Olde Europe
Diamond Member
- Dec 8, 2014
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Sure. How do you know how sure they are?
Simple. I researched the question. I am very confident that the Washington Post, the NYT and other major media outlets fully corroborate their sources. They don't get phone calls from unknown people and then report what they say. THEY KNOW WHO THE SOURCE IS. They just promise to keep their name out of the story.
Finally, reliable sources print corrections when errors are made. Both the WP and the NYT do this.
How The Times Uses Anonymous Sources
When To Trust A Story That Uses Unnamed Sources
How Do We Verify Anonymous Sources? — ProPublica
Did you actually read the links? Because both the links' format and your stance on the matter suggest you didn't.
Really, it pisses me off no end to find these shitty google links all the time. It is, of course, up to you, to tell google what you are reading, which sites you are visiting (even though you probably shouldn't). Why invite others to do the same I patently don't understand. I find that discourteous, to put it mildly.
So, here's the direct link to the NYT (more direct links below). They're basically saying, we're checking, trust us. I find that pretty weak. Pro Publica is somewhat better, but not much.
The highlight actually was a detailed discussion by FirveThirtyEight. Perry Bacon apparently put a lot of thought into this, and details it well. The bottom line is, generally distrust stories with unnamed sources (the exact opposite of what you seem to be advocating), but in certain circumstances it's valid to put a little more trust in these. Had you actually read the article by 538, you'd have realized there's a second part, FirveThirtyEight (II), which lists the different types of unnamed sources, and roughly explains which to trust somewhat more, which less. I found that the most helpful of all, and actually learned something.