The Right Stuff

I think that Jack Schafer’s prescription at Politico is right on the money

Extraordinary times like these call for normal measures: The meticulous, aggressive, and calm presentation of the news. One of our examples should be the Washington Post’s David Fahrenthold. Fahrenthold could have assessed the Trump candidacy by filling Twitter with angry comments or by setting himself on fire. Instead, as everybody knows, he excavated the self-dealing garbage dump that was the Trump Foundation as if he were an archeologist and published a series of patient stories that resulted in a penalty against the foundation and its planned closure.

Joining the protesters or sulking in their tents is not the right strategy. That will only discredit the press. The right thing to do is their jobs.

11 comments… add one
  • steve Link

    Agreed, they should just do their jobs, and accept the fact that no matter what they find the Trump supporters won’t believe it.

    Steve

  • It applies here and to a conversation I’m having on another thread. Sam Clemens’s advice still holds:

    Always do right. This will gratify some people, and astonish the rest.

  • Modulo Myself Link

    Reporters have always gone after man-bites-dog stories. That’s their job. They are going to have figure out how to deal with a daily surplus of these.

  • Andy Link

    The press hasn’t learned anything in the last year. They are obsessed with fact-checking irrelevancies to ensure “the people” know what a blatant liar he is, but they are rubes playing Trump’s game.

    NPR had about two hours worth of coverage on the lies/spin about crowd size. They also talk constantly about twitter and rhetorically ask if they should report this kind of stuff – and the answer is YES, the American people need two hours of naval gazing about a dishonest press conference.

    Dear MSM, FFS ignore twitter and concentrate on reporting an actual story. Reporting what a very famous person puts on twitter is not news. Reporting trivial controversies while ignoring bigger issues just shows everyone with half a brain that you are getting played and are as worthless as a lot of people claim.

  • Andy:

    Among the many problems is that the art of reporting has fallen out of fashion. The point-of-view style of writing that has supplanted who-what-where-when supports that. Every article is an opinion piece now.

    A combination of the wire services, news rooms cut to the bone (or eliminated altogether), white gloves, and laziness account for some of it. Journalists take dictation and write an opinion piece about it rather than going out and digging up stories.

  • Andy Link

    NPR was a bastion of real reporting, but over the past year they’ve really jumped on the POV, “fact check” style of news. I’m increasingly switching over to foreign media which still does real reporting and it’s night-and-day when compared to the US media.

  • I frequently turn to English and French news sources. I find French sources particularly good on Africa, especially in former French colonies

  • Andy Link

    Agree. I wish France24 was available here, it is an excellent 24hour news service.

  • Andy Link

    Here’s just one example of quality European reporting:

    The Netherlands welcomes Trump

  • Cute.

    It’s a great time to be a comic.

  • Andy Link

    “It’s a great time to be a comic.”

    Trump is creating new jobs already!

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