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Nov. 6, 2009
Rabbi Berel Wein: Choosing to hear
JWisdom.com Zero to 1/60th: How to Empower An Hour with Gavriel Aryeh Sande (7 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick The mullahs' big week
Suzanne Fields A Fallen Wall for Fallen Man
Nov. 5, 2009
The Kosher Gourmet: Three scrumptious -- but simple -- butternut squash dishes
JWisdom.com Hidden Hints: Unlocking Faith & Prayer with Rabbi Jay Yaacov Schwartz (10 minutes)
Nov. 4, 2009
Tom Hamburger and Kim Geiger: Should prayers be covered?
JWisdom.com When God played peacemaker With Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (5 minutes)
Nov. 3, 2009
Martin Peretz: Beware, Barack. Beware, Rahm. Beware, Axelrod
JWisdom.com Are you are closet idolater? With Sara Yoheved Rigler (10 minutes)
Nov. 2, 2009
Paul Greenberg: The Holocaust is now on Facebook
JWisdom.com Abraham's Strange Change With Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer (5 minutes)
Oct. 30, 2009
Rabbi David Aaron: Secret to Immortality
Caroline B. Glick Silencing dissent in America
Oct. 29, 2009
Lini S. Kadaba: Do tactics avert flu or reduce humanity?
JWisdom.com We Must Revamp our Religious Vocabulary With Gavriel Aryeh Sanders ( 10 minutes)
Oct. 28, 2009
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Atheists in Bubbleland
JWisdom.com Why what we wear impacts who we are With Rabbis Mordechai Becher, Menachem Golberger and Aliza Bulow ( 10 minutes)
Oct. 27, 2009
Paul Greenberg: The United Nations Is Outraged Again, Or: Department of Mideast Static
JWisdom.com The Science of Love With Rabbi Jonathan Rietti ( 7 minutes)
Oct. 26, 2009
The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Damaging disclosures with a twist
JWisdom.com Wisdom and Wonks With Rabbi Eytan Feiner ( 7 minutes)
Oct. 23, 2009
Rabbi David Aaron: Are you ready for the ultimate pleasure?
JWisdom.com Watermark and oneness with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 4 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick Stop using limited powers in a way that expands our enemies' advantages over us
Oct. 22, 2009
Steven Emerson: Terror Cases Share Desire to Kill Americans
JWisdom.com No More More Family Fights --- Really? By Sarah Chana Radcliffe ( 5 minutes)
Oct. 21, 2009
Tonya Alanez: Holocaust denier sues survivor, calling Auschwitz memoir 'vicious lies'
JWisdom.com Meditating Jewishly: A Panacea for Success by Sarah Yoheved Rigler ( 7 minutes)
Oct. 20, 2009
Dennis Prager: Obama and Dalai Lama: Why Israel Worries about U.S. President
JWisdom.com Abraham was not religious By Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer ( 6 minutes)
Oct. 19, 2009
JWisdom.comWhy Good People Do Bad Things By Rabbi Eytan Feiner ( 7 minutes)
Oct. 16, 2009
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The Perfect Number
JWisdom.com Hearing Voices By Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 5 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick How Turkey was lost
Oct. 15, 2009
Jeff Jacoby: Peace vs. the 'peace process'
JWisdom.com: Former MTV producer and stand-up comedian Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff: Taming a Control Freak (A VERY fast 15 minutes)
Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review Nov. 21, 2006 / 30 Mar-Cheshvan, 5767

The Press: Ideology vs. Incompetence

By Pat Sajak


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | In our increasingly polarized political atmosphere, I live in two very different worlds. I've spend much of my life in show business (and the news business), so I tend to have a lot of liberal-leaning friends, and, when it comes to politics, I travel in mostly conservative circles. I have no problem with that; heck, I was a fan of both the Cubs and White Sox when I was growing up in Chicago, and that was practically against the law.


The biggest difficulty for me is I always seem to be making someone angry. Most of my liberal friends don't understand why I rub shoulders with people they consider to be the equivalent to gibbons on the evolutionary scale, and the bulk of my conservative friends stare in disbelief when I so much as suggest not everyone in Hollywood has a statue of Satan by his bedside.


Many of the pieces I've written on this site have troubled the Left side of my world; this time, however, I'm sure the Right side might by a little annoyed. The subject is the press and its politics. Let me start by saying I think it's indisputable there is a liberal bias in our journalistic institutions. Studies have repeatedly shown journalism as an area that tends to attract those of a liberal bent. There are a lot of theories as to why this is so, but I'll leave that for another time.


The trap for conservatives is the tendency to blame all their problems on the press. After a while, it begins to sound like whining, and, perhaps more important, it provides a crutch enabling the Right to overlook other factors which contribute to their difficulties.


Now here's where I really start to lose my conservative base. As shameful as the press might be in the way its ideology affects the stories it covers, that often takes a back seat to an even greater tendency in both the broadcast and print media; namely, the urge to focus on the sensational, the controversial or the trivial. And that dereliction of their duty is often bipartisan.


What got me thinking about all this is Nancy Pelosi's troubles in the race to choose a House Majority Leader. I won't rehash it here, but it involved what many considered an unnecessary controversy caused by her endorsement of her chosen candidate, and the fact that her fellow House members voted against her wishes by a very wide margin. Inside-the-beltway tongues wagged, countless stories were written and broadcast, and many questions were raised about her leadership abilities.


Does this story deserve all this attention? I don't know about that, but I do know this: if Pelosi were a Republican, and the same events had occurred, conservatives would have been wailing about it all as a plot to undermine the party by concentrating on a relatively trivial matter and blowing it out of proportion. In other words, when they do it to our guy (or gal) it's a plot; when they do it to the other side, it's a deserved criticism.


My personal belief is the press in this country is in terrible shape. The new technologies have them running scared, and objectivity, for the most part, has been traded for advocacy. And while their often thinly-disguised ideology is shameful, when it comes to shallow, personality-driven stories, they are non-partisan.

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Comment on Pat Sajak's column by clicking here.

JWR contributor Pat Sajak is the recipient of three Emmys, a Peoples’ Choice Award and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He's currently the host of Wheel of Fortune.



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