Quieting the Noise of this Political Season

About Today’s Episode

Whether we like it, love it, or hate it, we are now in the midst of a full-blown Presidential campaign. The news just keeps happening. After the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, President Joe Biden decided to end his run for a second term. He endorsed his Vice President, Kamala Harris, and all political parties are now in full campaign mode. As a result, conversations about politics will be unavoidable for most of us. Though we try to avoid politics in our podcast, we are going to try something a bit different. We are going to talk about the issues in the campaign (not the personalities) and offer some suggestions for how you can have similar conversations on political topics. This week we are going to focus on how you can silence the noise being produced by the campaigns and become clearer about how you feel about the issues. The links below will take you to some websites where you can learn more about media bias and where you can do your own fact checking…without the noise, without the pundits.

Learn more: 

The following links are to articles, podcasts, and videos related to today’s topic.

• Defining “Pundit” - Oxford Reference: https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803100354759#:~:text=An%20expert%20in%20a%20particular,Dictionary%20of%20Phrase%20and%20Fable%20%C2%BB

• Perplexity and “What is a pundit?”: https://www.perplexity.ai/search/what-is-a-pundit-znyNkPwtQlWW82FValHRMw#0 

To check the bias of news outlets: 

• Allsides.com: https://www.allsides.com/unbiased-balanced-news

• ad fontes media: https://adfontesmedia.com/

• Media Bias Fact Check: https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/

To fact check news yourself:

• Fact Check: https://www.factcheck.org/

• Politifact: https://www.politifact.com/

• Snopes: https://www.snopes.com/

• The Washington Post Fact Checker: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/fact-checker/ 

For conversation opportunities:

• 3rd Space Table Talks: Sponsored by Getting to 3rd Space with Lamar & Tom. Learn more here: https://forms.gle/ZtXEPty7g6bCyEXz8 

• Braver Angels: https://braverangels.org/

• Meet Up: https://www.meetup.com/

• Conversation Cafe: https://www.liberatingstructures.com/17-conversation-cafe/ 

• Socrates Cafe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socrates_Cafe 

Party Platforms: 

• Democratic Party Platform: A draft of the 2024 platform was released on July 13, 2024, but will not be finalized until the DNC Convention in Chicago, August 19-24m 2024. You can read the current platform and follow updates to it here: https://democrats.org/where-we-stand/party-platform/ 

• Republican Party Platform for 2024: To find the RNC platform on its website, click on the following link then scroll to the middle of the page. Under “Our Platform,” click on the “Learn More” button on the red banner and this will open up a PDF version of the 2024 platform approved at the RNC July convention in Milwaukee: https://gop.com/about-our-party/ 

Ways to Hear and See Getting to Third Space

Getting to Third Space is on all major audio podcast platforms including Spotify, iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, and Apple Podcasts. You can also watch us doing the podcast on the Tenacious Change YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/@tenaciouschange. Once there, click on “Podcasts” and you’ll be able to see the Getting to Third Space playlist. Or, if you like, copy, and paste this link into your browser and it will take directly to that playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXwopowpXKCcrS7PV5MsdmHPANTzBKu_b

Meet Lamar & Tom

Lamar Roth and Tom Klaus are lifelong friends exploring how to get to a Third Space - a space where two or more people with opposing viewpoints, ideologies, and worldviews can come together to hear, listen, share, and connect with one another. Together Lamar and Tom hope to carve out a Third Space where everything can be on the table for open, straightforward, honest, and, yet kind and respectful inquiry. 

To contact us with a comment, suggestion, ideas for guests or topics, or just to say hello, send us a voice message on Spotify or email us at lamar.3rdSpace@gmail.com and tom.3rdSpace@gmail.com.

Credits:

• Wild Opinions and Nonsensical Musings by Lamar Roth and Tom Klaus

• Images by Getty Images, Pexels, Pixabay, and Cyberlink AI

• Photos by Lamar Roth are copyrighted by Roth Images, all rights reserved. For more information, visit https://www.rothimages.com/

• For permissions or additional information: lamar.3rdSpace@gmail.com.

• Getting to Third Space with Lamar and Tom is a Klaus Haus Creation for Tenacious Change, TM and Copyright 2024 by Tenacious Change LLC, All Rights Reserved

• For permissions or additional Information: info@tenaciouschange.us or tom.3rdSpace@gmail.com.

No living creature was harmed in the production of this film, but a lot of Colombian coffee was consumed.