November 11, 2005
Tuesday’s overwhelming victory for traditional marriage should send a number of shockwaves across the political landscape. One point that was exposed clearly was the complete disconnect between the editorial boards of Texas newspapers and the people.
Every one of the large papers, and most of the mid-sized ones, threw their hats in the ring in opposition to Proposition 2. Against this monolithic bloc, Texans were adamant. They took those editorials and threw them back in the scribes’ faces, with 76.2 percent of the voters giving the thumbs up to traditional marriage.
Nothing gets 76.2 percent of the vote. Nothing that’s contested anyway.
Politically, that’s about as close to a rout as you can come. In fact, it’s an embarrassingly crushing defeat for the opponents of Prop 2. Maybe that’s why they took their website down within two hours of the polls’ closing.
But the real loser is the media. This was the Kentucky Derby, and they put their money on “anybody but Secretariat.” A more humiliating display of their powerlessness is hard to imagine.
For years, the media have stood astride the road of conservatism like some angry gnomes. “Don’t tread this road, or I will summon a great magic against you,” they have shouted. And for years, conservatives have balked. Fear of the gnomes has forced them off the road of conservatism, time and time again, even when their constituents begged them to get back on it.
It’s not that they’re RINOs – it’s that they’re scared. Scared of what the gnomes of the Austin American Statesman, the Houston Chronicle, and the Dallas Morning News will do to them if they oppose political correctness, or immigration, or CHIP.
In truth, the editorial boards sit behind their curtains like the Wizard of Oz, turning dials, creating smoke, and shouting into amplifiers. But when it all comes down to it, they’re helpless against the people. And on Prop 2, the people gave them the finger.
Michael Sullivan, of the Texas Public Policy Foundation, hit on this in an editorial a few years back called “Why the Statesman Doesn’t Matter.” Sullivan argued, rightly so, that politicians should tune out the media, because ultimately, they’re not representative of anything but a liberal fringe.
The liberal bias in media nationally is well-known and heavily commented upon. One might think that Texas, being a conservative state, would at least skew the data a little in the direction of moderation. Not so.
In 1992, I was a journalism student at Texas A&M – arguably the most conservative state university in the country. In a straw poll of students in the department, Bill Clinton and George Bush were virtually tied, even though, campus-wide, Clinton came in third after Bush and Ross Perot.
At the most conservative state-run journalism program in the nation, the best conservatives could do was break even. Of course, A&M’s journalism program has now been shut down.
Journalism attracts liberals the way business schools attract conservatives. In 1974, with the resignation of Richard Nixon – which resulted in great part from the work of reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein – a new era in journalism began. Fueled by almost limitless egos, the belief arose that it was now the proper place of journalists to change the world, as opposed to just reporting on it. With that attitude, of course, it follows that a newsman’s role is not to just tell us what the people think, but to advocate for what they should think.
And advocate they have. Virtually every conservative politician has been skewered and stretched on the rack of the editorial pages. Time and time again, the media have endorsed against the conservative agenda. And time and time again, the people of Texas have ignored them and voted their conscience. The Houston Texans have a better winning percentage.
Maybe it’s time that we took journalists at their word. How often have the editorial pages called for political representation that “looks like Texas.” How often have they demanded that businesses hire more minorities? How often have they called for more diversity?
Perhaps they could illustrate this sacred principle by taking the lead themselves. If you want a diverse editorial board, you don’t hire five white liberals, a black liberal and a Hispanic liberal. That’s not a diversity of ideas.
When was the last time a paper hired a white male from Abilene? A suburban woman from The Woodlands?
The bottom line is that Texas newspapers don’t look like Texas. Certainly not the Texas that voted for Prop 2. Maybe it’s time for elected officials to brush aside the gnomes and follow the will of the people who voted for them, not the rantings of editors who didn’t.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Printed with permission from the Lone Star Report
James A. Bernsen has been a senior correspondent for the Lone Star Report since January, 2004. Bernsen has extensive political and journalism experience. After having worked for the Stephenville Empire-Tribune, Uvalde Leader-News and Brazosport Facts, Bernsen was selected as an Arthur F. Burns Fellow, and worked at the Berliner Zeitung newspaper in Berlin, Germany in 1998.
Bernsen, an 8th generation Texan and native of Castroville, attended Texas A&M University, where he was a political reporter and Assistant City Editor of the student newspaper, The Battalion. He graduated in 1995 with bachelor’s degrees in journalism and German. He is a Naval Reserve intelligence officer, a licensed private pilot, has played lead guitar in a blues band in Europe and serves as a volunteer crewman on a restored 19th Century square-rigged sailing vessel, the Elissa, which is owned and operated by the Galveston Historical Foundation.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Home
Archives |
