All Sides

[Sober Poet]

Not normally the one to post in the political forum. My wife is a political scientist and is way better at politics than me. I admit I am interested though and do lurk in the political forum a lot actually.

I guess I just can't help it. Love him or hate him, this presidency is fascinating, and we are getting tons of insight into how our government functions (or how it doesn't perhaps).

Everyone is talking left or right, especially with news sources. I am someone who can often see the merits in both sides of an argument, and it makes me wonder sometimes what happened to the middle.

To quote Pearl Jam (Eddie Vedder) from "Porch":

"All the bills go by

And initiatives are taken up

By the middle

There ain't gonna be any middle anymore."

Or, if you prefer, consider the famous line from Irish Poet William Butler Yeats in "The Second Coming":

"Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world."

It is informative to watch you all provide and question each other's sources for news/ideas/etc. and it got me thinking. I am a lucky researcher in that I tend to find what I am looking for, and I found this (by the way, I copied their description of themselves here, I did not write it):

AllSides - Unlike regular news services, AllSides exposes bias and provides multiple angles on the same story so you can quickly get the full picture, not just one slant.

Now, I am not promoting the site, hell, I just found it myself, yet their concept interests me. You can see for yourselves that they do a Left, Center, and Right take on the news of the day.

Another item of interest; click the "Bias" link at the top to find their "Bias Ratings", where they look at all kinds of news sources and rate them left, right, or center. The list is interesting, I had never heard of most of the news sources and there should be something new there for everyone, regardless of where you land on the spectrum.

I won't explain the whole site to you. Fellas, have at it! Let's hear your reactions. Are these people crazy idealists? Does their left, right, center concept hold up in your view? Are their bias ratings fair and accurate? What do you think about the idea of adding a "bias" extension to Google Chrome to tell you which way a site leans? See something else of interest that I did not mention? For instance, they seem to be activists, but what kind in your view?

I figure after the Comey testimony is a good time to share this item, everyone I know was talking about it yesterday. One last question, is anyone aware of another site or service that has a similar mission? Just curious...

[OldBrownsFan]

Sounds like a great idea if they can really pull it off. I do that pretty much now by watching the MSM and then getting the other side or angle from alternative news.

 

I like the idea of presenting stories with different sides and angles because most stories have different sides and angles. For example the MSM did a story on Obamacare recently and only showed those who would be hurt if Obamacare was repealed and never showed the other side of those hurt by Obamacare with higher premiums, deductibles and less choices as well as how it hurts employers.

 

Also we have so called fact checkers today that I cannot trust such as Snopes who have a left wing bias.

 

It is not so much the MSM flat out lie (although occasionally they have been caught even doing that) my real beef with the MSM is their slanting of stories to present the narrative they want to present. That most in the MSM are liberals we usually get the liberal slant/argument in their stories. I don't have a problem with what they present most of the time but rather what they fail to report and leave out (the other side of the argument).

[Westside Steve]

They do windows roofs and vinyl siding correct?

 

WSS

[VaporTrail]

This is awesome, but ultimately it still comes down to subjective ratings as for what counts as middle. NPR and 538 are listed as center, while I'd classify them as left leaning. I'll definitely be giving this a shot.

 

Here's a picture of your average liberal idiot's perceived bias of the news.

 

 

Here's one that I've adjusted.

 

 

 

And Bloomberg would go around the Atlantic and The Guardian.

[Sober Poet]

They do windows roofs and vinyl siding correct?

 

WSS

 

It's possible...that you are the witty type...must be a Sagittarius...

 

THIS guy does Windows for sure:

 

 

 

Don't hire these guys:

 

 

And surprise, surprise, this guy does NOT do siding:

 

[MLD Woody]

Sounds like a great idea, until it calls the blaze bias and then all hell will break loose. I'll have to look at it tonight