Expert guests who appear on television news programs often earn their living working for interest groups or think tanks. Knowing about the ideology, agenda, and funding of the organizations for which the guests work may often shed light on the information they provide. This activity is intended to build media literacy skills so that you can better evaluate the opinion expert guests used so frequently in the media.

Step One
Type the name of the organization with which the guest is identified (it usually appears on the screen under his or her name or is mentioned in the introduction of the guest) into a search engine such as Google. For example "Cato Institute." You will find that many of these organizations, which are not-for-profit institutions, have Web sites that end with .org. Cato's Web site is "Cato.org."

Step Two
Look for a part of the Web site that tells you about the organization. In the case of the Cato Institute, its Web site has a menu listing called "About Us." This is very common with these kinds of organizations. There you will usually find answers to the group's mission, ideology, programs, and sometimes even funding. In some cases, the latter information may take a little more digging.

In the case of Cato, one discovers the institute was created in 1977 to promote what it calls the "classical liberal" points of view. It would include items as individual liberty, limited government, the free market, and the rule of law as being important to its agenda. Funding comes from a variety of sources but it accepts no government funds. One might contrast this with the National Association of Manufacturers that is funded by industrial manufacturers and has an agenda limited to promoting issues that relate to its membership.