Alas, Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism published its presidential election report entitled “Winning the Media Campaign” last week on one of my favorite political subjects. All together now: “Liberal Media Bias!”

The study examined 2,412 news stories from 48 news outlets for six weeks following the Republican convention, which ended on Sept. 4. The data reveal that John McCain received a larger dose of negative coverage than Barack Obama. Specifically, for McCain 57 percent of the stories appeared to be “unfavorable” in tone with 14 percent positive. For Obama it was 29 percent negative and 36 percent positive. But before jumping on the “Liberal Media Bias!” bandwagon, consider one of the key findings:

For McCain, coverage began positively, but turned sharply negative with McCain’s reaction to the crisis in the financial markets. As he took increasingly bolder steps to try and reverse the direction of the polls, the coverage only worsened. Attempts to turn the dialogue away from the economy through attacks on Obama’s character did hurt Obama’s media coverage, but McCain’s was even more negative.

Not surprisingly, the study found “horse race reporting,” which focuses on political tactics, strategy and of course polling, made up 53 percent of the newshole. A meager 20 percent focused on policy. In other words, Iraq War, government regulatory practices, health care, education and energy get to fight over the crumbs. No wonder the candidates recycled the same talking points at each debate. The national press was not probing them for real substance. The report, however, shoulders some of the blame on the tenor of both campaigns: “This focus on tactics and horse race grew in the last three weeks as both campaigns became more negative in their rhetoric.”

While the report caused a clamor in the blogosphere, particularly those sites devoted to outrage at liberal media bias (I’m not going to link to an example — there are too many. Just Google those three words and you’re off and running), at least one news outlet offered a salient explanation and a dose of self-reflection. Although Politico.com was not one of the media outlets analyzed, the Pew study prompted this must-read response, entitled “Why McCain is getting hosed in the press.”

The authors at Politico admit that McCain and Sarah Palin have been skewered in the press generally, including on Politico, for the past month:

There have been moments in the general election when the one-sidedness of our site — when nearly every story was some variation on how poorly McCain was doing or how well Barack Obama was faring — has made us cringe.

As it happens, McCain’s campaign is going quite poorly and Obama’s is going well. Imposing artificial balance on this reality would be a bias of its own.

Even the Drudge Report seemed to agree with this assessment, when it linked to the Politico.com story with the headline: POLITICO: DON’T BLAME US FOR THE BIAS, MCCAIN CAMPAIGN SUCKS…

If you don’t want to read the exhaustive Pew study (25 pages with pie charts), which I recommend you do before forming an opinion on the study’s conclusions, you can read this interview with one of its authors, Mark Jurkowitz.

Here’s a sample of what Jurkowitz said about media bias:

I would make one point about the allegations of media bias that come from web sites and the blogosphere and even some organizations that have been created to scrutinize the media. Many of those sources have more of an ideological bias than the news media they are pointing at, and that’s worth keeping in mind. …

Not only do you have an infinite number of choices when it comes to the Internet, but much of the conversation on cable news is now highly polarized, almost advocacy journalism. It may be that more people are now seeking out news sources that validate their views.

For my money, Mr. Jurkowitz stated the obvious. Internet access provides thousands of choices of political discussions, and that’s a big difference from simply turning on the TV, picking up the morning newspaper, or tuning into the drive-time radio show and expecting disciplined, impartial reporting on the day’s events.

Lastly, I’ll leave you with this quote from pollster Frank Luntz, a familiar face on Fox News. According to the Hollywood Reporter, Luntz lamented that much of the electorate tunes into cable news shows not for information but for reinforcement of pre-conceived opinions. Luntz predicted an Obama victory. He said Democrats have the edge when using the Internet, while Republicans are better at talk radio. “I’d rather have the Internet,” he said.