The Truth Behind Media Bias with John Stossel — Transcript

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1. 0:00You know, when you talk about guns in
2. 0:02the media, I'm always amazed at the
3. 0:05coverage or weird coverage we get in the
4. 0:07media. And I was thinking about who can
5. 0:09we get on to talk about what goes on
6. 0:11with the media and as it relates to
7. 0:13guns, but also just generally speaking
8. 0:15because you I'm an old J school guy and
9. 0:17I I look at what's going on in
10. 0:18journalism these days and it drives me
11. 0:20crazy. I thought, who better to do that
12. 0:21than John Staceil, the guy who's been
13. 0:23like popping the balloons of pomposity
14. 0:26and the craziness in the media for many,
15. 0:29many years. John Staceil, thank you for
16. 0:30being here, man.
17. 0:33>> Nice to be here.
18. 0:35>> All right. So, let me ask you, you you
19. 0:37have written about and covered uh the
20. 0:40media for many, many years. You've also
21. 0:42done things on gun control and how one
22. 0:44of the things that you have done
23. 0:45traditionally that I really appreciate
24. 0:47it is basically the whole deal of
25. 0:50everybody thinks this whatever that this
26. 0:53is but this is actually not true and
27. 0:55this is the other thing. What got you
28. 0:57started in wanting to kind of peel
29. 1:00things back and look at what's really
30. 1:02going on?
31. 1:05or outside of gone, what got me started
32. 1:08was I was a consumer reporter and I was
33. 1:11pointing out how business cheats people
34. 1:13and my instinct as a liberal young
35. 1:17reporter was that government should fix
36. 1:19that and but I stayed on the beat and I
37. 1:24I watched how the government solutions
38. 1:26made things more complicated and
39. 1:28expensive but didn't fix any of the
40. 1:30problems. They just added hurdles. So, I
41. 1:32started questioning a lot of what the
42. 1:35mainstream media and my own liberal
43. 1:38assumptions were. And I started reading
44. 1:41the conservative press, but I wasn't
45. 1:43thrilled with them cuz they seem to want
46. 1:46to go to war everywhere, including in
47. 1:48people's bedrooms. And I eventually
48. 1:51discovered Reason magazine. And oh, I
49. 1:54guess I'm a libertarian, whatever that
50. 1:56is. I want limited government. And the
51. 1:59gun issue came up because I was at 2020
52. 2:02in New York City. And if you think about
53. 2:04it, most of the reporters in the media
54. 2:06are on the East Coast. And we grow up in
55. 2:08a world where of course guns are a
56. 2:12problem and need more regulation.
57. 2:15My producer at the time though u was
58. 2:18Maxim Lot, son of John Lot.
59. 2:20>> Oh wow. No kidding. eventually introdu
60. 2:23introduced me to, you know, more guns,
61. 2:27less crime, a whole different concept.
62. 2:30And it was quite the head shifter. And I
63. 2:33remember confronting Al Sharpton about
64. 2:35what would it be like if anybody could
65. 2:37buy a gun. It would be chaos. There'd be
66. 2:40blood on the street. And I said, well,
67. 2:43you know, that's the law in most places
68. 2:46outside New York City, right?
69. 2:48>> And he had no idea.
70. 2:50Okay, that's an interesting point. I ran
71. 2:52into the same thing. I was doing an
72. 2:53interview some years ago with MSNBC and
73. 2:55they came down and did a whole piece. I
74. 2:58was talking to the producer from
75. 2:59Manhattan, as you might expect. And you
76. 3:01know, he said, "Well, I don't know
77. 3:03anybody who owns guns." And I said,
78. 3:04"Well, I don't know anybody who doesn't
79. 3:06own guns." I said, "But here's the
80. 3:07thing. I'll guarantee you that if you
81. 3:10were to actually ask the people you know
82. 3:12in New York, a lot of the people you
83. 3:14know own guns, but they don't feel free
84. 3:17to talk about it." He called me two
85. 3:18weeks later. He says, "Tom, it's
86. 3:20unbelievable. Half the people I know own
87. 3:22guns, but I never knew that.
88. 3:27>> I don't believe half the people I know
89. 3:29own guns." And my ultralleftist world
90. 3:33and they're giving me grief about
91. 3:35everything. That's one thing I don't
92. 3:36even bother to fight about.
93. 3:39>> No, no. I I understand.
94. 3:41>> I got other fish to fry.
95. 3:42>> Well, exactly. So, all right. So, let me
96. 3:44ask you this. You're right there in the
97. 3:46heart of well actually the center of
98. 3:48media for the world for the whole planet
99. 3:50in New York. What is it about the media
100. 3:55that drives the agenda? Is it a group
101. 3:58think thing? Is it peer pressure? I mean
102. 4:02we see the agendas there but when those
103. 4:05of us who are not there we wonder how
104. 4:06does that come about?
105. 4:10I'm not clear and I ought to be after
106. 4:12these years of making videos. Um, I am
107. 4:15still making them by the way. Every
108. 4:17Tuesday we release a new 5 minute or so
109. 4:21video on Stell TV.
110. 4:24It's group think and I mean you think
111. 4:27about the world the people who and why
112. 4:30this is I don't know but the people who
113. 4:31write for a living or just spend a lot
114. 4:34of time writing tend to lean left.
115. 4:37Artists tend to lean left.
116. 4:39>> The people who build things tend to lean
117. 4:42right. Uh I'm not sure why that is some
118. 4:47kind of brain difference, but without
119. 4:50question, the carpenters, the
120. 4:52homebuilders, some of it's that they run
121. 4:54up against all the stupid regulations
122. 4:56and that wakes them up to the problem.
123. 4:58Well, if you're a school teacher, you're
124. 5:00just collecting a salary all the time.
125. 5:02And you have no idea how intrusive
126. 5:05government regulations are.
127. 5:07>> Well,
128. 5:08>> but there definitely is a split. And the
129. 5:10people who write lean left and this is
130. 5:13why AI is a little dangerous. I I love
131. 5:16chat GPT. I use it every day.
132. 5:18>> But it pulls stuff from the internet.
133. 5:20And the internet is people who write and
134. 5:23that goes left.
135. 5:25>> No, that's an excellent point. you where
136. 5:26is it getting its information in the
137. 5:28first place and that information has
138. 5:30already been filtered that as it gets
139. 5:32poured into chat GPT and AI uh that's a
140. 5:36really interesting observation I hadn't
141. 5:37thought about it that way and you know
142. 5:39to to your point about people who are
143. 5:42well maybe dependent upon or expect the
144. 5:44government to take care of things we see
145. 5:46the same thing in the gun world it's
146. 5:47like okay I've studied this actually the
147. 5:50CDC studied it they said they couldn't
148. 5:52find any gun control law in the US that
149. 5:54had ever reduced crime And of course we
150. 5:56look at that go, "Yeah, well that's
151. 5:58because criminals break the law. It
152. 5:59seems simple to me, but I don't know why
153. 6:01that's not obvious everywhere."
154. 6:05I would bet you could study every law
155. 6:08that was supposed to do X, Y, or Z. And
156. 6:12did they accomplish their goal? I would
157. 6:15doubt it. But they rarely ask those
158. 6:17questions. Mostly they just say, "Oh, I
159. 6:20don't like this. There ought to be a
160. 6:21law." And they pass more laws. And no
161. 6:25group of school kids ever goes to the
162. 6:27state capital and asks the state
163. 6:29legislator,
164. 6:31you know, what what laws have you
165. 6:32repealed while you've been in power? No,
166. 6:34it's all about what laws did you get
167. 6:37passed?
168. 6:38>> It's funny. I I've always said, you
169. 6:39know, I want to ask every politician,
170. 6:41name me the first five laws that you
171. 6:43would repeal. And everybody kind of
172. 6:46looks at me like, what are you talking
173. 6:47about? I said, well, no, because the
174. 6:49laws you pass actually don't do what you
175. 6:52think they're going to be doing. And
176. 6:53then after they don't work, then your
177. 6:56response is, well, we just didn't go far
178. 6:57enough. We need more restrictive laws
179. 6:59than we already have.
180. 7:02>> Over and over and over. It's like
181. 7:06arterial sclerosis of laws. And think
182. 7:09about how well Germany and Japan did
183. 7:12after World War II. They were the boom
184. 7:15economies in the 60s. And uh some of
185. 7:18it's because they're Germans and
186. 7:20Japanese people, but I think a lot of it
187. 7:22is that we bombed them to smitherreens
188. 7:24and they had to start over without all
189. 7:26their old guilds and union rules, stupid
190. 7:30stuff that accumulate over time.
191. 7:33>> All right. So, first of all, let's tell
192. 7:35people where they can see what you're
193. 7:36doing these days because I mean, I know
194. 7:37they know you from ABC and all the
195. 7:39things you've done. You've had this
196. 7:40incredible career, but you're still
197. 7:42putting out, you know, the information.
198. 7:43and you're still trying to puncture
199. 7:45pomposity wherever you can find it.
200. 7:49>> In short, fun nuggets, uh, johnstell.com
201. 7:52gets you there, but you could just
202. 7:54Google stellv and you'll get there, too.
203. 7:57>> Sounds good. John Staceil, thank you for
204. 7:59your time. I appreciate it and it's
205. 8:01always uh enlightening to take a look at
206. 8:03things from a little different
207. 8:05perspective. Thank you, sir.
208. 8:08>> Thanks, Tom.