Beacon Street Journal

The interest in the news business by many of today’s journalists was sparked initially by what I call the Woodward/Bernstein effect. The idea of toppling a sitting president and exposing corruption in the highest reaches of our government to many, seemed like a noble and appealing calling. Many believed in the salutary effect and indispensable role of a free press in a modern democratic society as a check on abuses of power. The Woodward/Bernstein generation of journalists fancied themselves as “Speaking Truth to Power.” 

Over time however, this model became corrupted and evolved into an inversion of the original Woodward/Bernstein template. Gotcha journalism, slowly but consistently, was applied to Republicans only; the same standard of inquisitiveness or journalistic investigatory fervor was infrequently, if ever, applied to Democrats. The righteous mantra of Speaking Truth to Power, became debased and transmogrified into its antithesis: Suppressing Truth to achieve political power. 

For an idea of how the media has thoroughly and perhaps, irreparably, debased their institutional integrity and credibility and strayed far from the original Woodward/Bernstein standards in this election cycle, read the hard-hitting article by Michael S. Malone in which he, a long-time reporter of some thirty years, is ashamed now to openly admit to people that he is a journalist.

Malone chronicles the many examples of the abrogation of even the most rudimentary of journalistic standards that have plagued the news industry recently. He also demonstrates that the transgressions of the media during this election have primarily been those of omission: stories unfavorable to McCain are routinely published; those that are unfavorable to Obama are routinely suppressed. 

Malone’s article raise an interesting question, namely: Is it asking too much from the guardians of our first amendment rights, who use “the public’s right to know” justification when publishing classified information that without the shield of the first amendment, would be considered treasonous, that if they are going to adopt a standard of inquisitiveness, that they apply that standard uniformly during a presidential campaign so as to inform and enlighten the citizenry on whose benefit they purportedly act?

Though Malone largely lays the blame for bias at the feet of editors concerned for their dwindling career prospects in an environment of industry retrenchment and obsolescence, I think he misses, indeed totally ignores, a substantive reason that explains why most journalists have been in the tank for the Obama campaign. And, that is that they are all fellow travellers ideologically.

Many journalists have a loathing for the strategic, political and military prominence of the United States, and despite their requisite lip-service that they, of course, support the troops, in fact, many of them, products of the anti-war movement of the 60’s, utterly loathe all things military. For most of these journalists, world history begins and ends at the dawn of the civil rights era and, in light of their view that America is irredeemably racist, many view this struggle as continuing to this day. For a preponderance of journalists, objective reporting and investigating has been subverted in the name of a higher quest: electing the first African-American president. 

Those that stand in the way of the coronation of the Exalted One, and the fraudulent racial reconciliation for which he purportedly stands, are to be crushed, investigated with a fervor usually reserved for the most corrupt and venal public officials, demonized and parodied. This explains the unprecedented savaging of Sarah Palin. This explains as well, the ruthless investigation and probing into the private life of Joe the Plumber, a commoner, one of the “people” on whose behalf journalists tell us they earnestly toil. His crime? He, an ordinary citizen, had the audacity to ask a simple question about the New Messiah’s tax policies.

No calumny aimed at these non-believers is construed as out of bounds or outrageous when used in the service of a higher calling — the anointing of Obama as the national Savior who will somehow redeem the country from its original sin of slavery.

But certain repercussions stem from this warped and myopic ideology. First, we have heard  this campaign season the ludicrous and bizarre proposition proffered by the media ad nauseum, that any legitimate criticism of Barack Obama is at bottom, either explicitly or implicitly, a manifestation of racism. This setting of the rules was cynically established early in the race by the Obama campaign and eagerly ratified by the press corps. Questions about Obama’s sordid association with convicted felon Tony Rezco, his friendship with unrepentant domestic terrorist William Ayers and his longtime active participation in a church headed by a racist pastor, all these legitimate stories have engendered nothing more than a collective yawn on the part of the mainstream press.

Thus, have so many journalists, by the remarkable disinterest they have exhibited for pursuing stories unflattering to their idol during this presidential election, willingly discredited their profession and in the process, become advocates instead of guardians of the public trust.

An interesting phenomenon has occurred in tandem with the deprecation of traditional journalism during this election cycle, as the blatant bias of the media is accepted as a fait accompli by much of the public, the newspaper industry’s long, slow and inexorable decline continues unabated.

This election cycle may indeed represent the nadir of traditional media. It’s a matter of exposure: a visitor to the Drudge Report can cull in thirty seconds, a plethora and array of news stories, and assorted commentray that they would never see published in a newspaper nor hear on an broadcast news network. Inquiring and information-starved readers can click and chose as they see fit. In the 21st century, the old mainstream media news paradigm has simply become outdated.

Bloggers and the ubiquity of YouTube now routinely force otherwise recalcitrant journalists to publish stories inimical to their preferred candidates.

There is a very good likelihood that a new generation of news consumers, reared on iPods, YouTube and easy access to internet news sites, will simply bypass the old media outlets all together. With this transformation, the mainstream media’s function of gatekeeper, like their squandered credibility, will forever end.