Yes, several surveys have shown that most Washington-based reporters, most top editors of major metropolitan newspapers and most news directors on network TV lean to the left politically and voted for Bill Clinton in 1992.

But it does not necessarily follow that the news is slanted against conservatives or Republicans.

I say that from my own experiences as a 25-year veteran of newspapers and a lifelong Republican who has spent much of my opinion-writing career fighting the arrogant, self-serving presumptions of liberalism.

When I covered politics and state legislatures as a reporter, my copy was seldom much different from that of my liberal colleagues. News generally defines itself, and any apparent slant is due more to the individual reporter's vulnerability to "spin" or lack of under-standing of an issue than to intentional manipulation.

Most news stories are based on straightforward reporting that is totally reliable. Sen. Bob Dole did, in fact, resign from the Senate. President Clinton did agree to sign a controversial welfare bill. And jet airplanes did crash in Florida and New York.

No doubt someone could find a liberal taint in each of those news accounts. Usually, however, the perception of political bias stems from the reader's own prejudices - prejudices that many readers refuse to admit they have.

Lifestyle assumptions

Most journalists, especially those in the established media, accept the largely secular, urban, morally flexible assumptions of the East and West Coast cultural elites.

Most establishment journalists are well-educated, highly paid, career-obsessed, culturally sophisticated members of the nation's most privileged class. Their lifestyles have little in common with those of most of their Middle-American readers and viewers.

For example, few establishment journalists are regular churchgoers; their weekly ritual is to watch low-rated Sunday morning talk shows. Their gossip isn't about a neighbor or co-worker, but who will be the next editor of some minuscule-circulation opinion journal.

With their six-figure salaries, establishment journalists have little understanding of how hard it is to raise a family on a working-class paycheck. They are more likely to vacation in London or on Martha's Vineyard than in Branson or at Walt Disney World. And from their gilded Manhattan and Georgetown ghettoes many of them look contemptuously upon such towns as Wichita, Omaha and Des Moines as little more than overgrown Gopher Prairies as depicted in Sinclair Lewis' "Main Street."

Lippmann's disciples

In his books "Public Opinion" and "The Phantom Public," Lippmann argued that the typical citizen was incapable of making wise decisions because most people are heavily influenced by advertising and propaganda. "The public is interested in law, not in the laws; in the method of law, not in the substance," Lippmann wrote.

Because the public is incompetent to govern itself - and doesn't really want to - political decisions should be left to experts, Lippmann argued.

The press' primary role, according to Lippmann, is to inform the public about important issues, but not to engage citizens in an active discussion of political affairs.

The news was to be written "objectively" by trained professionals who would not stir up the public's political emotions, as had the yellow press of the late 19th century.

That approach fits the self-interest of establishment journalists who see themselves as key members of the national power structure. And don't be fooled. Lippmann-style elitism is non-ideological; the editors of such conservative publications as the Weekly Standard, the Washington Times and the American Spectator are as comfortable in Washington as is any welfare-state liberal.

In Washington, the labels liberal and conservative are like shirts and skins at YMCA noontime basketball; the goal isn't to win, but to be a player in the power game.

Thus, complaints about political bias miss the point. The media bias isn't philosophical; the bias is to keep power in the hands of a mutually supporting elite that includes conservatives and liberals with the proper credentials and cultural attitudes. News and commentary are written from the perspective of insiders. That's partly why the freshmen House Republicans are often described as extremists: They don't follow Washington's demand to preserve an elitist consensus.

Going home

The most promising idea in politics in recent years is New Federalism, which seeks to devolve power from Washington to state and local governments.

Likewise, what's being called Public Journalism tries to revive grass-roots democracy by having newspapers encourage community activism - to help people take control of their own neighborhoods. The Public Journalism movement is led by such newspapers as the Wichita Eagle, the Charlotte Observer and the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot that are outside the New York-Washington-Los Angeles axis.

The New Federalism and Public Journalism are profound threats to the establishment decision-makers and journalists who exploit phony divisions between left and right when their real aim is to keep power to themselves and centered in Washington.

But more Americans are catching on to the Washington charade; they are pulling aside the curtain and seeing the wizard whose real bias is to keep pulling the levers himself.

Do you agree? Disagree? Send your response to Craig Branson, ASNE publications director. Mail them to The American Editor, 11690B Sunrise Valley Drive, Reston VA 20191; e-mail them to cbranson@asne.org.

Awbrey is editor of the editorial page at the Wichita (Kan.) Eagle, where this article originally appeared.