Liberal Media Cropping

Do mainstream media outlets have an agenda?

Some people actually trust the MSM to provide an "objective" presentation of events. Not surprisingly, the overwhelming majority of those people are Democrats.

According to Gallup's annual Governance survey, conducted September 12-15:

[T]he other significant changes recorded this year are a slight increase in public trust in media and a slight decline in trust in public officials.

Americans' trust in the media has partially rebounded after declining from 54% in 2003 to 44% last year. (The cause of last year's drop is not clear, but the most visible news controversy at the time involved CBS News anchor Dan Rather's reliance on faulty documents in his report that was critical of President Bush's service in the National Guard.) Today, 50% say they have at least a fair amount of trust and confidence in the news media.

Interesting.

Now check out the breakdown of those numbers.

% Trust a Great Deal/Fair Amount by Party ID

News/Mass media

Republicans-----31%

Independents----49%

Democrats-------70%

That trust gap is enormous. Although Gallup is quick to blame Dan Rather and CBS as responsible for last year's dismal 44% figure, the organization does not give any analysis, other than those numbers, as to why the majority of Republicans and Independents still continue to distrust the media.

Remember, this poll was taken before major media outlets pointed out that a significant amount of the Hurricane Katrina coverage was based on rumors and distortions.

Why would Democrats so strongly approve of the media's performance, while Republicans and Independents remain highly skeptical?

It's obvious. The MSM are mouthpieces for the Dems.

Remember this revealing bit of misrepresentation in the media?

Here's a photo that accompanied a Washington Post story detailing the appearances of Rev. Al Sharpton and Martin Sheen at the August Crawford protest.



The caption read:

Cindy Sheehan, left, holds Rev. Al Sharpton's hand, center, as Evan Bright reaches over to comfort her as they lay roses at the crosses at Camp Casey 2 near President Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas, Sunday, Aug. 28, 2005. Both women lost their sons in the war in Iraq.

It seems like it was quite a prayerful moment, a time of solemn remembrance.

The photo above certainly makes it look like a touching, intimate scene.

Looks were deceiving.

Upon zooming out, it became evident that the moment was an event manufactured for the media. Of course, they dutifully ate it up.




That intimate, heart-wrenching moment came off a little differently when viewed from this perspective, didn't it?

Once again, we have yet another example of liberal cropping.

This time it comes from the San Francisco Chronicle.

Zombie exposes the truth.

This photo appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle as part of its coverage of an anti-war protest in San Francisco on September 24, 2005.



This closely cropped photo shows what the protester is against--war. However, it does not show what the protester is for.




Zombie snapped the same photo, but gives its larger context. "You can see that the girl's protest contingent also sported Palestinian flags and obscene placards."

One more step back reveals an even clearer picture of the protester's group.



Zombie writes:

Here's my full original photo, uncropped. Now we can see that the girl is just one of several teenagers, all wearing terrorist-style bandannas covering their faces.

But, as you'll notice, the bandannas are all printed with the same design. Was this a grassroots protest statement the teenagers had come up with all by themselves?

When people picked up the San Francisco Chronicle and saw its photo of the protester, they received a distorted portrayal. They were not given the full context, that the teen was part of a group of terrorist wannabes.

It becomes clear that the person in the photo doesn't seem to be saying "No to war" at all. In fact, the protester comes off as promoting war against Israel. That's the part that the San Francisco Chronicle didn't want the public to see.

Thanks to the New Media, we saw it.