The lunacy that was expounded in the recent letter by Thomas W. Smee ("Notion of liberal media bias is completely off," April 15) points to exactly what is wrong with today's media. The fact that the letter was written by a graduate student of media studies should scare the hell out of us. First, Smee contends that ABC, CBS and CNN are objective news outlets. His statement that they provide a "fair and balanced" presentation of world events is laughable. By the way, I love the use of Fox News' slogan. The fact is, no news organization is unbiased. However, there are certainly more left-leaning media outlets (ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, BBC) than there are right-leaning media outlets like Fox News. Add to that, the fact that the left-leaning outlets reach about 10 times more audience, and your assertion is further disproved. The reason why Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and the like are growing in popularity is that Americans are starved for a voice other than that of the left-leaning media.

Next, Smee goes further into the realm of fantasy when he claims that, "Even if the majority of journalists are liberal, the media owners are the opposite: white, male, wealthy conservatives." Let alone the fact that Smee is obviously implying that all journalists must be black, female, poor, liberals, I hardly think that Ted Turner qualifies as a conservative media owner. Unfortunately, Smee, you're so blinded by your own liberal bias that you can't even see the hypocrisy of your own intolerant rant. You exalt the virtues of liberals, while your writing expresses veiled hatred of conservatives and those who disagree with you. You practice groupism and labeling throughout your letter. In short, you contradict all the characteristics liberals claim to stand for, or at least used to stand for -- ask Zell Miller about that.

Finally, I will give Smee credit for the one partially accurate statement in his letter. Americans are a kind and open-minded people. However, to say they would all vote Democratic if reality were allowed to run rampant is simply asinine. We, the American people, are much smarter than you give us credit for. Our founding fathers believed in a free marketplace of ideas because they trusted the wisdom of the American people. Now, if we could only debunk the myth that liberals are elitists who think they know what's best for us.