Michael Ware and Media Bias

Hugh Hewitt has been all over in the press lately. Before his new book was released, he was talking about media bias in the aftermath of Laura Ingraham's forceful argument on the Today Show about bias.

Two days in a row, on Anderson Cooper's show on CNN (transcript of day 2 here), Hugh mixed it up with Michael Ware of Time Magazine's Baghdad bureau. Tuesday on his show, Hugh interviewed Michael Ware, and he replayed the interview tonight.

A lot was said (the interview lasted over an hour, including commercials), but one point Ware made during the interview was also what he said on CNN.

On CNN:

I'm in a fortunate position. I am an Australian, writing for an American magazine. I have no stake either way. I can -- I have no agenda to pursue. I just want to know, what is really going on here?

On Hugh Hewitt:

But I mean, what I can say is that I, for one, certainly have no investment in beating one administration, or favoring one party over the other. I'm an Australian who reports for an American magazine. I have no stake in your political process whatsoever. I just call it as I see it. I mean, there's nothing to be gained for someone like me.

Methinks he doth protest too much.

What Michael Ware, and any other left-leaning journalist, has to gain is: Respect among his peers. Continued employment at left-leaning publications. Self-congratulation over getting the hard story (such as Ware's having been embedded with the "insurgents"). Pride at not having done any flag-waving, pro-war propaganda articles. Possible journalism awards, which always seem to go for the hard-hitting lefty pieces.

So I mean, I can't speak for every journalist. All I can say is that I don't personally have a liberal, anti-administration bias. And I can't say that I see that many of my colleagues do.

Michael Ware suffers from a journalistic form of macular degeneration, where blindness to the central vision develops gradually enough it isn't noticed until it's too late. That he can't see his own bias is understandable--how many of us are realistically aware of our own flaws? But not to be able to see it in his colleagues is just proof of his own blindness.

Journalism, as represented by Michael Ware, cannot be fixed if nobody sees the problem. And they're too busy blindly patting themselves on the back for their grand vision.