There once was a collective experience called nightly news. Imagine: On CBS alone, over 27 million Americans sat in front of their television sets for 30 minutes at dinnertime to watch Walter Cronkite, polled as the most trusted man in America, deliver the day’s news. (Today, the combined totals for the three main network newscasts barely reach 20 million and are trending downward.)
Americans likely supplemented that with a newspaper that was delivered to their house or purchased at a newsstand or newspaper box on the way to work. Maybe they relied on the radio. Maybe they got a weekly news magazine to go more in-depth. There was no internet. No cell phones. No 24-hour cable news channels. No endless variety of news outlets available with a tap or two of your finger. No apps. Just a small number of trusted sources to connect you with the world.
I don’t need to tell you that Americans’ news habits have splintered—that anyone with almost any ideological perspective can find a news source that serves up their preferred worldview, that it’s gotten harder for Americans from across the political spectrum to talk to each other, in part because they likely don’t share common sources for their knowledge of what’s actually happening (in other words, what counts as news).
Yes, we can probably all agree that the soccer World Cup is being played and basketball star Brittney Griner has just returned from Russia in a trade for a notorious arms dealer—even if we have very different notions of what these events mean. But, thanks to the variety of news sources, conflict persists over how deadly COVID-19 was and is or what exactly happened on Jan. 6 last year at the U.S. Capitol. More troubling are the available channels and social media platforms to feed the conspiracy-minded among us and exacerbate their attraction to violent extremism and hate. (Don’t get me started on the abusive slide of Elon Musk’s Twitter.)
I’m deeply grateful I can read and watch news from all over the planet at any time, even as I cling to the old habit of holding a physical newspaper when I drink my morning coffee. But I do question how much longer that will last as layoffs lead to the decline of quality and my ever-ready phone beckons. Despite having two former newspaper reporters in their house, my children rarely pick up a newspaper.
Such pondering led me to wonder about the news habits of the America, America community. Where do you get most of your news? Do you read a physical newspaper? Where do you get the local news of your town or city? Do you rely primarily—or even exclusively—on TV news? Do you have a favorite news anchor? Do you think The New York Times and The Washington Post are the most reliable sources for national news? If not them, then who? And do you have a preferred digital outlet?
As always, I look forward to reading your comments and the opportunity for us to learn from each other.
Dec 10, 2022·edited Jan 16, 2023Liked by Steven Beschloss
Good morning and yes, it's getting more complicated, or at the very least, it's changing and what that will look like is uncertain. I used to like the NYT & WaPo but they have badly let me down with their milqtoast normalizing of the very real authoritarian dangers we face. I do like NPR but only touch-in on occasion. So I follow.....people like you, and a couple dozen others who keep me informed about some of the pressing issues, but part of my sanity/lucidity measures involves limiting the intake of all the wild & crazy daily occurences. I was just admitted to Post.News and am liking it, but mainly just adding all the people I followed on Twitter for the inevitable implosion. I almost never go there. I just discovered Victor Shi, the very young man who is so articulate and enthusiastic and positive and deeply engaged with activism and what is happening (his daily YouTube is called On The Move with VictorShi)).. It's nice to see a young face doing this! I do not own a TV & haven't for 35 years. I love the internet though! Happy weekend, all. It's bright and sunny here in the prairielands of northern New Mexico ahead of a coming storm (we hope). Thanks everyone for your engagement and never give up! (Oh: local news I get from a few individual independent journals/newsletters/organizations who send out stories and info).
I get my news and outside information from the NY Times, Washington Post, The Atlantic, via subscription. Free reads: ProPublica (highly recommended), Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Foreign Affairs, Nature and and Science feed.
Also here, Heather Cox Richardson (I love here connection of history with today's events).
Off of MSNBC, CNN, local newspapers and evening news. Rarely look at local news.
One of my favorite news sources is from the All Sides app. It breaks down related stories from the “left, right, and center.” I appreciate the varied perspective. I appreciated Twitter because I could follow my favorite journalists who work for large and small publications.
Now that Twitter is such a hellscape, and I don’t appreciate contributing to that, I’ve discovered outlets like Substack, Mastodon, and most recently and appreciatively, Post. I also subscribe to NYT, WaPo, The Atlantic, and a few smaller, lesser known publications. I have a newspaper subscription from my local city of 300,000 population, but to be honest, don’t often read the physical paper. I do follow the local newspaper on Facebook. However I don’t want it to go away so I support it. But I’m 61 years old -- probably being sentimental about paper copy.
I consume my news with my phone or laptop more than anything else, but I often find myself being surprised to learn of news from Stephen Colbert, Trevor Noah (sorry to see him go), and network news occasionally. I often watch the local news.
I work for a civic health nonprofit, and we have conducted “truth in media” projects where we ask people similar questions to the one you pose here. It’s interesting to hear about the news silos that people can get into when they don’t have multiple resources for news. Not to throw the stones too hard, but the Fox News fans are rarely interested in hearing from more than their source of news. It’s frustrating to
hear. But sometimes just talking about it with them makes them realize they might benefit from an expanded media diet.
Give me a moment. I’m trying to put the toothpaste back in the tube.
Obviously, no one does that, but trying to get back to a common news stream as we had until the 1980s is akin to asking the three-year-old to hand back all the candy you’ve given him or trying the toothpaste exercise.
Until ownership limits on broadcast stations were essentially eliminated, until the federal government decided cable TV did not need a Fairness Doctrine or an Equal Time regulation, until Roger Ailes and his ilk realized that billions of dollars could be made by appealing to the not-so-hidden racist nature of so many Americans, we had reasonably accurate and fair reporting, the foundation of which was The Associated Press and a then still viable United Press International.
Newspapers were swimming in money into the 1980s. Television stations as well. Many large cities had two competing newspapers.
Broadcasters relied on one or both wire services, which prided themselves on accurate reporting. Print reporters were given time to research their stories. In large markets, television reporters often had but one story a day to produce and that for the 6 o’clock newscast.
That’s all history. Now try to find a newsroom in your “local” radio station. They are as rare as the Spix’s Macaw.
Today’s TV reporters are often one-man (or woman) bands – not just gathering facts but also having to shoot the story. And TV stations are hiring just-out-of-college grads with zero experience in reporting but who will work cheap. If you can find a phone number for your local newspaper, call it and see if you can talk to an actual reporter. Once proud newspapers that would boast of Pulitzer Prizes are down to half a dozen reporters and editors. TV reporters must produce stories for the 4 p.m., 5 p.m., 6 p.m. 7 p.m. and 10 or 11 p.m. newscasts.
That’’s why you see “police tape stations” where the best they can do to fill the hours is to race out to the latest knifing, shoot b-roll of police tape and perhaps the street sign and get a sound bite from the police spokesman. The reporters do not have time to actually dig up facts because they’re on their way to the next assignment and then they have to actually write something and actually edit the video.
This helps the TV stations shovel ever more gold to the owners, which are beholden to Wall Street. Sinclair and Nexstar, among the largest TV owners, are deeply in debt, with 2023 looming with its tiny handful of political races. Watch the layoffs start.
Oh. You asked about what media do I use. Since none of the toothpaste will go back into the tube, let me list them:
• New York Times, Washington Post and Los Angeles Times. The New Yorker. All digital.
• WFTS (Scripps) in Tampa for TV news. They still try, surprisingly. WTSP (Tegna) in Tampa for CBS News; their local effort would curdle antifreeze.
• WWSB (Gray) and WSNN (Citadel) in Sarasota if my blood pressure is too low.
• PBS NewsHour. NPR.
I will not waste money or time on the local newspaper, the once proud Pulitzer earning Herald Tribune. You could shoot a cannonball through their newsroom and not hit anyone.
While toothpaste will not go back in its tube and three-year-olds aren’t going to give up what was given to them without a tantrum, perhaps someone out there has a business plan or plans that will save local newsrooms.
I do not watch tv at all. I get my news from you, credible journalists, attorneys, doctors, Democrats in and out of Congress, local government, academics, others I follow on post.news, Substack, and, unfortunately, Twitter. My father was a journalist. He was typically very peaceful but if he was still with us would be quite furious with the decline of credible, well-researched, edited news today. Thank you for being here for all of us!
Dec 10, 2022·edited Dec 10, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss
• Where do you get most of your news? I get a great deal of news from Substack authors and enjoy reading and participating in reader comments. The interchange is illuminating. My go-to source for explication of daily news is historian Heather Cox Richardson, deservedly a Substack legend. I also learn about current events from the point of view of attorneys Robert B. Hubbell and Joyce Vance on Substack.
• Do you read a physical newspaper? Not any more.
• Where do you get the local news of your town or city? Local weekly newspaper (digital, mostly). Digital newsletters from my city.
• Do you rely primarily—or even exclusively—on TV news? Not any more. I hardly watch it, and if I do it's to mostly check the headlines on CNN or to watch a bit on MSNBC.
• Do you have a favorite news anchor? The brilliant Rachel Maddow, on only Mondays now. I record the show (as I do most programs, so I can zip past commercials.)
• Do you think The New York Times and The Washington Post are the most reliable sources for national news? I have digital subscriptions to both. They have been reliable sources but are leaning more right nowadays and tend to indulge what-aboutists.
• If not them, then who? NPR, The Boston Globe, the L.A. Times, BBC, The Guardian.
• And do you have a preferred digital outlet? Substack. See my first answer above.
My father was a journalism professor and I delivered papers as a teenager. It was hard to quit getting daily papers delivered but the amount of paper for recycling just got too much.
I subscribe to 5 newspapers digitally (2 nat’l, 2 local, and my hometown local) but end up mostly reading NYTs.
I supplement w Rachel Maddow, NPR, substack, and following occasional Facebook links. I abandoned Twitter when Musk purchase was first announced. It was my main source of diverse views and I’m on the lookout for a non-toxic replacement.
Professional Journalism keeps getting worse. Repetitive themes, dumbing down, lack of useful insights and explanation. Advertising is completely ruining the NYT WP and others online. I find myself just switching to subscriber services that do not advertise, when I can. Youtube is vastly more interesting as news -- because you can listen to the actual news makers (and yes, I subscribe to not get the ads, from Google anyway). The Internet is not TV.
P.S. Medium has no stinky ads and has some original writers such as myself, as well as reporters of immediate news. Often more accurate than the majors. And will subscribe as I did for you.
This happens to be the conundrum of my year-end review! How many (too many), how much (unsustainably expensive), how distracting (not enough time), how insightful (indubitably)!!
I have 38 regular sources for regular updates/information. The NYTimes is singularly THE most expensive/indulgent subscription (which 5 members of my family rely on to greater and lesser degrees). It is also the most infuriating -- see steady rise in price (exorbitant) and regular failures of objective journalism while still often driving national assumptions/conversations.
No TV sources because I rely little on TV “news” these days. That is not to say MSNBC or local news is never switched on, but there is insufficient depth to the material presented.
Additional caveat -- granted this list reflects a privileged, middle-aged, retired, white woman’s curation, but it evolved over the course of our devolution to authoritarianism and aimed to help me organize and repel as best I might.
SUBSTACK SUBSCRIPTIONS (Paid)
1. Civil Discourse with Joyce Vance
2. HEATED by Emily Atkin
3. Letters from an American by Heather Cox Richardson
4. Lucid by Ruth Ben-Ghiat
5. The Message Box by Dan Pfeiffer
6. Popular Information by Judd Legum
7. Robert Reich
8. Steady with Dan Rather and Eliot Kirschner
9. That Guy in Hutch by Jason Probst
10. Thinking about.. Professor Timothy Snyder
11. Chop Wood, Carry Water by Jessica Craven
12. Today’s Edition by Robert Hubbell
NEWSPAPERS/JOURNALS (Paid or Donation)
1. NYTimes
2. Washington Post
3. Slate
4. The New Yorker
5. The Atlantic
6. The American Prospect
7. Foreign Policy
8. ProPublica
9. The KCStar (local)
10. The Kansas City Beacon (local)
11. Shawnee Mission Post (local)
12. Kansas Reflector (state)
13. Missouri Independent (state)
ISSUES NEWS REPORTS
1. The Trace (Gun Violence tracking)
2. Food Tank (Food Security issues)
3. Nature Conservancy/Sierra Club (for Local Environmental issues)
RADIO/PODCASTS
1. NPR — three local channels
2. Majority 54 - Jason Kander / Ravi Gupta
3. Now & Then - Joanne Freeman / Heather Cox Richardson
4. iGen Politics - Victor Shi / Jill Wine-Banks
5. Amicus - Dahlia Lithwick
6. # Sisters in Law - Barb McQuade / Kimberly Atkins-Stoehr / Joyce Vance / Jill Wine-Banks
It definitely is complicated now! My news comes from: you, Dan Rather, Heather Cox Richardson, Robert Hubbell, Meidas Touch, SistersInLaw podcast, Dahlia Lithwick and occasionally Lincoln Project. I follow several journalists and lawyers on Mastodon as I’ve left Twitter and am finding trusted sources there. Thanks!
There is no doubt that letting go of the Fairness Doctrine, the decline of the physical newspaper, any Walter Cronkite type, junk reality shows on TV that make us laugh at rudeness and stupidity as if it weren't ruining our country, and seemingly low educational standards in large portions of the country have helped lead us to the point we are at now. I don't know where it ends. I spend a good 30 minutes a day or more deleting hundreds of emails I don't want to read and often can't get to the important ones, let alone really read a newspaper. I had been helped by Twitter before Musk, as so many people I respect would post there and provide links to articles. Now that is diluted. I subscribe to NY Times, LA Times, Atlantic, Wash Post but hardly ever get to look at much in them. It is difficult to read a newspaper online. Much prefer thumbing through pages made of paper so I could at least see each headline and then read what I needed to read. Now, we don't even see more than a handful of algorithm-selected headlines.
I read Heather Cox Richardson first thing every morning. I awaken looking forward to it! Then I read a couple of people I follow on Twitter. Angry Staffer is my favorite. I browse the Twitter feed for new stories. I have chosen carefully who is on my feed. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is another. I read my local newspaper and watch the local noon news as well as Lester Holt Nightly News. Those are my main sources. I occasionally open my CNN app, but I don’t usually learn anything new in there.
Several places - subscriptions to WaPo, NYT, philadelphia inquirer and Wall Street journal - adds up and won’t last forever , but trying to support what I can.
Mostly I read google news on my iPhone where I purposely populate different sources. That helps me understand how similar happenings get carried differently. Embarrassed to report I also read lots of news in my Facebook and Twitter feed but I always pay close attention to the source . Great topic and I’m of am age to have experienced the one nightly world news source .
Thank you for this question. I have such fond memories of Walter Cronkite and I share the importance of his legacy with my daughter who recently graduated from ASU’s Cronkite School. She is in the field reporting now and is dedicated to telling important human stories with complete integrity. I’m so glad for this and happy the school really pushes fact-checking and integrity. ...As for me, I listen to several political podcasts to learn the weight of the day’s events. I read local Phoenix papers (as a proofreader) and once in a while tune into PBS and NPR. I prefer the Washington Post to The New York Times. I have no use for FoxNews as it’s not accurate or news. But, I can always tell a Fox News watcher by the views he holds. It (and various social media outlets) is truly a cancer on our current society and I truly wish we could abolish it. It almost single-handedly has changed our values as a society. My wish is that after all of us having witnessed the previous corrupt administration’s complete lack of integrity that we all will be much more discerning of where we obtain our news and can see much more clearly what is Truth, and that no news source will be the mouthpiece for lies.
All of my daily news is from online sources including NYT, Washington Post, Bloomberg, and local sources close to home. My TV news is PBS, BBC, MSNBC, and occasionally Bloomberg. My wife and I decided to save on paper resources some time ago though I miss having my Sunday newspaper!
Dec 10, 2022·edited Dec 10, 2022Liked by Steven Beschloss
When I was growing up, my parents (a newspaper and a reporter) subscribed to 5-6 daily newspapers in Redwood City, CA, as well as many magazines like the New Yorker, Scientific American, National Geographic, and Atlantic. Being a news junkie is in my genes.
I get my news online from multiple sources: by ear (live radio), online, and via email alerts.
1) I listen to and am a sustaining member of NPR (KQED-FM, 88.5, San Francisco) a lot and get news alerts via email from NPR and KQED.
2) I subscribe to The New Yorker(digital and print), The New York Times and Washington Post (both digital), The Atlantic (digital and print), The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (digital), and to several online blogs on substack: Nineteenth, etc.
3) I spend a lot of time on Twitter (been there since 2009, not abandoning it to Musk and his invasive species nuts), following several journalists and topics to stay on top of the latest machinations in Congress, there various Tr$mp investigations, election results, etc. Twitter threads can be very enlightening and lead to all kinds of original and reliable sources.)
4) My wife reads Apple News. When she brings up stories she has just read there, I have usually been aware of it from my news sources (Twitter, NYT, WAPO, NPR, etc.) for 24-72 hours. I have noticed that Apple News, when I look at it, is usually "a day late and a dollar short" on delivering news "as it happens."
I subscribe to Apple News and read it on my phone and iPad. On there, I mostly read NBC, NYT, and WAPO. I love The Atlantic and use their app as well. I honestly read a lot of news links on Twitter from the same sources above, as well as local news sources. I subscribe digitally to my local paper, the San Diego UT, but I don’t open it much. I subscribe so I don’t hit the paywall when I want to read a story on there! (And I was just on the cover of it with my Moms Demand Action crew when Joe Biden came to town, so that was handy!).
I, too, grew up with the nightly news and my little brother was a paper boy. I miss that. I still take the New Yorker and the Atlantic, and the WaPo online for national news. I take the San Francisco Chronicle as home delivery and just recently cancelled my NYTIMES subscription because I couldn’t take so much of their right-wing slant. (Loved Michelle Goldberg, though.) I miss Rachel every night, but do watch bits and pieces of other MSNBC hosts. I also take the Guardian online.
I’m 65 years old and remember Walter Cronkite very well. I do think having multiple news sources is a good thing. However, somehow our first amendment has been hijacked, and truth and integrity are not, or don’t seem to be important anymore. Somehow truth in news must be regulated to be the most important thing when reporting news. Otherwise, we will never get back to the way we were. I don’t understand why we can’t make sure our news is trustworthy and true. Why can’t we place fines and label so-called news organizations, and their people that deliver these lies as liars. I can’t yell fire in a theater when there is no fire. So how can these people spew lies and not have any consequences?
The good old days. Walter Cronkite was a nightly fixture in my childhood home. We also received Life Magazine and Newsweek and one newspaper… today? I trust Washington Post and some journalists/news people on cnn, msnbc, etc but I listen only to those I do trust to at least give me the bare facts of what’s happening. It made me think of All the President’s Men which I only watched a couple years ago for the first time and I was stunned remembering the days before internet and cell phones. Oh for those days of news…
I used to just read the New York Times, and a few liberal magazines such as Mother Jones and Harpers. Then, after I moved to the boonies and getting the Times regularly became near impossible, I started to read online.
Now I get the Times online and their news alerts. I record PBS NewsHour but listen to network evening news, just to see the pictures and get a glimpse of things that aren’t reported in news alerts, such as big weather events and the like.
If there’s anything of import, such as a Supreme Court decision, I will watch the Newshour to get more in-depth reporting. (I especially like Martha Coyle)
In the past year or so, I have started to check in on Twitter more often, just to see what people are saying about what other people are saying, if that makes sense, more or less taking the pulse of the situation. Sometimes I see things reported there that I have not seen elsewhere. I dive deeper to make sure it’s not “fake news.”
I now subscribe to four substacks. I started by chance with Robert Hubbel, then added yours (I was familiar with you through your news commentary appearances), then Joyce Vance (for precision legal analysis) and most recently Dan Rather, for his kindness and decency.
I live in Germany and subscribe to New York Times digital and listen to many podcasts (especially NPR), but my husband reads the paper newspaper (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) and watches the nightly news here in Germany, and we discuss the way the various outlets are covering the same events.
I just deactivated my Twitter account just tonight which I have been relying on for minute by minute tweets from court rooms. I’m having withdrawals, but Musk is throwing his fortune into hate/lies/violence/fascism. Rachel used to give accounts of what was happening in the courts, but Monday nights isn’t cutting it. I’m desperate to hear of accountability in the moment it’s happening. HCR’s LFAA and Lucid & Snyder’s substack help. Bangor Daily News for local news. There is so much news happening every dang day and really important stuff, it’s challenging to be informed and keep up with all the other responsibilities in our every day lives, but my sources are very similar to what others have listed. I have no patience for the blah blah punditry on TV. NPR has been trying to both sides Fascism and Democracy and that is just yuck.
I haven’t watched TV news since it morphed into something like pro-wrestling back in the 90s. Reuters is my main source, followed by The Guardian and the Washington Post (all by way of the net). Life was better before cable.
Growing up, while eating supper, my father insisted on quiet while we listened to the evening news. We also had The Bradford (PA) Era delivered each day. Going back to the 1960s, I cut out news articles from all over the world , people, places, happenings,history, I have 3 big bins full. With trump, I stopped.
I get daily emails from NYTimes and CNN plus news from Centre Co., PA, Bradenton, FL, and NJ. Newspapers cost too much. $3 daily $5 Sunday. I am not very interested in Florida news as a whole.. I remember when living in NC, the local paper had such important news as how to make an apron and how to make a pine cone basket !
News now is Lester Holt on NBC, CBS Sunday Morning, 60 minutes, MSNBC, BBC, and CNN. I like Rachel Maddow,, Lawrence O'Donnell, Jose Diaz-Balart. I liked Don Lemon but he has been moved time wise, and Chris Cuomo but he has been fired.
I do not like Facebook-it is just a place to fight with each other, or twitter anymore . I liked Michael Beschloss' pictures and news from the past.
I read the Washington Post. I have for more than 50 years. But I find myself enjoying it less as it continues to drop readers favorites- the Post Magazine or the Style Invitational.
I used to subscribe--digitally--to the NYT and the Washington Post, but I have found both of them to lean much more in favor of Republicans than to be neutral in their news reporting. And I am not talking about columnists. Straight news reporting about the recent election--before AND after--focused on what Republicans needed to do to win. What Republicans failed to do so they did not win. What they needed to do in 2024. Not that Democrats had deserved wins because they had better candidates. Not that Democrats won because a large majority of Americans prefer Democratic policies. No. It seemed to me they are all far more interested in having Republicans in power. Never mind that there IS no Republican Party that is not MAGA and insurrectionist infected. Both of these major newspapers still seem to have no idea that we have only one viable political party (which, I agree, is obviously NOT a good thing), and they treat the Republican Party not equally, but superior to, the Democratic Party. This I will not support financially. I have terminated both my subscriptions.
I watch Lester Holtz’s 6 o’clock nightly news, but he, too, suffers from this malady. In one of his ads he repeats his question (I can’t remember to whom) about whether there will be violence in the streets if trump is indicted. Why can’t he ask whether there will be dancing in the streets if tfg is indicted? Why is he unaware of the fact that his question will encourage violence?
So I get my news from various headlines, notifications that flash on my phone, daily emails from “Die Krone” (an Austrian daily), Heather Cox Richardson, the BBC app, Reuters, NPR, the Guardian, and the Atlantic (the last two of which I have subscriptions for).
not on TV...and almost nobody I know gets their news on network TV. We go to people like you, blogs and podcasts. Now that Twitter has gone to the dark side, many of us have deleted our involvement there. Fox and network TV are no longer reliable (Fox has never been reliable). There are things happening in the world and in this country that the American People have no idea about because they watch network news or Fox. What we have is FUBAR, we are travelers being led in the dark and then blamed for not voting and it all began about the time that picture was taken of Walter Cronkite in 1968
Heather Cox Richardson, Robert Reich, NPR, WAPO, KC Star online daily. Also articles in The Atlantic, The New Yorker, NYT, Th Guardian, BBC, and various others on occasion. George Will makes sense sometimes. All online. I subscribe to Reader’s Digest for positive articles and humor.
My go-to is PBS Newshour, which I watch live or when convenient on YouTube, since I don't have a TV or streaming subscription. I like the calmer delivery and longer form segments, both news and culture. Nick Schifrin's reporting, in particular, has been excellent. In general, any time I can find first-person interviews I tune in this way. The DC radio news outlet WTOP's national security reporter, JJ Green, has a terrific fairly new YouTube channel called "Global" where he conducts longer interviews with interesting people. No fancy editing or graphics, just good conversations. I follow a few independent new outlets from around the country on twitter and other social media (like Tennessee Holler) and a person who blogs all my local rural Virginia county government meeting here on Substack. No more print papers, though I love to hold a real book for reading.
I grew up in a home with no TV (I’m almost 50) so NPR was our main source of news, and remains my go-to choice. We did read newspapers too, my father subscribed to Barrons for years, although that was secondary to NPR. When visiting my grandparents, they watched PBS NewsHour, and while I felt it was torture growing up, now if I do watch news on TV PBS is my preferred station.
I guess that not being exposed to commercial television daily has impacted me long term in the sense that I really dislike commercial TV and will avoid it if at all possible.
I will add, during the Trump years (and with the increase in gun violence in the US) I found even listening to the news to be “too much” to handle, and so I do read a lot of news on my phone. This allows me to curate what I consume even more. As a news junky, I have a need to know the news, but I also need to be informed in a way that doesn’t overwhelm with despair.
It’s such an interesting question and I use multiple sources. There are certain journalists I trust and others that I don’t. Rachel Maddow and Ali Velshi are two of my most trusted information sources. I daily read Reuters, the Atlantic, Aljazera, the New York Times. Most of the time these sources line up and I hope I’m getting the accurate truth but some days I just don’t know what to believe. I have great difficulty understanding how people can believe the trash coming out of most conservative sources. I also follow Matthew Dowd and Mark Elias. Some time ago I started to record Tucker Carlson so I could see what is going on at Fox but have watched short portions only three times!
The sad part is, I’m not sure it matters. What we’ve experienced is a loss of innocence. There’s a collective sense that there’s no longer such a thing as truth. The same story is told differently from different news outlets, and how do you really know that you’re trusted source is telling the truth? (Because I guarantee you there’s someone out there saying that your trusted source is the one spreading fakes news.)
If you can’t be sure who’s telling the truth anymore, how do you know we hat the truth is?
Great question! We still get the local Sunday paper. (I still like holding the newspaper in my hands.) However, it’s owned by Gannett, so “local” is a relative term. My husband is a videographer for our local ABC affiliate, so I get a lot of (unpleasant) news from him. 🤷🏼♀️ I sometimes watch the local ABC news & World News Tonight, but so much of it is depressing that I can only watch for small periods. I get WaPo online and read your Substack and Dan Rather’s. I also have a subscription to The Atlantic. The only cable news (?) show I watch almost always is Deadline: White House.
So…gone are the days/nights of everyone getting their news from one of the original three TV networks or the local newspaper at a time when news seemed to be delivered, not opined upon. We’re a world of 24/7 access to EVERYTHING! I’ve said just recently to my husband (who devours news of every stripe)…I wonder how long local TV news will continue to be a thing. Same thing with TV weather forecasters. We all have weather apps. How many people still wait for the evening news to get their local weather forecast?
i worry sometimes that people seem to get all their news online and not from reputable sources. (Yes, I know reputable is a relative term.) We all should want to educate ourselves through whatever means, but we also should want to access accurate info. I’m not sure how we do that in today’s world. But maybe folks like you can help us get there.
I have a digital subscription to the NY Times. I also view TV news on either MSNBC , CNN or the networks of ABC, NBC , CBS and on occasion FOX (to see what they are talking about when the other networks are all in agreement on something like calling elections). I have an alarm on my phone so that I do not often miss Rachael Maddow's show. I also have a digital subscription to a local news source web site for NJ called "TAP into Raritan Bay" which tells me about very local news, like which local kids have made the deans list at college.
David Muir (ABC) for our Walter Cronkite moment, Kudlow (FOX BIZ) for business/politics, GooGle news feed for the morning blast, Newsweek aggregator. Local small town Oklahoma radio (Music and current events).
Big city radio: KFI Los Angeles, KRTH Houston, Tx
Print: Tulsa World, The Oklahoman, Ponca City News (OK)
BTW, kinda grinning over the Post-Sh*t Show Twitter. Much less toxic.
I was suspended before Elon came along to be a fool. I still contend kids should come home in school buses. Not body bags. Must have hit someone’s nerve?
There was an incredible moment at the 1968 convention when David Brinkley made some very derogatory comments about Richard Nixon, while on a hot mic… I’ve tried to find a recording of that moment, but to no avail
I've always gotten my news from NYT. However, since the 2016 election, I read WaPo digitally, the New Yorker, and articles from twitter contributors I trust.
I have NPR on much of the day. PBS News Hour in the evening. Digital subscriptions to the WaPo & NYT. I do not have cable so I’m unable to watch the local news. I used to find links to articles in The Atlantic & ProPublica on Twitter but Musk has turned it into the hellscape he claimed he wouldn’t allow. Deactivated that account. I also subscribe to a few political podcasts. Al Franken is great.
I read the LA Times, WaPo and NYT. Also listen to NPR as well as PBS newshour. Some MSNBC and CNN depending on who the host is like Rachael Maddow, Lawrence O’Donnell. Following different sources gives a wider and more informed perspective. I did use Twitter but less and less as it descends into EM’s toxic wasteland. Sad because there was so much good content. Moved to Mastodon but not as versatile as Twitter was. Looking at Post. Loved your posts - very informative and educational.
I grew up reading newspapers. My father and grandfather subscribed to the Boston Globe and the New York Times. Growing up on Cape Cod offered little in the news business. Naturally, when it came to TV, the whole family watched Cronkite. Politics was often dinner conversation which is why I became a political junkie today.
Good morning and yes, it's getting more complicated, or at the very least, it's changing and what that will look like is uncertain. I used to like the NYT & WaPo but they have badly let me down with their milqtoast normalizing of the very real authoritarian dangers we face. I do like NPR but only touch-in on occasion. So I follow.....people like you, and a couple dozen others who keep me informed about some of the pressing issues, but part of my sanity/lucidity measures involves limiting the intake of all the wild & crazy daily occurences. I was just admitted to Post.News and am liking it, but mainly just adding all the people I followed on Twitter for the inevitable implosion. I almost never go there. I just discovered Victor Shi, the very young man who is so articulate and enthusiastic and positive and deeply engaged with activism and what is happening (his daily YouTube is called On The Move with VictorShi)).. It's nice to see a young face doing this! I do not own a TV & haven't for 35 years. I love the internet though! Happy weekend, all. It's bright and sunny here in the prairielands of northern New Mexico ahead of a coming storm (we hope). Thanks everyone for your engagement and never give up! (Oh: local news I get from a few individual independent journals/newsletters/organizations who send out stories and info).
I get my news and outside information from the NY Times, Washington Post, The Atlantic, via subscription. Free reads: ProPublica (highly recommended), Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Foreign Affairs, Nature and and Science feed.
Also here, Heather Cox Richardson (I love here connection of history with today's events).
Off of MSNBC, CNN, local newspapers and evening news. Rarely look at local news.
One of my favorite news sources is from the All Sides app. It breaks down related stories from the “left, right, and center.” I appreciate the varied perspective. I appreciated Twitter because I could follow my favorite journalists who work for large and small publications.
Now that Twitter is such a hellscape, and I don’t appreciate contributing to that, I’ve discovered outlets like Substack, Mastodon, and most recently and appreciatively, Post. I also subscribe to NYT, WaPo, The Atlantic, and a few smaller, lesser known publications. I have a newspaper subscription from my local city of 300,000 population, but to be honest, don’t often read the physical paper. I do follow the local newspaper on Facebook. However I don’t want it to go away so I support it. But I’m 61 years old -- probably being sentimental about paper copy.
I consume my news with my phone or laptop more than anything else, but I often find myself being surprised to learn of news from Stephen Colbert, Trevor Noah (sorry to see him go), and network news occasionally. I often watch the local news.
I work for a civic health nonprofit, and we have conducted “truth in media” projects where we ask people similar questions to the one you pose here. It’s interesting to hear about the news silos that people can get into when they don’t have multiple resources for news. Not to throw the stones too hard, but the Fox News fans are rarely interested in hearing from more than their source of news. It’s frustrating to
hear. But sometimes just talking about it with them makes them realize they might benefit from an expanded media diet.
Thanks for asking this question!
Give me a moment. I’m trying to put the toothpaste back in the tube.
Obviously, no one does that, but trying to get back to a common news stream as we had until the 1980s is akin to asking the three-year-old to hand back all the candy you’ve given him or trying the toothpaste exercise.
Until ownership limits on broadcast stations were essentially eliminated, until the federal government decided cable TV did not need a Fairness Doctrine or an Equal Time regulation, until Roger Ailes and his ilk realized that billions of dollars could be made by appealing to the not-so-hidden racist nature of so many Americans, we had reasonably accurate and fair reporting, the foundation of which was The Associated Press and a then still viable United Press International.
Newspapers were swimming in money into the 1980s. Television stations as well. Many large cities had two competing newspapers.
Broadcasters relied on one or both wire services, which prided themselves on accurate reporting. Print reporters were given time to research their stories. In large markets, television reporters often had but one story a day to produce and that for the 6 o’clock newscast.
That’s all history. Now try to find a newsroom in your “local” radio station. They are as rare as the Spix’s Macaw.
Today’s TV reporters are often one-man (or woman) bands – not just gathering facts but also having to shoot the story. And TV stations are hiring just-out-of-college grads with zero experience in reporting but who will work cheap. If you can find a phone number for your local newspaper, call it and see if you can talk to an actual reporter. Once proud newspapers that would boast of Pulitzer Prizes are down to half a dozen reporters and editors. TV reporters must produce stories for the 4 p.m., 5 p.m., 6 p.m. 7 p.m. and 10 or 11 p.m. newscasts.
That’’s why you see “police tape stations” where the best they can do to fill the hours is to race out to the latest knifing, shoot b-roll of police tape and perhaps the street sign and get a sound bite from the police spokesman. The reporters do not have time to actually dig up facts because they’re on their way to the next assignment and then they have to actually write something and actually edit the video.
This helps the TV stations shovel ever more gold to the owners, which are beholden to Wall Street. Sinclair and Nexstar, among the largest TV owners, are deeply in debt, with 2023 looming with its tiny handful of political races. Watch the layoffs start.
Oh. You asked about what media do I use. Since none of the toothpaste will go back into the tube, let me list them:
• New York Times, Washington Post and Los Angeles Times. The New Yorker. All digital.
• WFTS (Scripps) in Tampa for TV news. They still try, surprisingly. WTSP (Tegna) in Tampa for CBS News; their local effort would curdle antifreeze.
• WWSB (Gray) and WSNN (Citadel) in Sarasota if my blood pressure is too low.
• PBS NewsHour. NPR.
I will not waste money or time on the local newspaper, the once proud Pulitzer earning Herald Tribune. You could shoot a cannonball through their newsroom and not hit anyone.
While toothpaste will not go back in its tube and three-year-olds aren’t going to give up what was given to them without a tantrum, perhaps someone out there has a business plan or plans that will save local newsrooms.
NYT, WP, NPR. NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt. MSNBC. The Atlantic, the New Yorker.
I do not watch tv at all. I get my news from you, credible journalists, attorneys, doctors, Democrats in and out of Congress, local government, academics, others I follow on post.news, Substack, and, unfortunately, Twitter. My father was a journalist. He was typically very peaceful but if he was still with us would be quite furious with the decline of credible, well-researched, edited news today. Thank you for being here for all of us!
• Where do you get most of your news? I get a great deal of news from Substack authors and enjoy reading and participating in reader comments. The interchange is illuminating. My go-to source for explication of daily news is historian Heather Cox Richardson, deservedly a Substack legend. I also learn about current events from the point of view of attorneys Robert B. Hubbell and Joyce Vance on Substack.
• Do you read a physical newspaper? Not any more.
• Where do you get the local news of your town or city? Local weekly newspaper (digital, mostly). Digital newsletters from my city.
• Do you rely primarily—or even exclusively—on TV news? Not any more. I hardly watch it, and if I do it's to mostly check the headlines on CNN or to watch a bit on MSNBC.
• Do you have a favorite news anchor? The brilliant Rachel Maddow, on only Mondays now. I record the show (as I do most programs, so I can zip past commercials.)
• Do you think The New York Times and The Washington Post are the most reliable sources for national news? I have digital subscriptions to both. They have been reliable sources but are leaning more right nowadays and tend to indulge what-aboutists.
• If not them, then who? NPR, The Boston Globe, the L.A. Times, BBC, The Guardian.
• And do you have a preferred digital outlet? Substack. See my first answer above.
My father was a journalism professor and I delivered papers as a teenager. It was hard to quit getting daily papers delivered but the amount of paper for recycling just got too much.
I subscribe to 5 newspapers digitally (2 nat’l, 2 local, and my hometown local) but end up mostly reading NYTs.
I supplement w Rachel Maddow, NPR, substack, and following occasional Facebook links. I abandoned Twitter when Musk purchase was first announced. It was my main source of diverse views and I’m on the lookout for a non-toxic replacement.
Professional Journalism keeps getting worse. Repetitive themes, dumbing down, lack of useful insights and explanation. Advertising is completely ruining the NYT WP and others online. I find myself just switching to subscriber services that do not advertise, when I can. Youtube is vastly more interesting as news -- because you can listen to the actual news makers (and yes, I subscribe to not get the ads, from Google anyway). The Internet is not TV.
Me, From 1993, on exactly this question:
https://rhtcmu.medium.com/world-wide-web-d383579f18aa
P.S. Medium has no stinky ads and has some original writers such as myself, as well as reporters of immediate news. Often more accurate than the majors. And will subscribe as I did for you.
This happens to be the conundrum of my year-end review! How many (too many), how much (unsustainably expensive), how distracting (not enough time), how insightful (indubitably)!!
I have 38 regular sources for regular updates/information. The NYTimes is singularly THE most expensive/indulgent subscription (which 5 members of my family rely on to greater and lesser degrees). It is also the most infuriating -- see steady rise in price (exorbitant) and regular failures of objective journalism while still often driving national assumptions/conversations.
No TV sources because I rely little on TV “news” these days. That is not to say MSNBC or local news is never switched on, but there is insufficient depth to the material presented.
Additional caveat -- granted this list reflects a privileged, middle-aged, retired, white woman’s curation, but it evolved over the course of our devolution to authoritarianism and aimed to help me organize and repel as best I might.
SUBSTACK SUBSCRIPTIONS (Paid)
1. Civil Discourse with Joyce Vance
2. HEATED by Emily Atkin
3. Letters from an American by Heather Cox Richardson
4. Lucid by Ruth Ben-Ghiat
5. The Message Box by Dan Pfeiffer
6. Popular Information by Judd Legum
7. Robert Reich
8. Steady with Dan Rather and Eliot Kirschner
9. That Guy in Hutch by Jason Probst
10. Thinking about.. Professor Timothy Snyder
11. Chop Wood, Carry Water by Jessica Craven
12. Today’s Edition by Robert Hubbell
NEWSPAPERS/JOURNALS (Paid or Donation)
1. NYTimes
2. Washington Post
3. Slate
4. The New Yorker
5. The Atlantic
6. The American Prospect
7. Foreign Policy
8. ProPublica
9. The KCStar (local)
10. The Kansas City Beacon (local)
11. Shawnee Mission Post (local)
12. Kansas Reflector (state)
13. Missouri Independent (state)
ISSUES NEWS REPORTS
1. The Trace (Gun Violence tracking)
2. Food Tank (Food Security issues)
3. Nature Conservancy/Sierra Club (for Local Environmental issues)
RADIO/PODCASTS
1. NPR — three local channels
2. Majority 54 - Jason Kander / Ravi Gupta
3. Now & Then - Joanne Freeman / Heather Cox Richardson
4. iGen Politics - Victor Shi / Jill Wine-Banks
5. Amicus - Dahlia Lithwick
6. # Sisters in Law - Barb McQuade / Kimberly Atkins-Stoehr / Joyce Vance / Jill Wine-Banks
7. Ezra Klein Show - Ezra Klein
8. The Daily - NYTimes
9. In The Bubble - Andy Slavitt
It definitely is complicated now! My news comes from: you, Dan Rather, Heather Cox Richardson, Robert Hubbell, Meidas Touch, SistersInLaw podcast, Dahlia Lithwick and occasionally Lincoln Project. I follow several journalists and lawyers on Mastodon as I’ve left Twitter and am finding trusted sources there. Thanks!
There is no doubt that letting go of the Fairness Doctrine, the decline of the physical newspaper, any Walter Cronkite type, junk reality shows on TV that make us laugh at rudeness and stupidity as if it weren't ruining our country, and seemingly low educational standards in large portions of the country have helped lead us to the point we are at now. I don't know where it ends. I spend a good 30 minutes a day or more deleting hundreds of emails I don't want to read and often can't get to the important ones, let alone really read a newspaper. I had been helped by Twitter before Musk, as so many people I respect would post there and provide links to articles. Now that is diluted. I subscribe to NY Times, LA Times, Atlantic, Wash Post but hardly ever get to look at much in them. It is difficult to read a newspaper online. Much prefer thumbing through pages made of paper so I could at least see each headline and then read what I needed to read. Now, we don't even see more than a handful of algorithm-selected headlines.
I read Heather Cox Richardson first thing every morning. I awaken looking forward to it! Then I read a couple of people I follow on Twitter. Angry Staffer is my favorite. I browse the Twitter feed for new stories. I have chosen carefully who is on my feed. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is another. I read my local newspaper and watch the local noon news as well as Lester Holt Nightly News. Those are my main sources. I occasionally open my CNN app, but I don’t usually learn anything new in there.
Several places - subscriptions to WaPo, NYT, philadelphia inquirer and Wall Street journal - adds up and won’t last forever , but trying to support what I can.
Mostly I read google news on my iPhone where I purposely populate different sources. That helps me understand how similar happenings get carried differently. Embarrassed to report I also read lots of news in my Facebook and Twitter feed but I always pay close attention to the source . Great topic and I’m of am age to have experienced the one nightly world news source .
Thank you for this question. I have such fond memories of Walter Cronkite and I share the importance of his legacy with my daughter who recently graduated from ASU’s Cronkite School. She is in the field reporting now and is dedicated to telling important human stories with complete integrity. I’m so glad for this and happy the school really pushes fact-checking and integrity. ...As for me, I listen to several political podcasts to learn the weight of the day’s events. I read local Phoenix papers (as a proofreader) and once in a while tune into PBS and NPR. I prefer the Washington Post to The New York Times. I have no use for FoxNews as it’s not accurate or news. But, I can always tell a Fox News watcher by the views he holds. It (and various social media outlets) is truly a cancer on our current society and I truly wish we could abolish it. It almost single-handedly has changed our values as a society. My wish is that after all of us having witnessed the previous corrupt administration’s complete lack of integrity that we all will be much more discerning of where we obtain our news and can see much more clearly what is Truth, and that no news source will be the mouthpiece for lies.
All of my daily news is from online sources including NYT, Washington Post, Bloomberg, and local sources close to home. My TV news is PBS, BBC, MSNBC, and occasionally Bloomberg. My wife and I decided to save on paper resources some time ago though I miss having my Sunday newspaper!
When I was growing up, my parents (a newspaper and a reporter) subscribed to 5-6 daily newspapers in Redwood City, CA, as well as many magazines like the New Yorker, Scientific American, National Geographic, and Atlantic. Being a news junkie is in my genes.
I get my news online from multiple sources: by ear (live radio), online, and via email alerts.
1) I listen to and am a sustaining member of NPR (KQED-FM, 88.5, San Francisco) a lot and get news alerts via email from NPR and KQED.
2) I subscribe to The New Yorker(digital and print), The New York Times and Washington Post (both digital), The Atlantic (digital and print), The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (digital), and to several online blogs on substack: Nineteenth, etc.
3) I spend a lot of time on Twitter (been there since 2009, not abandoning it to Musk and his invasive species nuts), following several journalists and topics to stay on top of the latest machinations in Congress, there various Tr$mp investigations, election results, etc. Twitter threads can be very enlightening and lead to all kinds of original and reliable sources.)
4) My wife reads Apple News. When she brings up stories she has just read there, I have usually been aware of it from my news sources (Twitter, NYT, WAPO, NPR, etc.) for 24-72 hours. I have noticed that Apple News, when I look at it, is usually "a day late and a dollar short" on delivering news "as it happens."
I subscribe to Apple News and read it on my phone and iPad. On there, I mostly read NBC, NYT, and WAPO. I love The Atlantic and use their app as well. I honestly read a lot of news links on Twitter from the same sources above, as well as local news sources. I subscribe digitally to my local paper, the San Diego UT, but I don’t open it much. I subscribe so I don’t hit the paywall when I want to read a story on there! (And I was just on the cover of it with my Moms Demand Action crew when Joe Biden came to town, so that was handy!).
I, too, grew up with the nightly news and my little brother was a paper boy. I miss that. I still take the New Yorker and the Atlantic, and the WaPo online for national news. I take the San Francisco Chronicle as home delivery and just recently cancelled my NYTIMES subscription because I couldn’t take so much of their right-wing slant. (Loved Michelle Goldberg, though.) I miss Rachel every night, but do watch bits and pieces of other MSNBC hosts. I also take the Guardian online.
I’m 65 years old and remember Walter Cronkite very well. I do think having multiple news sources is a good thing. However, somehow our first amendment has been hijacked, and truth and integrity are not, or don’t seem to be important anymore. Somehow truth in news must be regulated to be the most important thing when reporting news. Otherwise, we will never get back to the way we were. I don’t understand why we can’t make sure our news is trustworthy and true. Why can’t we place fines and label so-called news organizations, and their people that deliver these lies as liars. I can’t yell fire in a theater when there is no fire. So how can these people spew lies and not have any consequences?
The good old days. Walter Cronkite was a nightly fixture in my childhood home. We also received Life Magazine and Newsweek and one newspaper… today? I trust Washington Post and some journalists/news people on cnn, msnbc, etc but I listen only to those I do trust to at least give me the bare facts of what’s happening. It made me think of All the President’s Men which I only watched a couple years ago for the first time and I was stunned remembering the days before internet and cell phones. Oh for those days of news…
1. mostly online
2. my local paper prints on W, F and Su
3. MSNBC
4. Melber, Maddow and Velsi for 8 shows/week
5. NYT and WP
6. Guardian with a small monthly donation
7. still on Twitter, primed to register with Post
I used to just read the New York Times, and a few liberal magazines such as Mother Jones and Harpers. Then, after I moved to the boonies and getting the Times regularly became near impossible, I started to read online.
Now I get the Times online and their news alerts. I record PBS NewsHour but listen to network evening news, just to see the pictures and get a glimpse of things that aren’t reported in news alerts, such as big weather events and the like.
If there’s anything of import, such as a Supreme Court decision, I will watch the Newshour to get more in-depth reporting. (I especially like Martha Coyle)
In the past year or so, I have started to check in on Twitter more often, just to see what people are saying about what other people are saying, if that makes sense, more or less taking the pulse of the situation. Sometimes I see things reported there that I have not seen elsewhere. I dive deeper to make sure it’s not “fake news.”
I now subscribe to four substacks. I started by chance with Robert Hubbel, then added yours (I was familiar with you through your news commentary appearances), then Joyce Vance (for precision legal analysis) and most recently Dan Rather, for his kindness and decency.
I also really like The Onion 😆
I live in Germany and subscribe to New York Times digital and listen to many podcasts (especially NPR), but my husband reads the paper newspaper (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) and watches the nightly news here in Germany, and we discuss the way the various outlets are covering the same events.
I just deactivated my Twitter account just tonight which I have been relying on for minute by minute tweets from court rooms. I’m having withdrawals, but Musk is throwing his fortune into hate/lies/violence/fascism. Rachel used to give accounts of what was happening in the courts, but Monday nights isn’t cutting it. I’m desperate to hear of accountability in the moment it’s happening. HCR’s LFAA and Lucid & Snyder’s substack help. Bangor Daily News for local news. There is so much news happening every dang day and really important stuff, it’s challenging to be informed and keep up with all the other responsibilities in our every day lives, but my sources are very similar to what others have listed. I have no patience for the blah blah punditry on TV. NPR has been trying to both sides Fascism and Democracy and that is just yuck.
I haven’t watched TV news since it morphed into something like pro-wrestling back in the 90s. Reuters is my main source, followed by The Guardian and the Washington Post (all by way of the net). Life was better before cable.
Growing up, while eating supper, my father insisted on quiet while we listened to the evening news. We also had The Bradford (PA) Era delivered each day. Going back to the 1960s, I cut out news articles from all over the world , people, places, happenings,history, I have 3 big bins full. With trump, I stopped.
I get daily emails from NYTimes and CNN plus news from Centre Co., PA, Bradenton, FL, and NJ. Newspapers cost too much. $3 daily $5 Sunday. I am not very interested in Florida news as a whole.. I remember when living in NC, the local paper had such important news as how to make an apron and how to make a pine cone basket !
News now is Lester Holt on NBC, CBS Sunday Morning, 60 minutes, MSNBC, BBC, and CNN. I like Rachel Maddow,, Lawrence O'Donnell, Jose Diaz-Balart. I liked Don Lemon but he has been moved time wise, and Chris Cuomo but he has been fired.
I do not like Facebook-it is just a place to fight with each other, or twitter anymore . I liked Michael Beschloss' pictures and news from the past.
I read the Washington Post. I have for more than 50 years. But I find myself enjoying it less as it continues to drop readers favorites- the Post Magazine or the Style Invitational.
I used to subscribe--digitally--to the NYT and the Washington Post, but I have found both of them to lean much more in favor of Republicans than to be neutral in their news reporting. And I am not talking about columnists. Straight news reporting about the recent election--before AND after--focused on what Republicans needed to do to win. What Republicans failed to do so they did not win. What they needed to do in 2024. Not that Democrats had deserved wins because they had better candidates. Not that Democrats won because a large majority of Americans prefer Democratic policies. No. It seemed to me they are all far more interested in having Republicans in power. Never mind that there IS no Republican Party that is not MAGA and insurrectionist infected. Both of these major newspapers still seem to have no idea that we have only one viable political party (which, I agree, is obviously NOT a good thing), and they treat the Republican Party not equally, but superior to, the Democratic Party. This I will not support financially. I have terminated both my subscriptions.
I watch Lester Holtz’s 6 o’clock nightly news, but he, too, suffers from this malady. In one of his ads he repeats his question (I can’t remember to whom) about whether there will be violence in the streets if trump is indicted. Why can’t he ask whether there will be dancing in the streets if tfg is indicted? Why is he unaware of the fact that his question will encourage violence?
So I get my news from various headlines, notifications that flash on my phone, daily emails from “Die Krone” (an Austrian daily), Heather Cox Richardson, the BBC app, Reuters, NPR, the Guardian, and the Atlantic (the last two of which I have subscriptions for).
not on TV...and almost nobody I know gets their news on network TV. We go to people like you, blogs and podcasts. Now that Twitter has gone to the dark side, many of us have deleted our involvement there. Fox and network TV are no longer reliable (Fox has never been reliable). There are things happening in the world and in this country that the American People have no idea about because they watch network news or Fox. What we have is FUBAR, we are travelers being led in the dark and then blamed for not voting and it all began about the time that picture was taken of Walter Cronkite in 1968
Heather Cox Richardson, Robert Reich, NPR, WAPO, KC Star online daily. Also articles in The Atlantic, The New Yorker, NYT, Th Guardian, BBC, and various others on occasion. George Will makes sense sometimes. All online. I subscribe to Reader’s Digest for positive articles and humor.
Washington Post, Google news, and the Modesto Bee. Plus insight from Mike Peterson: https://www.dailycartoonist.com/index.php/2022/12/10/csotd-twice-around-the-rim-and-out/
World news tonight on TV and The Washington Post on my phone.
NPR or HLN in my car.
My go-to is PBS Newshour, which I watch live or when convenient on YouTube, since I don't have a TV or streaming subscription. I like the calmer delivery and longer form segments, both news and culture. Nick Schifrin's reporting, in particular, has been excellent. In general, any time I can find first-person interviews I tune in this way. The DC radio news outlet WTOP's national security reporter, JJ Green, has a terrific fairly new YouTube channel called "Global" where he conducts longer interviews with interesting people. No fancy editing or graphics, just good conversations. I follow a few independent new outlets from around the country on twitter and other social media (like Tennessee Holler) and a person who blogs all my local rural Virginia county government meeting here on Substack. No more print papers, though I love to hold a real book for reading.
I grew up in a home with no TV (I’m almost 50) so NPR was our main source of news, and remains my go-to choice. We did read newspapers too, my father subscribed to Barrons for years, although that was secondary to NPR. When visiting my grandparents, they watched PBS NewsHour, and while I felt it was torture growing up, now if I do watch news on TV PBS is my preferred station.
I guess that not being exposed to commercial television daily has impacted me long term in the sense that I really dislike commercial TV and will avoid it if at all possible.
I will add, during the Trump years (and with the increase in gun violence in the US) I found even listening to the news to be “too much” to handle, and so I do read a lot of news on my phone. This allows me to curate what I consume even more. As a news junky, I have a need to know the news, but I also need to be informed in a way that doesn’t overwhelm with despair.
It’s such an interesting question and I use multiple sources. There are certain journalists I trust and others that I don’t. Rachel Maddow and Ali Velshi are two of my most trusted information sources. I daily read Reuters, the Atlantic, Aljazera, the New York Times. Most of the time these sources line up and I hope I’m getting the accurate truth but some days I just don’t know what to believe. I have great difficulty understanding how people can believe the trash coming out of most conservative sources. I also follow Matthew Dowd and Mark Elias. Some time ago I started to record Tucker Carlson so I could see what is going on at Fox but have watched short portions only three times!
The sad part is, I’m not sure it matters. What we’ve experienced is a loss of innocence. There’s a collective sense that there’s no longer such a thing as truth. The same story is told differently from different news outlets, and how do you really know that you’re trusted source is telling the truth? (Because I guarantee you there’s someone out there saying that your trusted source is the one spreading fakes news.)
If you can’t be sure who’s telling the truth anymore, how do you know we hat the truth is?
Great question! We still get the local Sunday paper. (I still like holding the newspaper in my hands.) However, it’s owned by Gannett, so “local” is a relative term. My husband is a videographer for our local ABC affiliate, so I get a lot of (unpleasant) news from him. 🤷🏼♀️ I sometimes watch the local ABC news & World News Tonight, but so much of it is depressing that I can only watch for small periods. I get WaPo online and read your Substack and Dan Rather’s. I also have a subscription to The Atlantic. The only cable news (?) show I watch almost always is Deadline: White House.
So…gone are the days/nights of everyone getting their news from one of the original three TV networks or the local newspaper at a time when news seemed to be delivered, not opined upon. We’re a world of 24/7 access to EVERYTHING! I’ve said just recently to my husband (who devours news of every stripe)…I wonder how long local TV news will continue to be a thing. Same thing with TV weather forecasters. We all have weather apps. How many people still wait for the evening news to get their local weather forecast?
i worry sometimes that people seem to get all their news online and not from reputable sources. (Yes, I know reputable is a relative term.) We all should want to educate ourselves through whatever means, but we also should want to access accurate info. I’m not sure how we do that in today’s world. But maybe folks like you can help us get there.
I received most of my news at Gabe’s restaurant in Glenwood Illinois.
I have a digital subscription to the NY Times. I also view TV news on either MSNBC , CNN or the networks of ABC, NBC , CBS and on occasion FOX (to see what they are talking about when the other networks are all in agreement on something like calling elections). I have an alarm on my phone so that I do not often miss Rachael Maddow's show. I also have a digital subscription to a local news source web site for NJ called "TAP into Raritan Bay" which tells me about very local news, like which local kids have made the deans list at college.
David Muir (ABC) for our Walter Cronkite moment, Kudlow (FOX BIZ) for business/politics, GooGle news feed for the morning blast, Newsweek aggregator. Local small town Oklahoma radio (Music and current events).
Big city radio: KFI Los Angeles, KRTH Houston, Tx
Print: Tulsa World, The Oklahoman, Ponca City News (OK)
BTW, kinda grinning over the Post-Sh*t Show Twitter. Much less toxic.
I was suspended before Elon came along to be a fool. I still contend kids should come home in school buses. Not body bags. Must have hit someone’s nerve?
Resign in? Why?
There was an incredible moment at the 1968 convention when David Brinkley made some very derogatory comments about Richard Nixon, while on a hot mic… I’ve tried to find a recording of that moment, but to no avail
I've always gotten my news from NYT. However, since the 2016 election, I read WaPo digitally, the New Yorker, and articles from twitter contributors I trust.
I have NPR on much of the day. PBS News Hour in the evening. Digital subscriptions to the WaPo & NYT. I do not have cable so I’m unable to watch the local news. I used to find links to articles in The Atlantic & ProPublica on Twitter but Musk has turned it into the hellscape he claimed he wouldn’t allow. Deactivated that account. I also subscribe to a few political podcasts. Al Franken is great.
I read the LA Times, WaPo and NYT. Also listen to NPR as well as PBS newshour. Some MSNBC and CNN depending on who the host is like Rachael Maddow, Lawrence O’Donnell. Following different sources gives a wider and more informed perspective. I did use Twitter but less and less as it descends into EM’s toxic wasteland. Sad because there was so much good content. Moved to Mastodon but not as versatile as Twitter was. Looking at Post. Loved your posts - very informative and educational.
I grew up reading newspapers. My father and grandfather subscribed to the Boston Globe and the New York Times. Growing up on Cape Cod offered little in the news business. Naturally, when it came to TV, the whole family watched Cronkite. Politics was often dinner conversation which is why I became a political junkie today.
My news sources:
1. Online subscriptions to NYTimes, WashPost, local newspaper, Talking Points Memo.
2. Twitter; follow especially Ukraine war news.
3. Podcasts: In the Bubble, Josh Marshall, Planet Money, others.
4. Heather Cox Richardson's newsletter, others.
5. Cable TV: Rachel Maddow, Alex Wagner, L. O'Donnel, BBC at times.
A news junkie am I, obviously.
Was Twitter. Now it's Post. Was CNN and MSNBC on TV. Now I don't watch any news on TV. I use NBC and Yahoo apps