Quote of the Day: the Difference Between Journalism as Reporting and Shaky Journalism Used as a Partisan Political Tool
Our political Quote of the Day is by the Daily Kos’ Jed Lewison who succinctly nails the difference between reporting what appears to be a scandal and offering information to news consumers and leaping on what appears to be a scandal and quickly pushing it to the hilt for political motives.
He recounts how Gawker checked out a tidbit involving former Rep. Chris Lee sending a shirtless photo of himself to woman who had posted a personal ad on Craigslist. And then he looks at how Andrew Breitbart’s site, backed up by a slew of sympathetic weblogs, did a quick full-court press on the supposed story about high profile Democrat Rep. Anthony Weiner supposedly sending a lewd Tweet to a college student — a story that has proved to be bogus. This is not a story where all conservative websites and weblogs can be blamed: for instance, it was notable that Matt Drudge did not hype the “story” and Hot Air only ran links to it but none of it’s respected conservative bloggers picked it up and ran with it. If anything, they were wary given the source — a decision that proved to be wise.
Lewison nails the difference here:
Obviously, Breitbartworld’s post invited comparisons between Weiner and Lee, but the real contrast here is between Breitbart’s site and Gawker. While Gawker took almost a month researching and reporting its story, Breitbart’s gang went on attack immediately, without conducting a single bit of investigation. Strikingly, Breitbart’s website was the only site that got “lucky” enough to capture the screenshot before it was deleted, suggesting the possibility that if someone hacked Weiner’s Twitterfeed they were at the very least in close contact with Breitbart’s operation, if not involved directly in it. At best, Breitbart’s site shot first and asked questions later; at worst, it helped fabricate an attack on Weiner.
Either way, the difference between what Breitbartland did and what Gawker did could not be more clear. One was a political attack, the other was a piece of reporting. One deserved to be ignored, not just by the political media, but by everybody who consumes it; the other was a real story with real political implications. If you doubt that, just look at what happened in NY-26.
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There is a big difference between raising questions if something is fishy, pressing for answers, and reporting and the new “journalistic” technique of targeting people who belong to a different party to discredit them.
Reporting isn’t about the thirst to discredit.
It’s the craft of trying to discern.
18 Responses to “Quote of the Day: the Difference Between Journalism as Reporting and Shaky Journalism Used as a Partisan Political Tool”
Bogus? Really?
If it is bogus, we can trust that Anthony Weiner is cooperating with authorities right now. There needs to be an investigation into what happened. Representative Weiner owes it to the young lady in Washington to figure out who is harassing her. He owes it to people who are the victims of identity theft and hacking.
If he doesn’t cooperate with law enforcement, then what does that indicate? I can discern what it indicates. Can you?
WTF ->He owes it to people who are the victims of identity theft and hacking.
All indications are that Weiner is the victim of identity theft and hacking. So mnz3 is blaming the victim!!
Hacking of Twitter accounts is actually rather common and that includes celebrity accounts, full investigations and prosecutions are a good deal more difficult if the hackers cover their tracks. If he wanted to track down the people that did it step 1 was to not delete the picture, of course leaving the picture up would offend people and be embarrassing so he chose the least painful option and deleted it. I am one of the few people I know that hasnt had a Twitter/Email or Facebook account hacked so I find it amusing that the tin foil hat types are up in arms that Weiner must be lying since it is like lying that he got a parking ticket…its a fact of modern life.
What, a journalist or “journalist” not being slavishly farther-left and partisan Democratic? No wonder such an exception gets attention.
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Weiner is demagogic, loud, unruly scuzz who deserves next to no respect. It’s no wonder any impostor chose him as the target.
DLS -> Weiner is demagogic, loud, unruly scuzz who deserves next to no respect. It’s no wonder any impostor chose him as the target.
So let Breitbart and his minions “politically rape” him because he’s a scuzz and deserves whatever he gets. Is this what you say DLS?
There was not enough evidence to say for certain that he sent the tweet when the story broke, and there is equally not enough evidence yet to say if this is a hack or a cover-up.
Let’s wait a week or two, then see where we are before we decide either way.
Agree with Indefati – we should wait and see how this plays out.
Rudi wrote:
The reason this is so significant is being totally ignored here, and that is that Weiner is one of the very very few unabashedly feminist men in Congress. He consistently and forcefully stands up for women’s right to choose, to be safe against sexual harassment, to be safe against sexual assault. If he is out there harassing young women, it’s a huge loss. If he really did do what they’re saying he did, being vehemently pro-woman in his policy stances doesn’t excuse it. His policies do, though, make me more suspicious that this is probably a hack. (And yes, gcotharn, of course a hack is possible. It’s relatively easy, in fact. That doesn’t mean it was a hacker, but it’s pretty well established that yes, it was.)
Those who call him a “loudmouth”, well, yes. He is one of the only progressives who hasn’t pulled his tail between his legs and scurried away while the GOP blithely rips apart pretty much everything.
The NY Daily News reports it was a hacker:
http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2011/05/30/2011-05-30_rep_anthony_weiner_hires_attorney_to_explore_civil_criminal_charges_in_lewd_twit.html#ixzz1NvtVOJgk
Wait never mind. I now see that this is a Breitbart thing (how I missed it in my first pass reading is beyond me, I guess I must have drunk too much over the holiday weekend). Now I know for certain it’s a lie. That actually makes me feel a lot better.
Ok ,let ‘s raise our $1000 bet to $2000 over your statement that this is all a photoshopped hoax by Breitbart.
By the way, how many college coeds do you allow your hubby to follow on Twitter?
a famous Congressperson has no business following only 91 persons who include a slew of young girls. We know what that means. Everyone does, if everyone is willing to think clearly.
Oh boy. Well, if Breitbart said it, there are two things we know for certain: (1) it’s a blatant and provable lie, and (2) gcotharn will fight defy all logic and common sense to say it’s true.
Victims call police. Perps lawyer up.
Also: wow. I guess his skirt was too short to be a victim?
Ok ,let ‘s raise our $1000 bet to $2000 over your statement that this is all a photoshopped hoax by Breitbart.
By the way, how many college coeds do you allow your hubby to follow on Twitter?
Are you friggin kidding me? You have refused to pay up on the last bet, which I have so very clearly won, and which I’ve asked you about numerous times with no response from you. That means even though I am 99% sure Breitbart would not publish anything if it were true (and I said nothing about Photoshop…), methinks it unwise considering you do not keep your word in betting matters. I’ve got a 99% chance of being owed another $1000 I’ll never see, and a 1% chance of owing you $1000. Yeah, not a good bet. I’ll repeat what I said before, though, that I find it very weird and a little creepy that you are so enamoured of placing bets on matters you neither know about nor can affect directly. (So unfond of being honest in paying them off, though…)
And by the way, I do not “allow” my husband to do or not do anything. He’s a big boy, and he doesn’t need a mommy.
I mean, you really think it’s more likely Weiner, who has been nothing but totally vocal and genuinely supportive of women’s rights, is going to send a d*ck-pic to a young woman (“college coed” = slut!) he’s never talked to? There was a young man who had been harassing the young woman (presumably because she had the audacity to be 21 and cute and not want to have sex with him) who had also been harassing Weiner. Both Weiner and the young woman seem think it was probably him. That actually sounds a lot more likely to me. Plus, again, if Breitbart said it, it’s most likely the exact opposite of the truth.
Breitbart said his website was strictly “reporting the facts of the story”.
So because he only lies, that means he was strictly full of crap. Wow, this is like that old logic puzzle where one guard always tells the truth and one always lies…except that there’s only the one that always lies.
As for believing, I looked at the woman’s statement. She says there was no relationship at all, they’d never talked and never met. He says the same. It’s not like there’s some sort of he said/she said thing going on here.
Wow, only gcotharn could look at the evidence and come up with: he said he didn’t do it, Clinton said he didn’t do it, so he must have done it. I mean, wow.
I did not misstate at all. You think if he’s using the “Clinton defense”, that that makes him guilty. I find that “logic” quite specious.
What else have I “misstated”, gcotharn? I’ve not even pointed out your most ridiculous statement, that “we all know what it means” if young women are on a person’s Twitter followers. I don’t know who the young women are that he follows, but I know that *they* certainly don’t deserve to be pointed out as slutty girls because they happen to be reasonably attractive. How many ugly “coeds” does he follow? How many young men? The point is: the fact of having some young women on your Twitter list does not prove anything. When I was a cute young “coed” (ugh that term), I did exchange emails with a number of public figures, most of whom did have have spouses. I did so because I was interested in their policy positions, and I became friends with some of them. I didn’t sleep with any of them. Crazy, but true!
Look, g, maybe he did it. He wouldn’t be the first pompous ass who tried to take advantage of his position of power to sleep with people out of their age group and out of their league attractiveness-wise. I’m just saying that that’s not what it looks like right now, and you’re cherry picking a bunch of pretty inocuous stuff that doesn’t prove anything. Least of all that it got attention because Breitbart says it’s true. The young woman was already being harassed by one of her schoolmates. Let me tell you as someone who’s been there more than once that if someone is super creepy and bothering you consistently, when something creepy happens that you can’t explain, it was probably that person. But we’ll see.
Wow just watched the CNN interview. He still gets the benefit of the doubt but Weiner is sure acting evasive. Instead of just answering yes-or-no questions he keeps falling back on how he’s focused on his work. He’d get back to work a lot quicker if he just answered the question. He’s doing a nice job of making himself look guilty.