The media is are generally not as powerful as they're often made out to be. From 2001 to 2005 or 06, they were biased towards the GOP. What eventually made them switch over to a Democratic bias from 2006 until the stimulus bill debate this February, was Bush's increasing unpopularity. They are favorable to Obama now, but just wait until the honeymoon ends. In the 2008 campaign, they were almost always biased towards whichever candidates were currently ahead. In other words, they're generally reactive. Reporters react to events and attempt to analyze and justify events retrospectively. The idea that a certain politician is currently winning or that a certain party is currently in the majority due simply to chance, rather than some grand narrative of truth, is not appealing from the standpoint of a media analyst. If they start to believe their own justifications, then they become biased.
Those looking to the media to unlock the key of future elections are looking in the wrong place. The wisest words in politics belong to the late Harold MacMillan. When asked what represented the greatest challenge for a statesman, MacMillan replied, "Events, my dear boy, events."
You've got it. The media might elevate a turkey on occasion but they can't rescue one. The politicians can manipulate media to an extent, but that goes only so far. The media jump on scandals, especially those involving the two subjects that most adults understand (sex and money). They can easily explain adultery, salacious e-mails, and large quantities of cash that change hands or appear in a freezer. They can relate new unemployment (typically from highly-visible mass layoffs) and death tolls from wars.
They are more likely to catch adultery than deceit about military activities because the former is more easily related than the latter. Liberal journalists would have loved to have exposed deceit and shady dealings by Dubya (the shady dealings including his economic priorities that ultimately led to the real estate/subprime lending meltdown) because such was more subtle than some politician like Mark Foley getting caught sending salacious e-mails to underage boys, William Jefferson being found with thousands of dollars of cash in a freezer, or Mark Sanford "disappearing" only to have gone to Argentina for (details presumed if not stated).
Journalists aren't that different from the rest of us. They can fall for the bandwagon effect, and if the "tea party" protests became huge, then they would start reporting them as a major trend of dissent with Obama. They catch rhetorical folly only if it is so blatant as when it comes so obviously from someone like Sarah Palin (as when it appears in dependent and independent clauses in the same sentence).
