Header changed thusly:
Submitted by BBallleaper on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 1:54pm.
Most journalists I've known are: liberals; communists; anarchists; dope addicts; homosexuals; anti-capitalists; pro-abortionists; anti-war activists; for open borders; union thugs; socialists; anti-constitutionalists (except for their 'right' to hide their sources) anti-conservatives; racists; liars. Have fun. Add your own descriptive!!
You mean besides being a
Submitted by killa37 on Tue, 04/24/2012 - 8:42am.
You mean besides being a 'community organizer' and a 'professional diletente', Boy Baraka is also a 'journalist'???
Who Knew?!
Submitted by Aubrey on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 2:49pm.
My Lord....Stop the Presses....This is Stunning News!
Missing the obvious in 2008
Submitted by nohype on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 4:56pm.
"he stated that he didn't think there were "any" reporters working in the business who believed that former Alaska governor Sarah Palin should become president of the United States."
But all of them thought that Barack Obama should become president of the United States! We do not know and probably never will know how Sarah Palin would have functioned as president, but anyone who takes an objective look at what Obama has wrought must conclude that his has been a disastrous presidency. The unemployment rate, the explosion of federal debt, Fast and Furious--the scandal of the century, and his administration's war on religion are just a few of the lowlights of his tenure in office. Why should we have any confidence in the judgment of people who missed what was obvious in 2008, that electing a radical community organizer seeped in Marxist theory was a bad idea?
Too Bad
Submitted by Kingfish17 on Mon, 04/23/2012 - 5:49pm.
Politico co-founder Jim VandeHei states: "If I had to guess, if you put all of the reporters that I’ve ever worked with on truth serum, most of them vote Democratic,"
Too bad we can't put Obama on truth serum. That would probably take his support down to just 80% among reporters.
"You can’t go take a trip to Las Vegas...on the taxpayer’s dime." Barack Obama
I don't know if truth serum
Submitted by killa37 on Tue, 04/24/2012 - 8:50am.
I don't know if truth serum would work on Boy Baraka...............his whole life has been a lie - from day ONE to day WON. He has been steeped, marinated, soaked, and baptised in the lie that is his life, his personality, his mind, his heart, and...........well, I was going to say his 'soul', but that's been bought and sold and mortgaged a long long time ago. In his jaded and depraved mind, whatever he thinks or says or writes IS the truth, and reality, and the gospel according to HIM..................in fact, this guy is so convoluted and twisted that he actually believes the 'truth' is a LIE!!!!
That would be the main difference between Baraka and der Schlickmeister - Clinton KNEW lying, and he was/is really good at it. Boy BlahBlah IS a lie, and it comes naturally to him.