Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News [Paperback]

Bernard Goldberg (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 21, 2003

In his nearly thirty years at CBS News, Emmy Award winner Bernard Goldberg earned a reputation as one of the preeminent reporters in the television news business. When he looked at his own industry, however, he saw that the media far too often ignored their primary mission: to provide objective, disinterested reporting. Again and again he saw that the news slanted to the left. For years, Goldberg appealed to reporters, producers, and network executives for more balanced reporting, but no one listened. The liberal bias continued.

Now, breaking ranks and naming names, he reveals a corporate news culture in which the closed-mindedness is breathtaking and in which entertainment wins over hard news every time.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

IN HIS NEARLY thirty years at CBS News, Emmy Award- winner Bernard Goldberg earned a reputation as one of the preeminent reporters in the television news business. When he looked at his own industry, however, he saw that the media far too often ignored their primary mission: objective, disinterested reporting. Again and again he saw that they slanted the news to the left. For years Goldberg appealed to reporters, producers, and network executives for more balanced reporting, but no one listened. The liberal bias continued. Now, in Bias, he blows the whistle on the news business, showing exactly how the media slant their coverage while insisting that they're just reporting the facts. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

About the Author

Bernard Goldberg is the number one New York Times bestselling author of Bias, 100 People Who Are Screwing Up America, and Arrogance. He has won eight Emmy Awards for his work at CBS News and at HBO, where he now reports for the acclaimed program Real Sports. In 2006 he won the Alfred I. duPont–Columbia University Award, the most prestigious of all broadcast journalism awards.

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial (January 21, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060520841
• ISBN-13: 978-0060520847
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (862 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #67,759 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Bernard Goldberg, the television news reporter and author of Bias, a New York Times number one bestseller about how the media distort the news, is widely seen as one of the most original writers and thinkers in broadcast journalism. He has covered stories all over the world for CBS News and has won 11 Emmy awards for excellence in journalism. He won six Emmys at CBS, and five more at HBO, where he now reports for the widely acclaimed broadcast Real Sports.

In addition to his ground-breaking book Bias, Goldberg has written four other books on the media and American culture -- Arrogance, 100 People Who Are Screwing Up America: (And Al Franken is #37), Crazies to the Left of Me, Wimps to the Right, and A Slobbering Love Affair, about the news media's romance with Barack Obama. All have all been New York Times bestsellers.

In 2006 Bernie won the most prestigious of all broadcast journalism awards, the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award for an HBO story about young, poor boys who were sold or kidnapped into slavery and were forced to risk their lives as camel jockeys in the United Arab Emirates, one of the wealthiest countries in the world.

Bernie has reported extensively, both at HBO and at CBS News, on the transformation of the American culture. At HBO, in the fall of 2000, he wrote the Emmy award winning documentary Do You Believe In Miracles, the dramatic story of the 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey team and the most famous hockey game ever -- the game between the United States and the Soviet Union that revitalized the American spirit and helped bring America out of the malaise it had suffered though much of the 1970s.

At CBS, he anchored two prime-time documentaries about how the American landscape was changing. Don't Blame Me showed how the United States was becoming a nation of finger-pointers whose citizens more and more were refusing to accept responsibility for their actions. In Your Face, America was an hour-long report about the coarsening of America, about how vulgar and uncivil our popular culture was becoming.

Bernie has written op-ed pieces that appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post, about a wide range of subjects, including baseball, manners, and journalism.

He is also a news and media analyst for Fox News where he comments regularly on the state of the press and television news as well as on politics and culture for the network's top rated program, The O'Reilly Factor.

He is a graduate of Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey and a member of the school's Hall of Distinguished Alumni.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Editorial Opinion or News, March 19, 2002

By 

M. Richelle Redman "redman815" (Canyon, TX United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News (Hardcover)

This is a decent short course for anyone who is interested in learning how the "news business" operates these days. This book has taken a slam for its "conservative bias", so if you are still in doubt about the author's objectivity, I would highly recommend David Halberstam's The Powers That Be. David Halberstam could never be accused of having a politically conservative viewpoint, but he certainly echoes some of the same concerns about "media slant" of the news. They agree on one vital fact, there should be a clear cut delineation between news and editorial opinion that business mangement and advertising revenues shouldn't cross.

Here's my editorial opinion - it's become increasingly difficult to separate fact from opinion in the so called "main stream" media. Goldberg and Halberstam give anyone who isn't interested in being spoon fed a reasonable standard to question what's being presented as news.

59 of 69 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Must Read for all, February 3, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News (Hardcover)

I just finished reading BIAS and I HIGHLY recommend it for people of all political persuasions. A couple things to note:

1. It's a very engaging read -- well written and entertaining on top of infomative.

2. It's much more SUBSTANTIAL than I expected. I thought it would just be an anti-liberal gossip session but it had a LOT of MEAT in it that I think would be interesting to any AMERICAN, not just a conservative one.

3. I've always sensed a liberal bias in the media, but thought that was just "spin" ...reporting the PART of the news that fit their agenda. I was sincerely shocked to learn of instances where they have FLAT OUT LIED to us.

Great Book!

99 of 120 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars No New News Here, December 2, 2001

By 

Charles E. Brown "Charles E. Brown" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bias: A CBS Insider Exposes How the Media Distort the News (Hardcover)

The bias of many major news organizations has been debated for many years. For the most part, liberal or conservative, objective news reporting is illusory. Yet the PR machines of these same organizations feel that the general public is not capable of seeing right through them.

Goldberg's book, in my opinion, does a creditable job of further exposing the mechanics behind this bias. While there is no room to go into great detail, the book attacks ALL media bias; not just liberal (the recent Drudge Report articles seem to highlight just the liberal bias).

Goldberg makes a good argument for reexamining the whole corporate structure of the news business. One can certainly infer that the profits would still be there without the bias.

This reviewer has always liked the reporting of Mr. Goldberg, and this book certainly has brought out what I always suspected about him: that he tries to live up to the expectation of being objective. I would now be curious to see what happens to his career. According to reports, some of his colleagues were not pleased with this book.

I highly recommend this book as food for thought in the high-tech news world that we now live in. Our news organizations need to differentiate between news reporting and editorials.

Charles E. Brown