Letter to The Depressed Press

William Safire has an interesting take on the status of MSM, and is worth reading.

On resentment of media elitism by awakened cultural and religious voices: They're not crazies. Their opinions on stem cells and same-sex marriage are newsworthy and not an assault on church-state separation. Protests at "wardrobe malfunction" and campaigns against state-sponsored gambling are neither bluenosed nor repressive.

But there is no need for sensible seculars in mainstream media to feel an urgent call to get right with religion. It's O.K. to say "Merry Christmas" at the end of a newscast without worrying about equal greeting for Ramadan and Hanukkah and Kwanzaa and all the rest.
[...]
Today that media bias is undeniably liberal. That's natural when conservatives are the Ins; five years ago, the bias often ran the other way. As future elections near, that tilt must disappear from news pages to let the voters do the tilting. Some mainstreamers flopped on necessary election evenhandedness in 2004 and should be grimly thankful for a corrective kick in the teeth from other media, bloggers and righteous right-wingers.

I of course, disagree that "five years ago, the bias often ran the other way" - but then again Mr. Safire probably knew many would disagree and choose the word "often" instead of a more definitive "always", "mostly", or "usually".