New York Times and Confirmation Bias

A member of a Korean unification research team writes for the Catholic Peace Weekly column on current affairs. He gives his opinion on an article written for the New York Times by David Sanger, who wrote in a headline on the front page of the Times that "North Korea deceived Trump" showing some photos of a missile site in North Korea. He is a veteran reporter with many honors— both the reputation of the reporter and the authority of the New York Times did not allow doubts about the missile site. (The article can be read  understanding the bias without need to see it as dishonest, but easy to understand why the writer had difficulty.)
 
However, the New York Times article, which reported the site as a "hidden base," was reported by the Joint Chiefs of Staff to the Korean domestic media that a short-range missile was launched from that site in 2016. The New York Times' news was a bit faded. To attract readers' attention, it is often the practice to add stimulants to an article, and the New York Times is no exception. However, it is a distorted report when the  US-ROK intelligence agencies looked into the military base in the North and maintain that it is an unreported site and a huge deception. (The New York article did say 'suggests' deception).
 
Even before the date was set for the negotiation with the North in March, they had pictures of the North Korean site. Therefore, this shows clearly the United States' mainstream media's bias toward the North Korean problem. This 'confirmatory bias'  (the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms one's preexisting beliefs or hypotheses) is based on the belief that Kim Jong-un will not change, and even if he changes, it will only be temporary. Therefore, they are only interested in finding evidence that their North Korean allegations are correct. If you fall into a 'confirmation bias', you will see only what you want to see, facts become irrelevant and inflexibility overrides logic.

Politicians are the easiest people to fall into 'confirmation biases'— political arguments when to their advantage they deliberately ignore objective evidence that conflicts with their claim. President Trump seems to be an incarnation of 'confirmation bias'.

But in attacking Trump's North Korean policy, we should not ignore the mainstream media's 'confirmation bias' and close our eyes to the facts and flaws of logic. Politically, the 'confirmation bias' has existed since the very beginning of political party politics, and, can be cleaned at any time by the votes of the citizens.
 
However, we don't have a vote on the media. When the press gets caught up in the 'confirmation bias', it relies only on processed information for political attacks, instead of working to find the facts. The coverage of the media exists breathing in the political and social context in which they exist.

Professional journalists will not dispense themselves from the  "5W1H" way of reporting.  Bob Woodward of the Washington Post, who uncovered the Watergate affair, says he still advises his juniors to "bite the hand that feeds them". The media should not jump into political battles but only objectively report the conflicts.