Post-debate thoughts: Harwood and media lies
Roger L. Simon points out how CNBC moderator John Harwood lied during the debate last night:
But more than that, the debate revealed something I had thought about before, but never seen so clearly ”” how bias can affect the brain, almost make it dysfunctional. I assume John [Harwood] is an intelligent man…Nevertheless, Harwood did something extraordinary. He lied about Rubio’s tax plan in the exact same way not once but twice ”” once at the debate and once about two weeks before the debate. What made it extraordinary was that Harwood had apologized for that same lie the first time on Twitter on October 14 and then lied again Wednesday night as if he didn’t remember his own apology and correction…
Cognitive disorder? Quite possibly. I submit that media bias (and the moral narcissism from which it stems) can be so strong that it is akin to a brain disease. It literally renders you stupid or makes you disbelieve what you know to be true. Bias has hallucinogenic properties. Who knew?
Simon is coming down on the “fool” side of the old “fool vs. knave?” debate that we’ve had so many times on this blog, about so many people, both in politics and in the media. In effect, what he’s saying is that bias has made Harwood into a fool for the purposes of Rubio and the debate. Perhaps; perhaps. But I’ll offer some other possibilities.
The first is that perhaps Harwood has always been a fool. Perhaps he’s not an intelligent man, merely one who is good at parroting the politically approved line and stringing some words together. Perhaps he’s risen in the ranks for that and other reasons that have more to do with personality and sucking up to the right people, and perhaps he’s never really been tested because he lives in a liberal bubble. So maybe he’s just not that sharp, and doesn’t remember or didn’t understand the tax issue very well to begin with.
Now that I’ve stated that possibility, I must say that it’s not my leading theory. My leading theory is the “fool and knave” theory, and it works like this: the first time Harwood made the error on Twitter, it was as Roger Simon describes. Harwood’s pre-existing bias towards Rubio and Republicans made him jump on a “fact” that made Rubio look bad, without really stopping to think. In other words, his bias made him stupid. But once told of his error he had to issue an apology, which is the sort of thing a person tends to remember. So it’s very possible that, although he actually did remember his error, bringing it up again was the calculation of a knave who doesn’t expect it to backfire on him.
That was for two reaons. The first is that the MSM is used to getting away with it. If a lie is asserted often enough and loudly enough by the media, it becomes truth for most of their readers. The challenges and corrections go unheard for the most part, or they aren’t believed even if heard and even if true. Harwood probably thought that, between him and Rubio (as between Candy Crowley and Romney), he’d automatically be the more believable.
In addition, the liberal MSM (much like their hero, President Obama) fully believe themselves to be the smartest people in the room, and in many instances have, not just feigned contempt for Republicans, but true and heartfelt contempt for Repubicans. So they believe they will win any exchange with a Republican, even if they themselves are lying and the Republican is telling the truth. Maybe even especially if they are lying and the Republican is telling the truth. They believe in their own role as omniscient narrators, and believe that the public sees them that way as well. Can the omniscient make mistakes? Of course not.
But even beyond that, Harwood may have doubted that Rubio would challenge him at all. Harwood and his fellows have such contempt for the GOP candidates that there’s a good chance he thought that Rubio was unfamiliar with Harwood’s previous error, and/or that even if Rubio tried he would not be able to explain the math of his own tax proposals, or that Rubio wouldn’t have the guts or quickness to challenge him and to keep challenging him.
Does any of this matter? Not if the American people don’t care. Polls consistently show that voters think the media is biased (70%, according to this poll), But biased in what way? Towards right or left? The most recent poll I could find that asked those all-important questions is this Gallup poll from last month, and it tells an interesting tale.
In that poll, 40% of Americans trust the media. This is a great deal higher than it should be, and it is concentrated in Democrats, the majority of whom (55%) still think the media trustworthy. This compares to 32% of Republicans (who are these people??) and 33% of Independents who agree. The interesting question of “biased in what direction?” doesn’t seem to be reported in that poll, but it was asked in this similar one from a year earlier, with the following results:
Nearly one in five Americans (19%) say the media are too conservative, which is still relatively low, but the highest such percentage since 2006. This is up six points from 2013 — the sharpest increase in the percentage of Americans who feel the news skews too far right since Gallup began asking the question in 2001.
That number who think the media is biased to the right as been going up, not down, and my guess is that it’s still going up as America moves more to the left—or at least, as the Democratic Party moves more to the left. That is probably the audience Harwood is used to playing to, and part of the reason he may feel immune. And despite what should be his ignominy after last night, he’s probably correct that most Democrats won’t notice or care. Case in point: Ezra Klein on last night’s debate and the media’s role in it:
Cruz’s attack on the moderators was smart politics ”” but it was almost precisely backwards. The questions in the CNBC debate, though relentlessly tough, were easily the most substantive of the debates so far. And the problem for Republicans is that substantive questions about their policy proposals end up sounding like hostile attacks ”” but that’s because the policy proposals are ridiculous, not because the questions are actually unfair.
Klein quotes several exchanges between the moderators and the candidates in his attempt to back up his claims, but somehow—somehow—he misses Harwood’s incredible faux pas regarding Rubio. I’m sure it’s just an oversight—after all, Ezra Klein is also one of the smartest people in the room. And if you were a Democrat reading that sort of thing as your daily diet, you’d never hear about Harwood’s demonstration of both his bias and his stupidity, and you would continue on your merry way.
[ADDENDUM: Here’s a very full explanation of the substantive issue (Rubio’s tax proposal) involved in the Harwood-Rubio exchange.]
It’s an Einsteinian frame of reference. To the man on the train the landscape is moving; to the man in the landscape the train is moving. By redefining the “norm” further and further to the left, the leftist media looks conservative by comparison; there are no absolutes, it’s a societal relativism and the result of Neo’s oft referenced Gramscian march.
It is disturbing how more people are claiming that the media is too biased right wing. This is, of course, the perception of most of the people I know. Who are, as you know, very left wing. In fact, they have no idea at all how anyone could think otherwise. There’s the cognitive bias that’s deep and thick. But yes, it is alarming this number is rising which does indicate that the Dems are shifting leftward and that universities are doing a number on young people.
I didn’t watch the debate but saw parts and the bias was pretty horrific. I saw Cruz’s portion and he did fantastic calling them out, as did Rubio.
Bias is an obsolete word in this context. The question has always been, Intentional or Unintentional?
Is the MSM intentionally sabotaging things?
Klein is the one that wrote that innocent men should be taught not to rape by persecuting them for rape.
And you consider his comments worth quoting when it comes to who has the ridiculous economic plans?
how bias can affect the brain, almost make it dysfunctional.
Know what else can affect the brain?
Taking in Leftist language and allowing it to mind control you like a zombie, by using certain words over others.
“This compares to 32% of Republicans (who are these people??)…” Trump voters!
Maybe some of these people who think the media is too conservative are reacting to the high ratings of “Faux News.” I bet they don’t have any complaints about MSNBC.
Bloomberg.com is siding with Harwood on this: Fact Check: Study Says Rubio’s Tax Plan Helps Rich More Than Middle Class, Less Than Poorest:
Because of that slipping from “middle” to “lower,” I think the “liar” tag for Harwood is a bit harsh.
Ann:
Read the piece that’s linked in the addendum.
Wooly Bully:
Trump voters think the MSM isn’t biased???
Neo, I read that linked piece in the addendum. I’m sure it’s correct on the technical aspects of determining the “middle”, but I still think that rhetorical change makes that debate moment something less than a “lie”.
Ezra Klein is also one of the smartest people in the room
Please …
Obama’s finest speeches do not excite. They do not inform. They don’t even really inspire. They elevate. They enmesh you in a grander moment, as if history has stopped flowing passively by, and, just for an instant, contracted around you, made you aware of its presence, and your role in it. He is not the Word made flesh, but the triumph of word over flesh, over color, over despair. The other great leaders I’ve heard guide us towards a better politics, but Obama is, at his best, able to call us back to our highest selves, to the place where America exists as a glittering ideal, and where we, its honored inhabitants, seem capable of achieving it, and thus of sharing in its meaning and transcendence… Ezra Klein.
One of the smartest guy in the room … right.
I think you’re right, NEO, that Harwood is booth fool and knave. I’ve read that he’s dating a Dem Senator, which would make him like so much of the media — in bed with the Democrat party in some capacity (by marriage, through family, past employment by a politicians and/or Lefty activist organization, etc.). So by default he’s already on board with the Left’s point of view, and it only is reinforced by his colleagues.
DC really is incestuous — a reminder from 2012 election: http://preview.tinyurl.com/nuwxumw
Ann:
After screwing up the first time, he thought he could tweak and twist it a tiny bit and slip it in, unnoticed.
The “smartest guy in the room” syndrome has turned into a de facto aristocracy with all of the baggage that term carries. The aristocrats of old honestly did believe that their blood was different. It’s hard to take in just what that means at first. But we do see it in the progressives of our time. They have identified some attributes of intelligence with their own group such that it’s as self-evident to them as the blood of the aristocracy was. Academic (or quasi academic) psychology frequently shores them up with studies showing how “liberals” have more cognitive flexibility or intellectual courage. It’s pretty maddening to anyone with real cognitive flexibility.
I bet Harwood assumed that Rubio couldn’t remember the details, so he could just throw out his (known) wrong numbers and Rubio would be unable to refute them at a detailed level.
The MSM believes all Republicans are dumb. You must always factor that in to anything they report or comment about them (like being surprised that Cruz did well despite him being an ivy league graduate & lawyer – just like “brilliant” Obama – and having been described as one of his smartest students by Dershowicz).
Heck, Rush was saying that on the CNBC website this a.m. they had a post called “Are you smarter than a GOP candidate*” that identified the grade-level of the language used by each candidate. For example, Trump rates 5th grade, so they said something like “this explains why he’s so popular” – get it? Republicans are dumb, so of course the looove the dumbest candidate. Ha ha ha!
*Can you imagine characterizing a pediatric neurosurgeon as dumb? Carson may not have a detailed grasp of some political issues, but he is not dumb.
Fool and Knave = Stupid and Evil. We were discussing that earlier. When I think about it, this is like the Moral vs. Practical debate. Defined properly, the Moral IS the Practical. I think that’s the answer to this question as well. Defined properly, being stupid IS evil and being a knave IS foolish.
I still think that rhetorical change makes that debate moment something less than a “lie”.
It’s called propaganda, because it is intentional, not unintentional.
Defined properly, being stupid IS evil and being a knave IS foolish.
Basically it doesn’t mean anything, since it’s not a binary and doesn’t tell people anything, irregardless of what the matrix 2×2 ends up as.
When somebody pulls out a gun and starts shooting up the place you are in, are people really suicidal enough to start thinking “now is that a fool or a knave”….
From the debate transcript:
The Tax Foundation chart shows this (first column is income decile and the second column is % increase in after-tax income):
0-10 / 55.9
10-20 / 23.0
20-30 / 19.0
30-40 / 17.2
40-50 / 15.7
50-60 / 15.3
60-70 / 15.0
70-80 / 15.2
80-90 / 15.7
90-100 / 19.9
99-100 / 27.9
Just how does that show Harwood was wrong in his “about 15%” estimate for the middle of the spectrum?
I suppose if I were living on the planet Pluto, Neptune would seem like a pretty warm and sunny place. So one has to wonder what it means to be called “far right” when the accuser is so absurdly left-leaning it’s amazing he doesn’t fall over.
Miscellaneous and not terribly relevant point of information:
abdul7591, 7:01 pm — “I suppose if I were living on the planet Pluto, Neptune would seem like a pretty warm and sunny place.”
. . . except Pluto’s orbit at times takes it closer to the sun than is Neptune’s orbit. The last time this took place was between 1979 and 1999. It will happen again around 228 years after 1999. [Never mind that Pluto is no longer considered a planet!]
Reference: http://coolcosmos.ipac.caltech.edu/ask/160-Is-Pluto-sometimes-closer-to-us-than-Neptune-
Anyway, abdul7591, your point is well taken.
abdul7591 Says:
October 29th, 2015 at 7:01 pm
I suppose if I were living on the planet Pluto, Neptune would seem like a pretty warm and sunny place. So one has to wonder what it means to be called “far right” when the accuser is so absurdly left-leaning it’s amazing he doesn’t fall over.
FYI,Pluto was “unfairly downgraded to a ‘dwarf’ planet” by the IAU.
First they came for Pluto, next they’ll come for Uranus!
As to absurdly left-leaning accusers, see this:
“FIRST DEMOCRATIC DEBATE HIGHLIGHTS: 2015”
Aaaand, never forget Ezra Klein is one of the smartest guy in the room… really!
The questions were not aimed at substantive issues nor were they designed to prod the GOP candidates to attack one another.
Rather, the questions themselves were the attacks. They were designed to destroy the candidates. The answers were irrelevant. The damage was done when the question was asked.
While I applaud Senator Cruze for calling out the odious media misbehavior, he missed the point. But kudos for fighting back. It would appear that gthe field is learning from Donald Trump and that is a good thing.
Give me a &*^%ing break Ann! A single person, couple, or family making 30k or less does not now or under any future ‘plan’ pay anywhere near 56, 23, or 19 percent in income taxes. What they do pay, if they have actual income, is FICA. In which case they are paying into a ponzi scam.
Hardwood wasn’t displaying bias. He was in all-out stump-stomping evangelizing true-believer Clinton Democrat mode. *spit*
Sirius33 Says:
October 29th, 2015 at 9:15 pm
The questions were not aimed at substantive issues nor were they designed to prod the GOP candidates to attack one another.
Rather, the questions themselves were the attacks. They were designed to destroy the candidates. The answers were irrelevant. The damage was done when the question was asked.
* * *
Very true. It is similar to newspapers printing their (deliberate) lies in bold caps on the front page and the later corrections (if any) in small print in the middle sections; or lawyers asking the witness “Have you quit beating your wife?” questions which they know the judge will tell the jury to disregard, even though they are nearly impossible to set aside once heard.
Early in the article you talked of bias as “dysfunctional” thinking. Also the lefts belief in their own lies. You also spoke of Harwood and the other moderators as speaking “stupidly”, as well as having difficulty in remembering being caught in lies. This type of speaking and dysfunctional thinking is very common among marijuana smokers. Is it possible that Harwood and the other moderators as well as many on the left are just a bunch of stoners who cannot think or remember clearly? This might explain not only the MSM but also President Obama and Hillary Clinton. It sure is my pet theory.
Re: “conservative” media bias:
Every time I have complained to a liberal friend/acquaintance about liberal media bias, with examples to boot, I get a reply to the effect of:
“Your evidence is irrelevant. Media companies are all big corporations. Big corporations all favor the right. Therefore, media has a conservative bias, not a liberal one. QED.”
Ignoring, of course, the traditional publisher/editor chinese wall, and ignoring the fact that big corporations are as likely as not these days to support the left.
… also, the fact that most of these people are about as far left as Mao Zedong (I live in Seattle), the fact that the media is not-quite-as-far-left as they are is taken as proof that the media is biased somewhere right of center.
Jeb is not the answer, but Jeb is right to criticize Rubio for campaigning on the taxpayer dime and collecting a paycheck for a job he won’t do. Rubio needs to show up for work and do his job representing the people of Florida in the Senate — or he should resign. If he can’t show up for Senate votes and campaign at the same time, he can’t handle the job of President. Is Rubio lazy or incompetent? Or is he not doing the work because he only cares about his own personal ambition to be President? Even Rubio’s hometown paper has demanded he do his job or resign.
Zero accomplishments/ lazy career politician Rubio is unelectable anyway. He’s unelectable to conservatives because he led the charge on amnesty for the undocumented. Even most pro-lifers are not against a rape exception, but Rubio said women should be forced to have their rapists’ babies. That makes him unelectable to liberals. And his awful, bizarre plan to increase taxes on the middle class will make him unelectable to moderates.
Both would get shredded by the Clinton machine, but Jeb is right about Rubio. Rubio is unelectable because he has the Romney/Kerry problem: no core values besides his own ambition. Rubio tries to be everything to all people and thus has views that alienates every part of the political spectrum.
Media companies are all big corporations. Big corporations all favor the right. Therefore, media has a conservative bias, not a liberal one. QED
Just need two questions to demolish that.
Was the media supporting Bush II’s war in Iraq when they reported on daily IED and military casualties?
Why would the right wing media with a conservative bias owned by big corporations, try to end a war that was making profit for the military contractor corporations?
The Left was never correct about media bias because it isn’t a bias. It’s a leftist intent to sabotage. So basically the Leftists are saying the media is made out of non Leftists… interesting convenience for propaganda.
Many people have long thought that, regardless of its downside, Donald Trump’s campaign has a vey important purpose is this election cycle. On that point Michael Walsh chimes in with an important observation:
The link:
http://pjmedia.com/michaelwalsh/2015/10/30/the-medias-potemkin-village-starts-to-topple/
Trump is the internet’s anti Leftist candidate, which is also beyond political movement at this rate and is fast turning into a cultural and religious motivating force.
But that’s not because of Trump, anyone could have latched unto that power by now. They just chose not to.
Professor Tim Groseclose. He’s the greatest authority in scientifically documenting media bias.