We're unbiased. Really.

I know it's a topic I hit over and over again, but it's always nice when you find out professional researchers agree with you.

Yet another study has concluded that America's major media outlets tend to exhibit a political lean to the left. And this is not some tiny survey run by a right-wing website, but instead a major study led by UCLA professors.

"I suspected that many media outlets would tilt to the left because surveys have shown that reporters tend to vote more Democrat than Republican," said Tim Groseclose, a UCLA political scientist and the study's lead author. "But I was surprised at just how pronounced the distinctions are."

"Overall, the major media outlets are quite moderate compared to members of Congress, but even so, there is a quantifiable and significant bias in that nearly all of them lean to the left," said co‑author Jeffrey Milyo, University of Missouri economist and public policy scholar.

I'm interested to read the full study, since I find this second statement to be very compelling: we constantly hear left-wing politicians tell us that George Bush, Dick Cheney, Samuel Alito, etc., are "out of the mainstream"; and if the media inform their view of what constitutes mainstream values, I can see where they might be lost.

Another bias report was released from a far less scrupulous source, Brent Bozell's Media Research Center. This is his annual
Notables and Quoteables project, in which the most egregious and ridiculous examples of bias are recognized. It makes good reading, especially since this year's installment has copious links to actual video clips. It's good to have Mary Mapes' absurd "It's not my job to authenticate sources" comment about Rathergate on the record:

Mapes: "I’m perfectly willing to believe those documents are forgeries if there’s proof that I haven’t seen."
Ross: "But isn’t it the other way around? Don’t you have to prove they’re authentic?"
Mapes: "Well, I think that’s what critics of the story would say. I know more now than I did then and I think, I think they have not been proved to be false, yet."
Ross: "Have they proved to be authentic though? Isn’t that really what journalists do?"
Mapes: "No, I don’t think that’s the standard."

My personal favorite comes from Today Show host Matt Lauer (partial .wmv clip here) who comes this close to telling US soldiers on the ground that they're lying about Iraq (emphasis mine):

Matt Lauer in Baghdad: "Talk to me...about morale here. We’ve heard so much about the insurgent attacks, so much about the uncertainty as to when you folks are going to get to go home. How would you describe morale?"
Chief Warrant Officer Randy Kirgiss: "In my unit morale is pretty good. Every day we go out and do our missions and people are ready to execute their missions. They’re excited to be here."
Lauer: "How much does that uncertainty of [not] knowing how long you’re going to be here impact morale?"
Specialist Steven Chitterer: "Morale is always high. Soldiers know they have a mission. They like taking on new objectives and taking on the new challenges...."
Lauer: "Don’t get me wrong here, I think you are probably telling me the truth, but a lot of people at home are wondering how that could be possible with the conditions you’re facing and with the attacks you’re facing. What would you say to those people who are doubtful that morale can be that high?"
Captain Sherman Powell: "Sir, if I got my news from the newspapers also, I’d be pretty depressed as well."

I think that Capt. Powell deserves some kind of reward for that comment.

Tags: Mainstream Media, Media Bias, Media, Bias, Video,

It's civil war! Head for the hills!

I’ve found the coverage of the recent Iraqi national election somewhat lacking here in the US, but there was one theme I found prominently displayed in almost all reports: the idea that, should this election “fail,” Iraq would certainly descend into civil war.

This statement is ridiculous on its face, of course, since the vast, vast majority of Iraqis have clearly NOT taken up arms, but have chosen instead to participate in the political process. But a recent BBC survey also belies this “civil war” theory, and belies it in a big way.

Fully 88% of Iraqis surveyed stated a preference either for “One unified Iraq with central government in Baghdad” or “A group of regional states with their own regional governments and a federal government in Baghdad.” Only 9% favored separate states for the country’s regions.

And while there is some will for a single, strong leader (or group of leaders) to step up to the plate, there is an even stronger will for “An Iraqi democracy” (Q20). More than 57% of Iraqis think democracy is what the country needs now, and even more feel that it’s what Iraq will need in five years’ time (Q21). More than 76% expect the December 2005 elections to produce a government in which they’ll have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence (Q22).

What about the idea that the continued presence of US forces is an “irritant”? Question 35 asks about “which…things make you insecure.” Terrorism leads by a wide margin, being mentioned by almost 54% of respondents. “US/Coalition presence” was mentioned by only about 10% of people. There is no love lost for Coalition forces, of course; but it seems that the man on the street has no trouble identifying the real enemy.

The section of the survey dealing with local conditions is also telling. Interestingly, “The Security Situation” is not viewed as darkly by ordinary Iraqis as it seems to be by the US mainstream media. Indeed, 61% rate it “very good” or “quite good.” Approximately 21% rate it “very bad.” The local issues Iraqis seem most concerned about are the availability of jobs and electricity—both are rated marginally into the “bad” (Q13).

But here’s the thing: the poll suggests that most Iraqis feel that these things have either improved or stayed the same since the US invasion in March 2003. More than 60% of Iraqis consider the security situation the same or better than during the Saddam years, 56% say the jobs situation is the same or better, and nearly 62% feel the electricity situation is the same or better.

In other “same or better” categories we have:

Availability of clean water: 72%
Availability of medical care: 76%
Local schools: 84%
Local government: 67%
Availability of basic household needs: 72%
Your family’s protection from crime: 69%
Your family’s economic situation: 75%
Your freedom of speech: 72%

And lest anyone accuse me of cherrypicking, these eight (plus security, electricity, and jobs) represent every category surveyed by the BBC.

The Iraqis are never going to be the kind of cheerleaders we’d hoped, and that’s fine. I can’t imagine any situation where I’d be pleased to have the US occupied on an open-ended basis by foreign troops. But the average Iraqi seems to think his life is better now, or at least no worse, than before we arrived. They are beginning to show confidence in their civic institutions and displaying a healthy enthusiasm for democracy. Most importantly, they seem to believe that the insurgents are the real enemy.

Is this a country teetering on the brink of civil war? Perhaps; but I tend to think it’s a state resolutely weathering the pangs of its rebirth.

Tags: Iraq, Election, Democracy, BBC, Survey, Insurgency, Terrorist, Murtha

Stanley Williams meets lex talionis

Early this morning, somewhat after midnight Pacific time, the state of California executed Stanley "Tookie" Williams, the founder of the "Crips" street gang. He was convicted in 1981 of four brutal murders, and failed to receive the last-minute pardon his partisans had lobbied for.

Williams was condemned in 1981 for gunning down convenience store clerk Albert Owens, 26, at a 7-Eleven in Whittier and killing Yen-I Yang, 76, Tsai-Shai Chen Yang, 63, and the couple's daughter Yu-Chin Yang Lin, 43, at the Los Angeles motel they owned. Williams claimed he was innocent.

Witnesses at the trial said he boasted about the killings, stating "You should have heard the way he sounded when I shot him." Williams then made a growling noise and laughed for five to six minutes, according to the transcript that the governor referenced in his denial of clemency.

Much has been made of Williams' life in prison, about his "change" and public renunciation of the violent gang lifestyle. He was even nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Therefore, say his partisans, he should have been spared.

But despite what the media may say, these events do not make us reflect upon the death penalty; instead, what we should be discussing is whether our legal system retains any shred of retributive justice.

The theory of lex talionis, "law as retaliation," holds that for every crime, there should be a punishment--the state should exact retribution on behalf of the wronged. In our society, however, there is a growing emphasis on the rehabilitation of the criminal. We put him away so that he cannot harm society; but as he is likely to be released one day, it is important to turn him away from crime. This is laudable. But what about a criminal who is entirely sorry the moment after he's committed a crime? If a man makes a sincere turnaround, let's say, one that everyone believes, should we let him out right away?

I think most people would answer "no," that such a person must still pay for his crimes. Why then should we reduce Williams' punishment in any way? If his death sentence was commuted to life in prison, why stop there? Should we have released the man? Some say yes. But I have to wonder where we stand as a society if this is true--aren't there some crimes for which no punishment is sufficient? And if there are, how come four cold, brutal murders don't count?

Tags: Stanley Williams, Tookie, Crips, California Death Penalty, Execution, Murder, Retribution

Democrats Attack Free Speech

As I noted previously, the Democratic National Committee is on the warpath against US Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-OH) for her recent statement implying that the really-in-the-news Rep. John Murtha is a coward. For a couple of weeks now, they've been collecting donations and making plans to post a couple of billboards (design pictured at right) near Schmidt's office. Their idea, as a recent email from democrats.org states, is that this will show "Republican leaders [that they] need to learn they cannot get away with dishonoring the service of veterans to score political points."

OK, fine. But today's email was way over the top. It turns out that the Lamar corporation, the owner of the billboards the DNC wants, has decided against accepting the contract. The DNC's page on the matter has the details and says

By rejecting these billboards, Lamar has limited your right to be heard. They've stood up to silence millions of Democrats who believe that attacking veterans for political gain is disgusting, and they think they can get away with it because they own nearly every billboard in the district.

Tell Lamar to let us know immediately whether they intend to honor its contract -- and if not, why. Fairness and the public interest demand no less.

So reading this you'd think that Lamar is in breach of contract. Not so, says the letter the DNC wrote to Lamar, but which you have to click a link from the main page to read [emphasis mine]:

The DNC was told by your Huntington regional manager that Lamar is refusing to honor the contract because the advertisements are "too negative." In addition to refusing to honor the contract for the Portsmouth billboards, Lamar, through its Cincinnati office, refused to accept the same advertisement for placement on billboards in Cincinnati.

While Lamar's form contract reserves to the company the right to refuse to run a billboard advertisement, Lamar's conduct in this instance raises serious questions about whether the company is unlawfully or improperly using corporate resources to favor or benefit the Republican Party or Rep. Schmidt.

So here's the heart of the matter: Lamar, the legal owner of the billboards, exercised its legal and contractual right to deny the DNC's business. In return, not only are they being yelled at about censorship, but the DNC seems to be accusing them of a crime (i.e., making an illegal in-kind corporate contribution to a political candidate).

This is NOT censorship. Lamar owns the property the DNC wants to rent and has final say over what goes there. The DNC could make big banners and organize a parade or demonstration outside of Schmidt's office, hire a plane to fly such a banner all over Ohio, etc. These would all be permissible types of speech. But taking away Lamar's right to choose what goes on its property is repulsive.

Let's say I have a "Republicans Are Cool" sign on my lawn. One day, a DNC van rolls up and demands I put up a sign that says,"Shame on Rep. Christopher Shays." I should have the right to say no and not be accused of censorship for doing so. The DNC apparently believes that Lamar is not to be afforded this basic right.

Shame on them.

Tags: Democrats, Schmidt, DNC, Democratic National Committee, Murtha, Campaign Finance, Howard Dean, First Amendment, Censorship

Sony BMG, Music CDs, and Keeping Your Computer Clean

I've been following this story and collecting links for a couple of months now; and today, when I don't otherwise feel like blogging, seems like a good time to spew them out in some sort of coherent form.

The story in brief: It seems that Sony BMG, in an attempt to develop an innovative way to copy-protect music CDs, has stumbled on a way to 1) infect your computer with questionable software which is almost impossible to uninstall, and 2) destroy its public image in the process.

What's all the fuss about? Sony BMG loaded the so-called XCP rootkit onto 52 album titles, or more than 2.1 million CDs sold in the U.S. The program self-installs onto a PC playing the CDs and makes it susceptible to viruses. By now, the rootkit has likely already made its way into "hundreds of thousands, to millions" of computers, figures Dan Kaminsky, a security consultant. "This is a worm-scale infection."

A patch issued by Sony BMG to rectify the problem only made it worse. And some computer security experts say the company was slow to respond to early warnings.

Sony BMG maintains that XCP and its other copyright protection software "is not intended to cause any harm to your computer and is not a monitoring technology," according to its Web site. It has suspended its use of XCP and has asked retailers to pull the affected CDs off shelves. On Nov. 15, the outfit announced an exchange program for the affected CDs. "The company shares concerns of consumers and is committed to making things right," a Sony BMG spokesperson says.

What Sony doesn't mention is that they're also being sued by the state of Texas over the whole fiasco.

The "uninstaller" Sony released has, as the article says, come in for criticism of its own. This site has a technical description of the problem, but by way of summary it says

The uninstaller requires you to install an ActiveX control to your system before you can even request for an uninstall url. Turns out, the uninstaller activex marks itself safe for scripting, and has plenty of interesting methods available for everyone to use. Although I have not analyzed them in depth, I have tested one of them to confirm it really does what I think it does. It's called "RebootMachine". If you have installed Sony's ActiveX control, follow the link to invoke the RebootMachine method. I don't even want to know what the ExecuteCode method does...

In short, it requires to you install more code on your machine, which it then leaves behind, in order to uninstall the thing you regret installing in the first place.

I first encountered the problem via a post on the always-interesting Madville.com, which tends to have the best of the weird and interesting. The post in question is from a site called Mark's Sysinternals Blog and is generally above my ability to understand, but it scared the bejezus out of me and I immediately bookmarked the site in a folder called "Scary Computer Stuff." He summarizes his experience by saying

The entire experience was frustrating and irritating. Not only had Sony put software on my system that uses techniques commonly used by malware to mask its presence, the software is poorly written and provides no means for uninstall. Worse, most users that stumble across the cloaked files with a RKR scan will cripple their computer if they attempt the obvious step of deleting the cloaked files.

If you're concerned you may have one of the destructive "rootkits" on your system, check out this list of Sony CDs with the alleged "protection."If you've bought one and run it on your computer, chances are you're infected...and you would never know it.

Time was that the biggest problem you had running your computer was that your TRS-80's cassette drive would chew up the tape with the program you just spent 30 minutes loading. I've never been paranoid of spyware, though I do routine searches on a regular basis, but this is beginning to turn me into a conspiracy theorist.

Tags: Sony BMG, Sony, Rootkit, Copy Protection, Computers and Internet, Spyware, CD, Virus, Madville, Malware

I hate to say it, but Ann Coulter is on to something.

Let me just say right up front that I think the American political right needs far fewer Ann Coulters and more people of a diplomatic bent. But in a world where the mainstream media "covers" a topic by having Al Franken argue with Jesse Helms, perhaps we should look for the best in what we have.

Coulter's 1 December 2005 column caught my eye yesterday, and not because of her use of "encomium," one of my favorite words. She rips into the practice, undertaken these days largely by members of the right, of praising one's opponent while disagreeing with him/her.

During the House debate on Murtha's insane proposal to withdraw troops in the middle of the war, Rep. Henry Hyde, R-IL, said Murtha deserved an "A-plus as a truly great American," and Rep. Curt Weldon, R-PA, said "none of us should think of questioning his motives or desires for American troops."

On the House floor, both Republicans and Democrats repeatedly gave Murtha rousing standing ovations. There was so much praise for Murtha that one of his Democratic colleagues asked him if he still had to attend Murtha's funeral.

What is this? Special Olympics for the Democrats? Can't Republicans disagree with a Democrat who demands that the U.S. surrender in the middle of a war without erecting monuments to him first? What would happen if a Democrat were to propose restoring Saddam Hussein to power? Is that Medal of Freedom territory?

This has been nagging me for some time. Since 9/11, the media seems to jump all over someone who questions another's patriotism, commitment to the troops, or any other mark of good character. As a result, these introductory praises ("He's a great guy, took a piece of shrapnel from the commies at Inchon, but....") have become extremely formulaic, with any deviation punished to the highest degree.

Take the case of Rep. Jean Schmidt, who in the debate over the Murtha proposal made the very grave mistake of indirectly calling Murtha a coward. The backlash over this, in the media and by the left, has gotten out of control. I received a couple of emails over the past few days from those swell guys over at the DNC, and it seems they're collecting donations aimed at putting a billboard right outside Schmidt's office saying "Hold Jean Schmidt Accountable." While I have no problem with this, Howard Dean framed the argument in this way:

Jean Schmidt is only the latest Republican leader to cross this line of civility and respect for our veterans -- it's time to say enough is enough. Republican leaders use these tactics to distract people from the simple fact that they have lost credibility on national security and foreign policy.

Only the latest? Cheney seemed to spend more time calling Murtha "a good man, a Marine, a patriot" than actually challenging his idea. We have built up the idea that these masks mean something to the policy debate, built it up so much that it's easy to see how hollow an approach it is.

Tags: Ann Coulter, Murtha, Patriotism, Schmidt, Dean

My Christmas Pet Peeve

On the occasion of my hundredth post to Log and Line (yay!), I'm going to indulge myself and dispel a little misconception that gets to me. Jesus, as far as we know, was born in a cave and not a barn, whatever little scenes we Christians may set up each year.

It's probably no accident that most representations of the Nativity (at least in Europe and the New World) show the infant Jesus lying in a manger (to be clear, this word refers to the feeding trough used as a crib and is not synonymous with "barn") take place in little models of familiar-looking wooden stables. But the most ancient traditions of the Church tell us a different story. Justin Martyr's (d. 165) is the oldest written reference to the tradition:

"But when the Child was born in Bethlehem, since Joseph could not find a lodging in that village, he took up his quarters in a certain cave near the village; and while they were there Mary brought forth the Christ and placed Him in a manger, and here the Magi who came from Arabia found Him." --Dialog with Trypho the Jew, c. 161 AD

Some might object that the gospels were composed well before this date. To this I reply 1) the gospels do not say "barn" either and 2) the Apostolic Fathers placed a great value on orally transmitted tradition (Papias springs to mind here).

For several years, my own Nativity scene took place inside a little cave I made from pieces of shale, but I reluctantly abandoned these when it became clear that my small children would break their fingers playing with them. I await the leisure to build another, though perhaps painted styrofoam would be a better choice.

Tags: Christmas, Justin Martyr, Cave, Nativity, Pet Peeve, 100th Post