I'MMA LET YOU FINISH
Well, I don't know if it's so much that they are hacks as that journalists actually can be incredibly cutthroat and all too happy to watch a colleague flounder while they all smile and quietly agree.
Are any of them unionized? The "journalists" that is. I would guess not, but I'm curious.
Way off topic here, but Cubs win! NL Central champs!
Sorry, couldn't resist that. Back to your regularly scheduled political blog.
Some journalists are unionized in bigger cities. But it doesn't mean a whole lot anymore, witness the Detroit newspaper strike of a few years back - Mitch Albom crossed early on, weakening the strength of everyone else.
Had I been a member of the White House press corps who drew a front row seat when the administration reassigned chairs awhile back- relegating Helen Thomas to the back of the room- I would have made a point to offer her my seat.
Indeed, had the reporters a shred of integrity, they would have ignored the imposed seating chart altogether, and sat wherever they damn well pleased. First come, first served.
Taken as a group, they are a shameful embarrassment to their profession. Just pathetic.
Re the Cubs' win: Aww, crap.
In other news, perhaps what journalists need more than union is a professional association that regulates a little on their behavior.
Way off topic here, but Cubs win! NL Central champs!
I miss Harry Carrey.
Relegated Helen Thomas to the back of the room.
Afraid of an 80ish-year-old woman.
What a bunch of freaking losers.
Losers. Losers. Losers.
Rove, you fat, ugly, balding piece of human flesh.
I am a (lowly) newspaper journalist and all I can tell you is the following:
1) the vast majority of reporters are not unionized and never will be. the unions that exist at newspapers are largely in the production end, not the newsgathering end
2) the competition among newspapers is extremely intense at every level and there is little or no cooperation between news companies. This accounts for a) a lack of common mission when addressing ethical issues and b) the real truth about journalistic conspiracies: they don't exist. sorry to burst so many bubbles, right and left. there's competence and incompetence, and there is most certainly a pack mentality that can take over and produce long spans of truly godawful journalism (I'm seeing very faint signs that we might be coming out of it), but there's nothing remotely organized or conspiratorial about it. If you spent even one day in the life of a major newspaper you would see the idea of a conspiracy is laughable.
There is definitely pressure from the corporate top that influences editorial choices and biases.
It seems to me that as a nation we have lost the habit of sticking together and sticking up for each other. Crossing a picket line used to be a big deal. No more.
It's the Republican culture of me and mine and what I can get over on the next guy. I don't think anyone should be surprised that this same attitude is reflected in many of the journalists of today.
secularhuman has got it dead to rights.
So, secularhuman, what accounts for the total lack of coverage of the failings of the Bush administration?
I mean, compared to the piranhas that were in full force when Clinton was the president.
Well, unfair to say total lack of coverage. This crap has been going on for months. Three years of Bush has seemed like nine.
Where are the piranhas now?
Yes -- excellent question by Pie.
Although part of it was just that sex sells, and also the repubs are better at pushing the scandal agenda.
Methinks the Bushies have scandals galore.
As the prostitute said contemptuously in "The Front Page": "Gentleman of the press!"
Then she spits on the ground...
I have a hard time listening to journalists whine about someone else getting exclusives. There are a hell of a lot of important stories out there waiting to be written, without waiting for press releases. It reminds me of a recent LATimes article, here's the punchline:
"Ashcroft is betting that the press corps has no core, that reporters are more committed to seeking advantage over rivals than protecting the public's right to know."
http://www.latimes.com/news/
cust...in25sep25.story
(Login/password: cipherpunks/cipherpunks)
A Question For Secularhuman, who wrote:
"There is definitely pressure from the corporate top that influences editorial choices and biases".
Does that pressure extend to what questions it is that a reporter might ask?
So, secularhuman, what accounts for the total lack of coverage of the failings of the Bush administration?
For the most part, astonishing laziness. There's just as much laziness and incompetence in reporting as any other profession. And I really, really believe that pretty much explains it, right there.
As has been proven ad nauseum, all the pathetic, half-assed Clinton "scandals" erupted because they were spoon-fed to the press corps by a group of deeply partisan Republicans actively seeking, scripting and pushing those stories forward. It was a scandal mill, pure and simple, funded by the names we've all grown to know and loathe.
Hey, if you've got an underground army digging up stories, and giving you gratis all the background and details that you'd normally have to find out yourself, that's a big time-saver. Is it any wonder that a select set of lazy hacks decided to use the stories coming to them over the transom, thereby furthering their careers with "big, sensational" stories while hardly having to do any legwork at all?
Hell of a lot easier than "real" journalism. No conspiracies, no phone calls to editors... just journalists with new "pals", who just happen to have this week's "story of a lifetime"...
Off with their heads!
I'm beginning to like the guillotine idea.
There is definitely pressure from the corporate top that influences editorial choices and biases.
If pack mentality and pressure from the top can do the trick there’s no need for a conspiracy. People are socialized according to whatever is normal at a given time and place. I mean, if you grow up in a place where you have to wear a burka you might feel naked without one. It seems like the PR reporters you see on TV have a teachers pet, people pleasing mentality that allows them to meet the expectations of the authority figures they deal with. It’s possible they experience little cognitive dissonance and have instead a highly developed instinct for which way the wind is blowing on any given day. I hope the wind blows a few burkas off real soon.
It seems to me that as a nation we have lost the habit of sticking together and sticking up for each other. Crossing a picket line used to be a big deal. No more.
It's the Republican culture of me and mine and what I can get over on the next guy. I don't think anyone should be surprised that this same attitude is reflected in many of the journalists of today.
The Ox
Dear Ox,
Driving the first nails into the coffin of American decency was the great and enduring accomplishment of Ronald Reagan, the Bushes have been completing the job. An example, homlessness was once considered a national scandal, now homeless people are reviled and hated. The media, both "news" and entertainment are the nails.
The Washington based media are rotten to the core, with less than a handful of exceptions, nothing that comes out of Washington should be taken at face value. It is all a prop for the Republican Party.
Yes, Helen Thomas was denied not just the first question, which she is/hadbeen customarily granted, but any question at all. Do these shitheaded journalists not realize that if WWWonderboy can cut her off, he can cut any of them off? Isn't the chilling effect (more like dee-freeze) that this imparts to the room worth sticking together to defeat?
Nimrods.
Utah Phillips tells the story that Harry Truman once called Mary Harris "Mother" Jones the most dangerous woman in America. At the time, she was 83 years old. (I think I got that right....)
The problem with journalism is largely systemic. I'm a reporter at a small-time daily paper, and I see exactly where the problems come from. When you start out, you write for a tiny paper where you have to file three stories a day, a system that encourages laziness and an acceptance of spoon-fed stories, and discourages the skepticism and enterprise that all great journalism is based on. The people who make it out of small papers and into larger ones are the people who either came in lazy or accepted that laziness was the way to get ahead.
Then you get to a bigger paper where the biggest driver is fear: fear of getting beaten by the other guy, whether he's at your paper or another one. That makes journalists spend their time covering their asses rather than looking for original stories. "Exclusives" are rewarded, but not as much as missing a story gets punished, so people run with spoon-fed exclusives while dedicating their time to pack journalism.
Obviously, a highly talented, highly motivated, and highly ethical reporter can cut through all that and do real journalism, but such people will never be a majority, or even a large minority. Lots and lots of talented, basically well-meaning reporters get sucked under by the system, and either buckle to its pressures or give up and go home.
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