Talk:The Daily Caller

Moving forward

I've taken in a lot of the substantive discussion above, and there seems to be consensus (to some degree) that the article could be improved, although to what degree remains to be seen. I am going to take the cue from XOR'easter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:XOR%27easter and have a look at how The Sun and other tabs have been handled, and try and draft something whole. That said, I'm a bit suprised at his comment that any change that would "involve removal of cited content, [which] is guaranteed to get Wikipedians' hackles up (people get prickly when they see negative numbers in their watchlists)." I don't understand at all if there is a place in WP for being proprietary about past work, or what "negative numbers in their watchlist" even means. Does that mean that if an article is revised and a cite deleted, it counts as some kind of demerit against the editor? That can't possibly be right, because it de-incentivizes any evolution or change to an article. WP editors, as far as I can see, do a good job of serving the public interest, and I'm awfully sure that individual pride of authorship takes a backseat to that public interest. If I'm missing something, it would be helpful to hear. CharlesGlasserEsq (talk) 15:27, 2 December 2019 (UTC)CharlesGlasserEsq

No, there is no formal system of demerits (nor, for that matter, is there a formal system for awarding merit points, only a determinedly casual way of expressing gratitude). I only meant that, in my experience, Wikipedia editors tend to find the removal of adequately-written material supported by adequate sources to be a bad thing, whether or not they themselves wrote that material in the first place. This is a lesson of experience; over time, one associates such removals with (to put it in slightly grandiose terms) badly serving the public interest. The psychological reaction to seeing large negative numbers in one's watchlist is typically negative itself. XOR'easter (talk) 16:03, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

XOR'easter, especially when such edits are proposed by representatives of controversial subjects.

The comparison with The Sun is instructive: that is a very old newspaper that was turned by its proprietor into a mechanism for advancing political interests. The Daily Caller was never anything other than a conservative propaganda sheet. As with all conservative media at this point, it must necessarily obfuscate and excuse the actions of Donald Trump, or it will lose revenue. It cannot make money by being honest about Trump or the Republican Party. Unsurprisingly, the article reflects this, and its attendant issues with fact-checkers. Truth has a well-known liberal bias. Guy (help!) 16:30, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

CharlesGlasserEsq, there is consensus that every article on Wikipedia could be improved. In as much as that consensus is specifically relevant here, the edits you proposed do not have consensus.

Start small. Identify things that are wrong and propose changes in the form "change X to Y based on Z source". Look at our list of good and bad sources to see what counts. Sources need to be reliable, independent and secondary. Articles on controversial subjects should not obscure their controversial nature - we do not whitewash. Note that the Daily Caller is at the borders of extremism according to https://www.adfontesmedia.com/interactive-media-bias-chart/, and every independent observer notes that it is highly partisan and that accuracy appears to take second place to ideology, which is understandable given its history.

Above all, please keep it brief. Remember, most of us think the article is fine as it is, so you need to make it easy for us to understand why anything should change. Guy (help!) 16:40, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Please see also WP:PAYTALK, CharlesGlasserEsq, and keep in mind that the editors engaging with you are different from you in that they're not paid for their efforts. Bishonen | talk 16:55, 2 December 2019 (UTC).

Well, with the greatest respect and sincerity, to say "The Daily Caller was never anything other than a conservative propaganda sheet. As with all conservative media at this point, it must necessarily obfuscate and excuse the actions of Donald Trump, or it will lose revenue. It cannot make money by being honest about Trump or the Republican Party." There is nothing in the article or reality that ties it's revenue to a Trump loyalty. And that statement indicates a far from objective viewpoint. In addition, stating unequivocally that "Truth has a well-known liberal bias" is indicative of a non-objective position. That said, what would it take to prove (with the highest caliber of sources) to show that TDC has often criticized conservatives, Trump and the kinds of industry generally associated with mere propaganda sheets? I'm not here to argue or insult, I'm here to persuade and appeal to your better instincts. CharlesGlasserEsq (talk) 17:46, 2 December 2019 (UTC)CharlesGlasserEsq

CharlesGlasserEsq, have you read Network Propaganda by Robert Faris and Yochai Benkler? It proves that point by statistical and network analysis.

A publication that thinks "patriot" is synonymous with "conservative" is not an honest broker. Guy (help!) 18:51, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

You're welcome to try and draft something whole and bill your client for the time you spend doing that, but I don't think it's the best way forward. Rather, I think you should heed the advice above (start small, keep it brief) and you may want to follow the format I suggested earlier: (1) what it says now, (2) what you think it should say, (3) quotes from and links to reliable sources supporting the change. Just start with one change and propose it. One place to start might be to propose a sentence or two to add to the History section about the awards received for the 2012 "Horse Soldiers of 9-11" story [1], which is currently listed in the awards section but not otherwise discussed in the body. – Levivich 17:51, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

I appreciate that, mucho thanks. I know I've said this before, but a few folks just coming back in ought to hear it loud and clear: There is NO EFFORT TO WHITEWASH anything. The Daily Caller made mistakes, and they have to own them. No getting around that. If I had been asked to "erase history" I would have never taken the assignment. What seems to happening here is one handful of people have prejudged TDC because it's conservative and any facts that support a "scorched earth" approach seem to be reason enough to change nothing. Another handful are cognizant that the article is an awfully lopsided litany of "here's everything bad we could dig up" and satisfied that that's enough. I'm aware of the bothsides-ism issue, but they have a lot of important and positive contributions to political discourse that the true value of WP can be realized by showing. Even if one doesn't agree with that particular story or argument. The Daily Caller's well-documented crusade against the rich Sackler family and their profiteering off of Oxycontin abuse is a good example. It's kind of sad that WP editors so intent on making TDC look as evil as possible would ignore such reporting: especially given the public importance of showing how corporate profits took priority over human lives. That's a long way off of being a conservative mouthpiece and WP's refusal to include episodes like that (there are many others) can't help but to lead one to see the article as it is as a smear piece. Do you see where I'm coming from? Thanks again, CharlesGlasserEsq (talk) 18:26, 2 December 2019 (UTC) CharlesGlasserEsq

It is still making mistakes. For example, it is promoting the Kremlin line on Ukraine. As to being a smear, that depends on your perspective. If you believe that conservative media honestly portrays a truthful interpretation of the same facts as mainstream media, then yes, you'll see it as a hit piece. If, on the other hand, you don't fall for the fallacy that "mainstream" and "conservative" are antonyms, and accept that companies such as AP, Reuters, Bloomberg and the rest are accurate (as independent scrutiny shows them to be) then you will not fall into that trap, and you'll realise that ideology, not fact, is the underlying value system in the conservative media. Guy (help!) 19:30, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Guy Media ethics is what I do for a living, and I was Bloomberg's top Media Global Counsel for 14 years. That's after 16 years as a reporter. There's a HUGE kerfuffle right now after Bloomberg announced last week it would not cover any Democratic competitors to Mike. And the French market regulators just fined Bloomberg 5M Euros for publishing hoax news. So pardon me for not accepting that all independent scrutiny shows them to be "accurate." The point is you're welcome to see TDC as ideologically driven. That's no less true for Daily Koz, MSNBC or Mother Jones. But all of them deserve to be treated fairly, whether you agree with ideology or not. And "adopting the Kremlin line on Ukraine" is a value judgment, not a fact. C'mon, man, work with me here in good faith. Reasonable people will differ, let the stories speak for themselves and trust people to see what's worth believing or not. The New York Times falsely reported that W Bush served a fake plastic turkey to troops in Afghanistan, but that shouldn't define the entirety of the Times' work, should it? We can list dozens of episodes of the Times getting it wrong, but we shouldn't make that the centerpiece of describing them. That has to be true for everybody: not just the folks with which you agree. This is exactly the emotional and political resistance to a truly academic approach that frustrates so many about WP. Almost as if to say "it's *our* football and if you don't like the way we interpret the rules, go home, noobie." CharlesGlasserEsq (talk) 19:57, 2 December 2019 (UTC)CharlesGlasserEsq

CharlesGlasserEsq, I don't know if you've noticed, but we treat partisan-left and partisan-right sources equally: we don't trust either. I was the one who deprecated Occupy Democrats as a source. I removed citations to it, and to MJ and HuffPo and the rest. But there is, right now, an asymmetric bias in US media. Conservative media loses revenue if it publishes fact that contradict conservative narratives. Liberal media suffers if it publishes ideologically-driven but factually incorrect material. There is a difference in kind between, say, Maddow and Carlson, and it lies in how their audiences will react if they prefer agenda over objective truth.

Anyone can publish a false story. The question is, whether they do it unusually often, and whether they promptly correct it when they do, and whether they adequately distinguish between fact and opinion, and whether they operate on the common fact base or not. When your editorial line appears to include climate change denial, denial of the Ukraine shakedown, support for Kremlin talking points around Ukraine (not a value judgment, see the testimony of Fiona Hill), uncritical repetition of the statements of people like Nunes, who again repeat Kremlin disinformation as if it were fact, then you have a serious problem, and it's really not our problem to fix. Guy (help!) 20:14, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

The Times retracted their error about the fake plastic turkey. That's what reliable sources do. – bradv🍁 20:19, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Same with Bloomberg. "Only a few minutes after the publication of the fake press release by various financial media outlets, Bloomberg News was the first one to publish a correction." The fact that they got fined for their mistake doesn't make them less accountable either. – bradv🍁 20:22, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

I won't argue for fun,
I won't argue for free,
with someone who's paid
to argue with me. – Levivich 20:30, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

​I'll argue all day,
I'll fight 'til I'm tired,
At least if I lose
I won't get fired. – bradv🍁 20:34, 2 December 2019 (UTC)