Come on, that’s not what he said. It’s just that Two Sides, Equal Time sets up false parameters and false equivalence.
Sure. That’s why when they used to hold discussions on the shape of the Earth, they were always obligated to get two sides…someone to argue that the Earth is flat like a regular round pizza, and someone else to argue that the Earth is flat like one of those goofy Little Caesar’s square pizzas. Imagine how limited the fact checking would be if they had only one of those voices. The truth is somewhere in the middle, of course.
www.bloomberg.com is pretty impartial. It’s straight business news.
The exception can be the editorials, but that’s clearly marked and doesn’t pretend to be news.
It didn’t even require equal time. I think people confuse it with the equal time rule (which still exists), which causes them to overestimate how important it was.
But in the name of God it doesn’t lead to nothing more than media echo chambers and, ultimately, Trump.
So your strategy is to make Fox News and right-wing talk radio illegal?
What exactly is the reason video and audio media shouldn’t be allowed to advocate for a particular point of view, yet print media can and should?
Or should we outlaw right-wing magazines, newspapers and websites while we’re at it?
Biased news sources have had a long and honorable history in the US. A century ago, most big cities had several daily papers, of different political stripes and different relationships to the truth, and usually appealing to certain well-defined ethnic groups. Back in NYC in the 30s, for instance, there were:
New York Times (Upscale, Jewish)
The New York Herald-Tribune (WASPs & Republicans)
Daily News (Italian,Irish & Jewish immigrants)
Daily Mirror (Sensationalist tabloid; I’m not sure of its audience)
Daily Worker (Communist)
Wall Street Journal (pretty much business news only)
New York Post * (Democratic and Jewish)
New York Sun
The New York World-Telegram (Protestant, Democratic)
The Journal-American.- (Catholic Democratic)
The New York Graphic - pure, unadulterated sensationalism.
(The lack of Republican papers was due to the fact that NYC was, as it is now, strongly Democratic).
All of the papers slanted the news to fit their audience. People bought multiple papers. What is interesting is that a Democrat would buy a Democratic paper and an Independent paper (that covered both sides). A Republican would buy a Republican paper, and an Independent one. Thus the independent papers got higher circulation and more ad revenue.
*The Graphic folded in 1932, and made the most sensationalist news outlet today looked like the New York Times. Their big invention was the “composograph,” which allowed them to . . . well, today you’d call it “photoshopping” – creating composite images to illustrate stories. Here’s an account It looks fake to our eyes, of course, but also looked fake back then. No one cared.
Your’re not really engaging with the point you quote. It’s a little ironic.
There used to be, but Walter Cronkite died.