Friday, March 23, 2018

23 Mar 2018 Why Different News?

Why Different News?

I wrote about trusting news organizations.  It is also amazing to see how two different news organizations present what they think is news.  At time President Trump has been sued by a porn actress claiming they had an affair.  She was “paid off” by Trumps personal lawyer a few weeks prior to the election.  She claims their confidentially agreement has been broken by the lawyer due to his public statements regarding the issue. 

Yesterday I looked at two different news sites to see how it was being reported.  At foxnews.com, a conservative view, it did not mentioned it at all.  To them it was not news at all.  On MSNBC, a liberal view, you would have thought it would be the end of the Trumps presidency.  They had blaring headlines about the story.

If the press is supposed to be objective, what are we to make of this? The same story presented in two totally different ways.  How is the public to decide which is the more accurate view?  Have our news organizations become so politicized that just presenting the “facts” is hard?  If one says nothing about a story and another says it is a very big deal, does that not further polarize the population?  How many places do you have to get the news in order to make a decision on which is “right?”

Each news organization will vigorously defend their position.  Each believes they are right.   However, each slants the news to their respective audiences in order to keep the advertisers happy with the demographic they want to target. 


This is not the principal of the Free Press words of the 1st Amendment to the Constitution.  Is reporting news totally objective not viable or profitable?  I know “totally objective” is tough since people are subjective. However, if an organization wants the protection of the 1st Amendment, it should abide by the intent.  I am pretty cynical on this.  I don’t expect much change until there is leader in the Presidency who unites and not divides. Until that time, we get opposite news reported to us.    

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