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Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

cnbc.com

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Re: Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

#721

Post by metabagel »

megous wrote: post #345
mschuster91 wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

News outlets by definition can not be neutral. Just look at the insane amount of stuff that the global news agencies like Reuters or AFP push out every minute, and on top of that comes all the state, county and local news. The very act of filtering what to report to the audience is political in itself. Say, floods or other natural disasters caused or (like wildfires) made worse by climate change. Most of them tend to…

You learn this by science, and scientific reporting. Not by reporting events usually selected by severity of harm to humans and clickbait factor to enrich the media companies.

I feel like you missed the point, which is that reporting or not reporting, or how you report something can all be examples of bias. The conclusions you draw. The quotes you use or don’t use. The ordering in which you report things.

The job of the journalist is to try to present a version of the story which is as close to the truth as possible, and without leaving out any relevant information. But, also the story is in context of the values which most of us hold dear, because we are human beings.

We might have thought that an unbiased news story would have to be written by a robot, but as we know now, LLMs are biased too.

Re: Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

#722

Post by dymk »

daft_pink wrote: post #34

Is anyone really changing their mind based on some newspaper endorsement? I’m pretty sure everyone knows who they’re gonna vote for at this point.

That’s what an undecided voter is, and that demographic is the one effectively deciding the next president, so yes these endorsements are consequential.

Re: Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

#723

Post by w0de0 »

dbsmith83 wrote: post #673

I find it strange that people are so upset about the absence of an opinion piece from this newspaper. What is the reason? Either you want to be told what to think, or you want everyone else to be told what to think. I think it is the latter. Would there be any outrage here if Fox news decided not to endorse a candidate? I highly doubt it. Some people may like being challenged on what they believe, which is good, but…

Perhaps one wants to be told what they - the paper as institution, to include both owners and editorial staff - think. What values do they hold, and why? These inform their reporting content and choices.

Moreover, no one thinks well in isolation. Others’ ideas challenge and inform one’s own. To engage, to converse, to question: this is not being told what to think, but rather a catalyst of unique thought. Else why are you posting here?

Re: Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

#724

Post by metabagel »

topspin wrote: post #584
adamc wrote: post #166

Good reason not to subscribe to the WP.

There you are! The correct response. Should this not fall under the "private company, do what they want" mantra we were all so fond of wrt (pre-Musk...) Twitter, Facebook, et al? The further advice then was; "make your own social media platform." Same thing happened at LA times a few days ago, also replete with an editor quitting, when owner Patrick Soon-Shiong blocked the same Kamala endorsement. You're free to not…

We also have the freedom to gripe about it. That is also the correct response.

Re: Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

#725

Post by dymk »

soupbowl wrote: post #585
nomdep wrote: post #480

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sick of this absurd FUD. You surely must realize that the claims that if Trump wins, democracy is going to end are just fearmongering, don't you?

How is it FUD? The last time Trump was elected Democracy died... didn't it? /s

He tried his best during his presidency, and has continued to do so since losing the last election.

Re: Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

#726

Post by metabagel »

nomdep wrote: post #125
jp_nc wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thats because of the calculation: - Endorse Harris and Trump wins, Trump will seek revenge on Bezos and Amazon (he tried this in the first term) - Endorse Trump and Harris wins, Harris will not act outside the bounds of a normal government official This is capitulation to the perceived threats of a Trump presidency and is very bad.

> Harris will not act outside the bounds of a normal government official California has even blocked SpaceX because they don't like the politics of Musk ( https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-10-11/la-me-sp... ) so I would say is risky to expect any of the two (or its followers) not seeking revenge.

The California Coastal Commission is rather (in)famously powerful. This is kind of a special case.

Re: Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

#727

Post by aix1 »

alwayslikethis wrote: post #394
noncoml wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes a lot time to build the reputation of impartiality. To be honest only BBC comes into mind when I think about a somewhat impartial medium. What I see is a traditionally Democartic leaning newspaper, choosing "impartiality" as an excuse, because they cannot come out and support Republicans. And of course I believe that this is the choice of the owner.

The problem for BBC is that it's government-funded. It can't really take a stance without potentially upsetting the next government.

> The problem for BBC is that it's government-funded.

That's not factually accurate. The BBC is principally funded through the licence fee (i.e. directly by the viewers).

Re: Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

#728

Post by w0de0 »

ahnick wrote: post #76

It seems like it would be less polarizing if it was the default state for news and information outlets to not endorse any candidate ever and just remain as neutral as possible.

While we’re at it, let’s do away with voting. Much less polarizing if we stop asking the demos to endorse a government.

Re: Jeff Bezos killed Washington Post endorsement of Kamala Harris

#729

Post by armada651 »

rayiner wrote: post #715
zmmmmm wrote: post #496

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The idea that editorial team has some kind of expertise, unavailable to general population That doesn't make sense to me - they literally spend all day every day absorbing, summarising and writing about context as their full time job. They are trained formally at assessing, evaluating and questioning facts. You can criticise the end result, but I can't see how it's reasonable to say they aren't far better positione…

Except in practice their editorial opinions boil down to value judgments that aren’t amenable to such analysis. They weren’t endorsing Harris because of the nuances of tax policy; it’s because they share her views on abortion, immigration, white liability for past racism, etc. These are the subject of moral and political philosophy, not expert analysis. That’s why WaPo has consistently endorsed the same party—even wh…

> They weren’t endorsing Harris because of the nuances of tax policy; it’s because they share her views on abortion, immigration, white liability for past racism, etc. These are the subject of moral and political philosophy, not expert analysis.

A candidate's social policies may be more important to some people than their fiscal policies. So an analysis of their social policies would be more useful to those readers than an analysis of their fiscal policies.

You can make an expert analysis of a candidate's previous stances and track record on those subjects. Politicians will routinely lie about their previous stances, so that seems like a useful analysis to me.

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