3 ms·

NPR is pretty left leaning. I certainly wouldn't call them unbiased. As for where to go I agree with the other comments. There is no unbiased news. I say ch

by SamAtt 16y ago

NPR is pretty left leaning. I certainly wouldn't call them unbiased. As for where to go I agree with the other comments. There is no unbiased news. I say check both. Add Fox News to your NPR habit and you should be fine.

mambodog 16y ago
Haha, now come on, surely* NPR wouldn't be equal to Fox News' level of bias and sensationalism... how about NPR + HuffPost? ...okay, yeah, I don't get why NPR is in there, either. * As surely as a non-American who just samples a lot of American media could say, at least. [edited: I guess that came out wrong... not intended to slag off NPR. Or are people just sensitive about HuffPo?]
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- cgranade 16y ago
  Certainly doesn't help to pick two right-leaning sources, anyway. I've never gotten where this whole idea that NPR is a liberal outlet comes from.
  - mambodog 16y ago
    I don't know why anyone would be regularly consuming any such obviously/strongly biased sources. I'd be concerned that spending too much time amongst poor journalism and extreme views, they might just start to seem more 'normal' or 'acceptable' when they are really potentially very damaging/hurtful our (your?) society as a whole. Certainly, sample some of it from time to time, to get a feel for what people are consuming, but there are more sensible options. For example, here in Australia I read a mix of The Age (moderate left bias) and the Australian (moderate right bias), and also sometimes the Australian Financial Review (surprisingly centrist, pleasantly free of sensationalism).
- mkramlich 16y ago
  I like HuffPo but lately I've begun to feel they're a bit Fox News-y except in the other direction. Though I don't exactly think it's an evil direction to be leaning in.
  - mambodog 16y ago
    I definitely enjoy some of their articles, I just singled them out mainly because they come to mind as an online news source with a clear left-lean. Still, while the politics stuff is usually well written, they bring themselves down a few notches with trash like the 'Celebrity Skin' section. Also, the 'Living' section is full of quackery, with amazing articles like this one about how having an enema would protect you from Swine Flu: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kim-evans/swine-flu-protect-yoursel_b_191550.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kim-evans/swine-flu-protect-yo...
cgranade 16y ago
I fail to see how adding a channel which makes a business out of blatantly lying about whatever issue they touch makes anyone fine. The case of Fox News is part of why I said we need to move beyond the whole "unbiased" versus "biased" debate to get to the real problem of downright fraudulent coverage.
Daishiman 16y ago
I don't know under what standards you can ever consider Fox News to be "news". They go beyong having a difference of opinion into outright lying and misstating facts. Taking into consideration the opinions of liars is now way to clear your own biases.
physcab 16y ago
NPR and Fox News? More like Fox News and Comedy Central.
mcknz 16y ago
Add MSNBC to your Fox habit and you should be fine. MSBNC is left-leaning. NPR does a lot of international reporting and stories regarding the arts, which I think is why they sometimes get unfairly labeled as left-leaning. If you take a look at a typical NPR story, they have time to go into enough depth to give reasonably equal time to different sides of an issue or debate. I was listening to Talk of the Nation recently and a conservative PA rep who is pro-Arizona immigration reform was given a lot of time to speak uninterrupted. Had that person been on MSNBC he would have been cut off quickly and questioned. I agree there's no one source for unbiased news -- you have to read/listen to a lot of sources and examine critically.
- cgranade 16y ago
  I think it's a real mistake to throw MSNBC into anything other than the "right-wing" column. Yes, they have Olbermann and Maddow, which are both good, fact-based shows with obvious and upfront ideological viewpoints, but that's overwhelmed by people like Scarborough, Buchannan, Matthews, etc. The presence of Olbermann and Maddow on MSNBC speaks mainly to that they do not want to appear to be as rightward-leaning as they actually are, and to the fact that fact-based programming, regardless of bent, enjoys a real lucrative niche. BTW, I think people have forgotten what a "liberal" looks like if Olbermann is held up as the extreme of the left wing. Remember, America is in the middle of recovering from one of the most severe ideological swings in recent memory, and so things that previously were center or even slightly right-wing are now seen as being extremely liberal. For instance, Obama's health plan is extremely similar to that proposed by the Republicans in the mid 1990s. Point being, bias can be seen relative to the zeitgeist, from which view MSNBC etc can be seen to attempt to steer conversation rightwards by making issues such as "deficit reduction" more discussed than issues such as "unemployment." Olbermann and Maddow spend much of their time defending their own views, and rarely set the tone of the conversation.
  - philwelch 16y ago
    I think in general, Americans have completely forgotten the distinction between liberal and leftist. It also bears mentioning that the status quo before Obama's health care plan was, for the most part, proposed and enacted by leftist Democrats over the past several decades, and the maintenance of those systems has been seen as right-wing or centrist when their creation in the first place came from the left. The few actual right-wing reforms to health care (such as the HSA) are in fact weakened by Obama's reforms.

by SamAtt 16y ago

mambodog 16y ago

Haha, now come on, surely* NPR wouldn't be equal to Fox News' level of bias and sensationalism... how about NPR + HuffPost? ...okay, yeah, I don't get why NPR is in there, either. * As surely as a non-American who just samples a lot of American media could say, at least. [edited: I guess that came out wrong... not intended to slag off NPR. Or are people just sensitive about HuffPo?]

deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
cgranade 16y ago
Certainly doesn't help to pick two right-leaning sources, anyway. I've never gotten where this whole idea that NPR is a liberal outlet comes from.
- mambodog 16y ago
  I don't know why anyone would be regularly consuming any such obviously/strongly biased sources. I'd be concerned that spending too much time amongst poor journalism and extreme views, they might just start to seem more 'normal' or 'acceptable' when they are really potentially very damaging/hurtful our (your?) society as a whole. Certainly, sample some of it from time to time, to get a feel for what people are consuming, but there are more sensible options. For example, here in Australia I read a mix of The Age (moderate left bias) and the Australian (moderate right bias), and also sometimes the Australian Financial Review (surprisingly centrist, pleasantly free of sensationalism).
mkramlich 16y ago
I like HuffPo but lately I've begun to feel they're a bit Fox News-y except in the other direction. Though I don't exactly think it's an evil direction to be leaning in.
- mambodog 16y ago
  I definitely enjoy some of their articles, I just singled them out mainly because they come to mind as an online news source with a clear left-lean. Still, while the politics stuff is usually well written, they bring themselves down a few notches with trash like the 'Celebrity Skin' section. Also, the 'Living' section is full of quackery, with amazing articles like this one about how having an enema would protect you from Swine Flu: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kim-evans/swine-flu-protect-yoursel_b_191550.html http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kim-evans/swine-flu-protect-yo...

cgranade 16y ago

I fail to see how adding a channel which makes a business out of blatantly lying about whatever issue they touch makes anyone fine. The case of Fox News is part of why I said we need to move beyond the whole "unbiased" versus "biased" debate to get to the real problem of downright fraudulent coverage.

Daishiman 16y ago

I don't know under what standards you can ever consider Fox News to be "news". They go beyong having a difference of opinion into outright lying and misstating facts. Taking into consideration the opinions of liars is now way to clear your own biases.

physcab 16y ago

NPR and Fox News? More like Fox News and Comedy Central.

mcknz 16y ago

Add MSNBC to your Fox habit and you should be fine. MSBNC is left-leaning. NPR does a lot of international reporting and stories regarding the arts, which I think is why they sometimes get unfairly labeled as left-leaning. If you take a look at a typical NPR story, they have time to go into enough depth to give reasonably equal time to different sides of an issue or debate. I was listening to Talk of the Nation recently and a conservative PA rep who is pro-Arizona immigration reform was given a lot of time to speak uninterrupted. Had that person been on MSNBC he would have been cut off quickly and questioned. I agree there's no one source for unbiased news -- you have to read/listen to a lot of sources and examine critically.

cgranade 16y ago
I think it's a real mistake to throw MSNBC into anything other than the "right-wing" column. Yes, they have Olbermann and Maddow, which are both good, fact-based shows with obvious and upfront ideological viewpoints, but that's overwhelmed by people like Scarborough, Buchannan, Matthews, etc. The presence of Olbermann and Maddow on MSNBC speaks mainly to that they do not want to appear to be as rightward-leaning as they actually are, and to the fact that fact-based programming, regardless of bent, enjoys a real lucrative niche. BTW, I think people have forgotten what a "liberal" looks like if Olbermann is held up as the extreme of the left wing. Remember, America is in the middle of recovering from one of the most severe ideological swings in recent memory, and so things that previously were center or even slightly right-wing are now seen as being extremely liberal. For instance, Obama's health plan is extremely similar to that proposed by the Republicans in the mid 1990s. Point being, bias can be seen relative to the zeitgeist, from which view MSNBC etc can be seen to attempt to steer conversation rightwards by making issues such as "deficit reduction" more discussed than issues such as "unemployment." Olbermann and Maddow spend much of their time defending their own views, and rarely set the tone of the conversation.
- philwelch 16y ago
  I think in general, Americans have completely forgotten the distinction between liberal and leftist. It also bears mentioning that the status quo before Obama's health care plan was, for the most part, proposed and enacted by leftist Democrats over the past several decades, and the maintenance of those systems has been seen as right-wing or centrist when their creation in the first place came from the left. The few actual right-wing reforms to health care (such as the HSA) are in fact weakened by Obama's reforms.