Media: The Biggest Losers This Election

The 2016 presidential election has once and for all unmasked the mainstream media as nothing more than Democrat Party apparatchiks. There no longer is even a pretense of journalism or fairness. Most "news" organizations have coddled Hillary Clinton, while lambasting Donald Trump.

Allegations of media bias are nothing new in presidential elections. But this time reporters and editors have openly confessed they consider Mr. Trump's candidacy a threat to democracy.  If you doubt that statement, then you have not being paying attention to the news coverage.

Here is what The New York Times media columnist Jim Rutenberg wrote.  "If you view a Trump presidency as something that's potentially dangerous, then your reporting is going to reflect that." The last vestiges of journalistic ethics have been shredded on the pages of the newspaper of record.  

Objectivity and balance are no longer viewed as ethical standards by the news media.  The new creed for journalists is to ingratiate themselves with the academic elite, the politically connected and the Washington power brokers, while pretending to pursue the truth.

A recent Associated Press-GfK poll confirms that most Americans are not fooled by the media's facade of unprejudiced reporting.  Overall, 56 percent of likely voters told researchers that the media is biased against Mr. Trump.  Just five percent believe the coverage favors him.

Even Ms. Clinton's supporters are more likely to recognize the bias against Mr. Trump.  Thirty percent of her voters single out the media for unfairly hammering Mr. Trump.  Sixty percent of her backers see no bias in either direction.  Their brain wave patterns should be analyzed.

A Rasmussen survey found 61 percent of likely voters put no faith in the political news they see on television, hear on the radio or read in newspapers.  That is a 16-point jump from the last Rasmussen research on the topic.  Only 21 percent express confidence in political coverage.

Here's just one example of why voters are justifiably suspicious. When Mr. Trump was ambushed with sexual misconduct allegations, ABC, NBC and CBS used 23 minutes combined covering the story on the day the news broke.  It was the lead item on all three networks.

Now compare that to the news reporting the day Wikileaks released a series of bombshell emails authored by Clinton Campaign Chairman John Podesta.  The three television networks combined spent all of one minute and seven seconds on the revelations.  And it wasn't even the top story.

The Wikileaks emails also have spotlighted the seedy underbelly of journalism.  Reporters emailed copies of stories to aides of Ms. Clinton for approval.  Journalists were fed stories by her campaign and reliably regurgitated the talking-points.  They might as well have been on her payroll.

In an extraordinary revelation, the Clinton campaign rounded up 65 reporters and journalists for an "off-the-record dinner" on April 10, 2015, to "frame" Hillary Clinton's message for her presidential announcement.  The invitation flagged that ABC's Diane Sawyer would be among the guests.

The list of attendees included a who's who of Washington journalism, including David Muir and George Stephanoplous from ABC, Norah O'Donnell with CBS and eight news people from the CNN network. Five reporters from The New York Times showed up for the cozy affair.

The dinner was hosted at the palatial home of Podesta.  Background sessions with reporters are not uncommon, but it is abnormal for journalists to be wined and dined by a campaign chairman. In days past, journalists avoided even the appearance of favoritism to one party campaign over the other.

Not to be outdone, CNN contributor Donna Brazile, who doubles as chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, was forced to resign from her news position after leaked emails showed she secretly supplied Ms. Clinton with the questions at least twice in advance of presidential debates.

Social media has thrown in with Ms. Clinton, too.  Google jiggered its search engine to bury unfavorable entries about her.  Twitter banned vociferous supporters of Mr. Trump.   Facebook was outed for its hostility toward favorable posts about Mr. Trump.  The fix was in for Ms. Clinton.

But social media does not pretend to be a forum for journalism. That's supposed to be the role of newspapers, magazines, television and radio. Those outlets which claim to report the news should be guardians of objectivity, fairness and impartiality.

Journalists in this election have been exposed as lemming-like partisans who are actively involved with the Democratic Party's campaign to claim the White House. Their shabby conduct has irreparably corrupted what few tattered principles remained from this once revered profession.

America no longer has an honest media.  The media is nothing more than an extension of the Democratic Party, Washington political insiders and liberal voices who champion views that many Americans consider anathema to our culture and heritage.    

That's not what America's founders envisioned when they enshrined the right of free expression and an unfettered press.