What does a TRUMP presidency look like?

[grumbler]

Does that make it incorrect?

It makes it incomplete.  All stories are incomplete, but if you understand a bias, you will understand the elements of the story being left out.  It's inherent in the nature of communication, but that doesn't mean it isn't potentially a problem.

[CountDeMoney]

Does that make it incorrect?

It makes it incomplete.  All stories are incomplete, but if you understand a bias, you will understand the elements of the story being left out.  It's inherent in the nature of communication, but that doesn't mean it isn't potentially a problem.

I wasn't asking you.  You already knew the answer.  I was asking Mr. A Right Winger.

[grumbler]

I wasn't asking you.  You already knew the answer.  I was asking Mr. A Right Winger.

[DGuller]

If you want to have faith in journalism, you should probably avoid stories about the subjects you know well.  The desire for a compelling and clear narrative can be really corrosive to honest reporting. 

That said, there is a big difference between being a journalist gathering facts selectively and selectively interpreting them for the sake of a better story, and being a propaganda mouthpiece getting blood money for spreading falsehoods.  Putting those two evils on the same level is yet another exercise in false balance, used to either defend the worst of the worst or to enable them.

[Admiral Yi]

I'll bite.  What's the difference?

[Jacob]

I'll bite.  What's the difference?

How are they the same?

[DGuller]

I'll bite.  What's the difference?

I'll bite and answer.  The difference is intent.  The classical journalists intend to tell the truth but somewhat compromise their ideals somewhere down the line.  Fox News, RT, etc. "journalists" knowingly lie to you, and remain uncompromising in their mission to brainwash you into an unthinking vegetable.

[Admiral Yi]

I'll bite and answer.  The difference is intent.  The classical journalists intend to tell the truth but somewhat compromise their ideals somewhere down the line.  Fox News, RT, etc. "journalists" knowingly lie to you, and remain uncompromising in their mission to brainwash you into an unthinking vegetable.

How do you determine intent?  Percentage of truth told vs. other sources you already trust, or some other metric?

[Valmy]

I don't trust the media, but while I do think that much of the media is biased (often unconsciously), I think the real problem with them is incompetence, not bias.

Why?

Because it's pretty clear that people who work in the national media, as a whole, are more heavily liberal and lean more heavily toward the Democratic party than the public at large.  I think most of them try to be professional and unbiased, but they're human;  some of their bias is going to creep in, even if they aren't aware of it.

As for the incompetence, look at how many stories posted here have sparked some degree of outrage, but the outrage has subsided once we got more information and realized that many things in the story were incorrect, or that important details had been left out.

Well they are becoming more and more independent as time goes on.



28% is much higher than 7% but lower than the public at large. I can certainly see how covering these political parties can do that to you.

[Tonitrus]

Comparing party affiliation and political leaning is mostly meaningless.  And the so-called "independent" classification has pretty much always been so.

[DGuller]

I'll bite and answer.  The difference is intent.  The classical journalists intend to tell the truth but somewhat compromise their ideals somewhere down the line.  Fox News, RT, etc. "journalists" knowingly lie to you, and remain uncompromising in their mission to brainwash you into an unthinking vegetable.

How do you determine intent?  Percentage of truth told vs. other sources you already trust, or some other metric?

I use a biological neural net algorithm pre-trained with evolutionary optimization and iterated a little with life experience.

[grumbler]

Comparing party affiliation and political leaning is mostly meaningless.  And the so-called "independent" classification has pretty much always been so.

This seems to me to be breathtakingly silly.  Are you really claiming that there's virtually no correlation between party affiliation and political leaning (i.e that it is "mostly meaningless")?  That right-wingers are as likely to be Democrats as Republicans?

And your second sentence is pure gibberish.  If you think independents are only "so called," what is your alternate word for them, and why is your word better than the traditional one?  And what is it that that they have been "pretty much so?"

[garbon]

At the same time, in the US, with party affiliation so easy to be changed, I'm not sure how much weight I'd give it. I mean, I've often swapped until the current day when the Republican party has achieved its final decadent form.

[CountDeMoney]

I can see how conservatives would be suspect of the journalistic process and the tenets or journalism (fact-finding, interviewing, verifying, fact-checking, and editing).  Sounds too much like the scientific method.

[Oexmelin]

And your second sentence is pure gibberish.  If you think independents are only "so called," what is your alternate word for them, and why is your word better than the traditional one?  And what is it that that they have been "pretty much so?"

Research in political science for the last 20 years tends to show that self-described independent act politically pretty much exactly as democrats or republicans (according to their professed leanings). The sliver of independent voters who can't fit political patterns from parties is much smaller than the number of self-proclaimed independents.