7 ms·

I see that CNN is in the middle-of-the-road section. Search 'Trump' (naturally, it's currently the best test case) and you get: "Former President Donald Trump

I see that CNN is in the middle-of-the-road section. Search 'Trump' (naturally, it's currently the best test case) and you get: "Former President Donald Trump repeated familiar lies about the 2020 election and insulted Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell Saturday when speaking to Republican National Committee donors gathered for the first time since Trump’s defeat, a person in the room told CNN." 'familiar lies' 'insulted' 'a person in the room told' The Weekly World News has taken over the world.

rsynnott 6y ago
... What would the proper ultra-centrist way of characterising lying and insulting Mitch McConnell be? Like, are you expecting them to use euphemisms, or just not reporting on former presidents lying?
- kingsuper20 6y ago
  I was thinking about that. It's not so much being a 'centrist' but being able to tell the difference between reporting and interpreting. The best case would simply be a transcript. I would start by saying that Donald Trump made claims about the election and finish up by stating the actual things that he said about Mitch McConnell. Being an adult, I'm quite able to figure out the context and severity of what he said. In addition, I'd probably use better sourcing than 'some unnamed guy we talked to'. Like I said upstream somewhere, it would be fun to rewrite news articles to report news rather than to interpret news. Save the prose for editorials.
  - hpcjoe 6y ago
    This. We haven't had real news reporting in the US in a long time. The family and I watch BBC America for something more akin to news here, as the major "news" orgs in the US, are spittle inflected hyper-partisans. All of them. This deeply saddens me, but I suppose it was inevitable.
  - rsynnott 6y ago
    > In addition, I'd probably use better sourcing than 'some unnamed guy we talked to'. So, I see a lot of complaints about this, but everyone uses unattributed sources. It is realistically the only way to report on politics, unless you just want to print press releases, which is really more the realm of wire services. This is how it has always worked. (Even then you have to be careful; politicians often make press releases by leak...) I don’t see an issue with pointing out that a lie is a lie.
hpcjoe 6y ago
CNN and its ilk haven't been news for a very long time. Moreover, classifying them as "middle of the road" is insulting to those of use who are centrist, middle of the roaders.

rsynnott 6y ago

... What would the proper ultra-centrist way of characterising lying and insulting Mitch McConnell be? Like, are you expecting them to use euphemisms, or just not reporting on former presidents lying?

kingsuper20 6y ago
I was thinking about that. It's not so much being a 'centrist' but being able to tell the difference between reporting and interpreting. The best case would simply be a transcript. I would start by saying that Donald Trump made claims about the election and finish up by stating the actual things that he said about Mitch McConnell. Being an adult, I'm quite able to figure out the context and severity of what he said. In addition, I'd probably use better sourcing than 'some unnamed guy we talked to'. Like I said upstream somewhere, it would be fun to rewrite news articles to report news rather than to interpret news. Save the prose for editorials.
- hpcjoe 6y ago
  This. We haven't had real news reporting in the US in a long time. The family and I watch BBC America for something more akin to news here, as the major "news" orgs in the US, are spittle inflected hyper-partisans. All of them. This deeply saddens me, but I suppose it was inevitable.
- rsynnott 6y ago
  > In addition, I'd probably use better sourcing than 'some unnamed guy we talked to'. So, I see a lot of complaints about this, but everyone uses unattributed sources. It is realistically the only way to report on politics, unless you just want to print press releases, which is really more the realm of wire services. This is how it has always worked. (Even then you have to be careful; politicians often make press releases by leak...) I don’t see an issue with pointing out that a lie is a lie.

hpcjoe 6y ago

CNN and its ilk haven't been news for a very long time. Moreover, classifying them as "middle of the road" is insulting to those of use who are centrist, middle of the roaders.