As far as I can see, in the UK we have a wide spectrum of "editorial outlook" in newspapers

I think we should move on from 'editorial outlook' based on allegiance to domestic political parties, and support a new sort of journalism which does not have allegiance to any one party or political state, does not have a predefined outlook, but instead feels free to attempt to publish the truth, however uncomfortable that may be for whatever party is in power. Opinion backed by strong reporting and facts should not be separated from news (because in reality even supposedly neutral or impartial reporting has strong biases and is often not based on verified fact but on relaying government statements), and it should not be based on which country your news org covers, what the government of that country wants to hear, or indeed what the people of that country wants to hear.

Re TV news, I don't accept it is any less constrained by issues of ownership and nationality than newspapers. The ban on Sinn Féin reporting in the 80s, the breathless coverage of the Falklands war and then the Iraq wars, the lack of coverage of the GCHQ scandal, the backing of one political party by Sky News, the embedding of journalists like Rebekah Brooks with politicians in their social life, all point to news services which are far too closely connected to the governments they cover in the UK. In the case of the BBC, they are regularly threatened with cuts in funding by whatever government is in power, and they simply can't afford to criticise the government in a sustained way. They have not for example reported significantly on the GCHQ stories, except to repeat government statements and reporting in other news outlets. I suspect a truly international news organisation would have no such qualms and would have covered it extensively.

How do you even define neutral in a way that does not simply justify a specific set of biases?

Something as simple as which news items you choose betrays huge biases: Do you write about the US government shutdown, or about the thousands of people dying of preventable diseases every day.

Word choices: Do you call something a coup, or a revolution? Do you call someone terrorists, or freedom fighters?

In many cases, there are many seemingly "neutral" choices, and many word choices that are technically correct, and what will seem "neutral" to you will be hopelessly politically slanted to others.

I'd much rather have media organizations of a variety of viewpoints that are honest about where they stand than someone that pretend to be objectively neutral.

In the example you give, we have lots of terms for the participants in asymmetric warfare, all employed to taint debate before it starts:

liberators, freedom fighters, rebels, guerrilla fighters, insurgents, terrorists

IMO the acronym or name chosen by the fighters/armies themselves would be best in each case, rather than a label dreamed up by the military which opposes them - it also stops lazy reporting which groups disparate groups together as one enemy.

I'd rather news didn't have a pre-decided viewpoint/agenda which they try to cut the facts to fit, which is often what partial news or 'op-ed' turns out to be when written by professional columnists. We should not have a liberal view or a right-wing view, we should have journalists who approach each story with an open spirit and actually do the journalism required to come up with an informed opinion and transmit that. That hard work should come before they have an opinion on any story.

To be completely neutral would mean you only state facts that have real meaning in the physical world, not in our heads.

For instance, the mere mention of a "nation" is a bias, because nations do not have a real physical existence, they are merely ideas created by man, and which many other man has decided to go along with, but there are a few who disagree. Our entire social structure is built around ideas, but all reporting talks about these ideas like they're real, irrefutable concepts. You can't be impartial until you're open minded enough to reject any idea and accept possible alternatives.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Live-From-Downing-Street-Robinson/dp...

Edit: At home we've been getting free Guardians from Waitrose - this has actually resulted in us buying some "right wing" newspapers to try and get a bit of perspective, my wife liked the Daily Telegraph but did concede she had gone too far by buying a Daily Mail (the Scottish edition) - which she described as "utter trash".

This is what I think is wrong with an attempt to choose a side - reporting should attempt to get to the truth on every topic, consulting experts in the domain (i.e. not politicians), going to sources, not an attempt to reflect the party political position or editorial line - that leads to distortion, and to people trying to somehow even out their news by getting two equally invalid opinions. The Guardian should be applauded for what it gets right (say the NSA reporting), but sometimes it's as distorted as RussiaToday when it comes to certain topics, and on some topics (Britain at war) it is just as parochial as its counterparts.