Last Post for a While

This morning Instapundit linked to an editorial that complains about Newsrooms Under Siege. (Registration required, but Bugmenot works). I reworked an earlier piece and sent the author the following email:

Mr. Wasserman

I read with interest your column, available on the web at the Philadelphia Inquirer's site
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/editorial/9613682.htm?1c

under the title "Newsrooms under siege". For your information, it was linked by perhaps the largest of the "small slivers," University of Tennessee law professor Glenn Reynolds at his site Instapundit.com. You seem upset that news sources are now being avidly fact-checked by "a loud and bullying sliver of the audience." Well, apparently I'm part of that audience. And those sources are being fact-checked because of the bias you apparently embraced when you wrote:

"The attack doesn't come from ideologically committed journalists and commentators who put together reports clearly selected and spun-dry to sell a political line. As long as such writers retain some minimal respect for fact, the transparency of their motives may even work to enrich the variety of information and interpretations available to all."

Here are two examples of why this little "sliver of the audience" is "loud and bullying", and please, explain to me how these two stories "enrich the variety of information and interpretation available to all." If you can.

The Associated Press has put out two stories in the last week that are unadulterated, blatant, partisan hit pieces for the Democrats. The first was a report that, and I quote: "President Bush on Friday wished Bill Clinton "best wishes for a swift and speedy recovery." "He's is in our thoughts and prayers," Bush said at a campaign rally. Bush's audience of thousands in West Allis, Wis., booed. Bush did nothing to stop them. " This was bullshit, and the AP yanked the offending lines - without initially issuing a retraction, and not before this lie had been picked up and spread by other news services. Links to this story in chronological order are:

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/007712.php

http://spinswimming.blogspot.com/2004/09/ap-bias-strikes-again.html

http://www.intellectualconservative.com/article3765.html

http://galleyslaves.blogspot.com/2004/09/what-story-about-ap.html

Links to audio and video of the rally in question are here so you can fact check it yourself: http://instapundit.com/archives/017600.php

Second, the AP put out an article critical of Arnold Schwarzenegger's RNC speech, accusing him of lying about the Russians in Austria during his childhood, and Austria having a socialist government.

The AP story can be read here: http://www.wstm.com/Global/story.asp?S=2257941

Unfortunately, again, it's bullshit, as aptly detailed here: http://www.freewillblog.com/index.php/weblog/comments/4179/

These people have been, along with Reuters and UPI and other "news services," the gatekeepers of the information the public gets. It's supposed to be their job to INFORM the public, yet it's obvious just from these two examples that they see their job is not to inform, but to MOLD public opinion. We must ask ourselves, what else are they lying to us about, and why should we trust ANYTHING coming from untrustworthy sources? People in the industry such as yourself who believe that slanting the news "enrich(es) the variety of information and interpretations available to all" are the reason for the backlash. So much for the much-vaunted neutrality of the media, eh?

You'll appreciate this: James O'Shea, managing editor of the Chicago Tribune was quoted on the Swiftboat Veterans for Truth accusations in an August 24 column in Editor and Publisher magazine: "There are too many places for people to get information. I don't think newspapers can be the gatekeepers anymore -- to say this is wrong and we will ignore it. Now we have to say this is wrong, and here is why."

(Link: http://www.mediainfo.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000617053)

Or in the case of the AP and your "enriching the variety of information and interpretation," newspapers and other media sources get to just make stuff up and pass it off as news, and it's up to us, the "loud and bullying sliver of the audience" to say "this is wrong and here is why."

As one blogger put it recently: "The Internet has detected the mainstream media as a form of censorship and simply routed around them." Not quite yet. Not completely. But I intend to do my part in that routing.

Kevin

http://smallestminority.blogspot.com/

Part of that small sliver that's stuck under your fingernail.

I doubt seriously that I'll hear back from him.

UPDATE: Wasserman replied!