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Ted Cruz

7 (6.5%)

Rick Santorum

16 (14.8%)

Michelle Bachmann

13 (12%)

Chris Christie

23 (21.3%)

Rand Paul

49 (45.4%)

Total Members Voted: 107

[PanH]

In private, there's no lower drinking age, but in public places, it's forbidden until 18. What's weird is that the data doesn't always match with the site the data comes from (childrenschances.org).

[MetalSlimeHunt]

The thing about ethnic discrimination is definitely not accurate for the US. It's not even accurate in the sense that it is around but not in the constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution disallows inequal protection under the law, which by definition includes discrimination by ethnicity.

[Frumple]

Yeah... I'd probably call some of those maps on a few things. Cases of "technically true, but they're missing some of the picture". Protection from discrimination based on ethnicity, ferex, is legally guaranteed to folks in the US... when they're hired or being considered for hiring by companies of a particular size -- 15 and up, in this case. As MSH notes, it's been defended repeatedly based on th'inequal protection bit. Smoking is banned in schools at the subnational level, as well (search through for "school"), and education is guaranteed for the disabled (just not constitutionally). Good deal of the stuff on those things does appear to be accurate, but it's somewhat troublesome that they're outright wrong or highly misrepresentative on some other bits

Don't get me wrong, you want to shit on the states in the arena that article addresses, there's plenty of room to do it. No need to leave out facts.

Report the unadulterated facts with absolutely no personal interjection or opinion. It's rather easy, excepting for when you have a paycheck.

Just make sure you avoid reporting all the potentially relevant facts and that's an absolutely beautiful way to get some deliciously biased material out there. Deception 101 is how to do it with facts, heh. The disabled education bit is an excellent example... check the source on the inclusion of the disabled into the education process. No, education's not constitutionally decreed, but there's pretty significant legal support anyway. And in an article that's ostensibly about "children's chances", it's pretty bloody obvious that reporting on the constitutional support but not the institutional support is blatant bias.

Edit: Well, okay, either blatant bias or ineptitude. Could be either, I guess.

[XXSockXX]

Some of these maps seem odd indeed.
- There is no national smoking ban in schools in Germany, but there are subnational smoking bans in public buildings and workplaces, which include all schools. (even bars sadly)
- work- and education laws against discrimination exist, quite a lot actually, just not in the constitution
- where do they get numbers for what an "unemployed minimum wage worker" receives per day? We don't have a minimum wage. But welfare does not only include money you actually get handed, it can include your rent and many material benefits, so it's difficult to come up with an average fixed number.
- teacher's education is seperate from the bachelor/master system and requires special training, so it does not really equal a bachelors degree
- minimum drinking age 15-17 is not accurate, you can drink beer and wine from 14 on under parental supervision, purchase beer and wine from 16 and hard alcohol from 18 on.

Overall these maps don't say much, some places in Africa look as "good" as Europe, which doesn't really provide an accurate picture of reality.

[misko27]

So people, how about DOMA? The lady in Texas who filibustered the abortion Bill for 13 hours? That Gay marriage is now legal again in California? That Anthony Weiner is leading in the polls?!? This stuff requires more then a passing glance.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

I am not surprised. As noted in the Happy Thread, my dark powers of prescience have allowed me to forsee these events. Except Weiner. I do not look into the future of Weiners.

DOMA was always screwed. It did not even try to conform to the Fourteenth. As for Texas, that state is going to turn battleground and eventually flip in the next decade, just you watch.

[Owlbread]

This is actually what it does, and quite well. Simply stating what is known - nothing more.

The problems come when they get political and set up an interview with a politician or when they require somebody with a point of view. It's hard for these interviewers not to show their leanings. Jo Coburn springs to mind, I really don't care for her. Don't get me started on that dreadful hog of a man Andrew Neil. I actually hate him. There's few people I truly hate, but he is one. I think the very impartial Raymond Buchanan and Isabel Fraser are vastly superior, the latter of whom is in a whole class of her own.

The majority of our problems with the media actually come from our terribly biased newspapers. I suppose we differ from the United States in that manner; in the USA, it is TV bias. In the UK our newspapers, controlled by a select, powerful few with strong political leanings, are oftentimes more powerful than TV.

[FearfulJesuit]

The Senate's immigration bill has passed. The ball is in Boehner's court now. I expect it to go down in a litany of wailing and gnashing of teeth...

And what happens if it doesn't pass, you ask? John McCain has the answer.

[nwob]

While I admire the job the beeb does in maintaining such, it is near impossible to report something without bias.

Report the unadulterated facts with absolutely no personal interjection or opinion. It's rather easy, excepting for when you have a paycheck.

This is actually what it does, and quite well. Simply stating what is known - nothing more.

I think that's a naive view of people's perception.

Even if you're just reporting facts you still have to use words and language is inherently biased.

Consider the difference between "Person X said", "Person X claimed", "Person X stated", "Person X insisted" or "Person X declared".  Your word selection here will significantly change our view of a situation.

And that's without mentioning the problem, as has been mentioned by others here, that you can't simply report all the relevant information, because you don't have the space or the time and nobody will read it.  So what do you include in your relevant context? Because the facts you include will colour people's views of the events you're reporting on.

[Loud Whispers]

And that's without mentioning the problem, as has been mentioned by others here, that you can't simply report all the relevant information, because you don't have the space or the time and nobody will read it.  So what do you include in your relevant context? Because the facts you include will colour people's views of the events you're reporting on.

To be honest, an omniscient network that reported everything would be pretty awesome.

[Descan]

This just in: Man in San Francisco has a hang nail.

More at eleven.

[GreatJustice]

This might be beating a dead horse, but it is quite impossible to have "no bias" when it comes to political issues. Okay, you can interview the "different sides" to the issue, but generally speaking there are many different views from a wide variety of sources, and you can't spend all day interviewing people who think the recession was caused by space aliens with mind control ray guns. So you weed out certain views, but some may very well be valid but lacking in public support or extreme. If the Marxist Leninist Party wants to have a say, not giving them that say is biased but so is including the Marxist Leninist Party opinion on every issue that comes up.

Now you can just report facts, but which facts? Politically charged debates often have a variety of statistics involved that can support multiple views, and which are often more complicated than seen at first glance. If you're talking about gun control, do you compare homicide rates, deaths by firearms, or homicides with firearms? How do you decide which country has "more" or "less" control when they may very well vary wildly in different respects? If you're talking about economics, what statistics do you use and in what contexts? It's all very well to report that East Borgistria experienced a GDP growth rate of 15% after a recession, but that's meaningless if most of that GDP is coming from a colossally expensive project to construct a golden statue of the president (though reporting that is tipping things the other way again).

In Britain, this is mostly solved by the BBC trying to keep its biases subtle, or at least not at odds with the major parties in the British government. In America, though, it's quite a bit more silly. If a news station tries to be unbiased in America, like CNN, they take the view that anything the two major parties disagree on is nuanced and complicated, whereas anything they agree on is set in stone and must be true. If one party insisted that the Earth revolves around the Moon and the other that the Sun revolves around the Earth, these stations would seriously echo both views as being absolutely worth consideration and may even try to "compromise" the two together. Meanwhile, if some people insisted that both parties were incorrect, they would be laughed at during the interview. Thus, you have the curious situation where most Americans from all sides of the political spectrum think positively of Snowden, and yet the American media quite overwhelmingly calls him a dirty traitor. It's rapidly becoming hard to tell the difference between "unbiased, journalistic" Western media and outfits like Pravda.

[misko27]

Weiner is now 3-way with Quinn and Thompson.

-snip-

Remember Twain!: "Facts are stubborn things. Statistics are pliable."

[MetalSlimeHunt]

His Imperial Majesty Rick Perry establishes religion in Texas schools.

[FearfulJesuit]

His Imperial Majesty Rick Perry establishes religion in Texas schools.

Look, I'm sorry, I'm an agnostic...but nobody is hurt by people saying "Merry Christmas." As for the symbols...I mean, it would be better if they weren't represented, but jeez, if you're putting up a tree and not a crucifix...

This isn't /r/atheism, is what I'm saying.