Statistics that show liberal bias in the press

I read George Peternel's view in your paper about "The myth of liberal bias in the press." I felt it was a thoughtful point of view, even though I mostly disagreed with what he had to say.

Mr. Peternel certainly has a right to his opinions, but I think some facts about the media and their voting patterns might put the debate about their liberal bias on more objective grounds.

There are numerous research reports from multiple organizations that conclude that an overwhelming percent of the White House press corps (90 percent) vote Democratic. According to a meticulous and ongoing Indiana University analysis, only 7 percent of journalists countrywide now say they are Republicans.

Finally, the Center of Public Integrity has analyzed journalists' donations to the campaigns of Clinton and Trump and found that 96 percent of the donations went to Hillary Clinton. There are many more research reports reaching similar conclusions.

Journalists are human beings and their political "bias" does affect what gets reported, as well as what gets left out. It influences headlines and it influences the "priority" and "emphasis" of what is reported. We may not like that, but it is human nature.

I would argue that both conservative and liberal journalists have some political bias in their writings. Since liberal journalists significantly outnumber conservative journalists, mainstream media will have a more liberal bias.

A case in point. I read last week's Herald article on the Trump news conference. I did not have the same impressions of the conference as the writers conveyed in their article. I'm sure that my political "bias" influenced my views. But I'm also confident that the writers' political "bias" influenced how they chose to report what took place. In my view, there was liberal bias in their reporting.

R. James Young, Jr.

Inverness