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Goldberg slams liberal media bias
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by Joanna Pliner
Thursday, February 2, 2006
Jonah Goldberg attacked the liberal bias in the country's political spectrum during a lecture Wednesday night at Grainger Hall. Goldberg, an editor and columnist-at-large of the National Review Online, specifically criticized the media's coverage of Hurricane Katrina.
Speaking as a sponsored guest for the Collegians for a Constructive Tomorrow, Goldberg said the Katrina incident is "probably the biggest media scandal of the past 20 years" and the biggest criminals "were the cops themselves."
According to Nicholaus Pongratz, regional director for CFACT, the media's amplification of public issues is seen "too often" in the media.
Goldberg poked fun at the "hard left" media, saying after Katrina, the media thought it had done a commendable job and had redeemed itself in the eyes of the public.
"Everybody saw in Katrina what they wanted to see," Goldberg said in reference to the racial bias presented by the media.
According to Goldberg, the media tried to use Hurricane Katrina as an opportunity to blame President Bush.
Critical of liberal bias, Goldberg also criticized Bush's "compassionate conservative" persona, which Goldberg referred to as the Republican form of the "I want to feel your pain" relationship President Clinton tried to forge with the American people.
Goldberg said such compassionate conservatism applies personal views to political problems, adding "the government can't love you … and never will."
According to Goldberg, people should ideally look at the government as a neighbor.
In light of the controversial Hurricane Katrina, he said the government should help people in need, but need not — and should not — stick around.
"[The government] should do what it is supposed to do and nothing else," he said.
University of Wisconsin sophomore Chris Paulson said the discussion raised an interesting point.
"[The idea that] somebody so far to the right didn't always agree with Bush is important for liberals to understand," Paulson said.
However, Goldberg focused most of his criticisms on the "hard left's" bias in the media, condemning the liberal bias in reports on global warming and environmentalism.
Goldberg targeted those who blamed the Indonesian tsunami — caused by the movement of sub-oceanic tectonic plates — on global warming, by rhetorically stating it was "hard to do the math on that one."
In relation to his criticisms on natural disasters, Goldberg said the number of hurricanes has not increased in recent years and the data "flatly does not support it."
But Brian Shactman, chairman of College Democrats, said the numbers of Hurricane Katrina speak for themselves, and pictures do not lie. Shactman also said everyone saw the faulty relief response by the government, and added it is the "typical Republican response to blame the liberal media."
Shactman said the increase in the number of hurricanes each year and the warming of ocean water temperatures necessitates a deeper look into the possible effects of global warming.
University of Wisconsin junior John Nacker said he was not particularly knowledgeable about environmental issues, but said Goldberg's speech would help him construct his own opinions, agreeing with most of Goldberg's views.
Bary Lenser, a University of Wisconsin senior and frequent reader of Goldberg's columns in the National Review Online, said his disagreements with Goldberg's views are the interesting part.
"[He is] very witty more than anything," Lenser said.
Anonymous (February 2, 2006 @ 8:15am):
One must respect Jonah Goldberg's view on Hurricane Katrina and the devastation that the storm caused in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama.
Of course, one must also remember that Mr. Goldberg has never ventured to those areas affected by Hurricane Katrina. Even today, Mr. Goldberg relies solely on what he reads (The Wall Street Journal Op-Ed page, The American Spectator, Fox News, etc.) to formulate his views about Hurricane Katrina, the thousands who perished, the hundreds of thousands who were forced to evacuate various Gulf Coast communities in a three-state area, and the billions of dollars in devastation.
Mr. Goldberg has never put his veritable "boots on the ground" in any community ravaged by Hurricane Katrina. Of course, no member of the staff at National Review or National Review Online has visited the affected region. Instead, these individuals remains safely sheltered in their Beltway communities of Washington, D.C. and Northern Virginia, in New York City, and in Los Angeles/Beverly Hills/Hollywood.
Mr. Goldberg's lone ventures have been to safe college campuses in the upper Midwest and Northwest. Not many hurricanes, thankfully, reach these areas. Ergo, Mr. Goldberg relies on pithy comments, selectively chosen bits of material, and a familiar litany of complaints (the media, Democrats, criticism of politicians converted into anti-Americanism) in speech after speech after speech.
Sad, isn't it, that Mr. Goldberg, a man who so believes in personal responsibility, finds himself unable and/or unwilling to see for himself the devastation brought to hundreds of thousands by Hurricane Katrina?
Of course, it should also be noted that neither Mr. Goldberg nor any member of the National Review and/or National Review Online staff has reported on the ground from either Iraq or Afghanistan. Instead, Mr. Goldberg allows the Bob Woodruffs and the late-Daniel Pearles to risk and, sadly in the cast of Mr. Pearle, to lose their lives to bring America the news.
But, hey, everyone's got to make tens of thousands of dollars per speaking engagement.
Mr. Woodruff did his speaking in Iraq and nearly died.
Anderson Cooper and even Geraldo Rivera did their speaking in the New Orleans area immediately after Katrina.
Mr. Goldberg does his speaking in Wisconsin and Minnesota. Fine states both, but not exactly located right next door to New Orleans or Baghdad.
Some people have courage. Some people do not.
Mark Raven
Anonymous (February 2, 2006 @ 9:04am):
Yes, yes, this is all well and good, but what about the more important questions... like what is government doing to advance volcano lancing technology?
Anonymous (February 2, 2006 @ 10:15am):
> Shactman said the increase in the number of hurricanes each year <
There hasn't *been* an increase in the number of hurricanes world-wide each year. There has been an increase in *Atlantic* hurricane activity in the past few years, and a corresponding *decrease* in Pacific and Indian Ocean hurricane activity - leaving the net number of hurricanes effectively unchanged.
The waxing and waning of the frequency of hurricanes in the Atlantic and non-Atlantic regions follows a well-documented cycle that runs for 20 to 30 years and has been observed for a long time. People who bother to look this stuff up (which does not include most journalists, college or professional) never cease to be amazed at how completely unskeptical the media is when about dubious claims from liberal organizations - never fact-checking a statistic from a homeless "advocate", the National Organiztion of Women or a self-proclaimed environmental group. But if an identifiably conservative group makes an assertion, even one that seems supported by the facts, any news story will invariably include multiple quotations from critics who disagree - critics who are never identified by political leaning or affiliation, but only in neutral terms ("consumer advocate", "scientist", "legal scholar".) Conservatives are invariably "a scientist from a right wing think-tank", "Republican lawyer" or "right wing author".
Anonymous (February 2, 2006 @ 11:42am):
There is no liberal media bias. Just go to mediamatters.org.
Anonymous (February 2, 2006 @ 1:53pm):
Of course, Mark Raven has no idea whether people at the National Review have been to the hurricane area or not (some of their writers have). Of course, several conservative journalists have been to Iraq during the war.
Of course, Mark Raven like to use the phrase "of course" because, of course, it conveys exactly the smugness that the left likes to convey to people to whom they feel superior. Which, of course, is why Dems keep losing; the majority of Americans don't like this attitude.
Anonymous (February 9, 2006 @ 9:25am):
Are we really to believe the "argument" that Goldberg is unable to comment on a national story (Katrina) because he hasn't put his boots on the ground? By that rationale, George W. Bush (at least 5 visits to the affected area) is much, much more credible on Katrina than is Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco), who has yet to visit the area.
Will Mr. Raven accept Jonah's wisdom on ANWR, since he is one of a very few that has actually visited the refuge?
And, are we really being asked to accept the Beltway, New York and Beverly Hills as CONSERVATIVE ENCLAVES?
This Raven guy must really live in an echo chamber...
