American Media Are Using Classic Techniques To Push Propaganda
by
Both Ayn Rand and George Orwell would have recognized what is going on—and, in fact, they warned us about it.
A form of torture I endure for my research is reading the New York Times morning emails. The phrase “alternate universe” aptly describes its sly, misleading story titles, which demonstrate a built-in bias even before the report itself begins. A good example was a heading marked “Territorial Adventurism” used the other day in reference to Trump’s geopolitical strategy in Iran and elsewhere.
Adventurism is defined as “Involvement in risky enterprises, especially in foreign affairs, while disregarding established principles or adverse consequences.” How rich is it when one of the most liberal newspapers in the entire world delivers the news, as opinions, in a manner designed to predispose readers’ views of stories in a negative context? What hubris that pundits, and that is what they are, deign to tell you how and what to think!
Almost by definition, someone who tells you, “Here’s an important subject and how to think about it,” is likely a bad actor. We are overrun by too many of those bad actors in our country, and they play a starring role in our current crisis of conscience. Yet, there seems to be no way to get rid of these people who, like ticks and fleas, burrow into our collective conscience, leaving us sick, confused, and angry; many have lost hope for a better tomorrow.
When it comes to the written word, here’s our dirty dozen purveyors of yellow journalism:
- The New York Times—National daily with investigative reporting and a liberal editorial stance; large national readership and influence.
- The Washington Post—Major national paper with investigative focus and a mostly liberal editorial voice.
- Vox—Explanatory journalism that often frames policy debates from progressive perspectives.
- HuffPost—Digital news and opinion site known for progressive commentary and a broad audience.
- The Nation—progressive politics, culture, and a long history of left-leaning advocacy.
- Mother Jones—investigative reporting on social justice, corporate power, and the environment.
- ProPublica—left-leaning nonprofit investigative journalism focused on exposing abuses and prompting reform.
- The Intercept—investigative reporting with a civil-liberties and anti-establishment perspective.
- Jacobin—socialist and left-wing analysis and reporting.
- The Marshall Project—nonprofit journalism focused on criminal-justice reporting and reforms.
- InsideClimate News—another left-leaning nonprofit investigative reporting on climate, energy, and environment.
- Center for Public Integrity—left-leaning nonprofit investigative reporting on corruption, money in politics, and accountability.
And again, that’s just the written word. Across the broader media landscape, progressive and left-leaning voices are distributed through an ecosystem—from legacy national newspapers and public broadcasters to high-traffic digital influencers, nonprofit investigative newsrooms, and starkly activist platforms—giving the left multiple redundant and mutually supportive channels to reach audiences with different news-consumption preferences. Often, the reports are coordinated.
Meanwhile, conservatism’s reach is concentrated in smaller outlets. Fox stands out as the single dominant right-of-center broadcast brand, although NewsMax has a growing audience. This means the left often achieves broad cumulative reach through many specialized outlets that together are self-referencing and mutually supportive.
These tactics from progressives, socialists, and communists have evolved over the decades. Still, they would be starkly visible, understandable, and familiar to the likes of Ayn Rand and George Orwell as nothing more than old tricks dressed up as modern trickery for weak, low-information audiences.
Ayn Rand would frame contemporary media slant primarily as a moral and epistemic failure rooted in collectivist values, institutional incentives, and the abandonment of objective standards. She would argue that many outlets prioritize coordinated agendas, identity or policy advocacy, and moral signaling over the pursuit of facts and individual judgment, producing journalism that reads as persuasion dressed up as reporting rather than as disinterested inquiry. Rand’s Objectivist critique emphasizes the primacy of reason, individual responsibility, and the danger of subordinating truth to political ends, anathema to progressives.