THE COMING BATTLE FOR THE MEDIA:
Curbing the Power of the Media Elite
William A. Rusher
New York: William Morrow and Co., 1988
228 pp., $18.95
"It is the thesis of this book that in recent decades the principal media in the United States ... have allied themselves with those political forces promoting liberal policies (meaning primarily the Democratic Party), and have placed news reportage at the service of those policies."
So begins William Rusher's latest book, The Coming Battle for the Media, an unapologetic assault on the American media. Conservative though he may be--and Rusher is considered one of the fathers of American conservatism--he raises a cry that is becoming more warring of late and is increasingly joined by those who would never have thought of themselves as bedfellows of the right-of-center.
Rusher's primary target is the big ten "media organizations" where most national and international coverage originates. They decide which dozen or so of the hundreds of possible stories to bring to the nation's consciousness as "issues" and whatever political spin is given to them. By name, the big ten are: the wire services Associated Press (AP) and United Press International (UPI); television networks ABC, CBS, and NBC; newsweeklies Time and Newsweek; and the nationally influential newspapers the New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal.
Other media organizations are important, of course, and Rusher acknowledges the Public Broadcasting System, Cable News Network, U.S. News and World Report, Reader's Digest, and USA Today. But it is the big ten that carry the most weight as news sources: Most people get most of their information from them. The other seventeen hundred daily newspapers, thirteen hundred television stations, ten thousand radio stations, and countless periodicals that make up the media are, if they cover national and international politics, usually subscribers to one or more of the big ten.
A well-argued case
Accusing the media of being partisan players in national politics is not a minor matter. To be anything but nonpartisan in the news business is to abdicate one's claim to credibility.
Rusher's decibel level is decidedly low and controlled as he hammers his points home with examples and figures. (He once had the audacity to author a book entitled How to Win Arguments, so it is with no small measure of confidence that he lays out the problem, the evidence, and the summation like the Wall Street lawyer he used to be.)
Interwoven among his many examples of distortion of the truth in favor of the liberal agenda are statistics about the liberal leanings of media professionals--supplied by media professionals themselves--and the shocking revelation of just how many top reporters, news analysts, and producers are fresh off the staffs of liberal congressmen, senators, and presidential candidates.
Aware of
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