{"id":36366,"date":"2013-05-17T12:00:26","date_gmt":"2013-05-17T17:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=36366"},"modified":"2013-09-13T07:51:43","modified_gmt":"2013-09-13T12:51:43","slug":"confirmation-bias","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=36366","title":{"rendered":"Confirmation Bias"},"content":{"rendered":"

The\u00a0Strib\u00a0<\/em>has a new publisher, Mike Klingensmith.<\/p>\n

David Brauer at the\u00a0MinnPost\u00a0<\/em>checked up on the guy’s financial donations<\/a>, as well as the new board chair Mike Sweeney’s\u00a0– which ranged from “moderate Republicans” to “very liberal Democrats” over the course of the past decade and change. \u00a0Brauer’s summary:<\/p>\n

\u00a0All in all, bipartisan, big-business-like, skewed toward the D.C. Establishment, with a whiff of fashionable Democratic insurgency late. (Obama was not yet a favorite when Klingensmith started giving.)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But here’s the part that caught my attention; Brauer says the previous publisher, Chris Harte, “pushed the page in a conservative direction” – defined by chair Sweeney and quoted by Brauer, as “My understanding of Chris\u2019s view was that he wanted to be fair to both sides”, which media people seem to think is a radical departure, since they don’t tend to think the current media has any bias.<\/p>\n

I mean, in his piece Brauer says the\u00a0Strib \u00a0<\/em>is ever so slightly conservative these days.<\/p>\n

But I’m putting words in Brauer’s mouth. \u00a0I’ll let him speak for himself – here, writing about the new guard’s rap sheet:<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t expect conservatives to be pleased with this record, but many seem happiest ripping the Strib as the Red Star. Harte\u2019s push toward the middle, or further, yielded few dividends with that crowd.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So let’s run down a summary of what conservatives would make of a sober look at what the\u00a0Strib<\/em>\u00a0has done over Harte’s term:<\/p>\n