In the Washingtonian, Harry Jaffe writes about a new study on editorial favorites in the Virginia governor’s race:
According to a report by the Center for Media and Public Affairs, a Washington think tank, Virginia’s three major dailies have published more “positive” opinion pieces about Kaine than about Kilgore.
For example, the Washington Post has written 58-percent positive takes on Kaine compared with 9 percent for Kilgore. The Roanoke Times’s comparison is 46 percent for Kaine, 7 percent for Kilgore.
The most surprising statistics come from the Richmond Times-Dispatch, a moderate-to-conservative paper in the state capital. The CMPA report says that 90 percent of the paper’s opinion pieces have cast Kaine in a positive light; Kilgore came out looking good 36 percent of the time.
Opinion pages in Norfolk’s Virginian-Pilot have been balanced.
An overview of the study’s findings is available as an 84k PDF.
Inevitably, some will conclude that this is further evidence of the Massive Left-Wing Conspiracy that is determined to keep Jerry Kilgore out of office, and that Richmond Times-Dispatch is clearly in on it. I think it’s more likely that this reflects the fact that Jerry Kilgore keeps saying stupid shit and doing dumb things, while Kaine is yet to commit a serious gaffe. It’s inevitable that the opinion pieces would reflect reality. (And I am, I should disclose, a member of the reality-based community.)
I’m awaiting protests against newspapers’ pro-reality bias. It won’t be long.