Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Fact Check Your News







Annenberg Political Fact Check
A project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, it is a nonpartisan, nonprofit "consumer advocate" for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics. It monitors “the factual accuracy of what is said by major U.S. political players in the form of TV ads, debates, speeches, interviews, and news releases.”

Annenberg Flack Check
This new Annenberg site fights fact-mangling site through humor and quick turnarounds without further propagating the underlying deception.

Columbia Journalism Review
The campaign desk site mission: “to encourage and stimulate excellence in journalism in the service of a free society. It is both a watchdog and a friend of the press in all its forms, from newspapers to magazines to radio, television, and the Web…CJR examines day-to-day press performance as well as the forces that affect that performance.”

Open Secrets
The site of The Center for Responsive Politics calls itself: "Your Guide to the Money in U.S. elections" – the “guide to money’s influence on U.S. elections and public policy.”

PolitiFact
PolitiFact is “A scorecard separating fact from fiction. A project of the St. Petersburg Times and Congressional Quarterly, it helps find the truth in the presidential campaign. “Every day, reporters and researchers from the Times and CQ will analyze the candidates' speeches, TV ads and interviews and determine whether the claims are accurate.”

Real Clear Politics
“An independent political site that culls and publishes the best commentary, news, polling data, and links to important resources.” Updated daily.

Snopes
A website for validating or debunking urban legends, Internet rumor, email hoaxes, and other such stories of uncertain or questionable origin.

Washington Post Fact Checker A permanent Post feature, it uses the one to four “Pinocchio” system to evaluate statements and claims.

Hat tip to Beverly Bandler for this fact check list

Pew: Newspapers Continue To Decline

After two dreadful years, most sectors of the industry saw revenue begin to recover in some, but not all sectors of the industry, according to a new Pew Project for Excellence in Journalism report. With some notable exceptions, cutbacks in newsrooms eased. And while still more talk than action, some experiments with new revenue models began to show signs of blossoming.

Among the major sectors, only newspapers suffered continued revenue declines last year—an unmistakable sign that the structural economic problems facing newspapers are more severe than those of other media. When the final tallies are in, we estimate 1,000 to 1,500 more newsroom jobs will have been lost—meaning newspaper newsrooms are 30% smaller than in 2000.

Monday, December 12, 2011

Driving People To Vote Against There Own Self-Interest And Moral Standards

In a startling admission from a major Tea Party champion, former Fox News host Glenn Beck said Friday that race may be a motivating factor in the Tea Party’s opposition to President Obama.
BECK: And I issued a challenge to Tea Party members. … [Gingrich] is a progressive. … If you have a big government progressive, or a big government progressive in Obama, one in Newt Gingrich, one in Obama, ask yourself this, Tea Party: is it about Obama’s race? Because that’s what it appears to be to me. If you’re against him but you’re for this guy, it must be about race.

The comment is striking coming from Beck, who organized major Tea Party events and strongly defended the movement against charges of racism.

While racism may be part of the motivating factor in the Tea Party’s opposition to President Obama, the other more significant factor may be the anti-Obama, anti-Democrat, and other fear-mongering against "the they" who plot to destroy America. Fear-mongering waged by Glenn Beck, Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, all of Conservative talk radio, and other conservative propaganda mills supported by conservative billionaires.

Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group. As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda, in its most basic sense, presents information primarily to influence an audience. Propaganda is often biased, with facts selectively presented (thus possibly lying by omission) to encourage a particular synthesis, or uses loaded messages to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented. The desired result is a change of the attitude toward the subject in the target audience to further a political, or other type of agenda. Propaganda can be used as a form of political warfare.

The next article down in this news blog is about conservative columnist David Frum, who was speechwriter for former President George W. Bush, blasting Fox News for delivering an “alternative knowledge system,” otherwise know as propaganda.

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