The News Media Raises the White Flag to Surrender its Credibility
It’s not often that a sea change in American society becomes so transparently (and painfully) apparent literally overnight, but that’s exactly what happened on the late evening/early morning of January 4 – 5, 2006.
Those few hours, and the subsequent days have confirmed the completion of the metamorphoses which has been ongoing for some time – the transformation from 20th Century Journalism of the Watergate era watchdogs of democracy and seekers of truth to today’s 21st Century Journalists – the shallow, vapid, ratings hungry whores which now almost exclusively occupy mainstream airwaves and print media.
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print journalists alike, to announce the miracle that never was – the “rescue” of 12 West Virginia miners , was a sick and shameful display of the selfish, heartless and egocentric self-congratulatory ongoing fraternity party of America’s 21st Century Journalists. An error filled escaped for which no one within this elite order of self-anointed purveyors or “truth” has actually apologized.
Each of the 24 hour news networks, in their haste to scoop their competition with breaking news, immediately disregarded the first rule of journalism – confirming ones sources, and raced one another to proudly proclaim their own arrogance and display their unprofessional work ethos to all the world on the evening of January 4th. So too did the front page headlines of USA Today , the New York Times and Washington Post among other prominent papers announce this completely untruthful, uncorroborated and false story. Yet surprisingly (?) the apologies from these 21st Century Journalists, which are owed on so many levels – firstly to the family and friends of the , miners who lost their lives , as well as to the general public, were not forthcoming. USA Today’s “Note to Our Readers” – issued on page 2 of the January 5th edition didn’t even bother to use the word “apology” .
Some members of the media even chose to defend their utter incompetence and the pain they caused, by blaming the coal mining company or the rescuers for not doing the media’s job of checking sources. The Executive Editor of the Washington Post Len Downie, whose paper’s account stated flatly that the miners “were found alive,” defended his and the actions of his paper by stating that “Our story was a reflection of what was being said at the time[…], Downie went on to blame others for his failure, refusing to accept any responsibility or blame, stating that “[he didn’t] regard it as [the Post’s] error, but as an error by the people in charge of the rescue.” . Apparently Mr. Downie believes it is the responsibility of the rescue to team to not only do everything humanly possible to effectuate the immediate rescue of the lost miners, but to properly and accurately check sources as they rescue, thereby relieving Mr. Downie of any further obligations beyond happy hour at the Capital Club.
What the heartbreak and embarrassment of the past week means to all of us outside the fraternal order of media demi-gods, is that we are now on our own. The days of looking to “Uncle Walter” on the CBS evening news to seek his explanations of the important current events and his grandfatherly advice are long gone. Any further reliance by the American public upon the 21st Century Journalists will only continue to be pure folly.
Just as important as the utter failure of the 21st Century Journalist in incorrectly covering the mining tragedy, is what these unelected and self-appointed demi-gods don’t regard as newsworthy and simply do not report.
The fact that a story such as the potential looming collapse of the biggest unconstitutional Stealth Cartel in history – the multi-billion dollar Big Tobacco/State Government Master Settlement Agreement (“MSA”) , is a near non-story is, unfortunately, only one of many examples of the affirmative decisions of the 21st Century Media to ignore truly newsworthy and complex matters, in favor of far less important “news” and celebrity stories; all in furtherance of the ultimate goal of these “new news” journalist – higher ratings.
The entire story, of the fight against the MSA and the ever expanding Stealth Cartel models which the MSA has spawned, would, but for the efforts of this site and the growing number of legitimate journalists, , citizen consumers , independent business people free market attorneys , be a non-story; not because of its lack of importance – simply because of its lack of coverage.
Journalistic integrity is dead – the news medium for all of us as Citizen Consumers and Independent Business people who are fighting to defend our free market economy from the ever-expanding Stealth Cartel partnerships of Big Business and State Governments is here on the internet – on this site . The news is out there – we must now not only actively seek it – but publish and disseminate it to our fellow Citizen Consumers, in every state on a timely if not daily basis.
The New York Times standard– “All the news that’s fit to print” is no longer true. It is now all too often, what is not deemed fit to print that is actuality the essential news of the day. These affirmative omissions by the 21st Century Media do not however, alter or reduce the importance of the non-reported stories. The un-news or omitted stories are out there and it’s up to all of us to track them down – communicate with one another and as of last week – affirmatively do the news media’s job for them – as they have collectively raised the white flag on journalistic integrity and have surrendered their moral authority to the corporate juggernaut that demands obedience to the bottom line, ratings ratings ratings…
Take Back Your State.