As NewsBusters has been reporting, the coverage of the Occupy Wall Street movement has been nothing less than atrocious.
Appearing on Fox News's the O'Reilly Factor Monday, political analyst Bernie Goldberg said it's because there are "people that sell Slurpees and cigarettes to insomniacs at 7-Eleven on the overnight shift who have more introspection than journalists who cover important events in our country" (video follows with transcript and commentary):
MONICA CROWLEY, GUEST HOST: Joining us now from Miami, the purveyor of BernardGoldberg.com, Mr. Goldberg.
So Bernie, here we have the very rich irony of major network news anchors and hosts and reporters making a gazillion dollars a year empathizing with Occupy Wall Street. Do you think there is anything -- anything to this apart from pure left-wing ideological affinity?
BERNIE GOLDBERG, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: Well, let's put it this way, Monica. I think there's a handy rule of thumb that, if we understand, it explains a whole bunch of things the so-called mainstream media do.
And the rule of thumb is this. If they share your values, you will get basically an easy ride. If they don't share your values, fasten your seat belt, because it's going to be a real bumpy ride.
Now, they treat the Tea Party, to use an easy example, one way, because they see conservatives as people who aren't very nice and, frankly, who are racist. So, if there is one sign at a Tea Party rally that is, in fact, racist, it's not only going to get on the air. It's going to be made to be typical of the movement.
On the other hand, they see these demonstrators as young idealists, sort of the American version of the Arab Spring. As a matter of fact, a number of reporters have made that very comparison, which is superficial at best and insane at worst. Because the Arab Spring was about people who were trying to overthrow dictators, who often tortured people with whom they disagreed. And in this country we have elections every two years. So what in the world is the comparison between the two?
That's where the rule of thumb comes in. If they like you, they treat you one way. If they don't share your values, they're going to see you in a totally different way.
CROWLEY: Bernie, let's talk about the coverage, because you also mentioned the Tea Party. And when the Tea Party was at its height, you saw a lot of the left-wing mainstream media coverage pounding the Tea Party for nonexistent offenses.
GOLDBERG: Right.
CROWLEY: The racism that didn't exist, the signs that didn't exist. And yet, in Occupy Wall Street, you actually have some serious law breaking going on. You've got drug use. You've got violence. You've got the open sex. And you've got the anti-Semitism.
GOLDBERG: Yes.
CROWLEY: And yet, as you point out, the mainstream media is glorifying this movement and romanticizing socialism.
GOLDBERG: Well, yes. I mean, let's -- let's use an apple to apples comparison. As I said earlier, if there was one sign at a Tea Party rally that was racist, it would get on the air. I guess I don't have a problem with that. What I do have a problem with is suggesting that it was typical of the whole movement.
But, in this case, we know that there have been more than a few anti- Jewish signs. And more that a few rants against Jewish people who supposedly control the whole country by, you know, Occupier, Wall Street Occupiers in New York and in other places. And these things don't get any attention, because one fits the template. It fits the template that conservatives are racist, so we'll show the one racist sign with you it doesn't fit the template that these people -- these liberal people are Jew haters.
Now I want to make clear, I'm not saying at all that these anti- Semitic signs are typical of the entire movement. They may, in fact, be outliers. But the one racist sign at a Tea Party rally was also an outlier, and that didn't stop the media from smearing the entire movement with that one sign.
Something Crowley and Goldberg didn't discuss are the allegations of rape at these events including a deaf man near the protests on Wall Street and a woman at Occupy Baltimore who's requesting police totally shut down the demonstration as a result.
These, too, go largely unreported by media madly in love with this movement. But I digress:
CROWLEY: Bernie, should we not be at all surprised that the left- wing, mainstream media has done very little to no investigation into who created Occupy Wall Street, who is orchestrating it, who is funding it, and who is making sure that it continues?
GOLDBERG: No. We shouldn't be surprised at all. We should be troubled by it but not surprised.
The story line has been written in stone. And we have seen it. These are the good guys, the Tea Party people were, well, we will say the bad guys to keep it simple. But these people who Occupy Wall Street, you heard some of these reports. They are shared in their frustration over the fact that the system is stacked against them. We shouldn't be surprised at all.
I don't want to -- I don't want to end this part of the segment on a bad note. But there is no hope, there is no hope for them ever coming around and doing the right thing. They are not -- they are not introspective people when it comes to their own profession.
No, they most certainly aren't, and our nation is suffering as a result.
