THERE’S even more discussion than usual in this election year about whether the news media have a political bias.

It’s an odd debate, because the answer is obviously and inescapably, “Yes.” In fact, print reporters and their editors show their lack of objectivity when they assign stories, when they report them, when they write them, when they give them headlines and when they lay them out. The same vertical bias exists in web media, on radio and on TV.

To understand how this works, it’s helpful to start with a story that’s on the political fringe. Take the attack on the World Trade Center. Around the world, hundreds of millions of people believe we attacked the WTC ourselves to provide an excuse for invading the Middle East. Even in this country, polls show that millions of Americans believe a vast coverup of the real events of 9/11 is under way, and that if our government didn’t hire the terrorists who flew planes into the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, it somehow cooperated in the attacks.

Yes, this version of the events of 9/11 is widely believed by educated people in many parts of the globe. Yet, it is never mentioned in this country by any major news organization. Even the fact that the question is raised is hardly acknowledged. Why? Because the reporters and editors who make the decisions at our media companies simply cannot give it any credibility. Most of them have never even considered the subject seriously. Everything in their upbringing, training and professional experience tells them it cannot be true. And because their conceptual framework doesn’t allow them to believe the United States attacked itself on 9/11, they pass on covering this particular story every time it presents itself and move on to something else. Something they can believe. As far as the attack on the World Trade Center is concerned, you might say American reporters and editors are all biased — and all in the same way, because they view the attack from an American perspective. They can’t help it.

On a less dramatic level, the same phenomenon takes place in almost every other story that involves controversy. No matter how hard a reporter may have tried to show no preference between, say, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama during the primary season, it simply wasn’t possible for them to remain neutral. Whether subtly or overtly, by story selection, choice of phrase, editing of photographs, or any one of a thousand other ways, most of the reporters covering the campaign showed they preferred Obama.

Likewise, during the Republican primary season, the New York Times, to name just one example, showed an overt preference on its news pages for John McCain as the party’s candidate. But as soon as he got the nomination and was pitted against Barack Obama, the paper began treating him like some alien creature barely worthy of a favorable mention.

Which brings us to last Saturday’s front page in the Monterey County Herald. The day before, John Edwards confessed to having an affair with a woman he met in a bar, and spending money from contributors to his presidential campaign to hire her as a videographer and take her on trips.

Friday night, the story was the lead on CBS, NBC and ABC. The next morning, it was on the front pages of the New York Times, the San Francisco Chronicle and the Los Angeles Times.

But the Herald put the John Edwards scandal inside. This was the Herald’s way of saying it thought the story wasn’t very important, and that (even though it only broke the day before) the other news media were overplaying it.

Was this a neutral decision borne of the Herald’s utter impartiality where John Edwards was concerned? Of course not. And the informed reader surely understood it to be a political statement — in effect, that despite his failings, in the Herald’s view, John Edwards is still a good guy.

Since it is inevitable that news coverage reflects the background, training, personal preferences and political beliefs of the people who are doing the reporting and editing, there is no reason to pretend otherwise. And it isn’t even necessary for reporters and editors to confess their lack of neutrality, as long as the news consumers understand what is going on.