Interesting that @ap is considered a leftward slant. I’m not sure if you’d consider Reuters the same at that point?
https://www.allsides.com/news-source/associated-press-media-...
They just rate it center. There is no single media source that will never have any bias at all. So that would mean there would never be an center.
>AP is a source that AllSides has struggled to rate, due to its content seeming to toe the line between Center and Lean Left. People on the right may be more likely to see AP’s content as clearly Lean Left. While AP's news and world reporting is largely Center, AllSides has found AP often includes subjective, leftward analysis in hard news reports and omits sources in its political writing; in addition, its fact checks are biased to the left
Reuters and AP are rated similarly there.
Granted that you need to read the websites methodology to determine whether you think those ratings are credible.
The Associated Press in 2015: "BREAKING: Obama sends $4 trillion spending plan to Congress, pledging help for middle class."[1]
The Associated Press in 2018: "BREAKING: President Trump sends Congress $4.4 trillion spending plan that features soaring deficits."[2]
If a news organization put "soaring deficits" in the Obama headline and "helping the middle class" in the Trump headline, I'd definitely call that right-wing bias.
https://apnews.com/article/97f7a140f39a43d0995587be61ed388f
Trump proposing tax cuts and ~$1 trillion in annual deficits going forward:
https://apnews.com/article/e50aec4820da4e30aed4bea9ff440e86
The plans differ considerably in substance, your comparison speciously treats them as similar or the same.
And even more, Obama sent a wishlist to a hostile Congress. Trump got more of what he wanted.
Factually speaking, Trump did blow up the deficit, and failing to report that, instead of reporting it, would be indicative of bias.
Budgets requested by Republican vs Democratic administrations are different as the parties have different spending and taxation priorities. Reporting budgets without acknowledging that the parties are spending/borrowing/taxing in different areas would be a lie.
Printing news stories that make Republicans look bad is not indicative of bias if those stories are, as is usually the case, factually true. The solution to this problem is not to complain about media bias but rather for the Republican party to do fewer things that look bad.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_United_States_federal_bud...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_United_States_federal_bud...
I would agree with you, except the AP didn't criticize Obama's deficit increases compared to Bush. Pick a non-recession year in the Bush administration (like 2007[1]) and you'll see deficit spending half that of Obama's. That's despite wasting tons of money (and lives) warring in the middle east.
I don't want to go all "both sides" here. One side is certainly more worthy of criticism than the other. But considering the fraction of journalists who are on the left, it's not surprising that an ostensibly unbiased organization can still have some leanings.
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_United_States_federal_bud...