Media Sentry

State of the Democrats Party VII: So, if you're a leading, active, and loyal democrat (read: Edwards, Dean, Clark, etc...), how do you feel about your party if other leading democrats are advocating a republican- John McCain- for the number two slot on the democratic ticket?

Kinda tells me that even the democrats know they can't muster the necessary talent and appeal to build a ticket that can win in November.

State of the Media- continued: Regarding my last post where a friend pointed out that editors today seem unable or unwilling to perform fundamental fact checking on news stories, this timely item appeared in the news today:

Thu May 13, 2:27 PM ET Add U.S. National

BOSTON, United States (AFP) - The Boston Globe newspaper apologised for running a photograph of graphic images purported to show US soldiers raping Iraqi women.

An editor's note said the photograph was "overly graphic" and acknowledged that the purported abuse portrayed had not been authenticated.

"Although the photograph was reduced in size between editions to obscure visibility of the images on display, at no time did the photograph meet Globe standards," the note said.

In earlier editions, the photograph -- portraying Boston city councilor Chuck Turner and activist Sadiki Kambon showing the purported rape images to reporters -- was large enough for the sex acts to be seen.

While the newspaper acknowledged questions over the authenticity of the rape images, it did not directly address accusations by an Internet news site, www.WorldNetDaily.com, that they were known fakes from a pornographic website.

Boston Globe ombudsman Christine Chinlund said she had been unable to locate the source of the images.

"My attempts to figure out where the photos originated have failed," Chinlund told AFP. "The websites that they allegedly came from have been taken down, so it's impossible to say."

The published Globe apology came amid the growing furore over authentic images of US soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners of war near Baghdad.


That's it guys, keep proving my friend's letter right! Oh, want to take another swing at Fox News while your at it?? ;^)

The State of The Media: I recently read an article that described a speech by an editor of the Los Angeles Times (or, more properly, the "Lost" Angeles Times) where he blasted Fox News. I was discussing this article with a friend who asked me to post the following open letter he sent to an on-air personality:

"This will be too long to be considered for on-air response, but I wanted to share an opinion with you on the subject of media bias. I've followed this debate for several years now and have always been aware of the decidedly liberal leaning of the major news media, but until recently, I've never given any deeper thought to the subject.

"I can't point to one event or story that prompted me, but very recently a question has been nagging me. Are we merely observing a left-leaning, agenda driven media, or is it worse than that? Are we actually witnessing the collapse of the major media in this country? I ask this because of several observations I've made that may be evidence of the collapse. Some of those observations are:

-The rash of plagiarism that seems to have broken out among journalists of all ages and experience levels. This may merely be laziness on the part of the journalists as commonly believed, or it may be evidence of the decline in skills and interest on the part of journalists

-The rash of plagiarized material that is not caught by editors and/or fact checkers. It seems that editors no longer demand the scrutiny once imposed that included fact checking and reviews for "integrity" of the story. This used to be common practice but it is now apparently very rare. Is this because editors and their staffs do not have the training and expertise to do these functions?

-Story presentation often copies other outlets. If you watch NBC, ABC, or CBS evening news, you will usually see the same stories, in the same order, presented with the same interpretation. Is this laziness on the part of producers? Or is there a total lack of skill on the part of the so-called "reporters"? You would think that with network competition and competition with the cable news shows, there would be a fierce battle to come up with "the real" story or at least something different than the competitors. To me, this is another possible indicator of the decline in journalistic skills and that producers are only passively interested in the news stories and how to present them.

-Story presentation in the print media is also subject to the same templated reporting. A given story in the L.A. Times, N.Y. Times, and Washington Post will usually run on the same page, with the same take, and will usually hold the same place above or below the fold. The drive to find facts missed by the others seems totally absent and it appears editors are totally detached from the news itself.

-The substitution of ideology over facts. That so many outlets both in print and on air can report a story with virtually identical ideological interpretations is evidence to me of a total lack of natural curiosity on the part of the beat journalist. Where has the curiosity gone? Where is the investigative instinct?
Many journalists seem to have no problem reporting political talking points as news with no follow up and no investigative follow up. There are times I listen to political reporters and personalities spouting something that could easily have come off a fax from political operatives and there are no qualifiers nor follow up reporting.

-Journalism students want to save the world, not find and report the truth. Poll after poll of journalism students indicate the main reason they want to be journalist is to save the world, or make the world a better place. What happened to integrity and the search for the truth? We may now have an entire generation of journalists that have no real journalism skills and are guided by ideological concerns rather than a fascination for facts.

"For the sake of my point, I will assume the worst case, that all of my bullets are true. If so, that would mean that we have a generation of journalists that have no investigative skills and are not inclined to learn any. We have schools of journalism that are not actually teaching students how to be journalists. We also apparently have editors and producers that have no idea how to verify the authenticity of a story, check the facts, and then package and present stories effectively. These same editors and producers are so unfamiliar with the news they are presenting that they can't spot plagiarized material or "facts" that are blatantly wrong or incomplete.

"If the skills are in fact gone, and the common trend and the "zeit geist" at all levels has degenerated from "get the truth and get it out" to "get it fast and get it out", then I submit that we are witnessing the collapse of journalism in America. On the other hand, there are some bright lights out there that prevent the collapse from being total and those lights are Fox News and The Washington Times."

I and my friend think the major media are in such denial that they cannot even assess the damage to the bond of trust between themselves and news consumers. It's easier to blame the user or consumer than it is to look internally, identify the problem, and then admit it. If they could do that, fixing it would be easy but you have to have the will to do it. Step number one in every 12-step program.