Recently, a thread of mine about the Economist got the response from people that the Economist is a statist magazine and has a pro-government bias. Interestingly, leftists sometimes also complain that it has a pro-elite bias, claiming that it gives very positive views on bankers and large business firms. And perhaps, people are quite justified in such a view.
It just made me wonder - what magazines do you people read? Which ones do you enjoy and which ones do you find more agreeable to yourself? And which ones do you consider the least biased.
Personally, I read The Economist, because I get really sickened by the blatantly mainstreamed opinions shown by writers in Time magazine and Newsweek. I was absolutely annoyed by an article in Time magazine called “Decade From Hell: And Why The Next One Will Be Better” where the writer said that the downfalls caused in the 2000s were caused by “absolute and unfettered faith in markets” and “reckless deregulation”, urging the need for a more strictly controlled realm in business. Meanwhile, Newsweek criticises Chinese manufacturers for setting up businesses in East Timor, just because they are doing businesses with their own money where they feel like, citing that their policies are an exploitation of locals and a destruction of environment. The Economist, compared to these, is written with such a practical and realistic perspective, that you won’t see its articles making uninformed claims of how faith in markets destroys nations.
An article in The Economist starts deceptively with an introduction that seems to give a mainstream opinion, and builds on it. Suddenly, it starts tearing that position down with very clearly argued facts. But then after, it withdraws from its own arguments, and then shows that they are still made in absence of certain material information. And then it criticizes the position of the opponents to the idea first stated, but then it again withdraws, and then shows limitations in its own arguments. And so, ultimately, it deconstructs every issue by showing all perspectives taken up on it, and then showing how all of them are wrong, and not entirely complete, and finally makes whatever conclusion that can be made in the most realistic and detached way of looking at the issue. So what it basically does is that it approaches all positions with skepticism, questioning one idea, question oppositions to the idea, and questioning again everything that comes from it.
For example, in their article on climate change skepticism, they criticized politicians for taking positions on scientific issues, because science is supposed to sell doubt, and politics certainty. And thus they even admitted, that politicization of the global warming issue is exactly what hurts the case for studies in climate research, and thus has not allowed the leaked email issue to get more attention and scrutiny. I do not know a single other mass published media which ever did this. What they rightly did was criticize politicians who use a scientific theory to push for a policy and also those who use dissension on a scientific theory to push for another policy, showing that both do harm. All this makes me excuse their occasional pro-intervention or government-oriented ideas, because it then seems more like they suggest these things given that the state exists anyway, rather than because they believe in the almighty powers of the state.