After hearing from our guest speaker on how politics and news in general gets covered in smaller news organizations, my opinions did change slightly. My eyes were opened to the fact that not all news organizations report news just to get more hits or views. One just needs to take the time to find an honest news source that one can trust to be unbiased and there to report the news, not to merely grab attention.

However, after watching the Republican debate, it is blaringly obvious that not all news networks work this way. The questions that the moderators from CNBC asked were clearly to increase viewership, to get the candidates to respond in a way that would generate headlines, instead of asking questions that pertain to the state of the nation or beliefs and policies of the candidates. This is ineffective journalism and only adds fuel to the fire of those who believe the “liberal media” only exists to berate conservatives. In this instance, that seemed true. There was hardly any journalism taking place, and as one candidate put it, the moderators seemed to want a “cage match” more than they wanted to inform viewers about the many Republican candidates’ ideologies.

Overall, I do feel that my opinions have changed somewhat, but where they stood on large networks in that they report on what will generate more viewership and in turn more revenue is fairly stagnant. Some networks chase the dollar whereas some chase the news, one must be able to tell the difference or bear the risk of watching puffery.