Long story short, I’ve recently come to think I’ve lived my life as a sockpuppet for a certain political leaning, and I want to see if I can’t start over again by being as open-minded as possible and making these decisions on my own principles. I want to see if I can make this change now while I’m still young. I decided a good place to start would be to clean the slate and re-pick a variety of news/opinion/information sources. Why am I posting this? Cuz some help from the politics forum of my most beloved message board would come in handy. Though one might think it would be an easy task to just Google and find a list of news sources and their political leanings, it isn’t. I saw one such list once somewhere, but lost it. I was thinking I would make a habit out of frequenting at least 3 separate news sites: one conservative, one liberal, one as far in the middle as possible. I don’t see any better way to seek truth these days. I know FOX is notoriously conservative, BBC and Al Jazeera liberal of course. I seem to remember only a very few services being listed as “moderate” or “neutral,” one of these being US News, but their website isn’t very helpful. Any elaboration or additions to this would be much appreciated. Also, if there’s a really good unbiased political point/counterpoint type site covering all the notable topics that seems to be generally regarded a cut above the rest, I would like to know. A good “reference” type site explaining such things as laws, acts, and bills in action in this country would help a lot in case I’m shady on something I keep hearing about. Popular sites that host essays and articles from some of the more well-respected writers for the major political categories in this country….conservative, liberal, democrat, republican, libertarian…wish I could describe this a little better. Basically, a major political category, a site for it…that’s it. A really good generally-unbiased “eye on the media” type website; I’ve known Spinsanity.com for this purpose, though I’d be interested in knowing if there is a more highly-regarded or better one, or if this one is even considered that unbiased. And last but not least, if someone can tell me what the biggest and greatest political message board on the internet is, that would be much appreciated. Something with tons of posters of differing viewpoints; something that is not overrun by one ideology—basically something with LOTS of enlightening argument and not solely heated drivel, though I know tons of that is unavoidable no matter where you go. If I can assemble an assortment of web sites with the preceding roles and make sure to frequent them all without burning myself out, I’m wondering if TV or newspaper would even be necessary. I tend to learn most from reading and have very little faith in news channels/news programs on the tube, and doubt I could get much of anything special with TV aside, of course, from live coverage of unfolding events. Come to think of it, in the rare instances I do watch TV news these days I turn to CNN. I’m wondering, is there a channel I can do any better with if I want the political leaning as close to the middle as possible? I know how ridiculous this question might sound to some of you. If any of you feel there’s something I can get by subscribing to a newspaper that I haven’t gotten 95% of given the preceding criteria, I’m all ears. That’s it…I know I know…a lot of “are you stupid?” and “why don’t you just seek this out yourself?” I do that, believe me, and have good ideas on a lot of this already….just wanted some help too; it’s a broad task. Thanks a lot.
Would it not be more constructive to just visit news sites without prior knowledge of any "leanings"?? If, as you appear to intend doing, you visit a range of sites, you will quickly discern any discrepancies or contradictions in different reports of the same event. By extension, you will also hopefully be able to then benefit in broader terms from that wider perspective. And, who knows, perhaps discount one or two of the sources on that basis, rather than prior knowledge of their apparent slant. Also, it seems to me that you're not really talking about news here, you're talking about sources of opinion, or persepective, if you will.