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Monday, February 14, 2005
A TOOL, NOT A REVOLUTION.
Bloggers didn't force the resignation of Janet Cooke from the
Washington Post. Stephen Glass did not depart from the New
Republic under a hail of Little Green Footballs. Ditto for
Patricia Smith and Mike Barnicle at the Boston Globe, Jayson
Blair at the New York Times, and Jack Kelley at USA
Today.
Yes, the departure of all these
miscreants might have occurred more quickly if bloggers had been
deconstructing their work in real time. In particular, the
Post might have been spared from actually having to return
Cooke's Pulitzer. But the notion that the MSM (and hasn't that
acronym grown tiresome already?) never took care of their own until
the bloggers came along is ridiculous on its face.
The theme of the day is that the
bloggers took down Eason Jordan just as they took down Dan Rather,
and good God almighty, what have they wrought? Please. Jordan went
down because he'd been on double secret probation since his
outrageous
2003 op-ed in the New
York Times, in which he admitted that CNN had played down the
crimes of Saddam Hussein in part to maintain the network's access.
After two members of Congress, Barney Frank and Chris Dodd, went
public with their anger over Jordan's suggestion at Davos that US
troops had deliberately targeted journalists, Jordan's support
crumbled in a matter of days.
As for Rather, the bloggers
certainly played a role in calling attention to the likely phoniness
of CBS's National Guard documents. But if the MSM hadn't been able to
push the story forward, Mary Mapes would still be employed at the
network.
On Sunday, the Washington
Post's Howard
Kurtz had a thumbsucker on
What It All Means, and today a troika
does the same in the New York Times. Kurtz's is the more
insightful, and not because he quotes me. The fact is that media
scandals have been taking place for years, and they will continue to
take place. Bloggers make a difference on the margins - speeding
things up, pushing the story forward, unearthing tidbits that
otherwise might have gone unnoticed.
Blogging's become an important
check on mainstream news organizations - but it's not a
revolution.
JORDAN ADDENDUM. Boston
Herald reporter Jules Crittenden, a former embed,
takes
a swipe at Steve Lovelady,
managing editor of CJR Daily, who, in an e-mail to Jay Rosen,
refers to Jordan's tormenters as "salivating
morons" who comprised a
"lynch mob."
JUST CHANGE THE NAME. If
Laura Bush wants to shake things up in the East Wing, that's fine
with me. Come on - who cares? But imagine what we'd be hearing if
Hillary Clinton had fired a chef brought in by Barbara Bush. Now read
this
piece by the New York
Times' Elisabeth Bumiller.
posted at 9:49 AM |
3 comments
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3 Comments:
To make sure I've got this right, MSM=MainStream Media?
I'm trying to be hip, but at age 48 it's getting harder.
To make sure I've got this right, MSM=MainStream Media?
I'm trying to be hip, but at age 48 it's getting harder.
Time to Discard the Bogus Yes/No FrameworkDan: you're applying a limited yes/no framework that offers little insight into the Blogger phenom.
"Are Blogs a revolution, yes or no?" One can lazily and simple-mindedly answer "no," but this misses the point, and indeed, typifies the problem with 2-D self-perpetuating MSM myopia.
Instead, you ought to praise the instances where bloggers truly provide correctives to MSM incompetence, duplicity and bias.
The current scandal of political operative/male prostitute Jeff Guckert in the White House press pool is a perfect example. He was uncovered entirely by Bloggers. MSM reporters were NEVER going to touch this scandal --even reporters who knew Guckert was fishy and stood next to him in press briefings for over a year.
This is where Bloggers are doing the work the media WILL NEVER DO any more than the Catholic Church will turn its own pedophile clergy in to the police (you, Dan, as a mainstream, thoughtful journo have failed to even acknowledge the Guckert scandal).
Today, we find yet another example of Bloggers doing what the MSM can't/doesn't/won't do itself.
At the same time, one must recognize that the added speed provided by bloggers is a revolutionary force much the same way that high-speed internet access helps to revolutionize the web.
And BTW, you are correct that Rather wasn't forced out by Bloggers; he was forced out by a combination of right-wing media sources of which Bloggers were just one small part --most prominently talk radio and cable TV-- plus the White House.
~Anthony G.
MEDIA LOG ARCHIVES
Dan Kennedy is senior writer and media critic for the Boston Phoenix.
