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At one point or another in his career, the political author is forced to sit down and write a column on a liberal bias in the media. Whatever his position, the columnist will almost invariably contribute nothing new or constructive to the debate, which seems to be solvable by facts, but is actually indifferent to them.

In the debate, liberals charge that there is no political bias in the media while conservatives call it a national conspiracy, a systematic exclusion of conservatism from the national news. Both liberals and conservatives are dreadfully wrong.

On the one hand, liberals completely deny any political bias, which derides their case and the position they should probably take. Simply watching reports by Peter Jennings, Dan Rather or Tom Brokaw will make the objective observer understand. But if that is not enough, so will almost every study done on the subject by impartial, non-partisan media sources.

According to a 1996 study done by the Roper Center, for example, 89 percent of Washington journalists voted for Bill Clinton in 1992, compared with 43 percent of the American public. Furthermore, 91 percent of Washington journalists today call themselves moderate to liberal; only 2 percent are conservatives.

Similar studies abound, detailing a consistent favoritism toward liberal ideas in the media.

On the other hand, conservatives charge that a systematic liberal bias in the media is something enforced from the top to the bottom – a silent code that must be followed by journalists who want to keep their jobs.

But this allegation is just as naive. In the age of fast information and alternative news sources, a methodical discrimination in the mainstream media is unfeasible.

Liberals must accept that the media are liberal. And conservatives must accept that though a liberal bias exists, it is often built into the media, unintentionally.

In January of 2000 the non-partisan Media Research Center released the results of a two-year study of the coverage of gun policy by ABC, CBS, NBC and CNN. Of the 635 stories that pertained to guns, the study found that 36 opposed gun control while 357 pieces advocated gun control.

Conservatives jumped on this figure. Surely, they thought and often wrote, this proves the media are wildly liberal. (These numbers above and even more are from Larry Elder’s book, “The Ten Things You Can’t Say in America.”)

It does. But in this case, much of the bias was built in, something the media could not solve even if they wanted to. The television can always show the incident when the easy availability of guns landed an AK-47 in the hands of a psychotic teenager who ended up killing eight people in his local grocery store.

But it can never show how the easy availability of guns landed a pistol in the hands of a father who protected his family against an intruder, or a woman who scared off a rapist, or an elderly man who startled a burglar. The media can show what guns did but cannot show what guns prevented. This is a built-in liberal bias that is natural and cannot be fixed.

Furthermore, if not built in, liberal slants are often unintentional. When nine out of every 10 journalists think alike, it is hard not to be biased. If the reporter is liberal and his editor is liberal and the editor-in-chief is liberal – if, in short, everyone from the writer to the publisher is liberal – it becomes difficult, if not impossible, to detect political biases.

Through no fault of their own, liberal editors are unable to catch and correct the liberal slants of their reporters. What are racial preferences to conservatives might be equalizing the playing field to liberals. This disagreement is a fact of human nature. As long as humans run the media, it will be biased – currently it leans left.

Of course, sometimes the bias is intended. When Dan Rather built a whole story on a dubiously attained document that was dubious itself to indict Bush of ditching the draft by dropping his name, that was real bias.

That Rather was willing to vilify a man because of one unverified piece of paper but not seriously address a more thorough indictment made by the Swift Boat Veterans against Sen. John Kerry shows that political considerations are often involved.

The conclusion is there is a liberal bias. Some of it is intended, most is unintended, and much of it is built in.

But what have conservatives done to correct the first and second? They have gotten fired from their newspapers or quit their networks, gaining fame and big bucks.

Bernard Goldberg exposed CBS, and Ben Shapiro attempted to expose the Daily Bruin. They informed the public – which is noble and important – but did they get anything done? Did the media become any less liberal because of them?

The simple answer is no. Liberal bias in the media cannot be solved by blanket criticism and unreasoned attacks. The media must be changed from within – by conservatives who stay on as journalists, who struggle through the bias and eventually overcome it, who don’t flirt with temporary fame but seek to achieve long-term change.

The liberal media is real, and it is powerful. But argument can only do so much.

Hovannisian is a second-year history and philosophy student. E-mail him at ghovannisian@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.