Inflamed rhetoric abounds in the health care debate and this is not the best way to carry on rational discourse about important issues. One problem is that most media outlets have the primary objective of making money so they cater to groups that consume their news. People then pay more attention to  news that maps onto their own personal ideology regardless of the quality or truth of the information. In other words,  people are more attentive to facts that they have a predisposition to believe and media organizations can take advantage of this to make a profit.

Do media organizations always report in this way? No, but it is sometimes difficult to know when this is happening especially when we have our own predispositions interfering. Moreover, many sources of information that people rely on are not news, they are opinion or commentary about the news. That is, people are theorizing or “spinning” the news. The problem with obtaining “news” from “spin doctors” is that they don’t necessarily consider themselves bound by the professional ethics of journalists and the value of ratings may trump the value of truth.   To be literate and informed citizens we need to be vigilant against our own tendencies to agree or disagree without checking the facts. For important issues, never rely on a single source of news and do your best to check the facts. There are a few fact checking sites recognized as being non-partisan - FactCheck.org and PolitiFact.com . Think about visiting these sites, explore all sides of issues, and always be skeptical.

Take a look at our subscription-based political information website, The National Journal.  This online source offers nonpartisan reporting on the current political environment and emerging policy trends and it includes polls, news, legislation updates, columns, and national and some state election tracking.  The National Journal online also contains  the full-text of articles from National Journal, Congress Daily, The Hotline, American Health Line, Technology Daily, and The Almanac of American Politics. To access this database, start at the Library homepage and click on Databases A-Z.