[PassedOut]

 Mbodell, on 2011-August-19, 19:33, said:

That's annoying, but what is worse IMO is the pattern of:

#1. There is some issue in the news.
#2. To report on the issue in a fair and impartial way here are two people to represent both sides of the issue.
#3. The news reporters/anchors do not report facts and just give the two people a soap box and don't correct them. On the "good" shows the hosts facilitate discussions. On the "bad" shows the hosts facilitate shouting matches.
Report the facts. Don't let people get away with lies, distorted and misleading statements, or other propaganda.

I have heard of programs like that. Searching my memory way back, isn't that where one of the soapbox people finally says to the other, "Jane, you ignorant slut..."? Or is that a no-no these days?

[kenberg]

 Mbodell, on 2011-August-19, 19:33, said:

That's annoying, but what is worse IMO is the pattern of:

#1. There is some issue in the news.
#2. To report on the issue in a fair and impartial way here are two people to represent both sides of the issue.
#3. The news reporters/anchors do not report facts and just give the two people a soap box and don't correct them. On the "good" shows the hosts facilitate discussions. On the "bad" shows the hosts facilitate shouting matches.

Nobody cares if one of the people is actually representing the facts or the mainstream scientific community and the other is a lunatic. Nobody notices if both people ignore a large segment of the population because they are unrepresented by the usual D-R split. Nobody cares if the issue is actually complex and has more than two sides.

Report the facts. Don't let people get away with lies, distorted and misleading statements, or other propaganda.

There was an instance of this many years ago that I often wish I had kept the reference for.

The subject was capital punishment. A radio host had two guests presenting their analyses of the benefits, if any, to society. Each one had his/her statistics, often from the same data, with wildly different statistical summaries. One would say, for example, that there was a 50% reduction in crime and the other would say that it was 2 or 3 %. The host just let them scream on, as if it were "You say to-may-toe, I say to-mah-toe" and just no way to decide who was slinging it. Probably both. Obviously the numbers represented very different calculations from the same data, and a few pointed questions could have cleared things up For example, 50% of what? 3% of what? Citing percentages without saying what they are a percentage of should be, perhaps, a capital offense.

Anyway, I agree wholeheartedly that just getting two points of view, "and now we will hear from the pro-alien abduction camp", is not serious journalism.

[helene_t]

I am not sure if I like the idea of journalists "just reporting the facts". I suppose it's a journalist's task to identify reliable sources, but sometimes sources of similar reliability will contradict each other, and the journalist may not be able to present an unbiased and qualified verdict.

So it can be justified to present opposing views. But of course it is ridiculous to leave it by "one expert says it's a 2% reduction and the other says it's 50%". In such cases it should be investigated what those percentages really mean and which sources they are build on. There was a case where one survey sponsored by Danish labour unions showed that 80% of Danes were in favour of employee-representatives in boards of directors while a survey sponsored by the federation of danish industries showed that 80% were against. But I think that was a little unusual. Normally, if different authorities quote vastly different percentages it is because they use different denominators, or something like that. If a drug reduces the risk of heart attack from 2% to 1% then the manufacturer might call it a 50% reduction while your health insurance company might call it a 1% reduction. And both will be right and both will be referring to the same statistics. And it's the journalist's task to make sure that nobody is left with the impression that the manufacturer and the insurance company contradict each other.

[Winstonm]

I think I have discovered Perry's stategy: to become so outlandish and spew so much nonsense that it becomes impossible for South Park to statirize him.

[hrothgar]

 Winstonm, on 2011-August-20, 12:01, said:

I think I have discovered Perry's stategy: to become so outlandish and spew so much nonsense that it becomes impossible for South Park to statirize him.

Dude...

Matt and Trey were about to satirize Saddam Hussein....

I hate Perry as much as nay other Democrat does, but he has a long way to go before he reaches Saddam's level of insanity

[Winstonm]

 hrothgar, on 2011-August-20, 12:09, said:

Dude...

Matt and Trey were about to satirize Saddam Hussein....

I hate Perry as much as nay other Democrat does, but he has a long way to go before he reaches Saddam's level of insanity

Richard,

To be fair, I said it was his strategy - I didn't say he had completed it.

[jonottawa]

 hrothgar, on 2011-August-20, 12:09, said:

I hate Perry as much as nay other Democrat does, but he has a long way to go before he reaches Saddam's level of insanity

Source?

If harshly 'expunging' rebellious elements within your country makes one insane, then surely Abraham Lincoln is at the top of the list.

As dictators go, Saddam Hussein was better than most. Iraq was the most prosperous and secular country in the region before the war criminal Dubya invaded.

[jonottawa]

As for the thread topic, while Perry is the current frontrunner, he is not an odds-on favorite at this point. It's really a 2-man (Perry-Romney) race, but if one insists upon calling it a 3-man race, then the 3 are: Perry-Romney-rest of the field, with each having about a 1/3 chance.

[ggwhiz]

 kenberg, on 2011-August-20, 04:32, said:

A radio host had two guests presenting their analyses of the benefits, if any, to society. Each one had his/her statistics, often from the same data, with wildly different statistical summaries.

A Red Sox pitcher (can't remember who) went into contract negotiations years ago and his agent produced stats that showed him as the 2nd best pitcher in the league. Management produced a chart that showed him as the 7th best pitcher on the team.

Our newsbites in Canada come from mostly 3 different sources and it is still woefully inadequate for "informed" journalism and only slightly less polarizing. Any moderator correcting the facts would have to be a genius.

[blackshoe]

 helene_t, on 2011-August-20, 09:14, said:

I am not sure if I like the idea of journalists "just reporting the facts". I suppose it's a journalist's task to identify reliable sources, but sometimes sources of similar reliability will contradict each other, and the journalist may not be able to present an unbiased and qualified verdict.

I don't think it's a journalist's job to present verdicts. It's his job to present information — verifiable (and varified) facts wherever possible, opinions (clearly so marked) otherwise. It's also the journalist's job to ask questions in clarification of anything dubious or confusing, particularly in a face to face interview. It's the viewer's/readers job to decide on a verdict.

[hrothgar]

 jonottawa, on 2011-August-20, 13:53, said:

Iraq was the most prosperous and secular country in the region before the war criminal Dubya invaded.

Are you on crack? Turkey and Israel both dwarf Iraq in terms of per capita GDP and have for decades.
Iraq's economy was crippled by the Iran - Iraq war back in the 80s, followed by the first Gulf War, and then years of sanctions.
Iraq's economy has actually grown since the war criminal Dubya invaded...

The Gulf states also enjoy much higher per capita GDP.
Admittedly, many of these should be excluded based on your use of the word secular;
however, I'd be hard pressed to claim that - say - Kuwait is noticeably more religious than Iraq.

If you're going to try to post "facts" get a ***** clue because comments like this last one are just plain embarrassing...

[jonottawa]

 hrothgar, on 2011-August-20, 18:42, said:

Are you on crack? Turkey and Israel both dwarf Iraq in terms of per capita GDP and have for decades.
Iraq's economy was crippled by the Iran - Iraq war back in the 80s, followed by the first Gulf War, and then years of sanctions.
Iraq's economy has actually grown since the war criminal Dubya invaded...

The Gulf states also enjoy much higher per capita GDP.
Admittedly, many of these should be excluded based on your use of the word secular;
however, I'd be hard pressed to claim that - say - Kuwait is noticeably more religious than Iraq.

If you're going to try to post "facts" get a ***** clue because comments like this last one are just plain embarrassing...

U mad, bro? Anyway, this is off-topic so I'll just summarize with this and give you the last word if you want it.

"Iraq, despite the brutality of Saddam Hussein, was a prosperous country with a highly educated middle class before the war. Its infrastructure was modern and efficient. Iraqis enjoyed a high standard of living. The country did not lack modern conveniences. Things worked. And being in Iraq, as I often was when I covered the Middle East for The New York Times, while unnerving because of state repression, was never a hardship. Since our occupation the country has tumbled into dysfunction. Factories, hospitals, power plants, phone service, sewage systems and electrical grids do not work. Iraqis, if they are lucky, get three hours of electricity a day. Try this in 110-degree heat. Poverty is endemic. More than a million Iraqi civilians have been killed. Nearly 5 million have been displaced from their homes or are refugees. The Mercer Quality of Living survey last year ranked Baghdad last among cities-the least livable on the planet. Iraq, which once controlled its own oil, has been forced to turn its oil concessions over to foreign corporations. That is what we have bequeathed to Iraq-violence, misery and theft."

[hrothgar]

 jonottawa, on 2011-August-21, 00:25, said:

"Iraq, despite the brutality of Saddam Hussein, was a prosperous country with a highly educated middle class before the war. Its infrastructure was modern and efficient. Iraqis enjoyed a high standard of living. The country did not lack modern conveniences. Things worked. And being in Iraq, as I often was when I covered the Middle East for The New York Times, while unnerving because of state repression, was never a hardship. Since our occupation the country has tumbled into dysfunction. Factories, hospitals, power plants, phone service, sewage systems and electrical grids do not work. Iraqis, if they are lucky, get three hours of electricity a day. Try this in 110-degree heat. Poverty is endemic. More than a million Iraqi civilians have been killed. Nearly 5 million have been displaced from their homes or are refugees. The Mercer Quality of Living survey last year ranked Baghdad last among cities-the least livable on the planet. Iraq, which once controlled its own oil, has been forced to turn its oil concessions over to foreign corporations. That is what we have bequeathed to Iraq-violence, misery and theft."

Do you understand that everything in this sentence could be true, and this still doesn't mean that Iraq was the most prosperous or the most secular country in the region?

FWIW, I agree that the US invasion devastated the country and resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people (probably even a million).
I believe that Bush and Cheney should be tried for war crimes.

At the same time, claiming that Iraq was the most prosperous country in the region is completely ludicrous.
Making these types of elementary mistakes discredits everything that you say.

[helene_t]

 blackshoe, on 2011-August-20, 18:04, said:

I don't think it's a journalist's job to present verdicts.

Well maybe the word "verdict" is wrong. What I mean is: suppose a professor at the institute of geodesics claims that the Earth is round while a website belonging to the flat Earth society claims it isn't. Then the journalist will have to judge whether there really is a controversy justifying presenting both views, or whether the professor's claim can just be presented as factual.

[PassedOut]

I see that republican candidate Jon Huntsman is distancing himself from the nut jobs in his party, among other things by acknowledging that letting the US default would have been completely irresponsible: Huntsman gets more aggressive with opponents, Obama

Quote

“And it waited until the eleventh hour and then we had some of my Republican opponents who basically, I think, recommended something that would have been catastrophic for this economy.”

Huntsman, who launched his campaign vowing to be civil, has struggled to gain traction in early polls, and with his moderate views and former job as Obama’s man in Beijing, has yet to find a constituency.

In the past week, with the entry of Texas Gov. Rick Perry in the race, Huntsman’s candidacy has become something of an afterthought, yet he gained some buzz this week over Twitter by taking Perry to task for doubting the science of evolution and global warming.

On Twitter, Huntsman declared: “To be clear, I believe in evolution and trust scientists on global warming. Call me crazy.”

Don't know how this will work for him, but if his numbers go way up it will be a positive sign for the country.

[BobElliott]

 Winstonm, on 2011-August-18, 17:15, said:

Now the good reverand Perry is bragging that HIS state teaches creationsim and evolution, and that he thinks kids are smart enough to figure out which one is right.

Meanwhile, here in good 'ol boy Oklahoma, Perry has a huge lead in the Republican Presidential polls.

It seems the bible belt Republicans support a return to The Dark Ages, while the Democratic Party has no idea what it supports, but it kind of likes the 1980s version of Republicanism - and the album Best of the Bee Gees.

At what exact point in time did America lose its collective mind?

[BobElliott]

When JFK was elected.

[PassedOut]

Conor Friedersdorf has a piece in the Atlantic today discussing the reasons that the media treats unlikely-to-win candidates very differently: Why the Press Loves Jon Huntsman but Ignores Ron Paul

Quote

As much as I agree with Sullivan, Fallows, Weisberg, and all the other journalists praising Huntsman for challenging orthodoxies of thought in the GOP, however, I am struck by the very different standards that govern coverage of two other candidates, Ron Paul and Gary Johnson.

Neither Huntsman nor Johnson nor Paul is likely to win. All three are challenging orthodoxies of thought in their party. In doing so, all have an opportunity "to affect the political conversation for the better" and to "shine light on the evasions of his rivals, even if it fails to change the outcome of the race."

Here is the difference.

Huntsman is challenging orthodoxies of thought that afflict the GOP alone, and taking positions that reflect the conventional wisdom in the media: evolution is a fact, so is climate change, and the debt ceiling had to be raised. In contrast, Johnson and Paul are challenging orthodoxies of thought that are bi-partisan in nature and implicate much of the political and media establishment.

Even though the positions taken by Ron Paul and Gary Johnson opposing military interventions, the "war on drugs," and the erosion of civil liberties ring true, they threaten the established order. The war industry and the prison industry provide a lot of jobs -- jobs that would disappear if that order collapsed. But that doesn't mean that those positions are wrong, and it certainly doesn't mean that they should not be covered.

[Winstonm]

 BobElliott, on 2011-August-21, 15:10, said:

When JFK was elected.

I always suspected the day America set aside its petty religious biases and elected a Catholic was the start of the rot.

[kenberg]

I forwarded blackshoe's Jon Stewart link about the dissing of Ron Paul to my son-in-law. He responded by sending me another Jon Stewart link.

http://www.thedailys...---the-top-tier

It's possible that I will revise upward my view of Stewart.

A word or two about orthodoxy: It has been years since I saw The Seventh Seal but one scene that I more or less remember has a (I think) blacksmith and the squire discussing philosophical matters and the smithie observes "You're lucky, you believe your own blather". I may be a bit off, but it was something like that. What we desperately need are some leaders who are not paralyzed by their ideological blather, be it leftie blather or rightie blather.

Btw, I just noticed that my spell checker accepts leftie as a word, but not rightie. Someone needs to look into this.