by Michael Edwards on 5/26/2010
I tuned into a local news program while asking myself, “Why don’t I watch local news more often?” After all, it’s kind of nice to know what’s going on in my area. But it didn’t take long for me to remember why I avoid the local news.
They were airing a story about vandalism, interviewing a few citizens in the neighborhood. After interviewing the people, they interviewed a dog. Yes, a dog. Out of camera range, the dog’s owner said, “Do you want the police to find these vandals? Speak.” The dog barked. The owner then said, “We hope they catch those bad guys, don’t we? Speak.” The dog obeyed again. I changed the channel.
This got me thinking about the quality of news in our country. Blogging has taken over the news on the internet. Heavily opinionated posts full of grammatical errors and poor punctuation are common, even from established news sources.
Now before you go finding errors on our website (and I know there are plenty), bear in mind that we are an organization of just a few individuals doing the best we can. With their resources, I expect better from the New York Times. It seems the news favors quantity over quality and reporting takes a back seat to sensationalism.
Take Fox News, for instance. Whether you are a Republican or a Democrat, the fact is, (and this is an absolute fact), Fox News does not report accurately or honestly. They report to excite, inflame, and support their agenda. The mistakes they make on a regular basis are ridiculous. And they have no regard for integrity.
Now before you go thinking I am obviously a hippie, liberal, CNN-watching, Obama-loving, biased idiot, let me tell you I do not have much respect for CNN either. They, too, sensationalize, and they, too, just like Fox, were bought and paid for long ago by the powers that be who tell us what they feel we need to know. And in the process, so much news is simply ignored.
Now this is likely to put off conservatives, but my favorite news television program is The Daily Show. Yes, it’s sad. I agree. But this is the only show I have seen where every politician, whether a Republican or a Democrat, will be called on his B.S. They will show a video of a politician stating something passionately as if he (or she) has and will always feel a certain way, and then they will show the same politician one month or one year later stating the opposite. They expose lies. The Daily Show even shows some news stories that were ignored by the major networks. They do this all in satire of course, but none the less, they are the only ones.
My favorite source for news is the obviously progressive www.Alternet.org. I also like news websites from other countries who report on us. I appreciate the outside perspective.
While I do not consider myself a Democrat, I am certainly progressive and somewhat liberal. But I get my news from a variety of sources and I do watch Fox News on a regular basis (keep your enemies closer…).
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