Thursday, November 15, 2007

What sources do you use?


Below is a list of the ones I regularly use when researching this site, besides my own life/job experiences.

I don't watch much television at all, and read two newspapers regularly: The European Stars & Stripes (military newspaper), and Bild (a popular German paper, somewhat tabloidish, but perfect for my reading level in the language).

Aside from the above, all my research is done online.

Some sites on my blogroll to the right are not listed here. That is generally because they are sites that don't update themselves very often. I still check them though, just not everyday.

Other valuable sites below are not on my blogroll for several reasons, including: 1) Then it would be far too long, 2) Many of these sites already get monster traffic; they don't need any help from me, 3) I only list the sites that I endorse to the right; many of the sites below I sharply disagree with, but I check them to get a more complete picture of events in the world.

All of these sites I go to on a regular basis, almost every day in fact. In no particular order:

Yahoo! , instead of Google. Why? Because when I run Google here in Germany, I'm automatically redirected to Google.de, which is the German version. That wouldn't be a problem except that the search results end up with German sites on top of the list, which is not always what I am looking for. At least Yahoo! gives me a choice of what region I want to use.

Red State, for the conservative view in US Politics

The Van Der Galiën Gazette, an interesting blog that I don't always agree with, but has a strong European angle, digs out many stories I don't find elsewhere, and updates several times a day.

Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish. This man's arrogance and ignorance (not to mention huge fan base) is usually great source material.

The Brussels Journal, great conservative news site with European emphasis.

Slate. What is Slate? I have no idea anymore. It more or less tries to be everything to everybody, but that diversity is also a strength; if I sift through it I can always find some useful information on something.

Little Green Footballs is a must-read for me every day. No site, anywhere follows the Islamic Extremism like LGF. The site's author, Charles Johnson, is quite the expert on html, which is good, since his site is hacked on a regular basis.

James Taranto's WSJ Best of the Web. I don't always agree with him, but some of the stuff he digs out is pretty hilarious.

Reddit and Digg, two social networking sites that dig out a lot of interesting and varied stories, but you also have to sift through a lot of repeats.

BBC News. Biased, but more international coverage than anywhere else.

FOX News and CNN. They are not nearly as different as their supporters claim; good for finding out what is the current buzz in America these days, but on the other hand, way too much celebrity fascination for me to call them "news".

Acronym Finder (immensely valuable in my work)

Wikipedia, a great resource when looking for non-controversial subjects. Still, I always check the references for something before I repeat it myself. It's very rare that I would simply quote Wikipedia on its own.

Michelle Malkin and Debbie Schlussel, I don't always agree with them either, but they are true patriots and bring a lot of interesting stories to light that the main stream media ignore. They also don't just throw up links; they do a lot of their own investigative legwork.

Steve Sailer's Isteve. Mr. Sailer writes an awful lot about race, education, sports, immigration, and IQ, and isn't afraid to dive into huge batches of numbers either. He's also right a lot more than he's wrong; in fact, just about every prediction he's made on his web site has come true. His older, huge site is located here.

John Cole's Balloon Juice, I occasionally check to spare you all from the pain. If I want to see how the political left is wildly distorting reality, I just go no further.

Glenn Reynold's Instapundit, low on substance, but high on material.

Front Page Magazine, about as wildly right-wing as you want to get (too much for me, sometimes).

The Daily Kos. About as wildly left-wing as you can possibly get, and lot of hatred runs through that place. But the community has a good set up and a great layout for searching for material. Too bad most of the material is pure noise.

The Arab News. For obvious reasons.

Google Groups, particularly alt.politics.immigration, and talk.politics.european-union. These Usenet groups actually pre-date the Internet, and still have lively discussions and hard-to-find-elsewhere information.

The Daily Telegraph. Slightly tabloidish, but good for more insight into the UK.

The CIA World Factbook. Best place anywhere for up to date almanac information about any country.

Counterterrorism Blog. Great place for summaries of terrorist actions across the world, but it a little wordy and dry. They should hire me on; I have a few ideas to improve the layout...

Overlawyered, for a great look at the US tort system. The site is so hilarious, you might forget for a moment, that these lawsuits are all too painfully true...

Thereby hang's a tale. This site discusses the current War on Terror in plainer language than anywhere else. I don't always agree with the author, but he backs up what he says. The downside is, few people have heard of it because he's terrible at publicizing his site.

David's Medienkritik. A wonderful site that regularly highlights the way the German media portray the United States (hint: it's usually not flattering).

Gates of Vienna. An invaluable site focused on Islamic jihad in Europe.

Ex Pat Yank. Great site about British culture from an American perspective.

Spiegel Online. Great German magazine online, English version available here.

Stern magazine generally pounds on America. Still, they love photography and so that's why I set them as my default home page. Their "View" photo page is fantastic.

Of course, that's not the complete list, but they are the ones that get heavy traffic from me. Are there any that anyone thinks I should add?

And just so you know, here are some popular sources I do not use when researching this site:

TV's The Daily Show or The Colbert Report
YouTube
My Space
Facebook
The Onion


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6 comments:

Anonymous said...

What, not fark.com?? That's about the best there is...

Also, http://www.intute.ac.uk/ is a huge free web database of information.

Ruth said...

Dear John,
you shouldn't reference BILD, it has a very low quality and is THE tabloid in Germany. The Sun in GB is worse yet it is the same category. I agree it is simple to read but that is because most people that read it in Germany are simple or just want to have headlines and pictures - and scantily dressed girls and/or scandalous stories.

If you want a good German conservative newspaper that is - admittedly - written in a sophisticated language read the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung or FAZ www.faz.net or Süddeutsche which is a bit more left but very well written as well. ZEIT is a weekly newspaper that is also very good, but please not BILD. Spiegel is like BILD for intellectuals and their style is often too sensationalist for my taste but they do have a good article once in a while.
Hello from Freiburg
Ruth

John Rohan said...

Ruth - Yes, I know Bild is basically a tabloid paper (also online here). But it is the most popular paper in Germany, and more importantly, I can read it. I have tried, but I just cannot read the Frankfurter Allgemeine or Süddeutsche Zeitung, they are too far above my level.

Trotzdem bin ich ein Mann, und manchmal mag ich bloße-Brust Frauen und skandalös Geschichten!

Sarah said...

I check Conservative Grapevine every morning. A lot of the links are fluff, but Hawkins compiles many interesting links there.

ian in hamburg said...

LOL

Well, now that I've calmed down, I must say that I have a lot of respect for you. Not many people would freely admit they use Bild as a news source. Naked girls, bald-faced lies, sensationalism perhaps, but not news.

John Rohan said...

It's less for news and more of a window into German culture...