Our left-right media divide told through Charlottesville

>On each side, one publication dominated the conversation. The New York Times and Breitbart, represented 32 percent and 26 percent, respectively, of the top links shared by each camp.

>Other stories broke through both sides, such as Vice’s viral documentary on the events in Charlottesville.

>The data targets Twitter users with clear political allegiances — specifically, politically active users that exclusively followed either a Republican or Democratic 2016 presidential candidate. The top stories shared by both camps each day from Saturday, Aug. 12, through Wednesday, Aug. 16, show the political lines drawn between core supporters of Trump and the administration’s staunchest detractors.

>Outside major media headlines, core Republicans were more likely to share videos, while Democrats were more likely to share petitions.
...

>the blatant whataboutism on the bottom right
>the knee-jerk extremism on the top left
shameful on both sides t b h

>>171254
>>171254
This is what I do every day, I compare MSNBC and Fox news. They cover up the news and hide the truth with misdirection. They tell people what to think.

The real news is buried. Fox is smarter about it and better at painting narratives for months, years by highlighting stories (local or national) that support their long term goals.

You would think the daily headlines would be about republicans purposely sabotaging our only healthcare system in an effort to convince us to support a healthcare bill we don't like.

Everything else is background noise right now. This is the big con that matters. But the left is stupid and chasing russia like that matters, Pence is an even bigger puppet for McConnell.

>>171270
I think the left is just stuck on the idea of Russia as being a potential deus ex machina to end Trump. I mean, how else do you beat a man who openly claims obvious falsehoods that his supporters then believe with religious fervor? No amount of messaging is going to get through to Cletus in bumfuck Alabama that trade is actually good for the economy, or that a few dissenting fringe voices on climate change doesn't make the scientific consensus any less strong, or that there's not a pedophilia ring run by the Clintons.

But if it was proved that Trump is a Russian tool that "might" be enough to have him tarred and feathered. I say might because favorability towards Putin is on the rise among GOP voters, and half of them say they'd support delaying the election if Trump put forward the idea. Nixon still had some support even after the smoking gun tape, I could see half the GOP sticking by Trump no matter what revelations came out.

It's unfortunate because the healthcare bill, coming from a president who claimed he wasn't like other republicans and would cover everybody, is the real outrage. But policy doesn't make for good cable tv.

>>171254
>tfw if Obama had defended Nazis as being "good people", we'd have the same fucking response

lmao.jpg

>>171270
It's a good thing less than 1% of the population gets their news from cable news channels. It's all corporate media with different partisan flavorings. Stop falling for their marketing gimmicks.

>>171271
If the Congress is full of the same gerrymandered-in hornswagglers decade after decade then it ultimately doesn't matter who the president is. The President only gets to sign what Congress sends him and can only declare war if Congress pays for it.

>>171282
Fuckin ridiculous that my winner-take-all vote is diluted by people who live in a city more about 75 miles from me.

>>171328
You from California too? If not, it's the same here. I really hope Jefferson becomes a thing, because otherwise this state may as well be called The Extended Territories of San Francisco and Los Angeles.

>>171336
Nope
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/eb/Texas_US_Congressional_District_10_%28since_2013%29.tif/lossless-page1-1920px-Texas_US_Congressional_District_10_%28since_2013%29.tif.png
Look at that horse-shit. It's a dense sliver of liberal Austin and a swathe of the conservative-leaning small-town Texas, stretching all the way to the suburban outskirts of Houston. Its width is actually near double the initial figure I gave you.

Gerrymandering is an affront to representative politics. In a winner-take-all style election, I only stand to benefit from being grouped with Austinites. And small-town Texans only stand to benefit by being grouped with their like.

>>171336
Trump said he was against the electoral college and lo and behold, it wont be fixed.

Such corruption. They dont care that your vote is worthless because they are too busy screwing us and playing the game.

>>171255
>Democrats were more likely to share petitions

This explains so much

>>171426
Honestly, I think the biggest problem is that other people outside of our local territories are able to make decisions for us on our behalf. It's absolutely retarded that a man in New York can influence policy that's applied to Texas, or Florida Man has any say what goes on in California. This almost ensures that slightly less than half the country stays shackled to the other half and in turn creates massive waves of resentment on both sides because many issues have zero capacity to compromise (IE Gun Control, gay marriage, public education, etc), and when compromise is attempted, instead we wind up pissing off both camps with a half-assed solution. Implementing more state autonomy in laws would help curb this greatly.

Not that this would really help intra-state democratic systems, as Austin would still wind up shackled to Texas as a whole and California would still be beholden to a majority in Los Angels, but I think it'd be a step in the right direction that might help alleviate these problems in the future.

>>171506
That's pretty much a problem that you have to accept as a given with federated representative systems of government. It's as old as they are and we still don't seem to have a firm grasp on what's best.

>>171511
I'm not say we should just start up a Confederacy over night, I just think there needs to be more boundaries between the states before things get too far out of hand. We're at a very dangerous point right now where both sides are about evenly matched in numbers, whereas before things were rarely as close as they were now. It's not too much of a stretch to think one side is going to be discontent with some decision which is going to light a powder keg and throw people into open revolt and rioting.

>>171518
A full scale civil war would require the united states be in a much more desperate situation. The vast majority of people in this country are well fed, employed, and have access to a nearly limitless amount of distractions, and entertainment through the internet. People don't generally pick up a gun, and start shooting unless they're crazy, or desperate.

>>171506
That's the sort of thing that sounds nice on paper but falls apart when dealing with the complexities of a modern interconnected economy. States aren't nearly as isolated or self sufficient as they were when we were an agrarian society.

>>171528
I don't really think social policy really affects economic interconnection of states, unless you mean that a disasterous economic policy in one state would affect surrounding ones. It'd be a trivial matter to simply continue standard trade deals in place between the states (After all, interstate trade is one of the biggest sources of income for many states), and although the door could always be there to close if a state desired, I seriously doubt any would do so. They're not likely to get a more favorable trade deal with any other neighbor anyway.

There's a lot of benefits that states have with each other that they don't with other countries, and a lot of that most likely won't go away with some additional autonomy just because it's a net loss for many, especially for things like freedom of movement, employment, and trade. At the same time though, smaller political units can adopt more rapid change than a large one (Like the entirety of the US), which means states would be in a better position to quickly develop and implement policies beneficial to themselves or desired by much of their population, whereas previously it would require support from radically different places that may be opposed to such developments.

An example I would say is on the government sponsored healthcare. There are many states that would like to implement a system where every citizen of their state had healthcare similar to European countries, and other states that are opposed to the idea. Attempting to reach a compromise at the federal level will be next to impossible and someone will certainly lose out, fueling that resentment. At the state level, it would be much easier to reach a consensus, allowing a quick implementation of a policy that can be evaluated on a smaller basis compared to the entire US.

The major issue I would say about this system is that it assumes all states can stand on their own without as much federal aid, which isn't true for many states.