Football is slow so this week so I thought I would post an example of news media bias. This is an old example, but quite interesting.
In the 80s, I worked on some Peacekeeper missile components. This missile was seriously debated in congress at the time and almost got canceled several times. One of the big three networks had a video that they would show whenever the evening news reporter read the current story about the missile. The video showed what appeared to be a large missile just barely clearing the launch tube with multiple pieces falling off the missile. Then a large explosion appears.
The video was unlabeled and the news reporter never said anything about the video. The natural conclusion one would draw from the video is "This missile doesn't work anyway, so why do we need to waste money on it."
The truth is that the video showed a successful test of the steam system which was used to pop the missile out of its' canister and the pieces flying off were spacers designed to fall off.
The news media is clever! In this case, they made the missile look like a failure without ever actually speaking a single falsehood. They didn't actually lie because they never said a word about the video. They tricked most people by showing the video and not explaining what it was.
By the way, even after the missile had been tested several times and films of successful launches were available, they still used the original steam canister test video.
In conclusion:
1. The missiles were deployed and are still defending the US today.
2. No, I will not get in a discussion about the US deploying these missiles.
3. DON'T BELIEVE WHAT YOU SEE ON TV.
4. Anyone else have any news media bias stories?