The American Spectator

Note From the Publisher

In With the New

By Alfred S. Regnery from the November 2008 issue

THROUGHOUT THE CAMPAIGN for the White House, it was increasingly apparent that according to media elites, Barack Obama’s victory was unquestionable. There is little doubt that an Obama administration’s foibles could only add up to good news in the enamored American press.

Rarely has a political season seen such biased reporting from the drive-by media, and rarely has the public been so aware of it. In a recent Rasmussen poll, 69 percent of registered voters were convinced that reporters try to help the candidate they want to win, and this year, by a nearly five-to-one margin, voters believe reporters were trying to help Barack Obama. And in an exhaustive study on news coverage of the Democratic primaries, the watchdog Media Research Center concluded that Obama had one big advantage over all his primary rivals: the support of the national media, particularly the three broadcast networks. “At every step of his national political career,” the MRC concluded, “network reporters showered the Illinois senator with glowing media coverage, building him up as a political celebrity and exhibiting little interest in investigating his past associations or exploring the controversies that could have threatened his campaign.” Some observers think it is even worse than just bias, that the media elites are actually functioning as arms of the campaign and Obama’s strategy knows it and relies on it.

All of this should be no surprise, and may all be of marginal consequence anyway. John McCain is, after all, a tough guy very capable of making his positions known (he even kicked New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd off his airplane in Pittsburgh not long ago), and Sarah Palin is not exactly a shrinking violet. Most important, there is a very vibrant counter-cultural media, full of every conceivable kind of information and available, for the asking, to anybody interested enough to sit down at a computer, flick on the radio, or read The American Spectator.

We particularly suggest that if you are fed up with the mainstream that you take a look at the new and improved American Spectator website (www.spectator.org). We have spent the past year designing and building it to make sure that our readers can have the latest and greatest AmSpec articles. The site will deliver photo slideshows, audio and video content, and, as always, our notorious (and sometimes outrageous) journalism that you have come to expect from the magazine. We have named our associate editor, ace political reporter W. James Antle III, editor of the new site. We’re confident he’s up to the task. Wlady Pleszczynski, who has been its tireless editor since its inception nearly a decade ago, will continue to provide it with his thoughtful guidance and sharp wit. We’ll be adding articles and blog posts throughout the day, so come back often and keep yourself informed of all the news, not just what the left-wing media folks want you to know.

Instapundit’s Glenn Reynolds, a keen observer of media bias, says that if you want a “media environment that isn’t dominated by the Gwen Ifills and Keith Olbermanns of the world, you need to ensure that other kinds of voices flourish. That means supporting the alternatives with your eyeballs, your subscriptions and your advertiser-patronage.”

We at The American Spectator could not agree more.

Alfred S. Regnery is publisher of The American Spectator and author of the new book Upstream: The Ascendance of American Conservatism (Threshold/Simon & Schuster).

Letter to the Editor