None of the above, thanks.
I end up turning to whichever explainer seems to be fact-based while also being relevant to the topic. I hadn’t even heard about that hot mic thing with Biden until I saw it on a results page for my (algorithm-influenced) Youtube search for Biden+SOTU+2024 stuff.
Ok.
Same.
My news intake may be atypical for a U.S.ian. For current events I:
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have no TV.
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have no subscriptions to any streaming services NetFlix, AppleTV, Hulu, Disney, Maxwhatever it is, etc.
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read (in a fast messy unthorough way) online: the Austin Chronicle, the Austin American Statesman, the Hays Free Press, the Dallas Morning News, The Guardian, Le Monde in English, and the LA Times online. I gave up on the NY Times; instead, I read The Onion. Not a joke. Sometimes: Mother Jones, The Nation, The New Yorker, The Intercept, and ProPublica depending on what they’ve been covering.
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listen to Deutsche Welle, NPR (when driving), Texas Standard and/or whatever KUT has on unless I am in the car that has the HD radio so I can listen to the BBC, Pod Save America, and for this election year: Meidas Touch stuff for the legal breakdowns of TFG lawsuits by actual lawyers, as long as I get to skip over Michael Cohen’s voice because it puts me off.
I watch Beau’s two Youtube channels irregularly; John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight and SNL’s Weekend Update weekly. I used to watch Trevor Noah when he was on The Daily Show and miss him hugely. I watch Robert Reich’s various videos on Youtube variously… his UCB lectures are pretty interesting and the man brings receipts. I maybe watch Rachel Maddow once on her Youtube channel every few months.
All this to say that I freely admit I compare the crap outta any one story, and I may be an outlier re pop culture (which I largely have no use for) and some of the more common news channels.
What I am curious about is quite often outside the culture I find myself in.
I find Beau’s vibe direct, observant, reasonable, presented with humility and humor. When he’s been wrong, he corrects himself. When he needs to make citations from primary sources like the documents written by the U.S. states that seceded prior to the U.S. Civil War, he reads them out loud on camera–at length. Oh what a deadly dull TV moment for most networks: reading historical documents on air! Cut to commercial! Go go go–
Beau has some insider knowledge (personally and from his own sources) from walks of life I will never access (law enforcement, military, etc.). He focuses on provable, demonstrable, evidence-based facts. He is as careful as a man can be AFAICT, his wife is a nurse, they are parents. I appreciate these facts personally.
He states repeatedly he does a lot of checking before recording and posting a video. His sources seem to be fairly reliable. He avoids hot takes, gossip, trendy crap. He does not shy away from saying the hard things needing to be said. Cut to commercial! Go go go–
He is outside my frame of reference in many ways. I frankly don’t care if some people can’t get past his Southern accent, or his beard, his t-shirts, whether his otherwise seeming unique combo of his convictions and beliefs and values, and what he may look like to some people. There are a huge number of liberals in the American South and I am super grateful for each and every one of them. I truly am. Brave people. I love 'em to bits. And I tell 'em I do.
Whatever energy he gives off to you is definitely not what I get from Beau.
It is what it is.
bOING peeps, feel free to pitch me some news sources you trust.
Our family has no stickers on any of our cars. It’s not safe to do so even if we did feel like it, here in central Texas. My neighbor’s nice car had one Beto sticker on it and got $3000 of keying damage in 10 minutes on a Thursday afternoon in the closest town. She’s was babysitting that day and was just out to lunch with her young charge.
ETA: Link added. I started a new thread asking as much.
