Politico media writer Dylan Byers appeared Friday on the Bill Press show on Current TV and liberal talk radio to discuss the Gallup poll showing low confidence in the media (especially TV news), but when Press said he couldn’t find a credible, objective general news source online, naturally Byers insisted surveys show Politico is “pretty much right down the middle.”
This isn’t based on the content – ask Herman Cain and his bevy of alleged anonymous girlfriends about an anti-Republican tilt – but based on surveys of who reads the site. [MP3 audio here. See video and transcript below.]
PRESS: When I watch Brian Williams I really do believe, or Diane Sawyer, or Scott Pelley I really do believe I’m getting a half hour of – well it’s usually only maybe ten minutes because the rest of it is about medical or lifestyle issues. But at least you find out what’s going on, just the news of the day. That’s hard to find online. You find a lot of opinion.
BYERS: You do find a lot of opinion. I will say purely in terms of politics and this is not to plug Politico because I –
PETER OGBURN, Press producer: I knew this was coming. Knew this was coming.
BYERS: No no no, I’m willing to be critical of Politico, but just let me put this out there. Surveys have been taken and it has shown that we are pretty much, in terms of our readership right and left, we are pretty much down the middle.
“But for politics,” complained Press, saying he wanted a general source for wildfires news or other non-political news – although liberal journalists can quickly turn the wildfires into a global-warming-crisis editorial.
