The media's “bias is roughly 8 to 10 percentage points in favor of the Democratic candidate in a typical election,” Professor Tim Groseclose wrote in his 2011 book, “Left Turn.” The reality of this bias is illustrated by a story currently in the news.
Nicole Shanahan, the billionaire entrepreneur and former vice presidential running mate of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has made a startling admission: “I completely misunderstood MAGA,” she admitted in a recent interview.
And it was the media that gave her the wrong information.
(So, who is spreading “misinformation” again?)
The beginning of change
American Thinker (AT) reported on the story, writing, “Until recently, Shanahan's political leanings were Democratic. She has donated to Democratic candidates and funded Democratic issues for 20 years.” The website also goes into some detail about Shanahan's background, noting, for example, that she has taken some anti-establishment positions (e.g., she is skeptical of big pharmaceutical companies). But the story begins with her entry into politics. AT states:
In March 2024, Mr. Shanahan joined Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s independent presidential campaign as a running mate. By this time, Mr. Shanahan had already seen Democrats bar Mr. Kennedy from the primary, and after March he watched as Democrats kept Mr. Kennedy off the ballot in most states.
Now that the election is over and Kennedy has endorsed Trump, Shanahan has appeared at several conservative press conferences, from Jesse Watters to Adam Carolla. What's interesting is that her exposure to real conservatives, rather than the image of a conservative portrayed by the left, has helped her understand, as she told Dave Smith (host of the podcast “Part of the Problem”), how the media and the Democratic establishment have consistently lied about conservatives and the MAGA movement.
In her own words
Shanahan told Smith about the quasi-Red Pill moment:
Actually, the best thing about joining forces with Trump was that I got to see MAGA in action and learn a lot about it. I was completely misinformed about what MAGA was.
I don't know if you've ever looked deeply into the world of MAGA, but I just had the impression that they were extremists with guns who were going to come to my doorstep and drag my liberal family out of their house and do horrible things to liberals, and that's how MAGA was marketed to most of America by the mainstream media.
And what I learned about MAGA is that they are actually their own political party. They are the grassroots organization that elected Donald Trump. They have a lot of power to decide where to direct their energy and support.
MAGA members are really smart, thoughtful, intelligent people. I received a beautifully written note from a MAGA supporter…
You see, our base didn't know how to engage with MAGA. Our base wasn't MAGA-oriented in the sense that they even knew who and what MAGA was… (video below)
Myth and reality
The disconnect from reality that Shanahan experienced is an interesting phenomenon. While anyone can be a victim of prejudice, conservatives tend to understand liberals, not vice versa. One reason for this (among others) is that “leftism” has become the default in today's establishment: it permeates the media, entertainment, academia, and big tech companies that shape our culture, making it impossible not to be exposed to liberal ideas.
In contrast, absorbing only mainstream media and associating only with fellow ideological adherents allows leftists to live in a bubble of false reality. Consider also that our entertainment portrays leftism as the Enlightenment default and presents fictional cartoon versions of conservatives (e.g., Archie Bunker). Perhaps coincidentally, this is exactly the concept pre-woke Shanahan and other liberals have of “MAGA types.”
Almost Not Alone
Speaking of which, Shanahan has some woke allies. In fact, just yesterday a columnist named Adam B. Coleman said he was a “Trump hater” until he “learned the truth about the media's 'very clever' lies.”
Writing in the New York Post, Coleman admitted that he “used to be one of those naive people who thought the American media put the public's interests ahead of their own.” As a result, he believed every vile smear they peddled about Trump, until he began to investigate the myth that there were “good people on both sides” in Charlottesville and discovered he'd been fooled. “I felt racially manipulated,” Coleman wrote, later adding:
When lies are exposed and betrayal is confronted, the natural question remains: if they are willing to lie to me about this, what else are they lying about?
Being a Democrat, I assumed that the main element of the information presented to me was truth, and never imagined that it might be laced with harmful falsehoods.
And here is a young woman with pink hair who posted a short video (note the language) explaining that she used to hate Trump, but realized she was misinformed, and will now vote for him.
Too little, too late?
Multiply that number by a thousand and you might get a picture of an “awakened people.” Sadly, multiply that number many times more and you might get a picture of those who are still asleep.
Now, let's go back to Professor Grossclose's estimate that mainstream media bias favors Democrats by 8 to 10 points in every election. And note that the bias of big tech companies gives Democrats an even bigger advantage. For example, one estimate suggests that they could shift up to 15 million votes to Democrats at election time.
Some people might say, “Wow, 10 percent plus 15 million votes! If you subtract that from the Democratic vote count, they'll never win the election!”
But in reality, they will.
Democrats will not simply die on the hill of left-wing insanity. Rather, they will adapt, as political parties always do, in their case by adopting more moderate, more pro-American policies in order to survive.
And that's the tragedy here. If the media had done their job, it would have been beneficial for the entire country, including the Democratic Party. The Democrats would be a better, more honest party. The Republican Party would also improve, unencumbered by malicious, policy-suppressing propaganda. And Americans would have a better government, with the greater and the lesser of two evils becoming even greater and lesser.
But, of course, there is no heaven on earth, but this temporary place doesn't necessarily have to be hell, either, as the media has noted.
