Poll: Do you trust OSINT accounts/sites that also express political opinions?

[DEFCON Warning System]

There are more and more Twitter accounts and web sites that deal in Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) that also post a lot of political opinion. This became even more prevalent during the 2020 US elections.

Do you trust these organizations that have political opinions and/or political agendas more, less, or just the same as those who post no political opinions.

Disclaimer: The DEFCON Warning System is politically neutral and posts no political opinions.

 

[entropolis]

Would be nice if you added an entry for "Fine with political opinions as long as everyone realizes they're opinions, not everyone elses obligation. Or somesuch. If people can manage to be respectful of the quid pro quo, then having the political wheelhouse someone is steering from greatly frames their answers with much greater clarity. Declaring bias, and accepting we all have some is the mature, full disclosure thing to do.
...acting like only your own politics have any merit? That's just an invitation to get punched in the mouth.

 

[RiffRaff]

Media sources with a political agenda can usually be trusted with "Breaking News" events, although I got really disgusted with American news media when everything became a "News Alert." There are some OSINT sources with obvious political bias that nevertheless are pretty quick to post breaking news events. Problem is, depending on the subject matter of the breaking news, I might have to wait for a second source to break the news before I trust it completely. One of the things I admire about this organization is its efforts to separate political affiliation from analysis of events. I think the more polarized the United States becomes, the more important non-partisan geopolitical analysis becomes.

You will always have the "cultists" on both sides of the political spectrum who no matter how balanced and neutral a story or analysis is will cry "fake news" if it portrays their "side" in any negative light at all. However, in my opinion, those people aren't truly interested in analysis; only in being proven "right." There is nothing that can be done or said to convince such people that you are politically neutral, so I ignore them and their protests.

 

[CreepyMonkey]

AS a former, and sometimes still active, journalist, I have a heavy interest in this.

What used to be the standard of journalism was neutrality. It didn't matter what your own beliefs were or were not; what we called, "Journalistic integrity" was paramount to reporting anything. You kept your nose out of political leanings and reported the news AS IS, and let the people make up their own minds.

But all aspects of real journalism are now dead. So called 'reporters' are a joke these days with absolutely no research done the old fashioned way; phone, investigation and footwork. It's all about opinion these days...which of course isn't news at all.

So bottom line for me; if someone voices their political opinion that's fine, as long as it is done privately and personally. Once you start broadcasting to the world your own political opinions as though someone actually gave them credence or gave two shits about it, you've compromised your ability to report neutrally. If you can't resist the urge to open your mouth and speak without regard to your integrity as a journalist I can't trust you to post anything neutrally and I will just always assume your reporting is slanted in the leaning of your political opinions.

You either are someone who has integrity and reports to the people the news, or you get to mouth off to no one in particular that you believe blah blah blah. There is no middle ground in my opinion as an old school journalist.