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The Trouble With TV News ("Sept. 11...revealed the abject failure of the news media")
Wall Street Journal Online (two-week free subscription) ^ | March 2, 2005 | Joe Flint

Posted on 03/06/2005 11:11:03 AM PST by baseball_fan

A New Book Assailing the Networks Suggests That There Is No Easy Fix

News junkies who fear that profits outweigh public service at the broadcast networks will find even more reason for alarm in the just-released "Bad News," a scathing indictment of television news by recently retired CBS foreign correspondent Tom Fenton .

…he charges that just as Sept. 11 "pointed up the myriad failures" of the U.S. government, "it also revealed the abject failure of the news media."… media failed to warn viewers of "the storm clouds approaching our shores," and suggests that was a betrayal of the public trust.

… could be just as easily applied to print media, where corporate pressures, busy readers and the ubiquity of wire copy have made many U.S. newspapers indistinguishable…

… He and his colleagues…had been tracking al Qaeda for more than a decade, but "rarely reported what we knew on network news -- because much of the time, our bosses didn't consider such developments newsworthy."…

… explains how political and cultural changes in the world played key roles in dictating the way news is covered…cites the end of the Cold War as a turning point. It was then that news organizations started to reduce their presence overseas…very moment when the world was becoming less predictable and more dangerous…correspondents … came to be regarded as alarmists…

… led television news to adopt an America-centric approach…it didn't drive ratings. That became a self-fulfilling prophecy, since the less foreign news on the air, the less viewers would develop an interest.…

… other major complaint against the networks is the outsourcing of much of the work done overseas…

…a senior vice president at CBS News, disagrees that this system hurts coverage, saying that the substantial cost savings actually allow for more international reporting.


(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
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…he charges that just as Sept. 11 "pointed up the myriad failures" of the U.S. government, "it also revealed the abject failure of the news media."… media failed to warn viewers of "the storm clouds approaching our shores," and suggests that was a betrayal of the public trust.

Is the an accurate assessment, and if so would this explain why much of the mainstream media was so loud in its complaints regarding a failure in intelligence on the part of the government, i.e. they were pointing fingers away from themselves regarding a cutback in international coverage?

1 posted on 03/06/2005 11:11:04 AM PST by baseball_fan
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To: baseball_fan

We need more "Martha Stewart" coverage.


2 posted on 03/06/2005 11:16:28 AM PST by baseball_fan (Thank you Vets)
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To: baseball_fan

We need more "Martha Stewart" coverage.


We need more "Katherine Zeta-Jones" coverage!


3 posted on 03/06/2005 11:18:29 AM PST by tet68 ( " We would not die in that man's company, that fears his fellowship to die with us...." Henry V.)
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Comment #4 Removed by Moderator

To: F15Eagle

"After the USS Cole attack hit the news, I called my father and told him to be on guard"

Excellent observation.


5 posted on 03/06/2005 11:26:49 AM PST by baseball_fan (Thank you Vets)
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To: tet68

you know the rules. where's the pic?


6 posted on 03/06/2005 11:26:51 AM PST by kaboom
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To: baseball_fan

Fenton is a darn good journalist.

I was disappointed when he retired, but he got no airtime anymore, so who could blame the guy for saying goodbye? I had not seen a report by him in months.

If tv news ignores his criticism, they do so at their own peril.


7 posted on 03/06/2005 11:27:06 AM PST by rwfromkansas (http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=rwfromkansas)
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To: baseball_fan
I'm wasn't a big fan of Geoff Metcalf when he was a radio talk show host on KSFO, but I gotta give him credit for recognizing back in 1997-98 or so what a danger OBL posed.
8 posted on 03/06/2005 11:28:14 AM PST by martin_fierro (yaaaaarrrrrrrr!)
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To: baseball_fan

Bump for later read.


9 posted on 03/06/2005 11:28:41 AM PST by Springman (I'm from Detroit, need I say more?)
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To: rwfromkansas

"If tv news ignores his criticism, they do so at their own peril."

It's about more than Dan Rather too, although he was a big problem. The rest of the MSM and corporate ownership might like Dan to draw all the fire away from the larger story and let him be the fall guy.


10 posted on 03/06/2005 11:33:31 AM PST by baseball_fan (Thank you Vets)
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Comment #11 Removed by Moderator

To: kaboom; tet68
you know the rules. where's the pic?


12 posted on 03/06/2005 11:36:25 AM PST by Arrowhead1952 (TV News and the MSM - - - ROTFLMAO)
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To: rwfromkansas

And yeah, he is a liberal who partly in this book is ripping the news for not criticizing Bush more on the war, but it still is a good book. I enjoyed it, but maybe because I am a news junkie.


13 posted on 03/06/2005 11:36:41 AM PST by rwfromkansas (http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=rwfromkansas)
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To: baseball_fan

The liberals have a point about how news is so corporate now. However, they are wrong that it leads to a conservative bias.

Fenton is right that it leads to lazy reporting, however. Why? Because if you are responsible to the corporate boss and not your news director, you will naturally do what he wants...which tends to be less grounded in real news and more in sensationalism in an attempt to get ratings.


14 posted on 03/06/2005 11:38:35 AM PST by rwfromkansas (http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=rwfromkansas)
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To: rwfromkansas

"...if you are responsible to the corporate boss and not your news director, you will naturally do what he wants...which tends to be less grounded in real news and more in sensationalism in an attempt to get ratings."

I'm sure you would agree there has to be some regard given to the national security aspect of news reporting and using the public airwaves. Allowing other foreign news organizations to gather our news for us might draw a parallel to relying on others (Iraqi exiles for example with an agenda) for intelligence about the post-war Iraq scenario: we need our own people on the ground. We disbanded our CIA human intelligence in the 80's and 90's, then disbanded our foreign news media intelligence. No wonder we were blindsided.


15 posted on 03/06/2005 11:50:38 AM PST by baseball_fan (Thank you Vets)
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To: baseball_fan
The old time TV "news" (non-cable) ISN'T NEWS! No only is what they present biased to the left, there is damn little information or "news." Tiem it! The national "news" is only about 18 minutes. Then, subtract the human interest stories or reports that "push" somes sponsor's medications and there isn't much left. Even CNN does a better job of infoming. ABCCBSNBC will tell you what's wrong with what Bush did today but little else. In fact, I often watch the news on a Spanish language station. I don't understand too much but the coverage is much, much broader. Even watching the BBC on PBS provides a much broader scope.

Here's an exercise. Take a piece of paper and a subwatch. Time every segment on the old-timey "news" and list the subject. Then, count the number of segments that are really "news," that is, something they could have brodcast any day and it wouldn't have made a difference, and add up the time for those segments. If you get 10 minutes a day, I'd be surprised. What passes as "national news" on the dying outlets is nothing but cheap content for some high priced advertising.

Again, even CNN provides much more information on a much more timely basis.

16 posted on 03/06/2005 11:59:26 AM PST by Tacis ("John ("What SF-180?") Kerry - Still Shilling For Those Who Would Harm America!")
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To: baseball_fan

Ditto.

BTW, this is another gem from the book I found online:

"The book's instant headlines will probably come from "60 Minutes" commentator Andy Rooney, who tells Fenton there is "no question" the media are liberal and takes a swipe at Rather: "I think Dan has been -- I don't know why; he may not be as smart as they think -- but he has been so blatantly one-sided. . . . He uses little words that are absolute clues, giveaways to his political opinions. Like saying 'Bush,' instead of 'President Bush' or 'Mr. Bush.' . . . A couple of years ago I heard him refer to 'Bush's cronies.' Well, Jesus, 'cronies' -- oh dear!"


17 posted on 03/06/2005 12:00:47 PM PST by rwfromkansas (http://www.xanga.com/home.aspx?user=rwfromkansas)
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To: baseball_fan
they were pointing fingers away from themselves
Big Journalism is an illegitimate Establishment, in that the members thereof studiously avoid competing to tell controversial truth. They love controversial lies, since they are so much cheaper talk, but they are not interested in controversial truth.

18 posted on 03/06/2005 12:04:23 PM PST by conservatism_IS_compassion (The idea around which liberalism coheres is that NOTHING actually matters but PR.)
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To: Arrowhead1952

Does she have a CCW to carry and conceal dem pairs of 44's?


19 posted on 03/06/2005 12:08:57 PM PST by Fee (Great powers never let minor allies dictate who, where and when they must fight.)
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To: baseball_fan
… He and his colleagues…had been tracking al Qaeda for more than a decade, but "rarely reported what we knew on network news -- because much of the time, our bosses didn't consider such developments newsworthy."…

Could it be that Sydney Bloomingidiot and George Steponallofus, plus other Clinton operatives, were exerting pressure to keep the lid on things so Slick could control events?

Allowing other foreign news organizations to gather our news for us might draw a parallel to relying on others (Iraqi exiles for example with an agenda) for intelligence about the post-war Iraq scenario: we need our own people on the ground. We disbanded our CIA human intelligence in the 80's and 90's, then disbanded our foreign news media intelligence. No wonder we were blindsided.

See above. Any connection?

20 posted on 03/06/2005 12:09:49 PM PST by Mind-numbed Robot (Not all things that need to be done need to be done by the government.)
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