After a long first year at Brandeis that kept my focus far away from current events, I couldn't help but spend much of the summer catching up. I've taken quite a bit of time during these past few months lazily perusing articles online, watching the news and even flashing back to the 1990s by reading an actual newspaper. Being very politically inclined, I can't help but gravitate toward stories concerning the Republican presidential primary race for the 2012 election.

At some point during an election season, some candidates and their supporters tend to perceive some sort of media bias and cry foul. Most of the time, allegations of unfair coverage are minor and tend to be ignored; however, in this primary race, there has been an undeniable prejudice among the mainstream media—television news and newspapers—against Texas Congressman Ron Paul.

The more time I spent learning about the Republican candidates, the more interested I became in Congressman Paul. Of course, that was partly a result of our similar views on liberty and America's wars overseas, but it was also because I found myself perplexed by how little coverage from the media he received. Considering the current influence of the Tea Party in the GOP and the general desire to change the status quo, I found it very strange that a Constitution-first, liberty-minded candidate with the most fiscally conservative voting record on all of Capitol Hill was getting so little attention. After all, one would think that such a candidate would be the darling of the Tea Party and anyone else who wished to depart from the past decade's expansion of federal authority.

Though Paul's name had been constantly marginalized since his 2008 presidential bid, his supporters were optimistic that if he placed well in the Ames Straw Poll in Iowa, it would legitimize his primary run and bring him to the forefront of the election. Despite having a historic number of votes and finishing only 152 votes behind the winner, Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, Paul's participation in the poll was all but forgotten by hosts on news programs including Fox News and CNN, among many others.

Several commentators, most of whom are Web-based, have blown their whistles at the mainstream media. Perhaps most notably, comedian Jon Stewart lashed out against the blatantly dishonest "reporting" and even pointed out an instance in which a CNN host said on the air that they would avoid playing any footage of Ron Paul preaching his message. Another one of Stewart's clips reveals a group of Fox News hosts establishing Michele Bachmann as a member of the "top tier" in the Republican primary as a result of her first-place finish at Ames. The hosts then proceeded to glorify a candidate who did not place in the top three, all with no mention of Ron Paul, the runner-up by a hair.

The bias goes deeper than a few "gotcha" moments caught by a comedian's writers, however. According to the nonpartisan Pew Research Center, Ron Paul is the third-least-mentioned candidate in the media among the GOP field. Given the supposed importance of a victory at the Ames Straw Poll, which was enough to propel Bachmann to the front of the primary race in the media's eyes, one must ask why the man who missed first by nine-tenths of a percentage point is, according to Pew's study, considered a newsmaker only one-fourth the amount of times that Bachmann is.

The answer is obvious: There is a strong tendency among the media to marginalize Paul's campaign. To me, it seems that many among mainstream Washingtonians would prefer one of their own to a stalwart opponent of the status quo. Regardless of the media's motive, however, people from all points on the political spectrum can agree that when the media seem to be attempting to influence the outcome of an election, it can greatly jeopardize the integrity of the democratic process. Demanding that the media be forced to give each candidate a fair shake would not be consistent with the ideal of maintaining a free press.

The beautiful thing about having a free press, however, is that we have the liberty to choose the presses to which we pay attention. I would advise against gathering information passively—by sitting in front of a television or flipping through a publication, as I mistakenly did too often these past few months. This is a surefire way for you to only hear about what those news sources want to discuss. Instead, I would suggest actively seeking out the full story online. If you hear about an interesting new poll on television, but they only mentioned how two of the candidates placed, seek the full version on the Internet.

This applies to far more than elections, though. For the first time in human history, every person has the ability to choose what information they receive. The web is the most valuable tool at our disposal; with it, we can gain a broader understanding of the world around us and amass the knowledge necessary to maintain our liberties. The responsibility to take the initiative is at your fingertips.