Media Matters Trots Out Fallacious Study, Is Discredited Again
Before the ink could barely dry on it, a study by Media Matters about Sunday morning talk shows was discredited.
In the study, MM tries to make the laughable claim that Sunday morning network talk shows are overly stacked with conservatives. A cursory look at the study reveals that MM’s findings are simply bogus. For example,
1. The "study" is stamped as covering the years 1997-2005. Hmmm. Notice that they conveniently omitted the first term of President Clinton! Betsy Fisher from Meet the Press noted this to Media Matters, and showed that the omitted years contained far more Democratic guests than Republicans. Doh! Fisher properly concluded that the study was "intellectually dishonest." (By the way, Media Matters’ lame excuse for omitting 1993-1996 was that "there were gaps in the Lexis-Nexis data." Ugh.)
2. MM also wants you to believe that if a guest has an "R" (Republican) next to his name, that automatically makes him a "conservative." Well, the most frequent guest on all Sunday shows has been Sen. John McCain, who is loved by the Sunday shows because he so frequently criticizes the Bush administration. The same with Sen. Chuck Hagel, who, when sitting with Dem Sen. Joe Biden, often agrees with him. Watching Hagel and McCain together has often been like watching two Democrats. (Laura Ingraham has taken note of this. Her radio show calls the Sunday-morning Biden-Hagel pairing a "Bagel.") A Republican critcizing Bush is a dream for the lib mass media.
"Intellectually dishonest" Media Matters is discredited again.
