Posted on 08/16/2004 10:43:55 PM PDT by weegee
It was an affirming moment. Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry walks onto the stage and audience members jump to their feet and applaud with wild enthusiasm. A campaign pep rally in Boston?
No, it was the UNITY: Journalists of Color convention, a gathering of African-American, Hispanic, Asian-American and Native American journalists, recently held in Washington D.C.
As I sat there with Karen Hunter, the readers' representative for the Hartford Courant and Chronicle colleague Pete McConnell, I thought this affirms what conservatives say about the "liberal media." This was a firmly partisan crowd when it shouldn't have been. I wanted to shout "No! no! We're journalists. This is not supposed to happen" each time the crowd of journalists rose to its feet to applaud Kerry.
Even Kerry, who was basking in the glow of love like a blushing rock star, must have been taken aback by this suspension of journalistic etiquette. It crossed my mind that had Kerry whimsically ordered the crowd "to raise your hands in the air and wave them like you just don't care," he likely would have received cheerful compliance. It was that surreal.
Objectivity already breached, the love for Kerry did not stop there as he repeatedly was interrupted by applause during his address. For his part, an obviously gloating Kerry played the crowd like he owned it, making promises that most U.S. presidents could care little about. This was a crowd of journalists, after all.
My favorite was his vow to watchdog the interests of minority-owned media companies and work to increase diversity in newsrooms. Of course, that was going to play with this crowd.
"I look around at all the talent in this room and say we can do better to expand the opportunities for people of color in the media," said Kerry, leaving the details to imagination.
I'll grant that the former is doable if Kerry does as he promised and opposes further consolidation of the news media. But the latter? It was an utterly ridiculous pledge that earned applause but likely will go nowhere should Kerry win the presidency.
I wish that I could excuse this display of approbation for Kerry as spontaneous combustion begotten by anxious anticipation after a better than 40-minute delay in the start of his speech and three announcements from the stage that "the program will begin shortly." But that would be disingenuous. This was a partisan crowd, pro-Democrat.
In contrast, President Bush's reception was exceedingly underwhelming, if civil. Indeed, had Kerry received a like reception the previous day, we wouldn't be having this discussion. But unlike Kerry, there were no repeated interruptions of Bush's address. No sporadic chants of "Bush, Bush, Bush" from the crowd. But there was disrespectful laughter from some in the crowd when, during the question and answer session, Bush stumbled while trying to answer a question about "tribal sovereignty." Conversely, no one laughed the previous day when Kerry flailed for an answer to a question that had stumped him. The difference was remarkable, and again affirming.
Bob Steele, a senior ethics faculty member at the Poynter Institute, a school for journalists in St. Petersburg, Fla., told a Baltimore Sun reporter of the display, "The key value here is professionalism. We should not allow ourselves to cross over the lights at the foot of the stage with partisan behavior."
McConnell, the Chronicle suburban editor, told the same reporter, "I was embarrassed. I know who I'm going to vote for in November, but I didn't think we ought to be out there snickering and laughing and giving standing ovations. As a group, we should have kept ourselves in check."
On the conference's last day, when many attendees were heading home, sight-seeing or shopping, the lone panel on journalism ethics convened. It sought to answer the question "Is the public right to distrust their news?" If Joe Citizen had witnessed the contrasting receptions for Kerry and Bush, his answer would be a resounding yes.
In attempting to explain the display for Kerry, one UNITY member suggested that this was a conference of minority journalists who tend to vote for Democrats. OK, but that should not absolve minority journalists from their responsibility to remain objective. It is, after all, our credibility that is on the line. And, in some instances, the industry does hold minority journalists to a different standard. Remember the fallout about diversity after the Jayson Blair incident?
When I was an aspiring sports writer, right before game time the public address announcer would admonish reporters that there "was no cheering in the press box." The idea was to remind reporters that they were there to report a story, not be fans of one team or the other.
That announcement would have been a useful reminder at the UNITY conference.
Campbell, the readers' representative, is a member of the Chronicle Editorial Board.
The media in general is leftist. This particular group of journalists is low class.
Will the real Uncle Tom please stand up . . .
These clymers aren't journalists.
They are the street whores for their head pimp, Kerry!
Juan Williams was probably leading the cheers for Kerry.
I heard sound bites from that rally for days before I realized the people cheering were "journalists". That's the one where Kerry says he wouldn't have spent 7 minutes reading to schoolkids and THE CROWD GOES WILD!!!!
Judging from the crowd noise, I thought it was the most enthusiastic Kerry rally in the history of his campaign. Maybe it was.
Why should they keep themselves in check? To fool people? We know who they're going to vote for as well. It oozes out of everything they write. They might as well just go ahead and clap and cheer for the Democrat. At least then they're being honest about it.
If Juan, who is dumber than rocks in our yards was there, he would be leading the cheers if he was on the correct page and paragraph.
Kerry is "basking in the glow" of being not-Bush?
How satisfying can that be?
we know the media tilts liberal & especially any journalists who attend a "media of color" event. What this event illuminates for us is the basic lack of intelligence of these media hacks. How many of us could get by in our professions not having even a basic understanding of our job?
He does own them...
For his part, an obviously gloating Kerry played the crowd like he owned it, making promises that most U.S. presidents could care little about. This was a crowd of journalists, after all.
If the same folks who run papers today were running them 40 years ago, they would have painted a person with blackface to fool the blacks. And rather than hire women, they would have asked "journalist" to use unisex names. We're not fooled. Time to put a few conservative tokens on staff.
We know who they're going to vote for as well. It oozes out of everything they write. They might as well just go ahead and clap and cheer for the Democrat. At least then they're being honest about it.
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