Politicians R DumbFollow

No, there is no fairness in most of Varus's statements.

God, people... arguing over what you're arguing over is SO Monday afternoon...

Um... Except that unlike both you and Varus, I don't really care if you were "surprised" or not. My point was that you were taking the same position Cat was with regard to an assumption that since the NYT is a "liberal media source", that since they broke the story, there could be no ulterior political motive for doing so. You're getting hung up (deliberately I'm sure) on whether a single word accurately describes your feelings. Who cares? Your argument clearly was that the NYT releasing the story automatically removes any thoughts that it was done at a time designed to be least harmful to the Democratic party.

I disagree with that. And presumably Varus disagrees with that too. That was what he was arguing with you about. It's not about whether you were surprised Joph.

Ok. Then why did you post this response? Sure looks to me like you are using the fact that the New York Times wrote the story to counter the suggestion that the "liberal media" might cover for a Democrat. If not, then what did you mean Joph?

Jophed,



But there is evidence. Unless of course you think Blair was the only one at the NYT making up stories.

Jophed,

What's asinine are your feeble attempts to convince us that the NYT didn't have an ulterior motive for publishing this story when they published it.

Oh and there is tons of evidence that proves the NYT is extremely liberal. They don't even pretend they're not.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/25/opinion/the-public-editor-is-the-new-york-times-a-liberal-newspaper.html





Edited, May 25th 2010 5:11pm by knoxxsouthy

I think that this is true; moreover, it is true almost universally. Remaining neutral on politically and socially charged topics is difficult, for the Times and for Time and for Fox.

I guess I think the word "neutral" in this instance requires qualification or elaboration. I think at least one form of neutrality is both very easy to achieve and incredibly harmful, and it seems to be the way many middle of the road news agencies go. That form of neutrality is to unequivocally give equal credibility, respect, and time, and temper to all perspectives. It's an artificial balance that masks the best and worst arguments of all sides.

As it stands, I feel that often that often one can be better informed by viewing two oppositely polarized news sources that make no attempt to be fair than by viewing two neutral news sources whose lean is the average of those two polarized sources.

At least one form of neutrality in news not only makes it uninteresting to most viewers, but also makes it not useful.

Edited, May 25th 2010 8:17pm by Allegory

I agree. But it's also worth noting that the additional danger with the "neutral" approach is that it may not actually reflect a middle position at all. And if that happens gradually over time, most of the viewers (and presumably those in the news business themselves) wont even notice it.

When I was in my "Why does everyone bash Fox news. I guess I'll go watch and see what they're talking about" phase, I did a comparison of a news segment shown on CNN to one on Fox News. Both segments had the same format (one host, 4 guests on a panel), and both segments covered the exact same topic. What was startling to me is that the 4 CNN panelists perfectly encapsulated the entire range of views represented by the 2 "liberal" panelists on the Fox News show. The views of the 2 conservatives on that show were not present at all in the CNN segment.

I really really wish my old DVR hadn't died (or that I'd thought to record that onto a DVD or something). It was incredibly eye-opening about how subtle bias can be. It wasn't that they presented and rejected certain viewpoints, but that they just weren't present in the discussion. Say what you will about Fox (and they've done some silly things as well), their format at least does put actual liberals and actual conservatives together to present opposing viewpoints. What you get on most news shows is variations of one side of the issue presented to the public as though it's a full range of views. And if that's all you see, how would you know you're missing anything?

Really? Because I seem to remember a decent amount of scandals from both sides recently.

God, why does the media always give GOP candidates a pass. I guarantee you that if this was a liberal candidate they would be holding on to the story to give it more play during elections.

Actually, I wasn't surprised that the NYT ran the story at all as much as I was surprised that they weren't beaten out by the Moonie-funded Washington Times or the WSJ.

Silly Joph, everyone knows IOKIARDI.