News Sources

[1engineer]

Precursor:
I have an 88 year old father in law who watches CNN and FOX all the time. He does not own a computer or cell phone lol. I read a lot of posts on here that like to blame, cite or ridicule the big news agencies like Fox, MSNBC, CNN and all the newspapers.

I read many sources, from Politico to CNBC, from Drudge to census.gov, from eia.gov to theonion.com along with many blogs, both liberal and conservative and look at such sites as politifact.com and factchecker.com. This is for national news. I DO NOT listen to many "pundits" or "talking heads" much at all. They are paid to express those positions, even though I'm quite sure they don't believe all of them. For local news I rely on local TV channels and the local newspaper and ignore the left/right lean and spin.

Eventually, on such topical subjects as the current scandals like the IRS and Bengazi and global warming, even though conflicting reports are the norm throughout the sources listed above, there are common facts and conjecture among enough of them that the real story starts to take focus. THAT'S when I feel confident I know enough of what's going on to form an opinion.

So, how do you guys get your news? Calling any source "trash" without merit is funny. Relying on any one source without evaluating several is irresponsible if you want to form an unbiased, educated opinion, even if ultimately it flies in the face of your liberal or conservative core views.

Again, even such obviously slanted organizations as Drudge or Huffingtonpost both serve up common facts on the same story, even if the author is leaning one way or the other.

Anyone else like this? Are most of you like lemmings and blindly follow your favorite source who happens to think exactly like you? Just curious.

 

[bofa]

I do not trust any single source. If I want to peruse the news I typically start with Yahoo or Google since they tend to pull multiple news sources. I think at some level all news outlets or individual reporters have some level of bias. I may still read it (rather I agree or not) but I try to weed out the conjecture and personal opinions. If I find a topic that heavily interests me I will usually run a search on the topic and try to sample from multiple sides to form my own opinion.

But if I want a good laugh, the Onion or the Colbert Report are it.

 

[T4RLaredo]

Most of my news is from the local newspaper and newsroom.

Have you ever watched the Bill Maher show on HBO? By no means is it a news source, but he does try to discuss the most relevant headlines and discusses the view points with his guests. The simplicity, sarcasm and his "New Rules" segment are some of my favorite things about the show.

Even though I don't agree with everything, I do agree with most of the viewpoints and that's what's keeps me coming back to the show... the sense of everyone gets to discuss their opinion in a live setting.

Check it out and see what you think.

 

[1engineer]

Most of my news is from the local newspaper and newsroom.

Have you ever watched the Bill Maher show on HBO? By no means is it a news source, but he does try to discuss the most relevant headlines and discusses the view points with his guests. The simplicity, sarcasm and his "New Rules" segment are some of my favorite things about the show.

Even though I don't agree with everything, I do agree with most of the viewpoints and that's what's keeps me coming back to the show... the sense of everyone gets to discuss their opinion in a live setting.

Check it out and see what you think.

You really might want to watch something that will offset that liberal opinion with something conservative. The real truth will be somewhere in the middle. Remember he is a talking head, who gets paid to toe the liberal party line regardless of the truth. People like Limbaugh do the same on the other side. Those guys are there strictly for entertainment, not news. If you use either side exclusively you will be totally misinformed.

 

[ddnww]

fox news = propaganda

 

[KCcarguy]

Ok, I'll be the first to admit....I'm a FOX News watcher. I know they are biased, but so is everyone else...pick your poison. For what it's worth, I think it's important that each point a view have a voice. People get upset about X-network being biased. But I'd rather have multiple voices and points of view than just one. I think it's good for all of us. I like Fox precisely because they challenge what the government is doing. I think the most important role of the media is to call the government out and keep them in check. I've only been watching for the past 5-6 years (when I finished grad school and had time for such things). I'll be interested to see what happens if we get a Republican president.....will FOX news fall in line or keep it up? Something tells me fall in line; in which case I'll be changing news stations.

I also try and watch NBC news (before local news) in the morning but it's usually just hollywood/ personal-interest crap so I end up turning it. I'll also watch a little MSNBC a few times a week to see what the other side is talking about. And I'm also guilty of reading the crap headlines/ stories on Yahoo.

 

[KCcarguy]

fox news = propaganda

And everyone else is strictly neutral? Put down the Kool-Aid.

 

[1engineer]

fox news = propaganda

Hahaha dude, If you listen to a pundit from any source, it's ALL propaganda. They get PAID to spout a position lol. Read the news, read it again from another source, then another. When you find the common threads from both left and right then you will know the story.

 

[1engineer]

Ok, I'll be the first to admit....I'm a FOX News watcher. I know they are biased, but so is everyone else...pick your poison. For what it's worth, I think it's important that each point a view have a voice. People get upset about X-network being biased. But I'd rather have multiple voices and points of view than just one. I think it's good for all of us. I like Fox precisely because they challenge what the government is doing. I think the most important role of the media is to call the government out and keep them in check. I've only been watching for the past 5-6 years (when I finished grad school and had time for such things). I'll be interested to see what happens if we get a Republican president.....will FOX news fall in line or keep it up? Something tells me fall in line; in which case I'll be changing news stations.

I also try and watch NBC news (before local news) in the morning but it's usually just hollywood/ personal-interest crap so I end up turning it. I'll also watch a little MSNBC a few times a week to see what the other side is talking about. And I'm also guilty of reading the crap headlines/ stories on Yahoo.

When Bush was in office they were hard on him too, although not as bad as they were Clinton or Obama. Unfortunately there is not any neutral place anymore, simply because the actual sources (government, law enforcement, lawyers, etc) are spinning it from the beginning. You have to go to multiple sources if you care about knowing the truth, or as close to it as possible.

 

[KCcarguy]

When Bush was in office they were hard on him too, although not as bad as they were Clinton or Obama. Unfortunately there is not any neutral place anymore, simply because the actual sources (government, law enforcement, lawyers, etc) are spinning it from the beginning. You have to go to multiple sources if you care about knowing the truth, or as close to it as possible.

Good point.

 

[Quatre Coureur]

I get my local news from the local big 3(abc,cbs,nbc) which are all liberal(its LA), and the Left Angeles Times(aka DNC Weekly), but I know that going in. As for cable I'll switch between Fox and Msnbc just to hear both ends of the spectrum. As a moderate, I tend to end up watching Fox more often because they tend to present both sides of an issue whereas Msnbc is left and far-left. Bill Maher had a show called 'Politically Incorrect'. It was thee most PC garbage u could imagine.

 

[ddnww]

Hahaha dude, If you listen to a pundit from any source, it's ALL propaganda. They get PAID to spout a position lol. Read the news, read it again from another source, then another. When you find the common threads from both left and right then you will know the story.

somewhat agree.. I believe all news media is propagandic information. none of the news stations inform us of the real truth nor do they talk about the real issues. except maybe pbs.. and that's just a maybe.

 

[MtnT4R]

I read t4r.org for all my news

 

[ddnww]

I read t4r.org for all my news

^^^ genius

 

[MtnT4R]

^^^ genius

Haha you know, its interesting though. When reading any news article, you need to cut through the journalistic bs to get down to the quantifiable facts. And then, the facts presented are only ones that support the author's argument, and as anyone who has ever taken statistics knows, numbers can easily be skewed to support any particular stance on an issue.

With the off topic section here, we get the news of the day, followed by analysis posted by people who are qualified to do much more than spout nonsense through their mouth holes on tv. Oh, and you all help me fix my T4 too. :thanks:

 

[JohnnyT]

For overall news across many topics, the NY Times is amazing. For current happenings in tech, science, health, travel, auto, career, finance, real estate, etc etc it's a great one stop shop.

For political news, it is just one source across many that you need to consider across various slants. I think the actual political "fact" made known to the common citizen is a very very small percentage not only because of the slant of the organization but much because of miniscule amount of what is released for consumption before the spin.

I actually know people who will not read the N.y Times because of their political bias. That's like not liking Toyota and not buying a 4runner because you don't like the design of the Venza.

 

[Ol'Blue]

Sourcing

^^^^ The only real B%^&# I have with the NYT is when they dropped names on where we are holding some really bad dudes over seas. Other country's have opened doors to help and the NYT really Fed allot of people over that one. To the point of National Security as I read in places. I have to find it again and post it up.

I know people have agendas and all but in most cases Media dose a crappy job on properly sourcing information.

I guess that is why Undergrad BA/BS is all about theses and sourcing right for Grad School.

Blue

 

[RandyDaytona]

Precursor:
I have an 88 year old father in law who watches CNN and FOX all the time. He does not own a computer or cell phone lol. I read a lot of posts on here that like to blame, cite or ridicule the big news agencies like Fox, MSNBC, CNN and all the newspapers.

I read many sources, from Politico to CNBC, from Drudge to census.gov, from eia.gov to theonion.com along with many blogs, both liberal and conservative and look at such sites as politifact.com and factchecker.com. This is for national news. I DO NOT listen to many "pundits" or "talking heads" much at all. They are paid to express those positions, even though I'm quite sure they don't believe all of them. For local news I rely on local TV channels and the local newspaper and ignore the left/right lean and spin.

Eventually, on such topical subjects as the current scandals like the IRS and Bengazi and global warming, even though conflicting reports are the norm throughout the sources listed above, there are common facts and conjecture among enough of them that the real story starts to take focus. THAT'S when I feel confident I know enough of what's going on to form an opinion.

So, how do you guys get your news? Calling any source "trash" without merit is funny. Relying on any one source without evaluating several is irresponsible if you want to form an unbiased, educated opinion, even if ultimately it flies in the face of your liberal or conservative core views.

Again, even such obviously slanted organizations as Drudge or Huffingtonpost both serve up common facts on the same story, even if the author is leaning one way or the other.

Anyone else like this? Are most of you like lemmings and blindly follow your favorite source who happens to think exactly like you? Just curious.

I really don't watch the news much. That said, I think the most unbiased source for news happening in the U.S. is the BBC. When I was a Navy intel officer in the reserves, it was actually considered to be fairly reliable as far as "open source" intel.

They seemed to routinely report on things U.S.-related with a degree of accuracy that was at or above the same level as U.S. news outlets, but without the politicalization/slants we usually get over here. Probably because they don't have a dog in the fight, I guess.

 

[-JD-]

I would agree about the BBC. I also found Al-jazeera to be a pretty reliable news source. I'm also not so sure that this dichotomy you all see really exists. I'm far from a news junkie but I have seen far more biased, stupid or flat out wrong information come out of fox news than any other news source.

As for the person who commented on Bill Maher's show I actually really enjoy it. Yes, Bill is liberal leaning, but he makes an effort to have conservatives on his panel for every show so that both sides of the issues can be represented. Although this is obviously more of a current events show than actual news reporting. Funnily enough he had a government official on a few months ago ( i cant remember who) but he commented that the Bill Maher show seems to be one of the last places on television you can go to have a reasonable debate based on fact with both sides getting a fair chance to represent themselves. Something I would like to see more of, whether the host is liberal leaning or conservative.

 

[Thai]

I also found Al-jazeera to be a pretty reliable news source.

:roadkill:

Ahhh, THAT explains your oddball views on matters.... :tsk:

For me, i watch both CNN and Fox. MSNBC is junk...geez, they are so far liberal that it isn't even funny! I have PULSE app on my phone...and have CNN, FOX, and local news (ABC).