Interesting People mailing list archives
IP: Re: Journalism's Moral Responsibility: Three Questions
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2001 16:26:00 -0400
From: wendyg () cix compulink co uk (Wendy Grossman) Subject: Re: IP: Journalism's Moral Responsibility: Three Questions To: farber () cis upenn edu\ > Many have asked, "How could our intelligence services have failed us > so?" But I would ask: How could our reporting on intelligence have > been so poor? ' In February, CIA Director George Tenet told the > Senate Intelligence Committee that Osama bin Laden's "global network" > was the "most immediate and serious" terrorist threat to the United > States. A handful of newspapers covered the testimony, and even their > stories were brief and buried. Could we please put the media blame where it belongs? Many journalists and editors want to report serious stories every day of the week, and they get blocked by publishers whose chief interest is the bottom line of the media conglomerate they work for. Almost every media outlet has had their budgets cut and staff trimmed, and the first thing that suffers is international news because the attitude among the bean-counters is that it's expensive and customers don't want it anyway. You want to blame someone for the media's two-minute international stories? Blame the regime that has allowed concentrated cross-ownership. What was the first thing AOL Time Warner did after the merger? Cut CNN staff. wg
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