OT: Best Journalism?

I hear that Che's favorite news organization is the CIA mind control satellites that George Soros uses to beam messages directly into his brain.

Actually, it depends. When he puts on his tin foil hat and it stops the mind control rays he hates them. But then he slips up and the mind control ray gets through. Than he LOVES the messages.

The Chicago Tribune newspaper does better investigative reporting than any other local news service. They've broken a ton of stories that would never have otherwise come out, like the red light camera fiasco. The company that got the contract bribed city officials, then to guarantee revenue they shortened the yellow lights at specific locations in 2 week time periods. The Tribune exposed the whole scam.

Actually, Dougsteer, even though I ripped on the WSJ, I've had paid subscriptions to center-right publications like WSJ and Econmomist for something like 20 yrs. As far as the WSJ, the news reporting itself is well-written and objective and the investment advice is sometimes pretty good. Stopped reading the editorial section, though. They had Steven Moore for years, a hack that went on to be chief economist of the Heritage Foundation. Steven Moore is an example of what stupid people think a smart person sounds like.

I personally like WaPo, NY Times, Krugman's blog, VOX, Salon. Note that I listen to both sides (even listen to you) -- so stop calling me a parrot, you trolling lunatic.

I definitely don't rely on the BBC for impartial journalism. Sky TV is much more objective and is not left leaning like the BBC. I'd agree with you Dougster that the Middle East coverage is much better and they have an outstanding journalist in a guy called Jeremy Bowen, what he doesn't know is not worth knowing.

I heard FOX is very bad over there??

I used to think the same about 60 minutes as you, Dougster, but then I had the opportunity to watch an interview they did with the Commandant of the Marine Corps. As a condition of granting the interview at all, CMC got a copy of the full recording, including outtakes.

First we watched what they aired, and then we watched the entire interview. Two completely different things. I lost all respect for them at that point.

Balancing BBC and Fox works out to about right. :)

Npr and the bbc.

For articles it's more about individuals than organizations.

The New York Times. It's the only news I have a paid subscription to.

"I heard FOX is very bad over there??"

But they have a tradition of putting on the air some über hot babes in short skirts.

Best- John Matisse on Fox business worst- anything on msnbc

Stossel. ...damn phone

@Londonguy: Fox is not really "news", it's conservative political rhetoric so they preach to the choir. They frequently invent their "facts" and always misrepresent the liberal viewpoints. MSNBC is the most liberal of the news and while they do editorialize as well, they seem much more aware of actual conservative viewpoints. Regular network news like CBS, NBC and ABC are all about the same as far as objectivity goes, and they're all straight down the middle.

Thanks for that info rockstar. I wished our national broadcaster was straight down the middle. For such service we have to watch Sky TV which isn't free to air.

For my day to day news I listen to NPR

When I was on the road for business last summer I stumbled across Al Jazeera America on cable. It seemed to have more actual news and a better international perspective than any of the typical US networks. Of course they will never become widely popular over here because 1) their name. 2) not enough political blowhards or celebrity puff pieces. Americans are proud of their ignorance.

Everytime I see the word BBC, I think of the term big black cock in porn lol.

^^ lol...I have thought that as well.

@likestolook: Well said. Most Americans are really unaware of the true nature of the issues we talk about, because we get our "news" in politically motivated sound bites, as opposed to more lengthy discussion of the actual ramifications of the issues. The Sunday TV news network (i.e. not Fox) shows are about as incisive as we get as far as mass media goes.

One thing that does slightly disappoint me during my visits to your country is the lack of access to world news on the TV. Granted I am very rarely in my room and even when I am most of the time I am either sleeping of shagging.

"One thing that does slightly disappoint me during my visits to your country is the lack of access to world news on the TV"

I doubt most Americans are interested in world. I'm guessing most Americans in the US cannot name either the PM of either Canada or Great Britain while I will bet almost 100 percent of the citizens of those countries can name the current US president.

@Che: Regarding Bloomberg, I find they provide relatively little editorializing and prognostication. (Mostly) just the facts.

OTOH, I actually like to follow editorials and prognostications. Not because I think they are accurate, but precisely because they are so inaccurate. So inaccurate, in fact, that you use them as a contrary indicator reliably. One of the reasons I spend far more time reviewing CNBC than I do Bloomberg . Not to mention that CNBC has a much wider audience. (I have my DVR set to record everything on CNBC for the last five days during North American market hours and then CNBC world to capture what is going on overseas.)

Sometimes it feels like there's almost a conspiracy when the editorials and prognostications are going full blast in one direction. Like they are trying to get everyone to believe one thing so they can swing the market the other way and make a ton of money. I saw that happening in October and was why I was completing certain taking exactly the opposite position as the no minds on TUSCL, Stevie-girl in particular who just get their opinions spoon fed to them by whatever biased media source feeds their confirmation bias and minimizes their overall cognitive dissonance.

I don't think it's exactly a conspiracy that it works like this: not like the media is deliberately lying. I think it's more the media reacts one way naturally and it builds to a hype and then when the big money see that, does nothing, and then they know it's time to make their move in the opposite direction. A little later the media comes along to what was the opposite of their original view.

I have heard though that editors have a big influence in what gets printed/aired and are part of a conspiracy to manipulate the masses. So they let reporters write as they wish and don't say they have to write a certain way, but then they decide what makes it to the press and what doesn't. I don't quite believe this, however, although I think the middle east coverage in the US is so bad it might be the exception to this rule. Or other exceptions in the case of war.

Regarding Frontline and 60 Minutes: To make my list something doesn't have to be close to 100% good. 50% good is a homerun as the media is concerned in my books. 60 minutes is good by that standard and Frontline is higher still.

I like doom and gloom as much as the next person, I just keep in mind that the media has a bias to attract viewers. And I also know about this calculated deception which goes on. How passive very active it is something I have not completely made up my mind on.

I should also mention that Netflix has a some very good documentaries along with some very bad ones. Maybe on top 5 list one of these years?

@Dougster: You'll note that I didn't say that I don't watch 60 minutes, only that I no longer respect their opinions. You asked about "best" journalism. :)

My view on 60 minutes, and many other news sources these days, is similar to your take on financials. If they're lambasting somebody, he's probably not a bad guy, if they're praising him, I'll move my wallet to my front pocket and keep my hand on my pistol. :)

A good thread of comments.

Generally I only see the worst reporting in the US.

First is propagandizing for parent company - a new movie coming out, actual product announcements disguised as news, a subsidiary of the parent "doing good for the community," etc. If you know who owns who, you know what to look for.

Then are the clearly agenda driven stories. They don't even play at the pluses and minuses of a story (that would entail critical thinking I suppose.) Just, this is bad. This is good. They tend to put out theories as fact. (Global warming, poverty causes crime, etc. there are many!) Thus since it is a "fact" no one can deny it as they would be seen as a crank.

And there is a lot of flat out fabrication in the news. The Lacross team rape, colleges are nothing but rape zones, the rape of so and so cuz she was black (uh what?), so and so was shot cuz of an angry white guy police officer (eh, you want the laws changed, go after the legislature!), sitting in a canoe during a hurricane while people slosh in ankle deep water in the background.

Then non-stories of corporations being blackmailed for support money of this cause or that, etc.

The latest are the ISIS stories - everyone who has a clue can see they are made in front of a green screen most of the time. Yet there are reporters scouring google maps for the territory.

Most on the ground reporters in the US are just plain stupid (you must have to be a rube to get through "journalism" school in the US as it is more of a re-education camp) and the anchors are beauty pageant winners who play down their intelligence.

There is a LOT wrong with US media these days.

@londonguy. here’s the answer to your question. Fox News is one of the LEAST biased of the major news organizations. that is unless you are going to believe rockstar666 and zipperhead68 when they try to tell you that the Koch brothers secretly bought UCLA to use as a front to put out right wing talking points disguised as in depth academic research using legitimate methodologies.

newsroom.ucla.edu

Media bias is real, finds UCLA political scientist

While the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal is conservative, the newspaper's news pages are liberal, even more liberal than the New York Times. The Drudge Report may have a right-wing reputation, but it leans left. Coverage by public television and radio is conservative compared to the rest of the mainstream media. Meanwhile, almost all major media outlets tilt to the left.

These are just a few of the surprising findings from a UCLA-led study, which is believed to be the first successful attempt at objectively quantifying bias in a range of media outlets and ranking them accordingly.

"I suspected that many media outlets would tilt to the left because surveys have shown that reporters tend to vote more Democrat than Republican," said Tim Groseclose, a UCLA political scientist and the study's lead author. "But I was surprised at just how pronounced the distinctions are."

"Overall, the major media outlets are quite moderate compared to members of Congress, but even so, there is a quantifiable and significant bias in that nearly all of them lean to the left," said co author Jeffrey Milyo, University of Missouri economist and public policy scholar.

The results appear in the latest issue of the Quarterly Journal of Economics, which will become available in mid-December.

Groseclose and Milyo based their research on a standard gauge of a lawmaker's support for liberal causes. Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) tracks the percentage of times that each lawmaker votes on the liberal side of an issue. Based on these votes, the ADA assigns a numerical score to each lawmaker, where "100" is the most liberal and "0" is the most conservative. After adjustments to compensate for disproportionate representation that the Senate gives to low population states and the lack of representation for the District of Columbia, the average ADA score in Congress (50.1) was assumed to represent the political position of the average U.S.voter.

Groseclose and Milyo then directed 21 research assistants — most of them college students — to scour U.S. media coverage of the past 10 years. They tallied the number of times each media outlet referred to think tanks and policy groups, such as the left-leaning NAACP or the right-leaning Heritage Foundation.

Next, they did the same exercise with speeches of U.S. lawmakers. If a media outlet displayed a citation pattern similar to that of a lawmaker, then Groseclose and Milyo's method assigned both a similar ADA score.

"A media person would have never done this study," said Groseclose, a UCLA political science professor, whose research and teaching focuses on the U.S. Congress. "It takes a Congress scholar even to think of using ADA scores as a measure. And I don't think many media scholars would have considered comparing news stories to congressional speeches."

Of the 20 major media outlets studied, 18 scored left of center, with CBS' "Evening News," The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times ranking second, third and fourth most liberal behind the news pages of The Wall Street Journal.

Only Fox News' "Special Report With Brit Hume" and The Washington Times scored right of the average U.S. voter.

The most centrist outlet proved to be the "NewsHour With Jim Lehrer." CNN's "News Night With Aaron Brown" and ABC's "Good Morning America" were a close second and third.

"Our estimates for these outlets, we feel, give particular credibility to our efforts, as three of the four moderators for the 2004 presidential and vice-presidential debates came from these three news outlets — Jim Lehrer, CharlieGibson and Gwen Ifill," Groseclose said. "If these newscasters weren't centrist, staffers for one of the campaign teams would have objected and insisted on other moderators."

The fourth most centrist outlet was "Special Report With Brit Hume" on Fox News, which often is cited by liberals as an egregious example of a right-wing outlet. While this news program proved to be right of center, the study found ABC's "World News Tonight" and NBC's "Nightly News" to be left of center. All three outlets were approximately equidistant from the center, the report found.

"If viewers spent an equal amount of time watching Fox's 'Special Report' as ABC's'World News' and NBC's 'Nightly News,' then they would receive a nearly perfectly balanced version of the news," said Milyo, an associate professor of economics and public affairs at the University of Missouri at Columbia.

Five news outlets — "NewsHour With Jim Lehrer," ABC's"Good Morning America," CNN's "News Night With Aaron Brown," Fox News' "Special Report With Brit Hume" and the Drudge Report — were in a statistical dead heat in the race for the most centrist news outlet. Of the print media, USA Today was the most centrist.

An additional feature of the study shows how each outlet compares in political orientation with actual lawmakers. The news pages of The Wall Street Journal scored a little to the left of the average American Democrat, as determined by the average ADA score of all Democrats in Congress (85 versus 84). With scores in the mid-70s, CBS' "Evening News" and The New York Times looked similar to Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., who has an ADA score of 74.

Most of the outlets were less liberal than Lieberman but more liberal than former Sen. John Breaux, D-La. Those media outlets included the Drudge Report, ABC's"World News Tonight," NBC's "Nightly News," USA Today, NBC's "Today Show," Time magazine, U.S. News & World Report, Newsweek, NPR's "Morning Edition," CBS' "Early Show" and The Washington Post.

Since Groseclose and Milyo were more concerned with bias in news reporting than opinion pieces, which are designed to stake a political position, they omitted editorials and Op Eds from their tallies. This is one reason their study finds The Wall Street Journal more liberal than conventional wisdom asserts.

Another finding that contradicted conventional wisdom was that the Drudge Report was slightly left of center.

"One thing people should keep in mind is that our data for the Drudge Report was based almost entirely on the articles that the Drudge Report lists on other Websites," said Groseclose. "Very little was based on the stories that Matt Drudge himself wrote. The fact that the Drudge Report appears left of center is merely a reflection of the overall bias of the media."

Yet another finding that contradicted conventional wisdom relates to National Public Radio, often cited by conservatives as an egregious example of a liberal news outlet. But according to the UCLA-University of Missouri study, it ranked eighth most liberal of the 20 that the study examined.

"By our estimate, NPR hardly differs from the average mainstream news outlet," Groseclose said. "Its score is approximately equal to those of Time, Newsweek and U.S. News & World Report and its score is slightly more conservative than The Washington Post's. If anything, government funded outlets in our sample have a slightly lower average ADA score (61), than the private outlets in our sample (62.8)."

The researchers took numerous steps to safeguard against bias — or the appearance of same — in the work, which took close to three years to complete. They went to great lengths to ensure that as many research assistants supported Democratic candidate Al Gore in the 2000 election as supported President George Bush. They also sought no outside funding, a rarity in scholarly research.

"No matter the results, we feared our findings would've been suspect if we'd received support from any group that could be perceived as right- or left-leaning, so we consciously decided to fund this project only with our own salaries and research funds that our own universities provided," Groseclose said.

The results break new ground.

"Past researchers have been able to say whether an outlet is conservative or liberal, but no one has ever compared media outlets to lawmakers," Groseclose said. "Our work gives a precise characterization of the bias and relates it to a known commodity — politicians."