Thursday, August 14, 2008

Addition

A few days ago, I wrote about Hillary Clinton, and quoted from Morning Joe and from an interview with Chris Matthews. 

I got an email asking why I was worried...that they were only opinions in the newsroom.

Here's why:  These people are supposedly unbiased.  But they were actively booing the President.  Here's another reason ... let's assume that one of those people booing was a news anchor.  And let's assume that our hypothetical person slanted a certain news story about the President. 

Again, this is a hypothetical situation.  But is it just barely possible that one of them could have and might have slanted a story about the President?  After all, a great many people point to the now completely-discredited 60 Minutes story about the President's National Guard service as an attempt to influence the 2004 election!  (A Wikipedia article about it can be found here:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killian_documents  Another can be found here:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killian_documents_authenticity_issues And an article which covers what the CBS' "documents" "covered" is here:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush_military_service_controversy)

They're supposed to be reporting the news without distortion or concealment.  And as I wrote before, there is a place for opinions ... the Op-ed pages.  Journals are also good places for opinions.  But for a reporter to interject his or her opinion into a story and then present it as fact is just wrong.  This happens to be my opinion, and the opinion of a great many others as well.

Apparently, it's not the opinion of some in the news media.  Instead of reporting the news, some of them are now creating it. 

And that's wrong.

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