Why I'm cheering the downfall of the newspaper industry

[Dominus Atheos]

Glenn Greenwald

The mission of the Beltway journalist
Thomas Jefferson envisioned the press ensuring that "light" be shined on our government officials through "investigations." Today, they explicitly devote themselves to the opposite.
Glenn Greenwald

Mar. 11, 2009
(updated below - Update II)
Earlier this week, I wrote:

It's difficult to select what one thinks is the single most illustrative symbol of how our country now functions, but if I were forced to do so, I would choose the fact that it is America's journalists -- who claim to be devoted to serving as a check on Government and exposing its secrets -- who are, instead, leading the way in demanding that the Government's actions of the last eight years be concealed; in trying to quash efforts to investigate and expose those actions; and in demanding immunity for government lawbreakers. What kind of country does one expect to have where (with some noble exceptions) it is journalists, of all people, who take the lead in concealing, protecting and justifying government wrongdoing, and whose overriding purpose is to serve, rather than check, political power?

Today, The Washington Post's Ruth Marcus provides as pure an example of this warped "journalistic" mentality as one can imagine:

On the legal issues entwined in the war on terrorism, Obama is, again wisely, proceeding more slowly than many civil libertarians demand. Guantanamo will be closed -- eventually. Military commissions have been halted, torture policies renounced and secret memorandums released.

Yet the Obama Justice Department backstopped the Bush Justice Department's assertion of the state secrets privilege to block lawsuits challenging wiretapping and extraordinary rendition. The administration argued that prisoners in Afghanistan cannot challenge their detention in court. It leaned on the British government to keep evidence of alleged torture secret.

Look at what Marcus is cheering for in that second paragraph, what she considers to be good things: Preventing judicial scrutiny of illegal government spying and kidnapping programs. Abducting people with no due process, shipping them off to Afghanistan, and then locking them up for years with no rights of any kind. Purposely concealing -- keeping secret -- evidence of massive government torture programs. These are the extreme secrecy and suppression efforts that this "journalist" favors.
Imagine if you walked into a random class in a journalism school and asked one of the students why they enrolled in journalism school, and they replied this way:

I want to become a journalist so that I can help the Government conceal its secrets. Especially when high political officials break the law, I think it's really important that nobody find out about it. In particular, I think it's crucial that victims of government torture and illegal spying be prevented from uncovering what was done and imposing accountability on our Government leaders. And the most important thing is that when government leaders break the law, they not be investigated.

So I want to go into journalism in order to do what I can to help the Government suppress the truth, avoid exposure, and evade accountability -- because I think the key role of journalists is to do everything possible to enable the most powerful political leaders to hide what they've done from the public. That's what I see as the most important function a journalist can serve.

That's Ruth Marcus. That's exactly what she's saying here. She's actually praising the Obama administration for "lean[ing] on the British government to keep evidence of alleged torture secret." In fact, it's most of our press corps saying the same thing. Protection of and servitude to political power and the maintenance of government secrets is their driving religion.
Thomas Jefferson, in a 1799 letter to Archibald Stewart, wrote: "Our citizens may be deceived for awhile, and have been deceived; but as long as the presses can be protected, we may trust to them for light." And Jefferson later added:

Our first object should therefore be, to leave open to him all the avenues of truth. The most effectual hitherto found, is freedom of the press. It is therefore, the first shut up by those who fear the investigation of their actions.

With some important exceptions, our press corps does exactly the opposite of what Jefferson envisioned. Instead of "trusting to them for light," we have The Post's Richard Cohen demanding that political leaders be permitted to operate -- these were his words -- "with the lights off." And instead of wanting to "shut up the press" due to a "fear of investigations of their actions," political leaders now want to amplify and glorify the press as much as possible, since it's led by the likes of Ruth Marcus, David Ignatius and Stuart Taylor who are singularly devoted to blocking investigations -- not conducting them -- and ensuring that government wrongdoing remains concealed, not exposed. All you have to do is read what they say -- compare it to Jefferson's expectation of what the role of the press would be-- and see how twisted and corrupted our national media is.
In Newsweek today, Howard Fineman has one of the flimsiest and most inane -- yet highly revealing -- columns in some time. Fineman announces that while Barack Obama may be popular among most Americans, "the American establishment' -- who Fineman believes, like most journalists, he speaks for and serves -- "is taking his measure and, with surprising swiftness, they are finding him lacking." As David Sirota notes, Fineman offers no evidence for his announcement of what "the establishment" thinks and never even bothers to identify what this "establishment" is which is rebelling against Obama, other than to say that "it is a three-sided force, churning from inside the Beltway, from Manhattan-based media and from what remains of corporate America."
Even if Fineman were right that this unseen "three-sided establishment" is becoming disenchanted with Obama, who should care? Or, more to the point, who should consider that to be a negative reflection on Obama? What has this "three-sided establishment" done that is remotely positive? What have they been right about? What disaster haven't they cheered on and enabled?
Just look at where the U.S. is and what has happened over the last decade. Look at the mentality as reflected in the Marcus column: it's urgent that our most powerful elites be permitted to operate in secret, with total impunity no matter what they do, and with no accountability. What better reflection on Obama could one possibly want to see than the fact that this "three-sided Beltway/media/Wall St. establishment" is supposedly dissatisfied with his actions?

UPDATE: About that classically execrable Fineman column, Jamison Foser writes:

Howard Fineman doesn't bother quoting or paraphrasing anyone in "The Establishment" in his column about the Establishment turning on Barack Obama. That's because Fineman, though he tries to pretend otherwise, is a member of that establishment. He doesn't need to quote it, he is it. . . .

Fineman's eagerness to speak on behalf of the Establishment is, indeed, creepy. What he says is even worse.

That's the most important truth of American political life: journalists like Fineman (and Ignatius, Marcus, etc. etc.) endlessly pretend to be watchdogs over the political establishment when, in fact, they are nothing more than subservient appendages to it, loyal spokespeople for it, completely merged into it. It's not that we have a press that fails to perform its function. They perform it perfectly. The point is that their function is to amplify and glorify establishment power -- the exact opposite of what Thomas Jefferson thought they would be doing when he advocated for a free press as the supreme safeguard against abuses of power.

UPDATE II: Continuing with my Marc-Ambinder-inspired pledge, we're in the process of contacting Ruth Marcus to invite her onto Salon Radio to discuss her column. I'll post an update with any response she provides.

Update:

The distorting effect of anonymity
Yet again, journalists aid the politically powerful in foisting deceitful claims on the public by concealing the truth behind a wall of secrecy.
Glenn Greenwald

Mar. 12, 2009
(updated below - Update II)
In response to the criticisms I wrote last week of the widespread and baseless grants of anonymity by journalists, Julian Sanchez responds that, while he largely agrees with the objections I raise, it is a more complicated problem than my argument suggests (emphasis in original):

Here's the problem, though. Sources request "background" or "off the record" status at the beginning of a conversation-that is, before you know what they're going to say. Maybe they're just going to give you spin, and maybe they're going to tell you something that would get them in hot water with an employer or colleague if it were attributed. When you've got a relationship with a source over time, of course, you can start being a bit more demanding with the folks who request anonymity for spin. But in a given instance, you don't know which it is until you hear what they've got to say, which often requires agreeing to a source's terms-at which point you can't go back on the agreement if they're just giving you the party line.

All that might be true, but one doesn't have to agree to have an off-the-record or background discussion with anyone unless one believes in advance that there's a legitimate reason to do so (see David Cay Johnston's refusal to do so with Obama spokespeople here). And even if one does agree to those conditions and the information one then receives doesn't warrant anonymity, the journalist can attempt to persuade the person to agree to have the comments be on the record (and newspaper anonymity policies not only require that such an effort be made, but also require that those efforts be described when using anonymity -- a "rule" that is ignored far more often than adhered to).
But the most important point is that journalists are not required to serve as message-carriers. The mere fact that you agree to a "background" discussion doesn't obligate you to then go forth and obediently publish whatever the person on background utters. If all they're doing is trying to inject claims (or "spin") into the public discussion in order to be able to influence or manipulate the debate without accountability (because they're allowed by the journalist to do so anonymously), then the journalist can -- and should -- simply refrain from allowing themselves to be used in that way. There's no value, and there is often great harm, when a journalist passes on false claims or even just "spin" on behalf of a political figure whose identity the journalist is shielding from the public.
There are very narrow circumstances in which, virtually everyone agrees, anonymity is warranted -- when genuinely secret information is being revealed or someone is risking something in order to disclose matters of public interest. But far more often than not, that isn't how anonymity is used. Instead, it's typically a weapon wielded by government officials and other politically influential people to use the journalist to disseminate information -- often dubious or outright false information -- to the public while cowardly hiding behind the accountability-free protective shield erected for them by the journalist.
Now that establishment media venues have finally (now that it's all over) taken note of the Charles Freeman controversy which was exploding on blogs and in Congress for the last week, we have yet another perfectly illustrative example of these distorting effects of anonymity. In The New York Times yesterday, Mark Mazzetti noted that Freeman blamed "the Israel Lobby" for the attacks against him, but then followed his description of Freeman's accusation with this paragraph:

Joshua Block, a spokesman for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a lobbying group, said Tuesday that his organization had not taken a formal position on Mr. Freeman's selection and had not lobbied Congress members to oppose it.

See? Contrary to Freeman's frenzied conspiratorial rantings, AIPAC had nothing to do with the controversy. The always-neocon-friendly Washington Post Editorial Page today went even further in insisting that Freeman's false claim of AIPAC's involvement was part of what the Post called Freeman's "crackpot tirade":

Yes, Mr. Freeman was referring to Americans who support Israel -- and his statement was a grotesque libel.

For the record, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee says that it took no formal position on Mr. Freeman's appointment and undertook no lobbying against him. If there was a campaign, its leaders didn't bother to contact the Post editorial board.

Since there are no on-the-record quotes from AIPAC opposing Freeman's appointment, the impression is created -- explicitly and deliberately -- that Freeman's claims of AIPAC's involvement are false, paranoid and even bigoted. But Fred Hiatt might have waited a day before writing that accusation so that he could read his own newspaper, where this article on the Freeman controversy by Post reporter Walter Pincus appears:

Only a few Jewish organizations came out publicly against Freeman's appointment, but a handful of pro-Israeli bloggers and employees of other organizations worked behind the scenes to raise concerns with members of Congress, their staffs and the media.

For example, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), often described as the most influential pro-Israel lobbying group in Washington, "took no position on this matter and did not lobby the Hill on it," spokesman Josh Block said.

But Block responded to reporters' questions and provided critical material about Freeman, albeit always on background, meaning his comments could not be attributed to him, according to three journalists who spoke to him.

Anyone who even casually followed the Freeman attacks from the start knew where most of the attacks originated. Once it was over, neocons like Daniel Pipes were sending out celebratory emails hailing former AIPAC official (and accused espionage defendant) Steve Rosen as being the catalyzing force behind the anti-Freeman campaign. Dan Flesher reported that, throughout the controversy, Block himself, on behalf of AIPAC, was contacting journalists and bloggers and (while hiding behind grants of anonymity) encouraging and feeding the attacks on Freeman. Greg Sargent, who thoroughly covered the Freeman controversy from the start at his Washington Post-owned blog, wrote yesterday:

As Ben Smith, Andrew Sullivan, Max Blumenthal and others have already shown, pro-Israel forces were instrumental in turning the Freeman pick into a major controversy. Reporters who covered this closely were subjected to a barrage of info and spin from that camp.

Once Freeman was safely vanquished, even some of the lynch mob leaders, like The New Republic's Jonathan Chait, were willing to acknowledge: "Of course I recognize that the Israel lobby is powerful, and was a key element in the pushback against Freeman." Richard Silverstein wrote more than a week ago that "this coordinated attack fits Aipac's modus operandi to a tee" and also noted the obvious: "This is Aipac laying down a marker, telling Obama that if he wants to stray from the fold on Israel this is what he can expect: war by attrition and death of policy by a thousand paper cuts. The Israel lobby desperately wants to slow down the train that is Obama's Israel policy."
Reporters knew that AIPAC was helping to grease the wheels of the attack because it was reporters at whom AIPAC directed those secret efforts. Politico's Ben Smith even granted anonymity to what he called "a top official at one major pro-Israel organization" (which may or may not be AIPAC) merely to boast that the Freeman "victory" sent a message that "hostility" towards Israel will not be tolerated. Smith, however, also noted:

But Jewish and pro-Israel organizations largely decided not to make the fight against Freeman a public crusade, though they were the first, and fiercest, Freeman opponents and made their views known privately.

Yet reporters agreed to keep AIPAC's "private" involvement a secret by allowing them to do everything "on background," and -- far worse -- then allowed what they knew to be the false impression to be created that AIPAC had no involvement in the campaign. Instead of the truth, what we have is AIPAC insinuating (through Mark Mazzetti's article) and Fred Hiatt outright stating that Freeman's accusations of AIPAC's involvement are false and deranged -- all because journalists concealed AIPAC's involvement by agreeing to keep it all off the record and therefore pretending it didn't exist.
This is what journalistically unwarranted grants of anonymity so often achieve. It isn't merely that these grants of anonymity enable politically powerful individuals and groups to participate in our debates and disseminate information without any accountability whatsoever, though it does do that. Far worse, it causes journalists to become active participants in the dissemination of falsehoods and frauds. When politically powerful people can hide behind anonymity while having journalists disseminate their claims, they have no reason to be truthful because they know that the statements will never be attached to them, and it is thus very often used not to illuminate issues but purposefully to obfuscate and distort them.
In response to the post I wrote on anonymity last week (which focused on anonymous White House claims passed on by Ezra Klein and David Brooks, which produced diametrically opposite, mutually exclusive reports concerning Obama's actions on Social Security), Klein wrote that while "he agrees with much of what wrote," anonymity is such a widespread practice that journalists have no choice but to agree to it even if they find it problematic:

I don't know how you get out of that cycle. But the judgment I've made is that my readers learn more even when the sourcing is anonymous then they'd learn if I decided to stop talking to officials on principal. It's not the optimal outcome, but it is, as far as I can tell, the best this site can do.

But that assumes, wrongly, that anonymous claims are always at least somewhat informative (even if not as informative as on-the-record claims would be). But often, perhaps most often, anonymous claims are the opposite of informative. They're intended to mislead and deceive, which is why the source is unwilling to attach their name to it. Passing those anonymous claims along doesn't help the public understand anything. It deceives the public.
I'm not singling out the Freeman/AIPAC episode here nor (as I emphasized) was I singling out Klein or Brooks last week. There's nothing unusual about what happened in the Freeman case. The opposite is true: it's an extremely common, highly illustrative example of how people in Washington use journalists to deceive rather than inform the public, and how journalists -- who love to be the ones who appear to be "on the inside" and in the know and whose careers are helped when they are used this way (because they appear to have scoops and insider insight) -- eagerly grant anonymity to anyone in power who requests it so that they will be chosen for similar mission-carrying, career-aiding tasks in the future. It's a dirty, synergistic dynamic which helps the source and the reporter and harms and misleads the public.
Justified anonymity is a vital tool for exposing government secrets and other forms of wrongdoing, but baseless grants of anonymity by journalists -- as the Bush era conclusively proved -- is the bond that keeps reporters and the politically powerful working in sync rather than adversarially, often with highly misleading and deceitful effects. That sort of anonymity is just another instrument used to shield the operations of the Beltway from scrutiny and public disclosure, and is the fuel that drives the incestuous, cooperative government-media monster. The accusation that Charles Freeman is some sort of raving paranoid for suggesting that AIPAC was behind these attacks on him -- a smear accomplished only by allowing AIPAC to do its dirty work behind the secrecy which journalists granted them -- is a perfect illustration of how severely this process can distort the truth.
* * * * *
One last point on Freeman: it's certainly true that some of the objections to Freeman had nothing to do with Israel and were motivated by claims that he was too close to the Saudi government or too soft on the Chinese, though is there anyone -- anywhere -- who believes that the controversy over a relatively obscure appointment of this type, not subject to Senate confirmation, would have received anything approaching this level of attention without Freeman's criticisms of Israel driving it?
More to the point: since when does closeness to Saudi Arabia disqualify someone from political office? Who in the U.S. Government advocates breaking off or even weakening our alliance with the Saudis? In Washington, close U.S.-Saudi ties are almost as much of an unchallenged political orthodoxy as U.S.-Israel ties, and it's been that way for decades. Does anyone remember this or this? Freeman was head of an organization that received miniscule amounts of funding from Saudi Arabia, an organization from which Freeman received a small salary. Compared to the involvement with the Saudis of the Bush family, which ran the country for many years -- or even the financial ties to foreign countries on the part of the Clintons, one of whom currently runs the entire U.S. State Department -- Freeman's supposed financial ties to Saudi Arabia is dwarfed by many magnitudes. And if ties to Middle Eastern countries disqualified people from holding high political office, we wouldn't know the names Doug Feith or Elliot Abrams or Dennis Ross or even Rahm Emanuel. Finally, the idea that the U.S. should maintain close relations with the Saudis isn't a fringe position; in fact, I can't think of anyone in high political office, now or in the prior administration, who argued otherwise.
And, for that matter, was there anyone in the Bush administration and is there anyone in the Obama administration who actually wants to take action against the Chinese -- our omnipotent bankers -- to punish them for their human rights violations or otherwise force them to change behavior? Freeman's comment on a private listserv about Tiananmen Square was certainly worthy of criticism (though see Dan Larison's second update here on the actual context of the remark), but the notion that his general views on and connections to the Saudis or Chinese is something unusual for Washington isn't even a serious argument. It's pure pretext to disguise what this controversy was about.

UPDATE: In the New York Times this morning, Mazzetti, writing with Helene Cooper, has a much better, more thorough article on the Freeman controversy, with this headline: "Israel Stance Was Undoing of Nominee for Intelligence Post." It quotes Chuck Schumer as accusing Freeman of "irrational hatred of Israel." The Freeman controversy, they write, raises the question of whether it is "possible to question American support for Israel without being either muzzled or marginalized," and quotes Robert Jordan, a former U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, as saying (with great diplomatic understatement): "The reality of Washington is that our political landscape finds it difficult to assimilate any criticism of any segment of the Israeli leadership."
Just to underscore how respected of a diplomat and civil servant Freeman was in mainstream political circles in Washington, David Broder -- the ultimate face of the Washington establishment -- today lambasts Freeman critics and begins his column this way: "The Obama administration has just suffered an embarrassing defeat at the hands of the lobbyists the president vowed to keep in their place."
Is Fred Hiatt going to accuse Mazzetti, Cooper, Broder and Pincus of advancing "crackpot theories" and "grotesque libels" for pointing out the driving forces behind the attacks on Freeman? This may be a case where the Israel-devoted Right overplayed their hand to obtain a short-term victory at the expense of long-term damage to their cause. Freeman is widely admired in many influential intelligence and diplomatic circles in Washington, which are clearly angry about the ugly character smears directed at him. Has there ever been an occasion where the taboos suffocating our debates over Israel and the vast influence wielded by AIPAC and others over America's Middle East policies have been so openly discussed and widely debated in mainstream publications?

UPDATE II: The Washington Post's David Ignatius, in a video commentary posted on the Newsweek site today, said (h/t thomas c):

The chair of the National Intelligence Council, Chas Freeman, steps down. That's a huge loss for a country that needs someone like him to push the envelope on its dangerously narrow foreign policy debate. . . .

Freeman said in a statement he issued last night that the fire had come mostly from the pro-Israel lobby, which didn't like his views on the Middle East, and I suspect that's probably true.

This reflects a disturbing fact about Washington: in foreign policy discussions, the range of permissible debate often stretches from A to B . . . . There is a correct line which is enforced by lobbies of various descriptions, and administrations jump that line at their risk, as the Obama administration seems to have decided yesterday. . . . It illustrates this fundamental and disturbing fact, that on many issues -- the Middle East is one, but there are many -- the range of permissible debate is too narrow for a country as powerful as the United States.

It looks like Ignatius is another person to add to the Washington Post Editorial Page's growing list of those who spout "grotesque libels" and "crackpot theories," as Ignatius endorses Freeman's accusation that "the fire had come mostly from the pro-Israel lobby."

The media is staggeringly incompetent. I for one am really glad most of them are going to be out on their asses within the next few months. Too many of them have forgotten what their job is, and don't understand the difference between "Journalist" and "Stenographer". Most of them don't bother fact-checking what someone says and just print it as the gospel truth.

[Darth Wong]

So who will take their places? The TV networks, who are far far worse? Internet bloggers? How many investigative journalists does salon.com employ?

[Dominus Atheos]

So who will take their places? The TV networks, who are far far worse? Internet bloggers? How many investigative journalists does salon.com employ?

Well which is better: the job being done incompetently, or not at all? At least if we didn't have a press corp faithfully repeating every word a politician said as the gospel truth, a lot less people would believe it.

[K. A. Pital]

The share of Newspaper attention has been falling in industrialized nations anyway. Internet overcame newspapers right now, so from there we're looking at a declining type of media, and whatever happens to it is mostly politically irrelevant.

The booting of a few TV talking heads would have more impact than the downfall of the entire newspaper industry, me thinks.

[ray245]

So who will take their places? The TV networks, who are far far worse? Internet bloggers? How many investigative journalists does salon.com employ?

Well which is better: the job being done incompetently, or not at all? At least if we didn't have a press corp faithfully repeating every word a politician said as the gospel truth, a lot less people would believe it.

So you are saying that because people are misled by news agencies, it will be better for the general public to be less informed about political issues?

The Internet still relies on News organizations for News to begin with, News that we can verify at the very least, as compared to Internet pundits painting a even more inaccurate picture of the world.

There is a key difference between relying on the Internet for political opinions, and relying on Internet blogs as a primary news source.

If someone is doing an incompetent job, we simply remove him or find a way to improve the industry as a whole. We do not just shut down an entire industry just because that industry has its flaws.

[Dominus Atheos]

So who will take their places? The TV networks, who are far far worse? Internet bloggers? How many investigative journalists does salon.com employ?

Well which is better: the job being done incompetently, or not at all? At least if we didn't have a press corp faithfully repeating every word a politician said as the gospel truth, a lot less people would believe it.

So you are saying that because people are misled by news agencies, it will be better for the general public to be less informed about political issues?

Yes, that's what I'm saying. I'd rather the public not know anything about an issue then know something that's not true. At least if they realize they don't know anything, they'll be more inclined to find out information about it and listen to others.

The Internet still relies on News organizations for News to begin with, News that we can verify at the very least, as compared to Internet pundits painting a even more inaccurate picture of the world.

There is a key difference between relying on the Internet for political opinions, and relying on Internet blogs as a primary news source.

At least with blogs and cable news people know not to trust it as the inviolate truth. Way too many people put way to much faith in printed media that it has shown time and time again it doesn't deserve. If people switch their primary news source to one of those two, they'll be more likely to critically consider what they're hearing and will be more open to alternate interpretations.

If someone is doing an incompetent job, we simply remove him or find a way to improve the industry as a whole. We do not just shut down an entire industry just because that industry has its flaws.

If you have a better way to fix it, I'd love to hear it. But for me, I'm going with "Burn it all to the ground and let something else will the vacuum."

[General Zod]

At least with blogs and cable news people know not to trust it as the inviolate truth. Way too many people put way to much faith in printed media that it has shown time and time again it doesn't deserve. If people switch their primary news source to one of those two, they'll be more likely to critically consider what they're hearing and will be more open to alternate interpretations.

You mean like people who watch Fox News?

[Dominus Atheos]

At least with blogs and cable news people know not to trust it as the inviolate truth. Way too many people put way to much faith in printed media that it has shown time and time again it doesn't deserve. If people switch their primary news source to one of those two, they'll be more likely to critically consider what they're hearing and will be more open to alternate interpretations.

You mean like people who watch Fox News?

There will always be idiots in the world, but at least this way the people who aren't idiots will have a better chance then they do now. Most/i] people will realize that some of the things Lou Dobbs, Keith Olbermann, and Chris Wallace might only be opinions or be personally motivated, while trusting the things from the AP that appear on the front page of their morning paper, despite the fact that the things the AP prints are just as suspect as anything by Lou Dobbs, Keith Olbermann, or Chris Wallace.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

So you are saying that because people are misled by news agencies, it will be better for the general public to be less informed about political issues?

The Internet still relies on News organizations for News to begin with, News that we can verify at the very least, as compared to Internet pundits painting a even more inaccurate picture of the world.

There is a key difference between relying on the Internet for political opinions, and relying on Internet blogs as a primary news source.

If someone is doing an incompetent job, we simply remove him or find a way to improve the industry as a whole. We do not just shut down an entire industry just because that industry has its flaws.

I think you are forgetting that people will always choose what they wish to believe in, and often the News organisations, be they Reuters or Bloomberg, are all too aware of this fact and they will persist in this trend.

[ray245]

Yes, that's what I'm saying. I'd rather the public not know anything about an issue then know something that's not true. At least if they realize they don't know anything, they'll be more inclined to find out information about it and listen to others.

You really think so? You know that there are many people who don't follow the news yet they feel their political opinions is reasonable? What makes you think that now that news organization is not around people will be inclined to run off and find out about news on their own?

Public will get the wrong message even if News organization does not exist.

We might as well abolish things like History and Science in primary and secondary schools because people may form the wrong opinions due to the fact that their studies is limited to their school syllabus. People who thinks that with their secondary school level education in history or Science, they can argue against scientist and teachers who actually holds a degree in that field.

At least with blogs and cable news people know not to trust it as the inviolate truth. Way too many people put way to much faith in printed media that it has shown time and time again it doesn't deserve. If people switch their primary news source to one of those two, they'll be more likely to critically consider what they're hearing and will be more open to alternate interpretations.

Why would people suddenly realise that the new source information is less accurate? Look at how universities are getting annoyed with students quoting or getting their information from places like Wikipedia. Why do you think unviserities professors ban their students from using Wikipedia in their research?

Should we abolish the Internet as well?

If you have a better way to fix it, I'd love to hear it. But for me, I'm going with "Burn it all to the ground and let something else will the vacuum."

You really have no idea what the impact will be do you? In a democratic nation like the US, where the people actually change the political direction. Now, all you are doing is making politicians having an easier time implementing more populist policies that will harm the nation in the long run.

In regards to solution, isn't the internet where people can discuss and comment on News one solution to this problem? The exchange of ideas and debate about issues will be far more useful than simply saying we need to abolish the News organisation as a whole.

I think you are forgetting that people will always choose what they wish to believe in, and often the News organisations, be they Reuters or Bloomberg, are all too aware of this fact and they will persist in this trend.

Yet abolishing News organizations as a whole will not have the desired effect Dominus Atheos wanted to have. People would simply find a 'news' or political website that they like and stick to it. Look at how often we find people treating Wikipedia as an reliable source of information, and how Global warming denials like to use Internet sources(aka Opinions or lies) to back up their claims.

There will always be idiots in the world, but at least this way the people who aren't idiots will have a better chance then they do now. Most/i] people will realize that some of the things Lou Dobbs, Keith Olbermann, and Chris Wallace might only be opinions or be personally motivated, while trusting the things from the AP that appear on the front page of their morning paper, despite the fact that the things the AP prints are just as suspect as anything by Lou Dobbs, Keith Olbermann, or Chris Wallace.

You do know that there are many people who couldn't tell the difference between opinions and facts?

[Dominus Atheos]

Yes, that's what I'm saying. I'd rather the public not know anything about an issue then know something that's not true. At least if they realize they don't know anything, they'll be more inclined to find out information about it and listen to others.

You really think so? You know that there are many people who don't follow the news yet they feel their political opinions is reasonable? What makes you think that now that news organization is not around people will be inclined to run off and find out about news on their own?

Public will get the wrong message even if News organization does not exist.

We might as well abolish things like History and Science in primary and secondary schools because people may form the wrong opinions due to the fact that their studies is limited to their school syllabus. People who thinks that with their secondary school level education in history or Science, they can argue against scientist and teachers who actually holds a degree in that field.

I'd actually be willing to support that if I thought there would be something better that would fill the void. Unfortunately there isn't in this case, but there are several when it comes to news.

At least with blogs and cable news people know not to trust it as the inviolate truth. Way too many people put way to much faith in printed media that it has shown time and time again it doesn't deserve. If people switch their primary news source to one of those two, they'll be more likely to critically consider what they're hearing and will be more open to alternate interpretations.

Why would people suddenly realise that the new source information is less accurate? Look at how universities are getting annoyed with students quoting or getting their information from places like Wikipedia. Why do you think unviserities professors ban their students from using Wikipedia in their research?

Should we abolish the Internet as well?

Pretty much everyone gets that something that appears on a blog might not be true. The same doesn't hold true for newspapers.

If you have a better way to fix it, I'd love to hear it. But for me, I'm going with "Burn it all to the ground and let something else will the vacuum."

You really have no idea what the impact will be do you? In a democratic nation like the US, where the people actually change the political direction. Now, all you are doing is making politicians having an easier time implementing more populist policies that will harm the nation in the long run.

In regards to solution, isn't the internet where people can discuss and comment on News one solution to this problem? The exchange of ideas and debate about issues will be far more useful than simply saying we need to abolish the News organisation as a whole.

So your solution to the problem is for... people to read more blogs? Great, just so long as we're in agreement.

There will always be idiots in the world, but at least this way the people who aren't idiots will have a better chance then they do now. Most/i] people will realize that some of the things Lou Dobbs, Keith Olbermann, and Chris Wallace might only be opinions or be personally motivated, while trusting the things from the AP that appear on the front page of their morning paper, despite the fact that the things the AP prints are just as suspect as anything by Lou Dobbs, Keith Olbermann, or Chris Wallace.

You do know that there are many people who couldn't tell the difference between opinions and facts?

Like I said, there will always be idiots.

[MKSheppard]

I love this line

I want to become a journalist so that I can help the Government conceal its secrets. Especially when high political officials break the law, I think it's really important that nobody find out about it. In particular, I think it's crucial that victims of government torture and illegal spying be prevented from uncovering what was done and imposing accountability on our Government leaders. And the most important thing is that when government leaders break the law, they not be investigated.

So I want to go into journalism in order to do what I can to help the Government suppress the truth, avoid exposure, and evade accountability -- because I think the key role of journalists is to do everything possible to enable the most powerful political leaders to hide what they've done from the public. That's what I see as the most important function a journalist can serve.

If only the press behaved like that. Then perhaps we might actually have a goddamn modicum of OPSEC here; with leakers of Classified information punished severely.

[Dominus Atheos]

I love this line

I want to become a journalist so that I can help the Government conceal its secrets. Especially when high political officials break the law, I think it's really important that nobody find out about it. In particular, I think it's crucial that victims of government torture and illegal spying be prevented from uncovering what was done and imposing accountability on our Government leaders. And the most important thing is that when government leaders break the law, they not be investigated.

So I want to go into journalism in order to do what I can to help the Government suppress the truth, avoid exposure, and evade accountability -- because I think the key role of journalists is to do everything possible to enable the most powerful political leaders to hide what they've done from the public. That's what I see as the most important function a journalist can serve.

Oh yeah, that is without question the best part of the article. If I could fit all of it, I'd sig those two paragraphs.

[ray245]

I'd actually be willing to support that if I thought there would be something better that would fill the void. Unfortunately there isn't in this case, but there are several when it comes to news.

So you are telling me to get my news from blogs?

Pretty much everyone gets that something that appears on a blog might not be true. The same doesn't hold true for newspapers.

The reason why so many people trust the newspapers or even news networks is due to the fact that they managed to build up an reputation. Once that reputation is build up, people starts to get less and less willingly to apply critical thinking in regards to news report from those websites.

All it takes is another blog to build up its reputation to the same extend as the newspapers, and we will have the same problem on our hands again. People would start taking blogs seriously at face values.

So your solution to the problem is for... people to read more blogs? Great, just so long as we're in agreement.

Not simply reading blogs alone, but participating in discussions about that piece of news. As opposed to simply reading blogs alone, why not debate about it in a forum? Instead of letting others spoon feed you with political opinions, you make a proper judgment on that issue through a debate.

[fgalkin]

Well which is better: the job being done incompetently, or not at all? At least if we didn't have a press corp faithfully repeating every word a politician said as the gospel truth, a lot less people would believe it.

Is that a trick question? Of course a job done incompetently is better than it not being done at all, at least you get SOMETHING.

Dominus, you will of course provide evidence that the newspaper press has gotten worse in the past few years, da? I mean, we're talking about that same industry that conspired to deceive the American people to hide the true nature of FDR's condition, all but blowed JFK at every press conference ever and repeated his words as gospel, started wars for their own benefits, and in the 19th century actually LIED about candidates during campaigns, at a time when no fact-checking was possible by most.

By your absurd criteria (and Greenwald's) the press ought to never have existed.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Darth Wong]

So who will take their places? The TV networks, who are far far worse? Internet bloggers? How many investigative journalists does salon.com employ?

Well which is better: the job being done incompetently, or not at all? At least if we didn't have a press corp faithfully repeating every word a politician said as the gospel truth, a lot less people would believe it.

Must you be such an idiot? Journalism won't disappear if newspapers do; it will simply be done by TV networks and Internet bloggers, who are demonstrably worse in all these areas than newspapers. Of the three major news media (newspapers, TV, Internet), newspapers are the only format which derive a significant portion of their income from their actual consumers, ie- the public. TV and Internet both derive all of their income from advertisers. Anything you can say about newspapers, you can say in greater magnitude for TV and Internet, and despite your monumental stupidity, the fact remains that journalism will get done even if newspapers fold: the problem is that it will be done in an even more superficial and corporate-friendly manner than it is now.

[aerius]

Just to put in a concrete example for the "accuracy" of blogs and TV, I present this gem.

ABC news
Excerpt:

Gibbs reminded reporters that when the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) initially passed, the stock market went up, but clearly the economy was in decline.

"It went up 1,000 points. Do you think at that point -- did you -- did you think at that point, based on the gyrations of the stock market, that our problems were solved?" Gibbs asked.

Did these idiots ever check a stock chart? Stock market as a lagging indicator? And this is from a more or less reputable network, I'd hate to see what kind of shit comes out of Fox News or the whack-a-loonie blogs.

[General Zod]

Did these idiots ever check a stock chart? Stock market as a lagging indicator? And this is from a more or less reputable network, I'd hate to see what kind of shit comes out of Fox News or the whack-a-loonie blogs.

Fox News has all kinds of hilarious things going on. Their huge fubar about 4-chan and Anonymous vs. Scientology last year was full of all kinds of outright lies and distortions. Then there's their little tendency to "accidentally" label unpopular Republican politicians as Democrats. This is just off the top of my head, mind you. I'm sure I could find other massive problems with Fox if I bothered looking.

[Dominus Atheos]

I'd actually be willing to support that if I thought there would be something better that would fill the void. Unfortunately there isn't in this case, but there are several when it comes to news.

So you are telling me to get my news from blogs?

Yes. But remember blogs aren't the best news source, so approach anything they say critically, and try reading multiple blogs so you can get different viewpoints.

Pretty much everyone gets that something that appears on a blog might not be true. The same doesn't hold true for newspapers.

The reason why so many people trust the newspapers or even news networks is due to the fact that they managed to build up an reputation. Once that reputation is build up, people starts to get less and less willingly to apply critical thinking in regards to news report from those websites.

All it takes is another blog to build up its reputation to the same extend as the newspapers, and we will have the same problem on our hands again. People would start taking blogs seriously at face values.

I suppose that's possible, but somehow I just don't see it happening. Anyway, at least with tv shows/blogs people usually read/watch more then one and they often disagree with each other.

So your solution to the problem is for... people to read more blogs? Great, just so long as we're in agreement.

Not simply reading blogs alone, but participating in discussions about that piece of news. As opposed to simply reading blogs alone, why not debate about it in a forum? Instead of letting others spoon feed you with political opinions, you make a proper judgment on that issue through a debate

Which side are you arguing for again? That sounds great to me, since it actually precludes reading newspapers.

[Dominus Atheos]

So who will take their places? The TV networks, who are far far worse? Internet bloggers? How many investigative journalists does salon.com employ?

Well which is better: the job being done incompetently, or not at all? At least if we didn't have a press corp faithfully repeating every word a politician said as the gospel truth, a lot less people would believe it.

Must you be such an idiot? Journalism won't disappear if newspapers do; it will simply be done by TV networks and Internet bloggers, who are demonstrably worse in all these areas than newspapers. Of the three major news media (newspapers, TV, Internet), newspapers are the only format which derive a significant portion of their income from their actual consumers, ie- the public. TV and Internet both derive all of their income from advertisers. Anything you can say about newspapers, you can say in greater magnitude for TV and Internet, and despite your monumental stupidity, the fact remains that journalism will get done even if newspapers fold: the problem is that it will be done in an even more superficial and corporate-friendly manner than it is now.

That's fine with me. Most people (like I said, there will always be idiots) realize that not everything a talking head or blog says is true. The problem I have is that the so called journalists who act more like stenographers have way too much faith put in them by the public. It's written by the Associated Press and printed on the front page of the New York Times, so it must be true! Things said by Chris Matthews or posted on Dailykos? Not so much.

[Dominus Atheos]

Just to put in a concrete example for the "accuracy" of blogs and TV, I present this gem.

ABC news
Excerpt:

Gibbs reminded reporters that when the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) initially passed, the stock market went up, but clearly the economy was in decline.

"It went up 1,000 points. Do you think at that point -- did you -- did you think at that point, based on the gyrations of the stock market, that our problems were solved?" Gibbs asked.

Did these idiots ever check a stock chart? Stock market as a lagging indicator? And this is from a more or less reputable network, I'd hate to see what kind of shit comes out of Fox News or the whack-a-loonie blogs.

As compared to the things written in the Wall Street Journal or Reuters?

[Patrick Degan]

That's fine with me. Most people (like I said, there will always be idiots) realize that not everything a talking head or blog says is true. The problem I have is that the so called journalists who act more like stenographers have way too much faith put in them by the public. It's written by the Associated Press and printed on the front page of the New York Times, so it must be true! Things said by Chris Matthews or posted on Dailykos? Not so much.

And you keep missing the point —most people only have the alleged veracity of their news source to judge for it's truth value and accuracy and don't have the time to verify every little fact or even their record on reporting. Bloggers who simply spew bullshit or spin out half-assed unverified stories are as bad if not worse than the stenographers you decry, and websites with corporate sponsorship are only going to exacerbate the current problem.

[Darth Wong]

That's fine with me. Most people (like I said, there will always be idiots) realize that not everything a talking head or blog says is true.

And how will they determine what's true? Simply reading lots of really shitty-quality sources? Look at your own moronic post earlier, where you said:

But remember blogs aren't the best news source, so approach anything they say critically, and try reading multiple blogs so you can get different viewpoints.

The plural of hearsay is not journalism.

The problem I have is that the so called journalists who act more like stenographers have way too much faith put in them by the public. It's written by the Associated Press and printed on the front page of the New York Times, so it must be true! Things said by Chris Matthews or posted on Dailykos? Not so much.

And you are so fucking stupid that it never occurred to you why they act this way. It's not because they have some reflexive faith in newspapers. It's because they're lazy, so they look for the biggest and most respected source in their own community. If the newspapers die, they'll decide that "truth" is whatever CNN and FOXNews both report (and those will be the "smart" ones; the idiots will just watch FOXNews). If CNN and FOXNews both die, they'll decide that "truth" is whatever gets reported on their favourite Internet site. And you have no grounds on which to laugh at their methods, since your prescribed method is a joke too.

[Dominus Atheos]

That's fine with me. Most people (like I said, there will always be idiots) realize that not everything a talking head or blog says is true.

And how will they determine what's true? Simply reading lots of really shitty-quality sources? Look at your own moronic post earlier, where you said:

But remember blogs aren't the best news source, so approach anything they say critically, and try reading multiple blogs so you can get different viewpoints.

The plural of hearsay is not journalism.

Unfortunately real journalism is dead and probably isn't coming back. As you explained above, most news sources are subservient to corporate interests, and have a huge stake in keeping the status quo. Plural of hearsay is probably the best we're going to get.

The problem I have is that the so called journalists who act more like stenographers have way too much faith put in them by the public. It's written by the Associated Press and printed on the front page of the New York Times, so it must be true! Things said by Chris Matthews or posted on Dailykos? Not so much.

And you are so fucking stupid that it never occurred to you why they act this way. It's not because they have some reflexive faith in newspapers. It's because they're lazy, so they look for the biggest and most respected source in their own community. If the newspapers die, they'll decide that "truth" is whatever CNN and FOXNews both report (and those will be the "smart" ones; the idiots will just watch FOXNews). If CNN and FOXNews both die, they'll decide that "truth" is whatever gets reported on their favourite Internet site. And you have no grounds on which to laugh at their methods, since your prescribed method is a joke too.

So then there's nothing we can do, and we should just give up? You clearly realize there's a problem, so what's your solution to fixing it?

[Darth Wong]

Unfortunately real journalism is dead and probably isn't coming back. As you explained above, most news sources are subservient to corporate interests, and have a huge stake in keeping the status quo. Plural of hearsay is probably the best we're going to get.

So you cheer the only form of news which draws anything but corporate advertising revenue?

So then there's nothing we can do, and we should just give up? You clearly realize there's a problem, so what's your solution to fixing it?

Clearly, you do not know how to read. Either that, or you do not know how to think. My solution is the exact opposite of yours: ideally, we would reject Internet and TV news for the shit that it is, and go back to newspapers. Of the three types, they're the best one, and if their revenue from readership went up, they might be able to resume their once-dominant role. Your idea (cheering their demise in favour of demonstrably worse alternatives) is sheer stupidity.

Will this happen? Probably not. But that doesn't mean I have to adopt your idiotic notion of saying that it's a good thing if the only major news format that actually derives revenue from the public is sent down the shitter.