Opinions are like elbows.  Everybody has one, most have two, and by reading the papers and watching the news, you’d think the media is run by double-jointed octopuses.

Take a look for yourself.  In tomorrows paper, take a yellow highlighter to the statements that are factual, not the entire sentence, just the factual statements.  You can give the author the benefit of the doubt and highlight the quotes from other sources if you wish.

Next, with a blue highlighter, highlight all the opinions.

When you’re done with the article, compare the number of yellow statements with the number of blue statements.  What do you notice?

If you’re like me, you notice that there are far more opinions in a single article than factual statements.

What happened to reporting the facts and letting the consumer form the opinion?

I believe that one of the drawbacks to living at warp speed is that we tend to leave the critical thinking to others for the sake of saving time.

Whatever, just give the facts to the guy on TV and let him tell me what the facts really mean.

Add some financial incentive and facts can be manipulated through opinion to achieve a desired outcome.

Opinions are OK, but they don’t constitute news.  To be honest, the opinion section in my local paper is only two pages by typeset only.  The opinions spill into the rest of the paper, most likely without conscious objection from the author.

I don’t mind opinion, but when reporting the news, please just stick to the facts, and let me determine what those facts really mean.

Think critically folks!  Ask for the facts and form your own opinion around them…  and turn off the TV!

The sports page records people’s accomplishments; the front page has nothing but man’s failures.

Commentary media, media bias, opinion vs. fact, television