32 Comments

1. striving for average:

agreed.

one of the best ideas I’ve seen in awhile.

Jul 29, 2005 - 8:52 pm 2. Kevin P:

Roger:

They will never do it unless the market forces them to do it. If they printed or allowed their web site to carry the entire interview it would take away their most prized weapons. The ability to take partial qoutes and tailor them to the narrative that they are weaving.It would also take away their ability to play the “He said this but this is what he really meant” trick of taking the person being interviewed words and interpret the “true” meaning. The press has fallen in love with the ability to treat the news as a historical novel. Lets face it, it is harder to be a great reporter when you can’t play a little bit with the facts.

Jul 29, 2005 - 9:29 pm 3. Katherine:

ìLets face it, it is harder to be a great reporter when you can’t play a little bit with the facts.î

Is that why we doní have great reporters anymore, perhaps?

Hey, I just formulated the Great MSM Paradox!

Jul 29, 2005 - 9:59 pm 4. Answerman:

What astonishing arrogance it must take to be shown an opportunity to improve your product and then to decline to use it…

Oh well, I guess open-sourced intereviews are going to be just another competitive advantage for PJM.

Jul 29, 2005 - 10:30 pm 5. Kevin P:

Roger;

According to Hewitt the reason given by the reporter for not conducting the interview on his show was that they didn’t want people to be able to read the story before it was written. Now since the story was on Roberts and Hugh was being interviewed because his name appeared on some of the memos just released I doubt that whatever Hugh would say would be a major part of the story. They simply want to retain control of the information so they can shape it to fit their predetermined narrative. By having the entire interview on tape they would not be able to shape part of Hugh’s responses to give credence to whatever they are going to print about Roberts work.

What is good journalism? gathering the facts and presenting them in a coherent fashion to give the reader a accurate idea of what the truth is. Having some of the facts out in public, unless there was going to be some earthshattering aspect to the info would not detract from the eventual story. Since Hugh’s work with Roberts was on smaller issues and not on most of the more important cases that Roberts worked on I doubt that the reporters would lose a scoop by letting Hugh’s responses out early.The reporters are like the old priests who were reluctant for there flock to be able to read the Bible themselves. they did not want them to be able to confront them on what they said.

I doubt that Hewitt will be part of the story but I wonder if they will be so stupid to say that Hewitt “refused to comment”.

Kevin Peters

Jul 29, 2005 - 11:25 pm 6. tbrosz:

You will also notice that most mainstream news stories will rarely, if ever, link to an original copy of a document or report that their news story is about.

When I dug up documents like the Kay and Duelfer report, commission reports, and others, I was amazed at the amount of cherry-picking and “interpretation” that took place on the part of the reporters. No wonder they don’t want you to see the originals.

Another example in this same vein might be the “selected interview.” Go to Baghdad, tape twenty people on the street, and pick out the guy who’s saying what you want your readers to hear as the “Voice of Baghdad.” Toss the others in the trash.

Jul 29, 2005 - 11:55 pm 7. JB:

Podcast it!

Jul 30, 2005 - 12:51 am 8. MattJ:

I would never consent to be interviewed unless I could make a recording of the entire interview. If I’m misquoted, the unedited audio will go up on the web.

Jul 30, 2005 - 4:07 am 9. Lola:

That would be great. Sometimes, what is left unsaid (or rather, kept hidden by those publishing the article) is more important than what shows up in the article. I once was interviewed by a reporter and photographer who wanted to cover my bridesmaid’s outing to a Moroccan restaurant where we would get our hands hennaed and they still got a couple of details wrong even though I tried to say as little as possible, knowing how errors and misinterpretations could creep in.

Jul 30, 2005 - 5:05 am 10. cahmd:

There is nothing that would prevent say the WAPO or the NYT from posting the entire interview in whatever format on their respective websites. They can even charge for it. If such “transparency” was truly newsworthy then they would obviously profit. The fact that they are not doing it is either because of dishonesty or ignorance. I am skeptical that ignorance is the reason.

Jul 30, 2005 - 5:09 am 11. Vulgorilla:

Hugh’s experience with the TSM is quite predictable. The TSM is not a story reporting machine, but a story fabrication machine (also known as a propaganda machine). In all cases, they need to be able to twist, or change, the facts as they see fit to better support their political views. Hugh’s offer to conduct the interview live, on-the-air, took that option away from them, and hence the predictable decline of the offer. This is why so many of us have cancelled newspaper & magazine subscriptions, and no longer get any news from the TV. They continue to slit their own throats, and I continue to giggle. Heh.

Jul 30, 2005 - 5:15 am 12. guinsPen:

Lets face it, it is hard… to be a great reporter when you['re]

a phony.

Jul 30, 2005 - 6:33 am 13. rickl:

I’m a member of the MSM (for 20 years) and I like the PJ media “post-it-all-and-let-the-people-decide” idea. But I don’t think many of us in the MSM are as quick to “creatively edit” footage and soundbites as you think. After all, we often interview pretty high-priority folks, and they usually remember what they said during the interview, and if we screw up, well, there’s a tape that can prove it.

That’s not to say there aren’t many such screw-ups. In my experience, most of them are what I call “half-truth” screw-ups, where we only put in part of a key remark or thought. Usually (not always, but usually) this is because of the horrible time crunch we face–both in the time we’re given to tell a story (under two minutes, usually), and in the time we’re given to prepare a story. (That’s not an excuse, but it is a factor).

Sometimes, I’m sure, the half-truth screwup is not a screwup at all but something more malicious, but I’m pretty conservative politically, and in the four years I worked at the world’s then-#1 cable news network as a reporter, no one ever changed a word of my copy in a way that advanced any political view.

Statements of fact in my copy WERE challenged, believe it or not, and long arguments were fought on tone and emphasis, in addition to what to leave in and what to cut out, and why the passive verb tense should never be used, as in this poorly written sentence!

(Certainly the script-editing process is flawed. For example, copy editors never look at the raw tape of an interview, so they have no idea whether I chose the best parts of it for the story; whether I intend to splice together two bites to make a completely different bite, etc. A reporter can, I agree, get away with a lot this way.)

Other factors: some TV reporters are not too bright. Many hew to what they believe to be the institution’s political point of view. (This is as true of Fox News reporters as it is of CNN reporters, if we’re all going to be intellectually honest about it). There are incentives, after all, for going along with what your bosses think is right–or left.)

But here are two truisms about MSM folks that I think the growing (and completely understandable) anti-MSM movement should try to remember: most reporters take a “challenge authority” approach to every story. It’s almost wired into us. Do we get this through experience, or do those of us with it gravitate toward media jobs? Who knows. Who cares? It’s there.

So when conservatives are in a position of control, they’re going to feel the media are out to get them. And justifiably so. But please, in this forum at least, let’s be honest with each other. When Clinton was going through his troubles, we SAVAGED him. We never let up. I have good friends who now have houses and cars they paid for using the overtime windfall they collected staking out Monica’s apartment, or chasing down Ken Starr. I couldn’t get my own (tech) stories on the air because of the nonstop Monica stuff. What salacious detail didn’t we broadcast–again and again?

Conservative radio hosts, in particular, are always hooting that the media gave Clinton a free pass. I remember it to be just the opposite. And I’m one conservative who would have been on the lookout for that bias.

When there’s blood in the water, it doesn’t matter whose it is. Blood is blood, and it’s all equally tasty to us.

The other thing I want you to remember that you have to be careful for what you wish for, because sometimes you get it. If we post all of our interviews online, you’ll get the sound checks, the stupid warmup questions, the even more stupid “stupid questions” (that we all ask) that we are SO grateful will never see air; the stumbles, the mulligans, the let’s-start-over-because-of-some-technical-glitch episodes (frequent!), and so forth.

If any of you make it through the entire raw tape of a routine 20-minute interview tape, I will personally drop some paypal in your tip cup. Trust me, you’ll find it much more entertaining than informative. But then you don’t trust me, do you–and that’s the point. : ) Well, I can’t say I blame you–I’m with you. I agree, let’s put it all up there and let people at least have the chance to scrutinize everything we do. I do think it would have the desired effect of holding the people who actually conduct the interviews accountable for the choices that are made later in editing–even if those choices are often made by people who weren’t there.

Jul 30, 2005 - 6:42 am 14. Joan of Argghh!:

The folks who can actually read the whole thing are already doing that. Heck, I’ve seen stories in the MSM papers with accurate quotes in them only to be wildly re-translated in the rest of the copy. The sound bite will remain the MSM’s biggest weapon in a world crowded with noise.

Bloggers had better learn the art of being succint and scintillating if they really want to be heard. I do think they’re eminently more literate and qualified to step up and whack the MSM with a cluebat. Good luck!

Jul 30, 2005 - 6:50 am 15. Narniaman:

Here’s a chance for someone to open up a great website — it could be called “The Whole Story” or the “Hugh Hewitt option” or something like that.

It would be a fairly easy concept. If person X (such as Hugh Hewitt or Roger Simon or some other newsworthy, important person) is interviewed by the MSM, insist that 1) they be allowed to record the interview, and 2) the MSM give permission for the recording to be posted immediately on “The Whole Story” website.

Even someone not quite so prominent or important as Hugh or Roger could get in on the fun by forwarding the recording of any interaction they had with the MSM to the “Whole Story” and have it posted there. Such a website could store an enormous amount of information, and would be an important source of information.

If the MSM objects, just like Hugh’s fearless reporter did, than maybe they weren’t all that interested in finding out the “Whole Story” anyway, and were much more interested in crafting another propaganda piece.

Jul 30, 2005 - 6:53 am 16. Kyda Sylvester:

Lola–that’s the most intriguing thing I’ve read in a while.

I used to work for a very prominent family in Sacramento real estate development. There were two daily newspapers at that time and the weekly Business Journal. All three wrote extensively about my employers (they were great copy). The misquotes, the factual errors, the misrepresentations printed in all three were as appalling as they were laughable. It was quite pathetic, really. I know because I was often the one called for “fact checking” purposes.

Jul 30, 2005 - 7:08 am 17. Rick Ballard:

Rickl,

I agree that the MSM spent an extraordinary amount of time and effort rummaging through Bubba’s laundry basket – wrt his zipper problem. I’ve heard that sex sells. I would take issue with you regarding MSM coverage of other matters within his administration.

To take just one instance, the coverage of Janet ‘Fry ‘Em’ Reno’s actions at Waco weighed against the misbehaviour at Abu Ghraib seems slightly unbalanced. Bubba kept that murderous scum at his side for eight years without paying a tenth of the political price that W paid for Ashcroft – who, to my knowledge, never committed any act worthy of anything other than praise.

I believe your comments concerning the probability of the vast majority of interviews being absolutely boring to be true. I’m a little surprised that you didn’t support the WaPo reporter from the POV that her job requires ‘fresh’ product and accession to Hugh’s request would have obviated that requirement. I don’t blame her at all for refusing. Hugh could have done a taped interview and then held the tape for 24 or 48 hours in order for her to perform her job correctly. If she pulled from context or misreported he would have had a fine opportunity to bash away.

Jul 30, 2005 - 7:21 am 18. Chris Fotos:

I appreciate where Hugh and Roger are coming from, and as a Pajamas Media blog I agree that the more original & complete documents the better.

But I don’t think Goldstein’s refusal to interview Hugh live and on the air is some kind of slam-dunk expose of nefarious MSM procedures. Live broadcast is Hugh’s home court; Print reporters aren’t usually in the position Hugh suggested and cautious person that I am, I doubt I would have rushed in either if I were Goldstein. And though Hugh is a gentleman, one could forgive Goldstein for not regarding the setting as entirely hospitable. And yes, the main idea for any reporter is to get something exclusive–dribbling it out live, and in someone else’s venue, kind of defeats the purpose of being a reporter for the Washington Post or any other publication that wants you to pay for them.

My blog exists largely to criticize biased reporting by Goldstein’s paper. But I’m not shocked or even especially dismayed by Goldstein’s declining the offer.

I should also add–I mean I might as well completely undermine the premise of my blog, right?–that the Post’s online venue, Washingtonpost.com, provides links to to source material, and my sense is that they’re doing that more frequently lately. One recent example would be original polling data.

Jul 30, 2005 - 7:26 am 19. Chris Fotos:

I’ll also add in reference to this comment by Roger:

But it can easily do one thing: it can provide all interviews – whether in text, audio or video forms – verbatim on the site….If I have anything to do with it (and, along with my colleagues, it seems as if I will), PJ will always have a link so that you can, in Glenn Reynolds’ famous words, “read the whole thing.”

Maybe not so easily. For one thing, not everyone will consent to being recorded–and even fewer may consent to being recorded and having that recording posted for all the world to hear. And in a really fun interview, a source may ask to go off-the-record for a moment–can we delete that without being j’accused?

And downloading an audio or video interview is going to be a cost issue for many blogs, I imagine.

Then you have some people who either take notes in shorthand or their own private version of it. Are PJMedia bloggers going to be required to post their original plus a translation of that? Are bloggers who interview someone but take notes by hand going to have to buy scanners to upload their notes? Can we black out, CIA-testimony style, parts of the interview that the source wanted off-record?

Etc. I don’t know, guys.

Jul 30, 2005 - 8:02 am 20. flenser:

Chris

Can you lay out any justification for someone to tell a reporter something “off the record”? I have a hard time thinking of one myself.

Jul 30, 2005 - 8:18 am 21. Chris Fotos:

Can you lay out any justification for someone to tell a reporter something “off the record”? I have a hard time thinking of one myself.

Yes! But first please note that I’m a journalist–I worked as a business/trade reporter in the aviation & defense field for most of my career–just so you know where I’m coming from.

It’s all about trust, and it’s a tricky game.

When talking to your friends, or when building relationships of trust with business colleagues, is every single utternance considered fair game for immediate unfiltered distribution to the rest of the world? I can’t speak for you, but I don’t think that ’s how it works in most relationships.

Journalism is about relationships too. It’s a Saturday morning and I don’t want to devote too much brainpower to this right now, but here’s a quick and fictional yet boring example: When covering trade negotiations, highly placed government source asks to go off the record for a moment when I was pressing him about why Country X refused to budge on Issue Z. The source couldn’t tell me on the record that X was holding up on the aviation bilateral because X was pissed off about an unrelated soybean agreement–which would create all kinds of hell for source A if it became public, since only a few people including source A know about it.

In the best case, source A is telling me this to let me know that it’s not because of opposition by Country X to the U.S. aviation proposal. Country X will soon be telling the world about the Soybean Dilemma, at which point I will be well positioned to scoop the soybean press (hah! you soybean press losers!!)

Now, if I can keep my mouth shut for a few weeks, I have now shown my trustworthiness to source A, who will return my calls and feel he can lay it all out for me in the future without a presumption on his part that he will be screwed. And if Source A’s story turns out to be true, he has proved his trustworthiness to me, which improves his chances of appearing in my stories as a reliable figure.

There are eighty billion permutations along these lines, and to avoid writing any longer I’ll state the obvious, quickly: Both sides of these relationships can be abused.

But in my opinion it is wildly unrealistic, not to mention destructive of normal human relationships, to demand that every single word spoken every single time be posted on the internets or printed in the Post or anywhere else.

Jul 30, 2005 - 8:44 am 22. flenser:

Chris

With all due respect, I don’t think that reporters should be in the business of developing “relationships” with their “sources”.

Your explanation of the need for “off the record” remarks boils down to the establishment of a cozy arrangement between reporter and source. I can see what both reporter and source get from it, but what about the news consumer? What do they get, other than the shaft?

There is a public expectation that if reporters find news-worthy information, they will reveal it. If your source does not want certain information to be made public, they should not be telling it to you. It’s precisely this kind of filtering activity on the part of the media which has led to widespread public cynicism.

And if Source A’s story turns out to be true, he has proved his trustworthiness to me, which improves his chances of appearing in my stories as a reliable figure.

You are totally missing the point here. Source A does not need to prove his trustworthiness to you. He, and you, need to prove it to us. And you don’t do that by withholding information.

Jul 30, 2005 - 9:32 am 23. Narniaman:

Chris:

I think you might be missing the point here.

No one is proposing that all conversations between a reporter and the potential MSM victim be recorded. . . . only that a mechanism be in place so #1) the potential MSM victim does have the liberty of recording what is actually said, and #2) the MSM victim has an avenue for publicizing the actual conversation should the need arise.

In your hypothetical example, Source A would not be required to immediately publish the details of your recorded conversation.

However, if you did something to betray your “trust” — source A could immediately have the recording of your conversation put on a recognized site so all the world could judge between what he said and what you wrote.

You also wrote:

“Maybe not so easily. For one thing, not everyone will consent to being recorded–and even fewer may consent to being recorded and having that recording posted for all the world to hear. And in a really fun interview, a source may ask to go off-the-record for a moment–can we delete that without being j’accused?”

May I suggest that if the reporter doesn’t want to be recorded while he is interogating his potential victim, maybe he shouldn’t be interogating?

And as far as the cost of downloading audio/video — it doesn’t seem to be a problem for most internet sites that specialize in downloads. For instance, have you ever visited “StupidVideos.com”? (I’m not intending to give them a plug, just to use as an example.) They have loads of videos that you can download for free, and seem to be able to sustain their operation with advertising.

Jul 30, 2005 - 9:48 am 24. Chris Fotos:

With all due respect, I don’t think that reporters should be in the business of developing “relationships” with their “sources”.

Well, unless you are from the planet Argon in the Mezulac system–that is to say, unless you are an alien rather than a human being–reporters and sources develop relationships along with everybody else in the world.

What does the public get from all of this? Better, more accurate stories, generated for example by a reporter and a source in a mutually trusting relationship. Can this be abused? Of course. Is there any human system that can’t? Let me know.

Of course Source A must prove his trustworthiness to me-why would I trouble my readers with information from Source A if I don’t first establish his trustworthiness? This is very basic stuff. Blogs operate on exactly the same principle when linking to….trusted sources. If a particular link is from an unknown or potentially insane source, the wise blogger will say Attention: the following link may primarily be useful to lunatics. Granted, some MSM stories would benefit from such a disclaimer.

In the example provided–in the best case–source A has prevented me from misinforming the public that Country X hates the U.S. aviation proposal. If source A has screwed with me–and Country X really did hate it–then lesson learned and my readers benefit because I won’t use that poopy-pants in the future.

And as far as withholding information is concerned, you can play for the long game or the short game. If I burn my source and immediately disclose that Country X is all about the soybean agreeement, yes, I have informed the public–once, and no more, from that source, who will never speak to me again. I–and my readers–may have one good day, sort of like the occasional Instalanche. And then my source will dry up, and likely other sources since Source A will not be shy about telling his own trusted colleagues about how I burned him.

But if I withhold the info temporarily, Source A becomes a font of information for me and my readers, who live happily ever after.

So time for golf, and enough with the soybeans.

Jul 30, 2005 - 10:12 am 25. Chris Fotos:

No one is proposing that all conversations between a reporter and the potential MSM victim be recorded. . . . only that a mechanism be in place so #1) the potential MSM victim does have the liberty of recording what is actually said, and #2) the MSM victim has an avenue for publicizing the actual conversation should the need arise.

Hi Narniaman. What I was primarily responding to there was Roger’s idea to make available (or require) that all PJMedia bloggers make the complete content of all interviews available. (If I have anything to do with it (and, along with my colleagues, it seems as if I will), PJ will always have a link so that you can, in Glenn Reynolds’ famous words, “read the whole thing.” )

As for downloading costs, hey, there may be a way to do it–it’s not really clear what kind of PJMedia infrastructure will exist. My thinking is about a small blogger getting by on a cheap account suddenly being flooded with massive download costs on a hot video/audio. Most of us would welcome it, but some cannot be so blithe about costs. A PJMedia-run advertiser-sponsored warehouse for such items is something that has occured to me as a good solution–and as you say, they’re out there already.

And I wasn’t thinking so much about reporters not willing to be recorded for later, unfiltered broadcast–the Goldstein episode notwithstanding– as I was about sources.

One funny thing you learn as a reporter is that many people will freeze up in the sight of a recorder (or the request over the phone for one) but are much less intimidated by hand-written note taking. Honestly, I think part of the reason is that the source can always say I got it wrong! But it’s also just a gut reaction at some reptilian level.

Apparently reptiles had problems with recorders too.

Anyway, really, the driving range is calling….

Jul 30, 2005 - 10:26 am 26. flenser:

Chris

You managed to avoid answering the question of why anyone should believe what you and your source feel like sharing with us.

As for your relationships; if I discovered that my doctor had a cozy relationship with pharmacutical companies, much cozier than his relationship with me, then he would cease to be my doctor in very short order.

If I discovered my lawyer had found information I needed to know while representing me in a case, and conspired with the opposing lawyer to keep it from me, then not only would he cease to be my lawyer, he would face disciplinary charges from the state bar, and possibly a civil suit.

Personally, I’d never believe anything I heard from you, given the attitude you display here. I make my own determinations as to what online content I believe and what I discount. I don’t cede that control to any blogger. If I know someone to be fairly reliable I may not always bother to dig too deeply into the background, but I should certainly be able to do so if I wished.

Enjoy your golf.

Jul 30, 2005 - 10:39 am 27. Kevin P:

Chris:

Your post’s are honest and they do give some perspective on the needs of a journalist. But when Goldstein refused Hewitt he was not forcing the reporter to do all interviews live. It was just this one. I assume she wanted some backround info on Roberts or she wanted Hewitt to respond to some memos that his name was on. i am sure that some people who will be interviewed would not want a tape of it. But the reluctance to do one live is a sign to me of the desire to keep control of the process.And a fear of the transparecy that the press often pontificates about. There is no FOIA when it comes to journalism.

I know there are many fine journalists who have high standards and strive to present a honest representation of the truth when they do a story. But I have been reading the LA Times every day for 37 years. I was once a straight ticket democratic voter and even though I am more conservative today I still pay for the paper every day. What I am about to say is not about their editorial page. It’s their front page. With the rise of the web and the ability to read whole speech’s and to get a wide variety of takes on the news I constantly find how often the Times news division cuts off qoutes to change the meaning of what the speaker said, how they intentionally leave out information that would give give more perspective. It happens constantly. So it makes me think there is more reasons then just protecting a scoop for why there was the refusal by 2 reporters to interview Hugh, more then likely a minor player in the Roberts story, and that losing the flexibility to use qoutes selectively to fit the narrative is one of the reasons.

This is just one example. It was a Iraq story. The Times field reporter was interviewed on the McNeil Leherer hour by Gwen Ifil. It was a year or two ago but so I don’t have the specifics but I believe it was about a mosque shooting. The field reporter gave a balanced, this is what I observed, report. He said there was firing from the mosque, that as far as he could tell the fire was initiated from the mosque and that the troops seemed to respond in a reasonable manner. he was not pro soldier, these guys are perfect and the other guys are scum. He was neutral and he just reported what he had witnessed and what he had dug out later.

The next day I open my Times and the story is on the front page. The first thing I noticed was that two other names had been addded to the story. What was written in the Times was completely different then what the reporter who was at the site had said on T.V. Some of the facts were similar but they had been spun to paint a decidely non-neutral take on the story. It wasn’t subtle. And the changes were not about facts that were away from the scene. Either the reporter decided to change his story, which i doubt, or his editors and rewrite people decided that the story didn’t paint the picture that they wanted.

I love newspapers and I will still buy the Times. But I have very little respect ot trust for what they print on their news pages. Some of the writers play it straight but the amount of agenda journalism is staggering.

Kevin Peters

Jul 30, 2005 - 11:42 am 28. Dexter Westbrook:

Mr. Peters,

Buying a newspaper and saying you don’t value the information that it provides makes no sense whatsoever. Either you like to waste money, or you’re lying.

If I were working on a story and wanted to interview Hugh Hewitt for it, and he said, well, I’ll only do this if I can broadcast the interview live, I would suggest an alternative — that he wait to broadcast the interview until after the story was published. In that way, Hugh Hewitt would have the transparency (a more accurate term would be ego stroking) that he claims to want, and if my interview elicits good information, I get to publish it first.

I would wager the reporters aren’t afraid of transparency. They just thought Hugh Hewitt and his ego isn’t worth the bother. His connection with Judge Roberts was tenuous and long ago, and in order to speak to him about Roberts, they have to serve as the dancing bear on his radio show.

I work as a reporter, and I used to get asked often to go on radio shows. My answer was the same — people who blather on radio shows, and who listen to the blather, either don’t have enough to do, or they’re getting paid to put out the blather. I wasn’t asking for money, I just didn’t want to waste my time.

Jul 30, 2005 - 9:19 pm 29. Kevin P:

Mr. Westbrook:

A fool or a liar. Thank you for the options.There are more sections to a paper then their News section. I enjoy parts of the Times, give credence to some of what is printed, and have learned that some of it is thinly veiled agit-prop. Where I once assumed that all the Times writers were “just the facts” journalists who kept their agenda’s at home I have observed that many do not. I do “value’ some of it.

Since this is your proffesion I understand that you are sensitive to alternative forms of media. Some radio is blather. Some is not. Some Blogs are simply crazed personel rants. some do a better job of transmitting news and reflecting on the news the papers do. Just as i do not put my faith in any political party I also don’t swallow every word that is printed on paper.

When I listen to Hewitt I know he is a Republican party stalwart so I take his political news with a grain of salt. But he is open in about where he is coming from while many(not all) reporters proclaim neutrality but a close examination of their work shows otherwise. Even when the NYT hired the ombudsmen and he stated that on inspection there was an obvious cultural bias in how the Times reported it’s news there were still denoal s and claims of strict neutrality.

Newspapers are under siege, thereprofits are crumbling and their subscriber base is shrinking and many that still buy the paper ignore large sections of what is printed. I still read the 85 to 95 percent of the paper every day. But I don’t swallow it whole, and the smug attitude you show by insulting a customer of your trade who still buys your product but is discussing how it could be improved is the exact reason why so many people are dropping the newspaper habit.

I have a suggestion. Even if you think my views on the newspaper trade is wrong I still purchase it and your proffession doesn’t have the luxury of pissing off many more customers. You may ask the recently fired LAT employees about the joys of finding another job. I stated that hewitt was more then likely a minor part of the story and but the reporter wanted info from him. He could have got it. He or she could ask the questions, if Hewitt decided to bloviate they could calmly ask the question again and if he was non responvive he/she could simply ignore him. It is the ‘my way or the highway’ approach of many reporters that is why things are looking so bad for newspapers today. If you think that they do not continue you watch papers fold. I have never been one whothinks that the blogs will replace newspapers, nor do I hope that they do. But ignore the reality of your trade and you will be in for a rude suprise.

Jul 31, 2005 - 10:19 am 30. Kevin P:

Mr. Westbrook:

One more thought. As much as some journalist’s like to portray themselves as practioners of a sacred art they still need to make a buck, they still need to sell their papers.As stated above if Hewitt tried to drag the reporter into conversations that had nothing to do with their story the reporter could have just responded with “I came on your show to ask you some questions regarding your work with Roberts, these other issues have nothing to do with the story.’ No problem there. Lets discuss protection of the “process”. Give me a break. The reporter was not likely to have asked Hewitt about some amazing scoop because all the info in the memo’s was out for all reporters to look out and Hewitt was a minor player.

So why bother doing the interview with Hewitt if the info was minor. Because it is free advertising on a nationwide show.The newspaper buisness is not in such great shape that it can turn down any opportunity for increased exposure.Papers often give their papers out for free to increase subscriptions. As much as you would like to think that anyone who listens to Radio is a knuckle dragging moron some actually read newspapers and by going on the radio they would have at least increased the number of hits to their on line sites for that story. More hits means better ad revenues. Some might even subscribe to the paper. More subscriptions means more ad revenue. More ad revenue means less firings, more hirings. The fact that the reporter missed a chance for free advertising in a proffesion that is struggling to retain readers is stupid from the start. ‘But Hewitt will critique it”. If he doesn’t like the story he will do that anyway. The reporters missed a chance to get info, even if it was minor, free advertising, and maybe some increased readership. The only possible danger is possible loss of control of the qoutes. And since all reporters want the entire truth out in the general public having anything that Hewitt could say out a day or two early would cost the reporter nothing.

I get the L.A. Times and the O.C. Register daily. Hewitt is always telling his listners to cancel the Times and I don’t because I don’t follow orders from him anymore then I listen to orders from the Times. I like newspapers. I don’t trust the news reports in the Times as much as I did because I have read to many articles that had qoutes that were truncated in a obvious attempt to alter the speakers words and that were overly selective in their presentation. Not for space, but for an political agenda.

Your job may be secure and you may have not have to worry about making money. But your industry is having serious problems and the arrogant snotty holier then thou attitude you show doesn’t help. Companies that call their customers stupid and blame their losses on anything other then poor performance by themselves don’t do that well. Research it.

Jul 31, 2005 - 2:17 pm 31. Dexter Westbrook:

Mr. Peters:

Boy, you DO have time to burn.

It would be better spent boning up on your spelling — unless, of course, a Pajamas Media correspondent doesn’t have to bother with, you know, spelling.

Have a nice life.

Jul 31, 2005 - 9:57 pm 32. Kevin P:

Dexter:

You are correct, I don’t preview and in my haste there are often spelling and grammar errors in my posts.You got me.

Let’s focus on your mistakes. I am not a Pajama’s Media correspondent. Just as someone who writes a letter to the editor is not a journalist. Roger wouldn’t include me in his collection of bloggers because of my sloppy writing. Especially since I don’t have a blog. Your ignorance of what Roger is putting together and the fact that you do not know the difference between someone who writes a comment on a blog and a blogger is typical of many Journalists comments on the blogosphere.They don’t know the basics and they make ignorant comments.

Your industry is losing customers to other forms of media. One of the reasons is the arrogant attitude you show. My post has numerous spelling errors. Your post’s are little more then “your fat and your mother is ugly.” Go ahead, keep calling bloggers pajama wearing cat food eating kooks. Keep repeating cliches that you borrowed from other writers. Keep calling your customers stupid. Watch as every year as more and more newspapers fold and “Journalists” find out that they can’t get their novels published and they have to get a job outside of journalism. Will Pajamas Media work? Who knows. But if you will read your own buisness section of your paper you will find that your industry is in deep trouble. Companies that survive listen to people outside their circle and to their customers. Industries that become shadows of their past greatness huddle in a closed circle and complain about how people are so stupid that they do not read us anymore and ignore our brilliant idea’s.

I am going to keep my final point very simple. I still purchase and read 2 newspapers a day. One liberal. One conservative. Your industry needs people like me.It is how they make money. Go ahead and ignore what is happening to your industry and watch as it continues to shrink. Lash out at people who don’t follow the party line and lick your boots. Call us stupid long enough and watch the subscription rate sink more and more each year. Yes, that brilliant! Great business plan. You are a wise man.

Aug 1, 2005 - 11:46 am

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