My Latest Experiment: I Watch the Liberal Nightly News

We all keep hearing about the liberal media over and over from conservatives. “We may have Fox,” they’ll tell you, “but you’ve got everything else.” They are of course skipping over the New York Post, the Washington Times, almost the entire Prime Time Cable News lineup (including MSNBC, CNBC, etc), Discovery Military, the Wall Street Journal, one of the largest cable providers on the planet (Sinclair) 8,000 hours of AM talk radio per week, the entire realm of Country music, the 100’s of military correspondents co-hosting news shows during a time of war, animated American flag graphics taking up half the screen, and 5 major Republican donors owning 98% of everything we see, hear and read on a daily basis. An honest recollection failure on their part, I’m sure.

Anyway, with the ousting of real journalism on the networks using veteran correspondents with accomplishments a mile long in favor of incredibly beautiful models, 3-years removed from their journalism degrees reading carefully scripted teleprompters, I decided I’d take the plunge. Tonight for the first time ever, I watched the NBC Nightly News, and took notes on every single story.

The following is an account of every single news segment during the ½ hour, as well as my commentary. What I found was shocking:

Segment#1

I must admit I tuned it at 6:31pm and may have missed 1 to 1:59 of story. With that in mind, I caught the end of the lead story, which was about the Iraqi constitution. The story was about the Sunnis agreeing to a piece of the constitution in Iraq that will enable it to go forward with Sunni endorsement. With the Shiites in control since the fall of Saddam, the two Muslim sects have agreed on little, so this was certainly great news coming straight from Iraq.

What a bunch of liberal bullshit. To lead with a story of good news from Iraq is insulting, considering there was nothing about the power flickering on for an extra ten minutes today in the Southern area of Basra.


Segment#2

More on the Hurricane Katrina cleanup. Most of the story feature shots of bush with a hammering nails into homes, hugging victims, and preaching about moving past the tragedy and increasing the relief effort. The story ended with an interview with a local citizen who said of the Bush visit, “I tried not to be impressed (with the President), but I was.”

Finally, a black man complimenting the greatest of the black leaders – President Bush. I guess this part wasn’t too liberal – although they could have morphed New Orleans mayor ray Nagin’s last name into a word that sounds like “nigger,” just like Rush Limbaugh actually did in a nod to all his racist fans. (listen to the audio of that here)


Segment#3

A story about the Harriet Miers nomination. The story centered around critics of the nomination who were not Democrats – but rather from the President’s own party, which is very, very rare. Apparently conservatives are worried that since she has no judicial experience, there is no record of her coming down on gays, abortion, affirmative action, stem cell research, and other issues the Republican Party platform claims to be against.

What a liberal slant. Is Al Gore producing the Nightly News? How dare they quote Republicans dissenting from the President!


Segment#4 – NBC Nightly News In-Depth

This is the feature du jour if you will. This is a segment often used to provoke emotion. It exists to enrage the viewer, or scare the crap out of them. Today? More than 10 minutes straight on the bird flu pandemic. Interviews featured a well-spoken Health Secretary, scientists, and how widespread the disease actually is.

Communists! There was more on Vietnam and China in this story than in a John Kerry war hero tale!


Segment #5

As I watched this segment, I recognized the first shot right away – Portland Headlight, arguably the most famous headlight in the United States, situated in Cape Elizabeth Maine. This story focused on ice stranded in Maine (and the rest of the country) reserved for FEMA’s Louisiana relief, but moving nowhere. It included an interview with Susan Collins, Republican Senator from Maine, stating how she was upset that FEMA was wasting so many tax dollars keeping the ice here.

Unbelievable. Another Republican speaking out against the Federal Government. I was about ready to throw my liberal TV out the window.


Segment #6

Ending as the Nightly News typically does, with a feel good story. This story reported on the New Orleans Times Picayune, and how they’ve continued to crank
out papers despite the flooding and the odds.

Obviously this segment was meant to make Bush look bad. Not once did the story mention how were it not for him, New Orleans would have no news at all.

I will attempt to issue follow up accounts of CBS and ABC’s Nightly newscasts as well, giving you more insight into the incredibly biased, liberal media. Stay tuned.