Friday, May 7, 2004

Another political quiz

Regular readers know that I am a total sucker for these quizzes. The result from this one is, umm, interesting.

Based on your answers, you are most likely a realist.

Realists…

•Are guided more by practical considerations than ideological vision
•Believe US power is crucial to successful diplomacy - and vice versa
•Don't want US policy options unduly limited by world opinion or ethical considerations
•Believe strong alliances are important to US interests
•Weigh the political costs of foreign action
•Believe foreign intervention must be dictated by compelling national interest

Historical realist: President Dwight D. Eisenhower

Modern realist: Secretary of State Colin Powell

If I had to choose from the choices on the results page, I would have pegged myself as something between "realist" and "Neo-con", leaning towards the latter. However, I changed three of my original answers to slightly more hawkish choices (reflecting ambivalence about my original picks) and still ended up as a realist. My cover is blown; I'm a flaming moderate! (grin) I'm not sure that I appreciate the comparison with Colin Powell, but it could have been worse. I could have been identified as John Kerry.

(Link courtesy of The Common Virtue; Michael has a link on his FAQ page.)

posted at 09:16 PM | permalink | Comments (1)

What party is he? redux

Last July, I noted a political scandal in which the AP reporter managed to totally obliterate any reference to the party of the central figure in the dispute (she was a Democrat). Now, it's happened again. In this article from the Seattle Times, Newhouse News Service reporters Harry Esteve and Gail Kinsey Hill manage to produce an 847 word article on former Oregon governor and Portland mayor Neil Goldschmidt, in which the word "Democrat" (his party) fails to appear even once. The only reference to his politics is in the ninth paragraph, in which it is mentioned that he was Carter's Secretary of Transportation.

The coverage was not atypical, a search of "Neil Goldschmidt" in Google news yielded 276 hits. The string "Neil Goldschmidt" -democrat -democratic reveals 252 hits, which means that an impressive 91.3% of the articles miss any mention of party affiliation at all, despite the fact that he was an appointee in a Democratic presidential administration.

Contrast that with the coverage of the John Rowland impeachment story. The string "John G. Rowland" returns 1790 results. "John G. Rowland" -Republican -GOP yields 949 hits, which means that 47% of the articles identify his party, more than four times the frequency for Goldschmidt.

I don't think this is a conscious bias, but it serves to illustrate the ingrained bias against Republicans that exists among reporters, who are ostensibly reporting, rather than providing commentary. This is the liberal media (denied by most reporters) that many conservatives rail against.

posted at 08:42 PM | permalink | Comments (0)