(“But”, you say, “the PRC is structured as a one party state, so there is no difference between party media and state media.” And that's true, but not in a way which elevates the credibility of party organs, just one that degrades that of state organs compared to ones in regimes where state institutions have some institutional protection against partisan patronage. Which is not to say that state institutions are ever neutral sources on the interests of their own state, just that even among structurally biased sources there are still different levels of unreliability.)