Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Do Not Expect Non-Partisan Political Information From Either Party

By Cara Torres


Non-partisan political information is. Simply, the facts about whatever is being discussed. The need for this type of information is what most people would like to have in order to form their own opinions of any particular issue. What they usually find, however, is partisan rhetoric disguised as facts, such as what is reported in most of the dominant media.

The propensity for the dominant media to listen only to one side of every issue makes the idea of a free press less attractive to many. The politicians that are listened to will have all of the say, in this way, for those who only get their news this way. There used to be hard news and commentary, both of them separate from each other, editorially. Now that distinction has been all but eliminated for the past 30 years.

By not presenting the non-partisan political information they claim to, the people are not well served. This is acceptable by many people, however, others want to know what is happening and not what some editor, or rather, politician tells them is going on. The hard questions that used to be asked of elected individuals make it plain that facts are not presented and, therefore, are that much more valuable when they are read.

Simply repeating the words of a politician as being the news fit to print makes the exercise of a First Amendment protected entity a dangerous element of the body politic. This does not matter whether it is a right or left wing elected or appointed person. Politics, for all of its necessity in the debates of the day, do not require the press to bolster one side or the other.

No press member will ask a direct question of a politician except in one case. That case is when they are interviewing a candidate or elected person of the other party. Since they rarely associate with these individuals, the news is simply filled with what the reporter gets from what their favorite candidate thinks the other will say. Since this is not from the horses mouth, so to speak, it is not news.

The inability to get a clear idea about things are especially important as we discuss gun violence. One side will say that guns are dangerous and, by having more weapons on the street, the violence is expanding. This contributes to the idea that everyone who buys a gun is going to become a crime statistic. The fact, on the other side is that, as gun ownership is more wide spread, gun crimes have gone down.

The political maneuvering around the issue of immigration is also lacking in facts. One side will tell everyone that all immigrants must be allowed in and, therefore, the laws do not mean what they say they mean. The other side will point out that legal and illegal do mean different things. They stand for the rule of law, however, none of this gets past the emotional reports about this issue.

Non-partisan political information is hard to find. There are websites and services that profess to be truly impartial, however, a quick glance through them will tell you which way they lean. One sided, unbalanced political information is something that is passed around to the like minded. This factual type of information is valuable only because of it scarcity.




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