IN A Washington Post column calculated to provoke a chorus of incredulous scoffs from talk radio hosts around the country, E.J. Dionne avers that Barack Obama's policy agenda is hampered by a "media environment that tilts to the right":

At first blush, this flies in the face of the right's conventional wisdom—and indeed, of the assessment of journalists themselves: 32% identify themselves to pollsters as "liberal", while only 8% self-describe as "conservative". But Mr Dionne's column also provides a hint at the solution to the contradiction: Democrats themselves have done their best to bolster the perception that Mr Limbaugh—highly unpopular outside the conservative base—is the face of modern conservatism. This may, as Mr Dionne suggests, be a strategic error, insofar as it shifts the boundaries of what is seen as mainstream political discourse. But Republican elected officials don't seem to regard it as a gift either. They are reluctant to openly criticise the influential Mr Limbaugh, and often seem to find themselves compelled to backpedal when they do. Yet it seems increasingly clear that party officialdom regards him as something of an albatross.

So is this a sort of perverse conspiracy? Liberal journalists helping to raise the profile of Newt Gingrich and Rush Limbaugh as part of a crafty campaign to assist Barack Obama? Like most forms of media bias, I suspect it's more subtle than that. No journalist with a scintilla of professional pride will consciously introduce a political agenda into his stories, but one's background worldview does inevitably make a difference when it comes to deciding which stories or claims don't smell right and require double-checking, as opposed to those it's safe to run with. Something similar may influence decisions about who is "newsworthy" on the left and right.

Given that political partisans are apt to have caricaturish views of the other side, consider who a hardcore conservative might seek out to represent the "liberal view" on a given position. Noam Chomsky? Ron Kuby? A moderate liberal might regard those folks as interesting, but is likely to be at least faintly embarrassed by them as well. Someone trapped in a conservative cocoon, for whom "liberals" are scary monsters you only read about, would be more likely to regard them as representatives of the "true" liberal position, even if elected officials are too mealy-mouthed to openly avow it. It may be that left-leaning journalists make a parallel error, then: They may enjoy Jon Stewart's program, but recognise him as an entertainer, not a serious political leader whose views represent any broader movement. They're too far from Mr Limbaugh, however, to see him in the same light.

"We are what we pretend to be," wrote Kurt Vonnegut in his novel "Mother Night", "so we must be careful about what we pretend to be." A political corollary, if this is correct, may be that our opposition becomes who we pretend they are. If the contest, after all, is framed as one between Barack Obama and Rush Limbaugh, then even those on the right who might otherwise resent the association may feel obliged to defend the radio talker, with the effect of pushing reality to more closely resemble caricature. The upshot is a thesis you're unlikely to hear floated on "The O'Reilly Factor" anytime soon: The liberal media doesn't recognise the existence of moderate, reasonable conservatives—which means outrageous blowhards take centre stage.

There may also be something of a feedback-loop effect here. Consider the following, from a recent article by the Nation's Chris Hayes:

"Most Republicans aren't waking up every day thinking, How do we kill banking regulation?" says Goehl. "Most people who listen to Rush Limbaugh aren't waking up thinking about how do we kill banking regulation. But the people with the deep pockets who have power in DC are thinking that. "I sometimes get frustrated because it seems like the left isn't focused on corporate power. We like to talk about the Sarah Palins and Rush Limbaughs, and meanwhile the American Bankers Association is one of the main entities running the country." And while most of us can name the latest moronic utterance from Limbaugh or Michael Steele or Newt Gingrich, the Ed Yinglings of the world remain comfortably anonymous. "I watch people click," says a friend who works at a web publication. "If you put a story on Sarah Palin at the way, way, way bottom of the page and a piece on the ABA in a screaming header on top, the Palin story would get more page views."

This is, I think, partly a function of two contrasting narratives partisans have about each other. The left's narrative about the right is that conservatives are loud, dim, and boorish, and so partisans on the left enjoy reading stories about conservatives who play to type. The right's current narrative about the left is that they're effete snobs who think they know better than everyone else—and there's nothing quite as satisfying as watching a supercilious facade collapse into anger. Conservatives who buy this narrative, then, may be more likely than their counterparts to consider it a cardinal virtue that someone is capable of annoying liberals. The race to the bottom proceeds from this weird symbiosis.

(Photo credit: AFP)