Inside the Bubble: When Media Loses Its Mirror

The Big Sort and America’s New Divide

Several years ago, my friend, Bill Bishop, wrote a tremendous book—The Big Sort. He had two main theses supported by considerable data. The first was that increasingly Americans are working, living, and worshipping with like-minded people. Second, the more like-minded the group, over time, the more extreme their views become.

For a long time, the American model had been captured in Robert Dahl’s seminal book, Who Governs? Democracy and Power in an American City. His thesis being we are a pluralistic society, where to be successful in governing, leaders needed to be able to address the needs and wants of a disparate group of people. He wrote that book in 1961. The city was New Haven, Connecticut, as in the city where Yale is. One thing is for certain: that the United States no longer exists.

Life in the Bubble

My thesis holds that Bishop had it dead right, and life inside a bubble is unhealthy for us, especially when the particular bubble has an outsized influence. Such is the case for our legacy linear “mainstream” media. This is put in quotes because, in its current state, it is hardly mainstream.

CBS and the 60 Minutes Shock

Our legacy media had two eye-opening examples in recent days. It has been reported that CBS’s new editor-in-chief of news, Bari Weiss, had “stunned” those at their long-running 60 Minutes program when she asked why the country thinks they are biased. Notice she asked about the country, not within the profession, and that she did not say they were biased, just that the country might think so. Yet, at 60 Minutes, the attitude is deeply held that all they are doing is telling the truth. At least as far back as Dan Rather making false accusations about then-candidate George Bush’s military service, accuracy and balance have no longer been relevant, just smug liberal arrogance. Not many reasonable people living outside their bubble have a doubt as to the reality of the program having a singular liberal bias. That those at 60 Minutes do not get the joke says a lot about them and little about the rest of us, except we are not nuts.

The Bari Weiss Example

Bari Weiss, you ask. Why she is the woman who left The New York Times in protest? You see, their Woke Patrol thought her insufficiently sensitive to the most leftist tenets of the progressive point of view and agenda. Never mind, she is a classic liberal. Her failure to toe the line made her the subject of online attacks from her peers.

Lest there remains any doubt as to where The Times stands on things, things, hopefully one of their editorial writers, Michele Goldberg, has removed that ambiguity. When asked why The Times did not have a single pro-Trump voice in its editorial section, she asserted it was a simple thing.

Finding a “pro-Trump, honest, and not racist” person was a challenge for her. “There are not many people in the middle of that Venn diagram,” according to Ms. Goldberg. Oh, I don’t know. Maybe give Frank Miele a call. A former newspaper editor, you might find him dead center in the middle of your diagram. He tosses in being really smart at no extra cost.

Does not appeal to you? How about Victor Davis Hanson? Without even asking, I will bet Mr. Miele considers him beyond intelligent. A Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institute, he is widely regarded as a Trump supporter. There are others. However, if Hanson is not good enough and smart enough to occupy a position at The Times, I feel confident he will be just fine, as well as anyone else who is not already reading your publication.

The Ceiling of the Bubble

Appealing to the limited number of people who already embrace your singular point of view inherently means you have a ceiling on who will be in your audience. There are reasons beyond the expansion of digital platforms that contribute to the rapid decline of the “mainstream media.” Reason one is that they believe anyone living outside their bubble is either not smart enough, nor good enough, or both to be allowed inside their bubble.

Common Sense

Common Sense: If the legacy linear media wants to be trusted by those outside their bubble, it will take a complete reorientation of its approach. Otherwise known as “not buying your…”