I was sitting at the dinner table of family friends when I was asked, "What journalists do you want to be most like?" I listed the first couple names that came to my head: Woodward and Burnstein, Cronkite, and Cooper. Their response, "Yeah, the unbiased good ones" and then started a conversation among themselves over the need for unbiased journalists.
It was then that it hit me: Is that even possible?
I mean, all humans have a bias. It is in our nature. The question is do we let it out. As journalists, we are not supposed to reveal our biases but instead be objective. That is the goal. Is it reachable? I don't think so, or at least not completely.
Everyone has their own spin to things. Everyone spins certain information a certain way. It is in our nature. But do we see it as bias? No. For the person doing the spinning, it is the natural way of seeing things. It is how it is, the truth.
For example, as a libertarian, I believe that Austrian economics is true and Keynesianism is wrong. If I got on the air and stated using logic and reasoning to prove that Austrian economics was write and Keynesianism wrong, I would be mentioned in an angry column in the New York Times by Paul Krugman accusing me of spinning and bias.
However, I may not see that as spin or bias but me presenting the facts and drawing a conclusion (and Krugman would do the same in defense of Keynesianism).
It is difficult to catch spin for the person doing the spinning. So what is a viewer to do? Read and watch as much as possible. I'm a big supporter of exposure to media. Use all the sources available and see all the sides and come to your own conclusion.
As a side note, at a libertarian conference I went to in DC, one of the talks was about becoming your own media. A panelist was asked, "What do we do about being objective yet also advancing libertarianism?" Her response, "Libertarianism is true! So just report the truth (libertarianism)."
And that is what the communists are saying about themselves as well.
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