The Emilly Latella Media

Sean and George both point out a New York Times hit piece on concealed carry holders in North Carolina, and how they're supposedly going on a crime wave and ZOMG teh ebil gunz!!!1!!one!

Reading it, I thought on media bias, and on the dark days of 2003 and my own transition from a PBS-listening SWPL to someone who at least sees the media for what they are.  In particular, I remember all of the posts at Instapundit about the Iraq Museum "looting", and all of the information that the media wasn't reporting because it undermined the narrative:

THE BAGHDAD MUSEUM LOOTING STORY was exploded weeks ago, when it turned out that only about two dozen items, not the tens of thousands originally reported, were looted from the Iraqi National Museums displays. In other words, the original looting stories were bogus. Yet today the factually-challenged New York Times describes the museums as having been “largely gutted.”

Perhaps the former Iraqi information minister is now working as one of the Times’ anonymous stringers? As Jerk Sauce notes: “The article raises some worrisome points about the looting of archeological sites in Iraq. But given the reporter’s – or is it his stringer’s – willingness to misrepresent the museum looting, how credible is this?”
Not very, I’m afraid.

I remember weeks at the Sunday brunch table with the New York Times, seeing the front page trumpeting more of the "looting" story - every day for something like 20 days, and telling myself "didn't happen."

Then one morning, I found it: the actual article - in the NYT, no less - saying pretty much what Insty said.  The article was  buried on page A20.  As Emily Latella used to say, nevermind.

Except when they bury a story, they do it at midnight, at a crossroads, and with a stake through its heart.  Here's the NYT from two years ago:

Well over half the exhibition halls in Iraq’s National Museum are closed, darkened and in disrepair. And yet the museum, whose looting in 2003 became a symbol of the chaos that followed the American invasion, officially reopened on Monday.

Thousands of works from its collection of antiquities and art — some of civilization’s earliest objects — remain lost.

Well, no.  Or if they are, it was an inside job by Museum employees or managers.  But don't look too closely, because the narrative's already cast in concrete.

It's what they do.

It's been years since the motto "All the news that's fit to print" hasn't been a joke.  The NYT isn't in business to print news, it's in business to print comforting confirmation bias for SWPL progressives.  That's actually their business model - guys like me stopped subscribing years ago, and will never come back, so now it's all about holding onto their progressive subscriber base.

So bring on the confirmation bias.  Mixing relevant (felony) with irrelevant (misdemeanor) data on CWL holders?  Sure - pump those numbers!

It's what they do.

This is not to denegrate what Sean and George wrote, which is necessary fact checking* (I'd go further, and ask for data on felonies - how many are violent, and how many are, say, raising rabbits without a license?), but in the grand scheme of things it probably doesn't make much difference.  The Progressive world view is imploding, and the sillier and more childish the confirmation bias, the faster it goes.

For what it's worth, here's my argument about the NYT to progressives:  When was the last time you read a story in the Times that really made you challenge one of your beliefs?  And isn't challenging your core beliefs the most important test for any real intellectual?

It doesn't always work, because there are a lot of people who prefer confirmation bias.  But it always makes them uncomfortable.  Good.

As for the NYT's hit piece on CWL holders?  Nevermind.

* It seems that "Jobs Americans won't do" includes basic fact checking, at least at the NYT.