Press Non-disclosure == Lies

While I already posted this issue on http://www.nicaliving.com/node/16924 the issue certainly goes way beyond Nicaragua. I reference  http://www.thenation.com/doc/20100301/jones/single which is about how pundits and experts are interviewed as experts without needing to disclose their vested interests.

I regularly hear about how unreliable what we call alternative media is. The most common excuse is that it is because the reporter isn't being objective. Somehow, a reporter that cares about a particular issue is supposed to present a less objective view of the situation than a reporter who interviews a source with a vested interest.

Personally, I would rather know the slant being applied in order to decide what I am really hearing. Expecting the Wall Street Journal to be independent of the best interests of Wall Street is about as far fetched as expecting a Communist Party paper to be independent of the idea that Communism is a good thing. Slightly more subtle are media outlets such as PBS which is, of course, funded by big corporations.

Today, more and more people are starting to see that independent media and even blogs are less likely to be tainted than big corporate media. But, is there more we can do to convince people which sources to believe?