Regarding the daily "Top News Story Compilations" posted on the home page. (1 Viewer)

Just to address questions I've received about the daily "Top news compilations" that I compile and post on the home page (everything bothers someone), here is what I look for:

I try to focus on political news articles coming from the least biased sources, AP, Reuters, NPR, The Hill, Politico, BBC, WSJ, etc. I simply look for headlines that I feel would most interest the viewers.

Where national MSM media like FOX, CNN, MSNBC are concerned, and are known for showing agenda. I will only tease the articles that do not contain what I perceive as agenda driven spin, deception, or sensationalism, and I steer clear of their opinion wings pieces, which are the main sources of misleading and dishonest contributions. The caveat is that I don't always read the entire articles, and often not much beyone the first paragraph due to time constraints.

If I am unfamiliar with a source, I will then go to mediabiasfactcheck.com and search for them to check their reputation for bias.,

Below are examples of non MSM sources that fall within bias ranges that I do not link original articles from:

Daily Kos:

LEFT BIAS

These media sources are moderately to strongly biased toward liberal causes through story selection and/or political affiliation. They may utilize strong loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes), publish misleading reports and omit reporting of information that may damage liberal causes. Some sources in this category may be untrustworthy. See all Left Bias sources.

• Overall, we rate the Daily Kos strongly Left Biased based on story selection that almost exclusively favors the left. We also rate them Mixed for factual reporting due to non-vetted content as well as a few failed fact check and misleading claims.

---------------------------------------------------------

The Blaze:




RIGHT BIAS

These media sources are moderately to strongly biased toward conservative causes through story selection and/or political affiliation. They may utilize strong loaded words (wording that attempts to influence an audience by using appeal to emotion or stereotypes), publish misleading reports and omit reporting of information that may damage conservative causes. Some sources in this category may be untrustworthy. See all Right Bias sources.

• Overall, we rate The Blaze strongly Right Biased based on story selection that almost always favors the right and Mixed for factual reporting due to a few failed a check and loaded emotional headlines.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

...and of course I ignore the extremes like:

Brietbart:


QUESTIONABLE SOURCE

A questionable source exhibits one or more of the following: extreme bias, consistent promotion of propaganda/conspiracies, poor or no sourcing to credible information, a complete lack of transparency and/or is fake news. Fake News is the deliberate attempt to publish hoaxes and/or disinformation for the purpose of profit or influence (Learn More). Sources listed in the Questionable Category may be very untrustworthy and should be fact checked on a per article basis. Please note sources on this list are not considered fake news unless specifically written in the reasoning section for that source. See all Questionable sources.

• Overall, we rate Breitbart Questionable based on extreme right wing bias, publication of conspiracy theories and propaganda as well as numerous false claims.

--------------------------------------------------
Occupy Democrats:

• Overall, we rate Occupy Democrats Questionable due to extreme left wing bias, promotion of propaganda and conspiracies as well the publication of fake news as evidence by numerous failed fact checks.

------------------------------------------------------
I also use various media bias charts such as the one below as guides and try to keep within the middle three ranges as much as possible:




Last thing. As most know I identify as a moderate, and independent. I don't care about left/right agenda, but only the truth. That doesn't mean that I read every article that I link to. Some I do, others I don't. Time constraints often limit what I can read, but I do like providing a daily news synopsis. This is evolving as I get further into it, and if you have an issue with any of this, I am open to discussing it here.

-Andrus

I will say that reading the front page news has given me an insight into why we are so polarized as a society. When two sides can both report the same political incident with one saying it proves one thing and the other saying it proves the opposite. There is no objective truth anymore. Just varied degrees of slant and spin. I definitely think we need to stay in the middle three columns, the extremes are just that, extreme!

Zardnok said:

I will say that reading the front page news has given me an insight into why we are so polarized as a society. When two sides can both report the same political incident with one saying it proves one thing and the other saying it proves the opposite. There is no objective truth anymore. Just varied degrees of slant and spin. I definitely think we need to stay in the middle three columns, the extremes are just that, extreme!

Click to expand...

Not faulting Andrus, but if you look back at his OP, it seems that he is conflating truth with centrism — this is a victory for Roger Ailes
In the current way we view things, one size day the earth is round, the other says it’s flat and we just assume the truth is the earth is shaped like a football
Now I do mostly hold to the post-modernist idea that there is no universal viewpoint. Which does mean that there are multiple valid perspectives
So instead of looking for Truth, we should focus on the verifiable- the 3% of scientists who do not believe in climate change should not be enough to throw doubt on the whole concept, but politically- for all intents and purposes- that 3% allows us to be evenly split about incredibly solid/verifiable science

The ‘sign of the times’ is that the country, like the board, focuses on the balance of ideologies and not on verifiability

I understand why the country and the board focuses on ‘can't we all just get along’ - but that certainly feels like a feedback loop

GMRfellowtraveller said:

Not faulting Andrus, but if you look back at his OP, it seems that he is conflating truth with centrism — this is a victory for Roger Ailes
In the current way we view things, one size day the earth is round, the other says it’s flat and we just assume the truth is the earth is shaped like a football
Now I do mostly hold to the post-modernist idea that there is no universal viewpoint. Which does mean that there are multiple valid perspectives
So instead of looking for Truth, we should focus on the verifiable- the 3% of scientists who do not believe in climate change should not be enough to throw doubt on the whole concept, but politically- for all intents and purposes- that 3% allows us to be evenly split about incredibly solid/verifiable science

The ‘sign of the times’ is that the country, like the board, focuses on the balance of ideologies and not on verifiability

I understand why the country and the board focuses on ‘can't we all just get along’ - but that certainly feels like a feedback loop

Click to expand...

Sure, there is some truth to what you say. But, I'd say agenda's aren't trustworthy. And all of the sites he listed have clear agenda's. I have no issue with official site pushed news being a bit more 'sanitary'. People are still free to post Op-Ed's or other biased reporting that shows a version of the truth you're getting at.

That being said, the ones he posted the graphics to, what's I'd argue is most important, is that the "factual reporting" is mixed, at best. That's not good enough.

BTW, thank you for the transparency. I thought you had it on an auto feed.

wardorican said:

Sure, there is some truth to what you say. But, I'd say agenda's aren't trustworthy. And all of the sites he listed have clear agenda's. I have no issue with official site pushed news being a bit more 'sanitary'. People are still free to post Op-Ed's or other biased reporting that shows a version of the truth you're getting at.

That being said, the ones he posted the graphics to, what's I'd argue is most important, is that the "factual reporting" is mixed, at best. That's not good enough.

Click to expand...

And tbc I’m not faulting Andrus or other mods or centrists in general- I get why we’re here
And to have a more ‘verifiable ‘ vs ‘ideological ‘ impulse would require an unsustainable manpower increase
But the dynamic set up that allows Democracy Now or Mother Jones to be dismissed out of hand is ... troubling

I had no idea that three of the major networks were considered to be "Left" sources of information. ABC, CBS and NBC. So when I watch the national news, it's got a left slant to it? I've certainly never felt that way. (Fox is the only major network that doesn't have daily national news at 5:30, so their cable channel is the only option.)

I love the earth-shaped football analogy, as it accurately frames the unfortunate paradigm shift of truth vs. untruth in the current era. And I don't endorse all of the particular characterizations above re: political bias. But I don't think I could fashion a more appropriate solution than what Andrus has proposed, in terms of keeping as many people as possible at the discussion table.

wardorican said:

BTW, thank you for the transparency. I thought you had it on an auto feed.

Click to expand...

The actual teasers that show up below the compilations (those with accompanying photos) are autofeeds. The only items that I am posting are those contained in the daily compilations.

Generally speaking, it had occurred to me that depending on where you stand politically, specifically if a person subscribes to the views of media outlets landing on either fringe, one might perceive even those categorized as the least biased on these bias charts as being quite biased to them personally.

I don’t think that I am conflating centrism with truth, as much as stating that I believe that more truth in reporting will come from the entities landing the middle, with less partisan slant.

As far as the autofed news teasers that sit below the daily compilation, I don’t pretend to subscribe to a lot of what comes up on that feed. At times some of those articles raise an eyebrow. The feed consists of media outlets that first, offered available RSS political feeds, and secondly landed clear of the fringes. I did want that feed to represent politics across the political spectrum for the sake of offering perspective and to show MAP’s neutrality.

Edit: I wanted to add that the media bias charts that you find online vary in opinion. For example, The chart I posted above as an example is different and less broad in scope than the one below coming from Ad Fontes media.

Andrus said:

Generally speaking, it had occurred to me that depending on where you stand politically, specifically if a person subscribes to the views of media outlets landing on either fringe, one might perceive even those categorized as the least biased on these bias charts as being quite biased to them personally.

I don’t think that I am conflating centrism with truth, as much as stating that I believe that more truth in reporting will come from the entities landing the middle, with less partisan slant.

As far as the autofed news teasers that sit below the daily compilation, I don’t pretend to subscribe to a lot of what comes up on that feed. At times some of those articles raise an eyebrow. The feed consists of media outlets that first, offered available RSS political feeds, and secondly landed clear of the fringes. I did want that feed to represent politics across the political spectrum for the sake of offering perspective and to show MAP’s neutrality.

Edit: I wanted to add that the media bias charts that you find online vary in opinion. For example, The chart I posted above as an example is different and less broad in scope than the one below coming from Ad Fontes media.

Click to expand...

One of my favorite charts.

Except, I'd say the Weather Channel during a Hurricane is when they go into CNN mode!

Not sure why I find it interesting that AlJazeera is rated as centrist with such a high reliability rating.

Zardnok said:

Not sure why I find it interesting that AlJazeera is rated as centrist with such a high reliability rating.

Click to expand...

I haven’t followed them much since AJ+ folded, but it was a dang good info/news site

GMRfellowtraveller said:

I haven’t followed them much since AJ+ folded, but it was a dang good info/news site

Click to expand...

Wasn't there a New Orleans Al Jazeera created a few years back? I vaguely remember something like that happening.