Monthly archives: January 2010

Washington Post: Speak only when spoken to

David Herrera,

We discussed some institutional legacies of journalism in one of my classes today, such as the idea that the newspaper or the broadcast anchor holds authority over what’s important in the world; the idea, as Walter Cronkite might have put it, that mainstream media control “the way it is.”

Wouldn’t you know it? That view reared its head in the Washington Post:

“I don’t think it’s appropriate for a reporter in our newsroom to be challenging the views, or challenging the integrity, of our editorial board”

speaketh Liz Spayd, the Post’s managing editor.

A reporter challenging authority? Perish the thought!

Diversions

David Herrera,

Jan. 22: Added dropped words so the post makes sense.

It’s a news industry truism that most people read newspapers for the comics and the sports. Assuming it’s a true truism, and even given that most readers of The New York Times are not comparable to the rest of the country, doesn’t Michael Roston’s advice on what the Times should charge for on its Web site make sense? Charge them for the diversions! Wedding listings, maybe crosswords. Hey, it might work.

Supervertical?

David Herrera,

From a recent story on paidContent:

PBS has confirmed its plans to create a stand-alone news website in partnership with its local New York affiliate, WNET. … The company describes the site as a “supervertical” that will allow PBS to aggregate all of its news and public affairs content along with content from other partners.

Can anybody explain the “supervertical” concept? Please do so in the comments.

All of the possible definitions I know for “vertical” lead me, I suspect, in the wrong direction: That the site will aggregate reports from its CEOs down to the janitors, for example, or that its home page will take a very long time to scroll down.

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On argumentation in reporting

David Herrera,

Perhaps I’m being unfair to journalists, or to writers in general, but I can’t understand how an article like “Labor Campaigns Against Tax on Health Plans,” in The New York Times, could make sense as a piece of writing trying to inform me of something.

Consider (what I think is) the article’s conclusion:

Having failed to persuade President Obama to scrap a proposed tax on high-cost health insurance policies, labor leaders took their case Tuesday to Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and they said they received a more favorable response.

“[Labor leaders] said they received a more favorable response [from Pelosi].” Shouldn’t this be an extraordinarily easy argument to prove? All I need is a to read a labor leader telling me how they were received by Obama, and how much better their reception from Pelosi was.

But what are we told about the reactions of “labor leaders”? Only Andrew Stern saying: “I love the House, and I love the speaker.”

By what rules of logic and argumentation can we reach the conclusion from Stern’s statement?

If no such rule exists, why should we believe what the article is arguing? Why couldn’t the article have simply featured a few quotes?

What upsets me is that the kind of logic on display seems to be common among journalists–those who describe their role as helping people know about what their government is doing. It frustrates me that what passes for political journalism is appears to be devoid of basic argumentative skill.

But, I can’t back up with data the feeling that this writing style is common. It is just memory talking. So, I would welcome arguments to the contrary.

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