It's nice to see that standard put into a mission statement.
The (feigned?) incredulity really misses the point. Fact is, this 'he said/she said' journalism that gives equal time to spinsters on any side of the issue has been increasing over the years and is rampant in the industry. Yeah, I'm glad NPR is changing their policy, but almost more than that, I'm glad they're doing it in such a public manner. They're naming the problem and putting it right out there. By naming the problem it causes us to have to snap out of it and look at how our news is being presented to us critically, if only for a moment (we Americans have terrible attention spans don't we?). Some of us who love consuming news have been dismayed by this for a while. I suspect many who hear about this announcement will be given pause though. That's a good thing in my book.
Basically, NPR is Talk Radio for Volvo owners now - commercials for everything but goldline and transparently stacked "panels" who aren't quite ready to start shouting at each other. I do like Click and Clack.
Tomorrows Friday News Roundup on the DR show: -Click and Clack definitely kick ass.
Seems like a balanced group. I very rarely ever hear anyone get to the point where they even remotely close to thinking about "shouting" in the sense that popular talk radio does. It's good stuff. As for the commercials, not sure what you're listening to but I'll take a few nods to such and such charitable fund and the occasional bloomberg shout out over actual Goldline ad's any day. Naftali Bendavid national correspondent, The Wall Street Journal.
Shawna Thomas White House producer, NBC News.
David Welna congressional correspondent, NPR.
NPR has commercials for TV shows on Fox (yeah, I was startled), car dealerships, charities (they may be not-for-profit, but the exec's profit and they pay for spots), summer camps, private schools, etc, etc. They to try to keep only high-tone stuff in there, but as the man said, "we've already established what kind of person you are, now we are just haggling over the price."
- Basically, NPR is Talk Radio for Volvo owners now - commercials for everything but goldline and transparently stacked "panels" who aren't quite ready to start shouting at each other.
You kid, right? I mean, that's the stereotype, but... I admit, if you are going to get a bias on NPR, it is going to have a liberal slant more often than not. However, I can't think of one major news organization that has a more even-keel analysis of events. I mean, seriously, what better option do I have? Cable is complete shit, and I don't have TV.
So it's not "if you are going to get a bias" it is how big is the bias. Looks pretty big to me. But then the pro-business side of the WSJ looks pretty big to me too, as does the conservative slant on Fox. I can't recall, actually, a media organization that didn't look pretty slanted to me. -XC
But, I don't have a Volvo, and I voted for a GOP governor last election, I don't support affirmative action, and NPR is the best mainstream news source I've found. It's far from perfect, but even if you step back and compare, it does a better job than most. Still, I do wish we had a US media discourse that allowed for more pluralism and nuance. IMO the team politics and ideologies that dominate make fools of us all.
NPR, like all news organizations, makes gigantic mistakes on topics I know well, and that means they do the same on topics where I have little/no knowledge. As for perception of bias, well, we all think we're centrists. :-)