The Implosion Of Another Bastion...
Over the course of the last few years, we have seen the beginning of the end for two of America’s largest bastions of old. The Democrats are imploding right in front of our eyes; reinforced under the Constitutional Option that reached it’s cloture stage today. But we’re also seeing the downfall of the news media.
Now, Marcie did a fine job this morning of pointing to the "mistakes" that have occurred over the last year or so. Those instances of journalistic felonies have not just resulted in the exposure of the inherent bias within the MSM, but it has also removed some well-known people from their prominent positions. Howell Raines was the long-time Editor-In-Chief of the New York Times, and was undone by a plagiarizing, lying columnist.
Dan Rather was brought down by his bias that can only be traced back to the current president’s father when he slammed the door on the newsman’s idiotic question of how to judge one based on their past. He doesn’t like the Bush family, and has done everything he can to impugn the current president, even using fake memos to do so.
And the list goes on. Eason Jordan’s mistakes started the day he announced that CNN had hidden much of the brutality of Saddam Hussein. And it ended on an extremely sour note of accusing our troops of committing war crimes. Newsweek screwed up a story, and people died because of it. Now, Linda Foley is at the center of a new storm, with the same old Eason Jordan lies.
What has happened to the media? Arrogance I believe is the key. For so long, they served as the purveyors of news and fact to the nation, that they believed their own hype. And with that belief comes the bias. You can’t attack a Dan Rather. He is a time-honored news man. Maybe so, but he still lied. And he got caught.
Bloggers represent the new media. We can get stories quicker than the old-style, nearly-extinct MSM. We report what we find, and them we comment on it. Or, we let others decide. When one reads a post on a blog site, you are either given the meat of the story (like we do, and several other sites do), or you’re given links to go look at the story yourself, and you may decide.
The media doesn’t do that. They mix the stories up with facts and commentary, which is not what a news person is supposed to do. Just report the facts. We’re not an ignorant population, and we can figure things out for ourselves. But the arrogant media doesn’t see things that way. Their bias, driven by their pride and political ideals, is evident with nearly every story they report and every broadcast they oversee.
Think about it. How could Dan Rather run with the TANG memo story? Where were the checks to make sure the documents were authentic? Obviously not there, otherwise they wouldn’t have been debunked so quickly. The same goes for Newsweek: One unconfirmed source was the nexus of their Koran-flushing allegation. And how quickly did that source back away once the story went south? He left Isikoff and Barry holding the bag. Again, where were the checks needed for such a story?
We don’t need no stinking checks! Yes you do. America isn’t happy with the MSM right now. Viewership is down on all the cable news outlets, except FOX News. Network news is, likewise, being flushed. And subscriptions are dropping amongst the major papers in America, including the New York Times, the LA Times, and the Boston Globe. (And that comes on the heels of a scandal rocking several newspapers that had admitted they "puffed-up" their own subscription numbers.)
The bloggers now serve as the ombudsmen over the MSM, and the media despises it. Some MSM outlets recognized the bloggers as a potential force to be reckoned with, especially after the fall of Eason Jordan. But many still turn a blind eye to us. They disdain us for a "lack of professionalism" or slander us by stating we’re just a bunch of pajama-clad muck-rakers that live to rise everyday and pick their carefully conceived pieces apart—supposedly checked by eagle-eyed editors—over the slightest mistake.
Honestly, not every blogger is a superb speller. I have made the occasional mistake, too, but we do not look for proof-reading mistakes. We are looking at what story is presented. I’ll not sit here and mince words over the proper spelling of al-Qaeda and al-Qaida, or the Koran and the Qur’an. I’d prefer to raise an eyebrow at comments like those made by Linda Foley, or over a story that accuses our troops of not respecting a religion in the world. My focus is that if you’re in the news business, make sure you get it right.
And there is nothing arrogant in that demand. If we bloggers have to be accurate—which we are under a great deal of scrutiny from our readers—then so does the MSM. And that is all America is asking. We don’t want to see all of the MSM fall. But we want the bias out of the reporting, and we want the accuracy brought back to the media where it used to be. If we want anti-America tripe, we can look to the media abroad; we don’t need it here within our nation.
And that isn’t saying that the media can’t be critical. That is granted under the First Amendment. But there’s a difference between being critical, and being hostile. For our troops, we see that much of the press they receive is hostile, and slanted. (Again, Marcie pointed to this in a comment made by Terry Moran in a recent interview) In Iraq and Afghanistan now, the media is extremely reluctant to point at anything good. They barely covered the elections in Afghanistan, and when Iraq held theirs the MSM was notably uneager to report on them. But the first IED that blows up in Iraq, or the next car bombing that goes down, the MSM will rush to the scene with the speed of a paramedic rushing to an accident.
Pathetic.
A change is needed not only within our halls of government, but also within the media. But it must be those in charge that make these changes. All America can do is prompt them to do so. And it is being done by those canceling subscriptions, turning the channel, or turning to the Internet exclusively, as Marcie and I did. Until those changes are made, then there will be critics. The bloggers will be here, waiting, for the next misstep of the MSM.
It’s what ombudsmen do. And we’re happy to take up that mantle. The MSM needs to know that there is now a check in place that they can’t avoid.
Publius II
Over the course of the last few years, we have seen the beginning of the end for two of America’s largest bastions of old. The Democrats are imploding right in front of our eyes; reinforced under the Constitutional Option that reached it’s cloture stage today. But we’re also seeing the downfall of the news media.
Now, Marcie did a fine job this morning of pointing to the "mistakes" that have occurred over the last year or so. Those instances of journalistic felonies have not just resulted in the exposure of the inherent bias within the MSM, but it has also removed some well-known people from their prominent positions. Howell Raines was the long-time Editor-In-Chief of the New York Times, and was undone by a plagiarizing, lying columnist.
Dan Rather was brought down by his bias that can only be traced back to the current president’s father when he slammed the door on the newsman’s idiotic question of how to judge one based on their past. He doesn’t like the Bush family, and has done everything he can to impugn the current president, even using fake memos to do so.
And the list goes on. Eason Jordan’s mistakes started the day he announced that CNN had hidden much of the brutality of Saddam Hussein. And it ended on an extremely sour note of accusing our troops of committing war crimes. Newsweek screwed up a story, and people died because of it. Now, Linda Foley is at the center of a new storm, with the same old Eason Jordan lies.
What has happened to the media? Arrogance I believe is the key. For so long, they served as the purveyors of news and fact to the nation, that they believed their own hype. And with that belief comes the bias. You can’t attack a Dan Rather. He is a time-honored news man. Maybe so, but he still lied. And he got caught.
Bloggers represent the new media. We can get stories quicker than the old-style, nearly-extinct MSM. We report what we find, and them we comment on it. Or, we let others decide. When one reads a post on a blog site, you are either given the meat of the story (like we do, and several other sites do), or you’re given links to go look at the story yourself, and you may decide.
The media doesn’t do that. They mix the stories up with facts and commentary, which is not what a news person is supposed to do. Just report the facts. We’re not an ignorant population, and we can figure things out for ourselves. But the arrogant media doesn’t see things that way. Their bias, driven by their pride and political ideals, is evident with nearly every story they report and every broadcast they oversee.
Think about it. How could Dan Rather run with the TANG memo story? Where were the checks to make sure the documents were authentic? Obviously not there, otherwise they wouldn’t have been debunked so quickly. The same goes for Newsweek: One unconfirmed source was the nexus of their Koran-flushing allegation. And how quickly did that source back away once the story went south? He left Isikoff and Barry holding the bag. Again, where were the checks needed for such a story?
We don’t need no stinking checks! Yes you do. America isn’t happy with the MSM right now. Viewership is down on all the cable news outlets, except FOX News. Network news is, likewise, being flushed. And subscriptions are dropping amongst the major papers in America, including the New York Times, the LA Times, and the Boston Globe. (And that comes on the heels of a scandal rocking several newspapers that had admitted they "puffed-up" their own subscription numbers.)
The bloggers now serve as the ombudsmen over the MSM, and the media despises it. Some MSM outlets recognized the bloggers as a potential force to be reckoned with, especially after the fall of Eason Jordan. But many still turn a blind eye to us. They disdain us for a "lack of professionalism" or slander us by stating we’re just a bunch of pajama-clad muck-rakers that live to rise everyday and pick their carefully conceived pieces apart—supposedly checked by eagle-eyed editors—over the slightest mistake.
Honestly, not every blogger is a superb speller. I have made the occasional mistake, too, but we do not look for proof-reading mistakes. We are looking at what story is presented. I’ll not sit here and mince words over the proper spelling of al-Qaeda and al-Qaida, or the Koran and the Qur’an. I’d prefer to raise an eyebrow at comments like those made by Linda Foley, or over a story that accuses our troops of not respecting a religion in the world. My focus is that if you’re in the news business, make sure you get it right.
And there is nothing arrogant in that demand. If we bloggers have to be accurate—which we are under a great deal of scrutiny from our readers—then so does the MSM. And that is all America is asking. We don’t want to see all of the MSM fall. But we want the bias out of the reporting, and we want the accuracy brought back to the media where it used to be. If we want anti-America tripe, we can look to the media abroad; we don’t need it here within our nation.
And that isn’t saying that the media can’t be critical. That is granted under the First Amendment. But there’s a difference between being critical, and being hostile. For our troops, we see that much of the press they receive is hostile, and slanted. (Again, Marcie pointed to this in a comment made by Terry Moran in a recent interview) In Iraq and Afghanistan now, the media is extremely reluctant to point at anything good. They barely covered the elections in Afghanistan, and when Iraq held theirs the MSM was notably uneager to report on them. But the first IED that blows up in Iraq, or the next car bombing that goes down, the MSM will rush to the scene with the speed of a paramedic rushing to an accident.
Pathetic.
A change is needed not only within our halls of government, but also within the media. But it must be those in charge that make these changes. All America can do is prompt them to do so. And it is being done by those canceling subscriptions, turning the channel, or turning to the Internet exclusively, as Marcie and I did. Until those changes are made, then there will be critics. The bloggers will be here, waiting, for the next misstep of the MSM.
It’s what ombudsmen do. And we’re happy to take up that mantle. The MSM needs to know that there is now a check in place that they can’t avoid.
Publius II
posted by Syd And Vaughn | 1:05 PM
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