In Thursday’s Washington Post, Paul Farhi laments the fact that the mainstream media has already decided to drop the Navy Yard massacre and focus on other things like the “Hiccup Girl Trial” and Britney Spears. Farhi blames many things, including (naturally) racism, but is not at all interested in exploring the real reason for the indifference of his media colleagues: The fact is that the media is never interested in stories that don’t offer them political upside.
Had an AR-15 actually been used in this week’s terrible Navy Yard murders, there is no question that the massacre would still be leading the national conversation as the media pushed to ban “assault weapons.” Had the shooter bought any one of his weapons at a gun show where no background check was performed, the media would be overdosing on this story with a renewed push to expand background checks. Had the shooter been a white, Christian, Tea Partier, the media would be delivering the news with glassy eyes and their pants around their ankles.
What kept previous mass-shootings alive in the national media conversation was the anti-gun Narrative our objective, unbiased, not-at-all liberal media collectively exploited — especially in the wake of Sandy Hook.
What kept the Tucson murders alive was not the fact that a congresswoman was involved, but that the media cynically and dishonestly found a way to collectively blame Sarah Palin for the murders.
Unless events overcome, when it comes to what drives our media narrative, it is always stories that push a left-wing agenda — that offer political upside. This week’s shooting was committed by a black, Buddhist Obama supporter who used the Vice President’s weapon of choice — a shotgun. So, naturally, the media has lost interest.
Hundreds of children are gunned down in Chicago every year. But the media doesn’t care about black children being murdered by mostly black people in a city that is supposed to be a liberal utopia and passed some of the strictest gun control laws in the country. Why? Because there is no political upside in telling that story.
This philosophy holds true for many things, not just guns.
Yesterday we learned that 180,000 mostly working poor employees of Walgreens will lose their health insurance due to the cost of ObamaCare. The media doesn’t care about “those” working poor because protecting ObamaCare is more important.
No left-wing political upside, no media coverage.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC
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