This is the op-ed that got Bernie Goldberg ostracized by his colleagues at CBS News.
Networks Need a Reality Check
A firsthand account of liberal bias at CBS News.
BY BERNARD GOLDBERG
Wednesday, January 2, 2002 12:01 a.m. EST
(Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Feb. 13, 1996. You can order Mr. Goldberg’s book, “Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News,” from the OpinionJournal bookstore.)There are lots of reasons fewer people are watching network news, and one of them, I’m more convinced than ever, is that our viewers simply don’t trust us. And for good reason.
The old argument that the networks and other “media elites” have a liberal bias is so blatantly true that it’s hardly worth discussing anymore. No, we don’t sit around in dark corners and plan strategies on how we’re going to slant the news. We don’t have to. It comes naturally to most reporters.
It’s funny how upset the left are about this book. I tried to buy it from a hippie bookstore the other day, only to be told it wasn’t available yet, and the outrage in Eric Alterman’s piece about it in The Nation is palpable.