The Death of Journalistic Ethics

BillOReilly.com ^ | 3/22/04 | Bill O'Reilly

[bertmerc1]

The Death of Journalistic Ethics There has been a subtle shift in opinion journalism in America in the past few years.

Now, we have people working for newspapers and magazines who are devoted to getting certain polticians -- namely the left -- elected to office.

While Rush Limbaugh and the right-wing talk show cadre are entertainers -- and describe themselves as such -- these people are embedded in the elite media and are not supposed to be political activists.

In a stunning admission in Sunday's New York Times, the following people attended a meeting with Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) in New York City: · Frank Rich of The New York Times · Richard Cohen of The Washington Post · Jonathan Alter of Newsweek · Howard Fineman of Newsweek · Jim Kelly of Time Magazine · Jeff Greenfield of CNN · Eric Alterman of The Nation Can you imagine if the President of FOX News Channel and the Editor of the Wall Street Journal met with President Bush in some apartment -- there would be outrage. Segment Guest: Richard Hanley, Director of the Graduate School of Communications at Quinnipiac University

[bertmerc1]

Did anyone see this last night on OReilly? Very interesting.

[MizSterious]

Well and good, but he should talk. He's done his share, too. Still, I'm glad he's exposing the others.

[devane617]

I saw the story. I could not believe they met in an apartment with other reporters, yet try to maintain a non-bias stance. I think the average Joe does not care unless it affects their current space. This goes to the heart of our problems in America as I see them. People do not care enough to complain.

[cynicom]

"The Death of Journalistic Ethics There has been a subtle shift in opinion journalism in America in the past few years.

Past few years? Where has this clown been since 1960? Living in his own cocoon?

[bertmerc1]

I shared this with one of my liberal coworkers and she looked at me like I had two heads! She didn't see what was wrong with it and said it was okay because Bush gets attention by virtue of being President. She thinks this must go on with the conservatives too.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

I think the last time I picked up a copy of TIME was 1970.

[bobo1]

Journalistic ethics?

I didn't know that they had any at all.

Blessings, Bobo

[Fiddlstix]

Journalistic Ethics

LOL
Now there's an Oxymoron if I ever heard one.

[Tax-chick]

I don't think journalistic ethics have declined ... from what? He should read some history. I'm also underwhelmed by O'Reilly in general, but he has one good point here. We need to stop pretending that there's a distinction between "news" and "opinion." Everything that is disseminated to the public is largely colored by the beliefs of the originator. We ought to acknowledge this, and insist on more information about the purveyors of information, so that the public knows whose opinions they're getting.

[cynicom]

There was a very distinct change in the media since 1960 when Camelot rode into town. Since then it has been all downhill into leftfield.

[bobjam]

Journalistic ethics is a myth. It always has been. Newspapers and other media outlets serve one function: to make money. That's it. The concept that journalists serve an egalitarian purpose of bringing the facts of current events to the masses and informing the uninformed is hogwash. Businessmen sell newspapers to make money. Political groups publish magazines to aid their political agenda. People complain about bias on the networks. So what if they are?

[skeeter]

Well and good, but he should talk. He's done his share, too.

I think his point is they (opinion journalists who continue to claim to be unbiased) appear to be integrating themselves into the democrats' campaign.

To which I say, 'duh'.

[thoughtomator]

This is serious. Clinton did the same thing, and an intimidated, cowed media was his maidservant for most of a decade.

[dirtboy]

The Death of Journalistic Ethics

Huh? It's been dead for some time. But folks who don't pay much attention think it's still alive because the corpse twitches from time to time.

[MosesKnows]

The Death of Journalistic Ethics

In order for something to die it must first live. Announcing the death of journalistic ethics implies that journalistic ethics once lived.

Over time journalist replaced reporters. It took many years before I discovered a subtle but important difference between a reporter and a journalist. The difference is that the reporter reports the news whilst the journalist stars in the news.

[rushmom]

Yes, seems to me I recall this kind of thing happend with Al Gore too. It is apparently okay if a liberal Democrat does it. But a Republican better not do it.

[angkor]

I don't think journalistic ethics have declined ... from what?

Agreed. HL Mencken bragged about making up stories with his pals at the Baltimore Sun. WR Hearst defined the term "yellow journalism." Go back further and you'll find absolutely slanderous and vile "reporting" about Lincoln and, even further, the Founding Fathers.

It was only in the last hald of the 20th century that scribblers and hacks began to think of themselves as holy gatekeepers to the great unwashed, as "objective journalists".

I'll take a starkly opinionated Mencken over a dishonest and self-important Marvin Kalb any day of the week.

[Cicero]

Things began to change in the 1960s. Camelot was an early instance. There always was bias, but it was kept somewhat honest by the competition. The New York Times had to deal with The New York Herald Tribune. Most cities had liberal papers and conservative papers, so no one could just sit on the news.

Things have undoubtedly gotten worse in the past few years. During his first term, clinton would order embarassing colleagues like Vince Foster and Ron Brown killed in order to keep them quiet. In his second term he pretty much stopped killing people because he figured out he didn't have to. If someone ran to the papers with a juicy scandal, they wouldn't print it anyway, or they would deflect and diffuse it as they did when Drudge broke the spiked Monica story.

What's new in the past couple of years, as O'Reilly I think correctly points out, is how shameless the media have gotten. They don't even pretend to be honest any more. They appeal to their followers not by claiming a story is true but by proclaiming that it is politically correct and on the right side of history, as the marxists say.

Why would they be embarrassed about going into a private discussion with Kerry to plan joint strategy? Like clinton, they can just say, "Everybody does it, and the Republicans do it even worse." Who cares whether that is true or not? Truth has no relevance.

[Tax-chick]

I'll take a starkly opinionated Mencken over a dishonest and self-important Marvin Kalb any day of the week.

Absolutely ... give us enough information to "consider the source," and we can decide how much credence to give the report.

I think the public generally knows where the newspapers stand (the Daily Oklahoman is Republican; the Tulsa World is Democrat), but people are much less discerning about TV news. Maybe that's because it takes more brains and education to read a newspaper than to watch TV!

[vanmorrison]

You're right about this, of course. In olden days, the only critical expectation readers of newpapers had was that journalists would be "objective" only insofar as they reported the straight facts of a story (who, what, when, where, why). Anything else was considered "editorializing". Can you imagine reading a Horace Greeley "On To Richmond" headline and thinking of it as anything other biased and opinionated? Even if you agreed with his position. In fact, you'd read his newpapers BECAUSE you agreed with his position.

Then came Karl Marx and his minions, who realized the value of propagandizing through distortion and deception by the "news" media. Marx knew that you could get the people to swallow any lie that was proffered under the guise of "objective reality", even though his dialectical materialism fundamentally denied that knowing such a truth was even possible. The rest is history.

This is why I avoid reading any article or editorial from any source that reveals itself at some point to be a product of a liberal mindset. If I'm reading a piece and I encounter some sort of indication of a leftist orientation, my well-honed bullshit detectors start throwing off red flags and I immediately stop reading and go no further. I don't need the headaches!