Corporations buying pro-GOP coverage?

Over the past week or two, I've been starting to get a strange feeling about the media being not quite on the level, and I think commenters on other blogs are starting to get this feeling too.

The Citizens United ruling enables corporations to spend as much as they want on political campaigns - and not disclose it. True to form, corporate expenditures in this campaign have increased markedly since the last cycle. And few would disagree that corporations strongly favor Republicans.

But I haven't seen any more actual campaign advertising than I usually do. In other years, the mailboxes and airwaves are already saturated with political ads well before late October, so campaigns don't really have many more places to advertise now than they did last time.

Yet at the same time, the media's actual coverage is - by far - more supportive of Republicans than I've ever seen it. This at a time when I haven't actually seen any more support for the GOP among actual people. (I see less public support for the Republicans now than at any other time since I've been old enough to notice.)

Are you thinking what I'm thinking?

I now truly believe that corporations are paying off news organizations to give favorable coverage to the Republicans. Think about it for a minute. This is technically a form of advertising, but it no longer has to be labeled as advertising, and the donors no longer have to be disclosed.

Simply put, it's advertising masquerading as news coverage.

I still avidly read "mainstream" newspapers (as difficult as that's become), and in no previous election season did I see so much coverage that seems so obviously orchestrated to write a narrative about what the election results will be. As I've said before, however, Republicans winning back Congress is not supported by polls that avoid the flawed likely voter screen - or by public opinion. Still, the media just keeps sticking to its GOP-friendly narrative, as if it's trying to create a bandwagon effect.

I'm not talking about just the media's usual right-wing bias. I've known since I was 15 that the media runs with stories that are fed to them by Republican campaigns. I'm talking about something more.

After seeing the widening disconnect between the media's narrative and actual public opinion, there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that Big Business is now paying the media generously for Republican-friendly articles. No doubt whatsoever. I think it's as much a part of their advertising budget as regular ads are.

I would BET THE FARM on it. You don't see coverage that's so friendly to a discredited party while the party continues to lose public trust, unless there's something propping up this coverage.