All reporters find it hard to write a story under deadline on a subject foreign to their training or education. They are, indeed, prone to condensing and summarizing way too much. They shorten and tweak quotes into misquotes far too often. They routinely stray way beyond what an editor would ever have allowed even 20 years ago. And, yes, some of them make their stories up. I won't defend any of this. It really isn't journalism. In this way, bloggers are only better in that they don't claim to be accurate, honest reporters of news but sort of an amalgam of scandal-sheet expose' and "hard rumor".
Most daily papers sold on the streets of America go for under $.50. Blogs and post sites are free (after you've paid your ISP). Economically not much different from a users POV. But if a newspaper's staff is even trying to live up to it's credo it's a far better bargin and a tragedy when it's gone!
Editors were told awhile ago to feature gay couples in the newspaper and on page 5 gay weddings.People stopped buying the papers.
You’re right - a good editor can make or break a paper. Most editors today are in the business of breaking papers.
I think we need look no further than the NY Times to see an example of a paper that was literally broken by a bad editor. Jason Blair got through because he was the teacher’s pet for an executive editor with a white guilt complex, Howell Raines. It can be argued that the Times has never really recovered from this scandal - Blair was nothing if not prodigious in his output, and the fabrications went back quite a ways, showing that the NYT had a huge breakdown in editorial review and cross-checking.
The central problem with “journalism” as it became post-Vietnam is that editors, as well as reporters, had an agenda, a goal towards which they wanted to slant everything in the paper, either good or bad, aka “advocacy journalism.” That they did this was undeniable. The bias is so prevalent that it hits you from the moment you pick up any urban paper and unfold it.
Kids going into journalism today want to “change the world” and all this other high-minded horsecrap, rather than merely report “just the facts, ma’am.” They all have been taught since they were weaned off their mommy’s boobs that Woodward and Bernstein are the standard to which they should aspire - ie, bring down those in power. Merely aspiring to always have the facts, names, dates and figures in their story correct, true and accurate is too low and quotidian a goal for these over-achievers, you see.
Trouble is, they only want to do this to one political party - the other party, they give a free pass.
The public was going to suffer only so much of this, and this last election cycle was the press’ last hurrah. The press knew that their ad revenues were down, that they were suffering from circulation collapse, etc. Rather than redouble their efforts to appeal to a wider audience or win back their disaffected readers, they merely decided to double down on the traits that got them to where they are today, and they proceeded to dig their own graves, from the owners on down to their scribblers and editors.
Now it is our job as citizens to toss them in and push their dirt in on top of them. Then we who actually make this country productive should kick back, pop open a six pack, drink it with relish and then, in our own leisure, piddle upon the graves of these these pompous pecksniffs and solopsistic sophists.
Something else will arise in their place. Information wants to be free, people want information, etc. I’m not worried that we’re going to live in the dark in ignorance. If anything, with newspapers out of the way, we might see a lot more facts become widely known...