Blindspot Report
Week of Jan 6-12
The weekly Blindspot Report from Ground News puts a spotlight on news that publications from one side of the political spectrum or the other had little to no reporting on.
Reeling from last week's events in Washington DC, we are reminded of the very real consequences of political divisiveness in news media. This newsletter and Ground News aims to bridge that divide with awareness and understanding of opinions on the other side.
If your politics lean right, you likely didn't hear that the top military leaders in the US declared that from a military perspective, last week's acts were "sedition and insurrection". And if your politics bend to the left, you probably didn’t hear that a legal analyst who testified at the Clinton and Trump impeachment hearings warned that from a legal perspective a swift new impeachment would cause lasting damage to the Constitution.
This Week's Blindspots
Blindspot for the Right: Top military leaders condemn ‘sedition and insurrection’ at Capitol, acknowledge Biden win In an extraordinary letter Tuesday, the nation’s top military commanders condemned last week’s acts of “sedition and insurrection” at the U.S. Capitol, while acknowledging Joe Biden’s election victory. Coverage Distribution: 18% Right Left 39% Center 43% 18%  
Blindspot for the Left: Turley: Swift new impeachment would damage the Constitution As Democrats reportedly prepare to impeach President Donald Trump again, legal analyst Jonathan Turley argued in an op-ed for The Hill that the process would “damage the Constitution.” He reasoned that the impeachment standard is based primarily on deliberation; a snap impeachment would forgo that deliberation. Coverage Distribution: 0% Left 22% Right 78%  
Blindspot for the Right: Data shows 2020 was Europe’s warmest year on record 2020 was the warmest year in Europe since records began, according to data published Friday by the EU climate monitoring service. Scientists say the data underscores the need for countries and companies to slash greenhouse gas emissions quickly. Coverage Distribution: 13% Right Left 32% Center 55% 13%  
Blindspot for the Left: China denies coercive birth control measures in Xinjiang A Chinese official on Monday denied Beijing has imposed coercive birth control measures among Muslim minority women, following an outcry over a tweet by the Chinese Embassy in Washington claiming that government polices had freed women of the Uighur ethnic group from being “baby-making machines.” Xu Guixiang, a deputy spokesperson for the Xinjiang regional government, told reporters Monday that birth control decisions were made of the person’s own free will and that “no organization or individual can interfere.” Coverage Distribution: 10% Left 10% Center 50% Right 40%  
Blindspot for the Left: Study Says Transgender Women Maintain Athletic Advantage Over Biological Women for longer than previously thought A new study says that transgender women maintain a physical advantage over biological women in sporting competition, including a full year after transgender women begin hormone therapy. Coverage Distribution: 10% Left 10 Right 90%  
Something we'd like to recommend this week again:
Is your social media feed an echo chamber? If you read your news on Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, or any news site, our browser extension we’ll let you know the underlying coverage distribution of the story - allowing you to spot news blindspots without ever leaving your feed. Learn more and download free for Chrome, FireFox, Edge, Brave and Opera Browser. 
Split Reporting
Highlighting discrepancies between the reporting on stories across different news outlets. This week's story:
McConnell told associates he believes President Donald Trump has committed impeachable offenses
What do the different news outlets focus on when reporting on this story?
Vanity Fair:
Mitch McConnell Is
Extremely Jazzed
About Donald Trump Being Impeached
New York Times:
McConnell is said to be
pleased about impeachment
, believing it will make it easier to
purge Trump
from the Republican Party.
HuffPost:
Mitch McConnell
Satisfied
With Second Trump Impeachment
The Hill:
McConnell has said
he thinks
Trump committed impeachable offenses
The Right Scoop:
Mitch McConnell
says Trump impeachment is good
, will make it easier to purge Trump from GOP
The Right Scoop:
THE END OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY:
Mitch McConnell Tells Reporter He Believes Trump Committed Impeachable Offenses
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Methodology
Ground News processes over 30,000 news articles each day. Articles from different news outlets covering the same news event are merged into a single story so subscribers can get all the perspectives in one view. Each article is labeled one of seven bias ratings (Far Left, Left, Leans Left, Center, Leans Right, Right, Far Right) based on the average bias rating of the publishing news outlet. All news outlet bias ratings are originally sourced from three independent news monitoring agencies (AllSides, Media Bias Fact Check, Ad Fontes Media).
The Blindspot Report is generated by evaluating the mean and standard deviation of the aggregate bias ratings of the week's top 100 (most covered and most read) stories. News stories with the greatest mean score (many more Right outlets than Left or vice versa) or the highest standard deviation of bias ratings (more coverage on fringes than Center) are selected for the Report.
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