What news outlet/resource informs, and doesn't try to influence?

Discussion in 'Politics' started by wegs, Jun 24, 2019.

  1. Neddy Bate Valued Senior Member

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    One party tries to give affordable health insurance to people, the other tries to take it away. If you see that as faint praise for the one party, then maybe you are falling for the 'both sides do it' trick.
     
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  3. Seattle Valued Senior Member

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    As Norm McDonald used to say "The more I learn about that Hitler fellow, the less I like him". The pandering Democrats are better than the pandering Republicans.
     
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  5. Seattle Valued Senior Member

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    Not on the health care issue. Health care providers tend to support the Republican Party. Try getting any legal reform done.
     
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  7. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    We enter the bubble world.
    In point of fact, I'm the one not insulting, or ranting, or posting falsehoods about other people. If you find that difficult to believe, simply reread your posts and imagine me posting anything like that directed to you. Or check out
    No. You are once again parroting Republican spin.
    Nothing in this thread sets up any such "bothsides" situation except your own posting, which does.
    It's an observation, not an "accusation". And it is completely accurate.

    You are claiming to have arrived at the exact same viewpoints, vocabulary, priorities, rhetorical formats, and erroneous revisions of established historical and political fact,

    - not just the same general assessments and opinions, in other words, but the same factual errors and bullshit phrases and unwarranted assumptions

    - as the Republican media propagandists have been pushing for decades now in their billion dollar media campaign to change the terms and ideological framework of American politics, and successfully imposed on all the major news outlets in the US,

    completely and exclusively via your own firsthand experience with physical reality and personal observations. By coincidence, in other words (the errors and false revisions of history and misrepresenting vocabulary cannot be via common source in reality).

    That is essentially impossible. You would be more likely to have won the lottery, or broken the house in Las Vegas.

    No one is questioning your desire to gain better understanding, etc etc. Your sincerity is not in doubt, your person has never been criticized or even questioned. No one has called you names, even when you posted slander and falsehood. No one has even called you a Republican - which would be namecalling in this context. But you are in fact posting Republican propaganda - same vocabulary, same "bothsides" rhetoric, same errors of historical and political fact, same viewpoint of "the media", same declaration of an inability to find straight news while demonstrating an inability to recognize it outside of the Republican propaganda pushed "both sides" frame you have explicitly bought into, same everything,

    and now you present the same basic reaction as every stereotypical Republican defender here has to being informed - politely, in civil and courteous terms, and with multiple examples directly quoted - that what you have been posting is largely identical with that professionally generated Republican Party propaganda. You start calling people "liars", accusing them of personal harassment, endorsing posts like #64 here (a straight up attempt at bullying, btw - so now you know what that looks like, and what it looks like to be accused of that by me), acting as though people were picking on you for having opinions they disagree with, etc.

    Take it as a reality check: you say you want to free yourself from Partisan rhetoric and bs, and find instead sources of straight and accurate news reporting; that implies you do not want to remain in the bubble world of Republican Party media corruption.

    So are you willing to step outside it? Accept information from outside "bothsides"? Give straight news its due regard?
    You will have to, at some point in your escape from the Republican bubble, learn to identify a"left" news outlet. The identifications you have posted so far on these threads are straight from the Republican propaganda spin marketers.

    If you think a "left" news outlet is one that focuses on spinning "Trump at it again" (which is an obsession of rightwing propaganda feeds, by turns defending, deflecting to Hillary or Obama, and lifeboat building), if you still think CNN or MSNBC is a "left" news outlet, you have a lot to learn. But a sincere effort would not take that much time.

    Suggestion:
    1)Thom Hartmann's dull and undramatic call-in show, which is televised on Free Speech TV. He is the best informed news and analysis show anchor you will find on TV - if solid information is what you want, there you will find it. Lefty viewpoint, of course.
    2) "Vice" - a showcase of sort of filmed magazine articles, which often presents a left viewpoint on its topics as well as the standard American capitalist take. That would fit well with a "both sides" approach that did in fact incorporate two or more "sides".
    3) An archive of major US news articles, opinion essays, and TV reports from August of 2002 until August of 2003 (covering the last few weeks of the elections of 2002, the gut check War Powers vote that 135 Democrats and a couple of Republicans passed, and the beginning of the wakeup from the Republican Party delusion marketing that sold invasion and military occupation of Iraq.) The focus there might be not right and left but right and wrong - after making two lists, who got the big things about the most important American governmental decision since WWI right and who got them wrong, you can review the lists and see what else the listees had in common.
     
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  8. Seattle Valued Senior Member

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    Iceaura, how do you imagine that Republican strategists have been so successful as to have taken over the message on all networks? That's an amazing statement. One that I'm afraid you can't backup without making up things.

    Have they taken over MSNBC? What is your expertise in this area?
     
    wegs likes this.
  9. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    I doubt wegs is. I honestly believe whoever that is, when they claim unawareness. They seem perfectly sincere. And that is irrelevant.

    Meanwhile, for the fourth or fifth time, as if it were not obvious and as if it were anybody's business: the value of confronting such posting - and this has nothing to do with the poster personally - is as an attempt at preventing the unopposed takeover of political discussion by Republican propaganda framing.

    The election of 2004 proved that the danger of letting a fascist Party's contrived bullshit pile up unconfronted until it drowns the public arena is very great. Without direct and continual objection it becomes conventional wisdom, taken for granted as the basis for all respectable media discussion, incorporated into policy justification in the real world - and governing by fantasy leads to disaster.
    They are not the same in that respect - not even close.
    The Democratic Party is unduly influenced. That's bad.
    The Republican Party is completely subservient - it can be fairly described as representing certain corporate interests, not "influenced" by them but incorporating them as its own. That's much worse.
    The Democratic Party has some (too many) corrupted politicians , politicians who solicit corporations for money and support and deliver votes accordingly, politicians who win office largely on the basis of ideological agreement with corporate interests and big donors.
    The Republican Party has essentially no uncorrupted members - every Republican politician is either bribed by corporate donors or supported by corporate interests on the basis of their agreeable ideology.

    That is not "the same", either specifically (handling the new D House members as if they were equivalent in their corruption by corporate interests to the new R House members is simply wrong, right?) or in general (when W petitioned for War Powers in Iraq, 135 Dems and iirc 1? maybe 2? Reps voted against - in the face of the corporate interests pressing for war. Had Congress been safely Democratic the US might not have invaded Iraq).
    Explanatory analogy: tolerance in machined engine parts. Some slop is inevitable - it's not good, not desired, but it's not worth the trouble and expense to get rid of it; the engine runs. Too much slop and the engine either seizes or blows - it's not worth the trouble and expense of building the engine.

    The current Reps are so far out of tolerance they are the wrong shape. They voted for a full scale foreign war of conquest and cut taxes on the rich in the same budget year, for chrissake. Then they left the War off the budget, to hide the extra deficit spending they had created.
     
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  10. Beaconator Valued Senior Member

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    Between One America News Network and Redacted Tonight you probably can't go wrong on decent views and intelligent rhetoric.
     
  11. Seattle Valued Senior Member

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    Are you self-appointed in this role of your's?

    Yes, the Republicans aren't of much value. What's new? That doesn't mean we should speak a lot of time "praising" the Democrats.
     
  12. iceaura Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    30,994
    No imagination involved: just listen (or read, better) to the news as delivered.
    Listen to the major news anchors, the people in charge, and pay attention to what they say.

    It's framed as the Republican Party line is framed, down to the finishing nails. Try to find, for example, the term "right wing Democrat" used on a major news network as a routine description of anybody currently in Congress or running for President. There's quite a few of them, after all - Klobuchar, Biden, Gillebrand, many local politicians, etc. The entire Dem Party establishment is solidly to the right of the polled majority of American citizens on most major issues. But no matter: The Republican propaganda frame is that the entire Democratic Party has moved far to the left (compared with what, they don't say), and that's how the news is framed. To get even a hint of the wild notion of a right wing Democrat, you have to hit the fringes: https://www.realclearpolicy.com/articles/2018/04/02/the_rise_of_the_right-wing_democrat.html

    Btw: You never noticed it was missing. How do I have such confidence? Because you posted I would have to make things up to present Republican Party propaganda framing in a major news scene completely dominated by "both sides" takes on each and every major issue or person. Silly boy.

    But mere bothsides framing and consistently warped vocabulary, though obvious and definitive, is not enough to move the needle for you guys. So what else can you do, for your education?

    You could, for example, watch film of Brian Williams - a big shot news manager at the time, a guy who told the talking heads on a major network what they were to say and how they were to say it - lecturing Matt Taibbi on his lack of "both sides" perspective and "respect" for Trump supporters as revealed in Taibbi's completely accurate and evenhanded and firsthand reports of interviews and descriptions of events at the many Trump rallies Taibbi had personally attended over months of shoe leather journalism.
    Except you will have to search the lefty blogs for an archived copy, I think. It used to be easy to find, but not any more for some reason.

    You could do a little research into the opinions of the people in charge of framing the news on the major respectable media:
    Here's Mathew Dowd, the guy in charge of framing the news at ABC, the guy who tells the talking heads how to frame issues and what words they are allowed to use on TV and so forth:
    https://crooksandliars.com/2017/01/matthew-dowd-calls-obamas-farewell-address
    "Arrogant" was of course one of the Republican propaganda feed's common and recommended adjectives to apply to Obama at all times - even to his plans to make a routine speech.
    Expanded for context: https://driftglass.blogspot.com/2019/06/matthew-dowd-is-fundamentally.html
    And another:
    Note: "Corrupt duopoly" was a Republican propaganda feed term - part of the "bothsides" schtick.
    Another? Ok:
    Whoops, I can't find the Matthew Dowd staff memo where he demands of his news deliverers that every mention of Trump's accusers (rape, etc) be immediately and simultaneously paired with a mention of Clinton's emails.
    So enough time wasted - finish with this:
    https://www.vox.com/2019/2/19/18231993/cnn-gop-operative-2020-election-coverage
     
  13. wegs Matter and Pixie Dust Valued Senior Member

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    Thanks for the suggestions, but...OAN is ''Trump supported'' I've read (I'm looking for a completely unbiased news source), and Redacted is a political comedy series on Hulu? lol I have Hulu, and haven't run across that, hmm. I did a quick search though, and it seems to be supportive of Repubs.

    I think I'm falling for The Economist, but time will tell if it lets me down. Interesting article about it here - https://medium.economist.com/is-the-economist-left-or-right-wing-2e04700ac76

    Are you a Republican, Beaconator? I've wandered into the Mueller thread a few times, and I think you are, but thought I'd ask. No worries, I'm just curious

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

    Do you feel that the majority of news outlets are geared towards supporting Trump and Republicans?
     
  14. Seattle Valued Senior Member

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    8,856
    https://www.businessinsider.com/mos...erica-cnn-fox-nytimes-2018-8#11-abc-news-4-11

    ABC is seen as one of the least biased news organizations.

    Are you this involved/interested in the politics of your own country? Just curious.
     
  15. Beaconator Valued Senior Member

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    The RT channel I have has more sources of news than just the comedy. Redacted tonight criticizes most forms of stupidity equally. It criticizes trump on occasion Though not to the extent you would find on the daily show with Trevor Noah and his unending use of trump as a punchline. They do a pretty good job of reporting on news missed by the main stream on a global level.

    One America news just has the most intelligent conversations between policies and "cause and effect" I've been able to find. Tipping point with Liz Wheeler shows good morals. The international news is reported well. National news is done well. The channel as a whole only shows opinions where opinions are scattered and does a great job of providing possible solutions and factual education on topics that might be hard to understand.

    They just had a former gang member on their show who is going against AOC in the next election and he is going to win because he educated himself above all the lies he was told growing up that she vehemently and blindly believes.

    I support reason more than either party.

    I do believe most news outlets support trump either directly or by their inability to have intelligent conversation to the contrary.

    A good example of this is the "does not exonerate" quote which CNN continued to run after it disseminated a gross confirmed misunderstanding of its use. Not to mention its second possible definition to mean "remove from duty or obligation". So it could be said the report does not remove trump from his duty.
     
  16. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    Not "they taken over", of course - do at least pretend to pay attention - but the framing and vocabulary and so forth of respectable mainstream news reporting was acquired from Republican propaganda feeds
    Meanwhile, after revising the question so it has something to do with my posting: Of course - Chuck Todd is one of the most famous exponents of "both sides", much mocked for the lengths he will go to in hammering anything into that mold (both sides sink to the bottom, he once said, describing Trump being horrible and Clinton pointing out that Trump was being horrible), lifelong partisan Republican Joe and Mika were so far in the tank for Trump they became a punch line as well as the anchors of the longest and most heavily promoted news and analysis show on MSNBC, Chris Hayes graduated from crushing on the masculinity of a prancing W strutting his junk under a "Mission Accomplished" banner to lame excuse mongering for outright evil, the centrist anchor and savior of the franchise via sheer competence - an Eisenhower Republican, Maddow accurately labeled herself - under the barrage of Republican agitprop became an "extreme leftist", leading to management defending its "bothsides" credentials by getting rid of anyone even slightly to the left of her (ratings be damned).
    "Is seen"?

    That's why the example - Matthew Dowd, a major influence (with his close associate Karl Rove) behind the rhetoric of W's nasty and lie-filled 2004 campaign, endorser and enabler of the Swiftboat slandering of Kerry, lifelong Republican partisan,

    now paid big bucks to be the chief political analyst of "unbiased" ABC news

    caught spouting wingnut Republican propaganda terminology and requiring - formally, written - that ABC news deliverers bend all of reality to maintain a "both sides" perspective on every single issue,

    is or should be telling.

    More Dowd, telling us about the principles governing ABC news reporting, from a blog that has done us the favor of archiving some of the high points:
    http://driftglass.blogspot.com/2017/12/matthew-dowd-remains-fundamentally.html
    http://driftglass.blogspot.com/2018/02/matthew-dowd-is-fundamentally.html (This one provides several Dowd tweets that will sound quite familiar to anyone who has been reading the posts I have been responding to here).
    http://driftglass.blogspot.com/2016/11/matthew-dowd-is-fundamentally.html
    http://driftglass.blogspot.com/2018/10/matthew-dowd-is-fundamentally.html
    That was the week before the vote. The FBI investigation into Clinton was still center news despite having been completed months before, the FBI investigation into Trump was in stride in secrecy, due to selective leaking by the FBI and a lack of serious investigation by journalists into Trump.
    http://driftglass.blogspot.com/2016/11/matthew-dowd-is-fundamentally.html
    And the blog-linked article about Dowd's becoming a critic of W after engineering his re-election in 2004 (yes, children, ABC's chief political analyst has done the reputation-preserving two-step into the bothsides lifeboat from a sinking Republican he helped put into office before) https://www.salon.com/test/2007/04/05/matthew_dowd_2/

    The only way ABC news can "be seen" as relatively unbiased is if the adopted definition of "unbiased" has nothing to do with physical facts or events as they took place, but rests instead on adherence to a "both sides" balance of claims and assertions and propaganda feeds between Democrats and Republicans; formally equal time for what are treated as competing propaganda feeds of equivalent validity, without regard for the reality involved.

    And since Dowd confirmed - in writing, on Twitter and in staff memos - that that was his policy throughout the 2016 campaign and well into Trump's first term, and casual observation confirms that news reports from ABC have been conforming to that policy at least until last month or so, it's safe to say that is a fact of ABC political news.

    That is the definition of "unbiased" on ABC - and that is also the Republican propaganda feed's frame for assessing bias in the media. A Republican propaganda feed that ABC's chief political strategist helped set up and formulate and fill with "content".

    ABC under Dowd has explicitly adopted the Republican propaganda feed frame for all of its news reports. MSNBC has filled its hours with the likes of Todd and Morning Joe, and adopted the priorities as well as the vocabulary of the Rep media feed.
    Want to try CNN?
    Comedy, intended as yet another personal attack in lieu of discussion or argument. The Bandar-log do not learn.
     
    Last edited: Jul 25, 2019
  17. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    And we don't. Certainly I don't, here.
    The deflection from an accurate assessment of the Republican Party's horrorshows to a supposed glorification of the Democratic Party, which then becomes the topic of discussion, is a standard tactic of course. Fox pundits do it a lot. It's a basic component of the bothsides meme - criticism of one side means praise of the other, on Planet Bothsides (it's flat, like a coin), so they get to pick which side they want to subject to the barrage of bs they have preloaded.

    That specific response is one of the most frequent, to my posts here. And as usual, it arrives fact and example free - not even a misread quote.

    So what's your point? - besides trying to downplay the extent of the Republican Party's depravity and incompetence at governing, that is. "Aren't of much value" is not how one normally describes disasters, crimes, betrayals of country, organized child abuse, and the like.
     
    Last edited: Jul 25, 2019
  18. Seattle Valued Senior Member

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    If I had to guess who was a paid propaganda poster on Sciforums you would be my only guess. You post daily on only one subject, nothing positive and it's all about a political system and country that isn't even your own country.

    How is Putin doing these days in your opinion? What is your opinion of politics in the UK and Australia?

    No one gets up in the morning and decides to rant all day on the politics of another country. Your common attempt at deflection is to say that I'm trying to make it personal. Of course. Your motivations are the topic.
     
    Last edited: Jul 25, 2019
    wegs likes this.
  19. Neddy Bate Valued Senior Member

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    Not that it matters, but I have to wonder where Wegs (and now Seattle) got the idea that iceaura is not from the US. I have been reading iceaura's postings for a long time, and they seem pretty obviously based in the US. I am guessing there is a case of mistaken identity here.
     
  20. wegs Matter and Pixie Dust Valued Senior Member

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    ...

    Meh, don't want to talk about a guy I have on ignore, now.
     
    Last edited: Jul 25, 2019
  21. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    Try the BBC.
     
  22. Beaconator Valued Senior Member

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    1,486
    You want affordable health care? Become a doctor.
     
  23. Beaconator Valued Senior Member

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    • Please post on topic, and avoid gratuitous and inappropriate sexual references.
    Big black C**K?

    Ill just stick with doctor who.
     

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