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President Obama used a memorial service for Walter Cronkite to opine on the media and the need for change.
From CBS News.com
Glenn Beck wasn’t at New York City’s Lincoln Center for Thursday morning’s farewell salute to Walter Cronkite. Neither was Matt Drudge, Michelle Malkin or any of the other familiar faces of the vast right wing conspiracy.” But they were all present in spirit during President Obama’s extended lament on the state of journalism.
Even though he didn’t name names, did he really need to?
“In an era where the news that city hall on fire can sweep around the world at the speed of the Internet, would (Cronkite) still have called to double check?” Mr. Obama asked.
Fresh from his August bruising at the hands of the death panel battalion, the president can be excused for looking back more fondly on an earlier era in journalism, one in which Uncle Walter was voted the most trusted man in America. Unlike those proverbial days of yore, the contemporary journalism profession is supposedly chockablock with shoot-from-the-hip artists who too often post first and ask questions later. Unfortunately, the president raised that question, but then chose not to examine why that is so. Instead, he sufficed with making an invidious comparison between that (again, assumed) golden age and the new world order where technology turns everyone into the publisher of their very own Daily Me.
“Would (Cronkite) have been able to cut through the murky noise of the blogs and the tweets and the sound bites to shine the bright light on substance?” the president wanted to know. “Would he still offer the perspective that we value. Would he have been able to remain a singular figure in an age of dwindling attention spans and omnipresent media?:
That was an easy setup for as practiced a rhetorician as Barack Obama.
“The simple values Walter Cronkite set out in pursuit of, to seek the truth, to keep us honest, to explore our world the best he could – they are as vital today as they ever were…and if we choose to live up to Walter’s example, if we realize that the kind of journalism he embodied will not simply rekindle itself as part of a natural cycle but will come alive only if we stand up and demand it, and resolve to value it once again, then I’m convinced that the choice between progress and profit is a false one and the golden days of journalism still lie ahead.”
I’m curious how this will play. To be sure, the speech paid warm homage to one of the most respected U.S. journalists of the post-World War 2 era. But under the heading of no good deed ever goes unpunished, conservative critics may rightly (no pun intended) bridle at the president’s implied suggestion that journalism needs reforming. In other words, did Congress add the title of Lecturer-in-Chief to the president’s job description nobody was looking?
Another point. Let’s more closely weigh the claim that journalism was richer “back in the day.” Yes, we had Woodward and Bernstein, but they were the exception, not the rule. The political elites often got away with a lot of nonsense that never made it into the papers. One also should ask whether all points of view were getting fairly aired. I grew up in the era when three television networks dominated the airwaves and a handful of ponderous establishment dailies told America what was important. To be sure, we’re going through a sometimes rocky transition but that doesn’t mean the same values represented by Walter Cronkite won’t live on.
Here’s a heretical thought: Maybe we’re living through another golden age of journalism right now but just don’t recognize it as yet. To be sure, the panoply of voices is greater than ever before. Admitedly, sorting through the chaff is not always easy. But that’s a small price to pay.
What’s more, the worry about quality getting sacrificed at the alter of sensationalism – especially in the emerging world of the Internet – applies both to left as well as right. Media baron Rupert Murdoch had something important to say about this in a speech last fall, where he faulted the response of some in the “established media” to the challenge posed by the Internet. His conclusion: “It’s not newspapers that might become obsolete. It’s some of the editors, reporters, and proprietors who are forgetting a newspaper’s most precious asset: the bond with its readers.”
That’s a worry for President Obama. And if Walter Cronkite were still around to weigh in on the topic, he’d make it unanimous.
The message Obama seems to be delivering is that when the media was in his corner he was fine with letting things be. But now that they are starting to look at his administration in a critical way the profession needs to be reformed. Well Obama did say he was going to be transparent and in this case he really is.
Post #2319
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About the author
Don Irvine is Chairman of Accuracy in Media. He is active on Facebook and Twitter. You can follow him @donirvine to read his latest thoughts.
6 Comments for Obama’s Media Reform
Ozark,
In the named news agencies in your post, there is no such thing as the Truth. There cannot be truth when there is an constant agenda, and only praise those they choose to believe.
Even yesterday’s 20 year old female and a 25 year old male who went to a Maryland ACPRN office to set up a prostitution ring which supposedly were bringing in 14 year old girls from El Salvador for the purposed of prostitution. ACORN agreed to find them a home where they could operate out of, were given information on how to avoid taxes. You can see the unbelievable video here:
The only news station to report this video was Fox News Channel, no other media reported on the incidence yesterday. The Video was released at 9:00am (EST) yesterday morning. White House officials had nothing to say on the subject, nor did the Justice Department, or even the US Attorney General Eric Holder.
Our Schools and Colleges do not teach “Real Journalism” any longer.
The only good news from yesterday, is possibly one of the best investigative journalist of the Big Media, Jonh Stossel is moving to Fox News to have his own weekly show.
He was saying he had spent so many years and so much time on stories, which ABC refused to air many of his investigative reporting, many of which were about the Obama Government on Health Care, Czars, and ACORN.
It would not surprise me to see Onion Domes on Government Buildings in the upcoming years, but at lease we were able to get rid of Van Jones, the so-called Green Jobs Czar, who is an unrepentant devout Communist. Tell me Obama did not know that?
As a recovering Journalists and life-long news junkie, I keep finding myself watching Fox News Channel more and more. The core of good journalism is that you ask tough questions of everybody. When the other national media quit asking good questions they were doomed. Journalism plays such an important part in maintaining a free society, I’m concerned about how we will survive as a democracy.
To the first 3 here.. Keep telling all you know
,,“do NOT listen to the LIES from D.C. & DO NOT
let anyone out there SHUT YOU DOWN or tell YOU to
BE QUIET & GO AWAY,,,just because we disagree with ‘The ONE’ “. As a combat Vet, I know that I
have PAID for your right to say what’s on your mind. So please keep on doing so, the Veterans will back you up. Wesley, keep fighting the good
fight.Tell every one you know!!!! OK??
Post #3:
Professor, the MSM are the largest problem we are in the situation we are in now, the sheer lack of a forthcoming and fair media. I believe they know, and have always known what this government stands for, including the criminality of many of it’s people. The Media has yet to show any of the undercover videos of ACORN Housing, today a third has been released, once again only Fox News is showing the newest video in Brooklyn, N.Y.’s ACORN scam. The media never even mentioned that Van Jones was a self proclaimed Communist working as an advisor to the president. Rather the MSM spends all of its time talking about anti-progressives.
Post #4:
Major,
I have lived, worked, and visited well over 60 countries. I traveled to D.C. to get special travel permissions to work in both embargoed counties, and countries where there were no friendly embassies. Beginning in 1979, I received my first special travel docs in Reagan’s first year in Office in late January of 1980, through Bush 43, and ending during the Clinton Admin…
During my travels, I also had to spend enough time in the U.K. who were we also had branches; the caveat was to be debriefed upon each return. In addition to my Military Service, collecting Intel was part of the arrangement while working for a legitimate US Company with offices in 103 countries. My longest deployment was in Libya during the 1980’s for six years. There are several countries
I would rather not mention here, basically I was working two jobs for two employers, one based in Houston, TX the other was made non-official.
As for after Obama won the Nomination, I made several predictions, (many here on AIM) once I learned he had not been vetted, I sought information on him, and dug deep, other than the common knowledge of his associations with Ayers and ACORN (Community Advisors), Rezco and the others.
Since I lost my career was ended to due to Leukemia, and a Bone Marrow disorder which has no cure, I am mainly home bound, I am able to go out in public if I take Procrit to boost my immune system, and red blood infusions every 2 to 4 months. Therefore I have devoted most of my time doing Contract Jobs Consulting companies, since I am bonded I am allowed access to their Intranet(s). The rest of my time is devoted to education as many people as possible to what this government is doing, I do quite a bit of organizing for pro-constitutionalists who still love and are patriots to our Country, and want it back. I sure as hell do, the things I have posted (not only on this site), I am sure I am on every Government list they have, I do not hold myself back. I just call it like it is regardless of the consequences, I will not be silenced.
My contacts with right thinking members of both Houses have been so consistent, many of us are on a first name basis, and will email me directly to do what I can to regain our Nation. I will never support an American Apologist, we have NOTHING to apologize for…
The War in Afghanistan was going along fairly well under Bush, now we have a President who has non-Military lawyers in our safe zone and the FBI forced to read detainees Miranda Rights, now the detainees have the ability to call witnesses in their defense. And the Left do not understand why so many Soldiers do not want to re-up. Under those rules of engagement, there would be no detainees left. Someone please tell me why we need a Civilian Force trained as well as our Military? I know why…
I will leave you with a couple of quotes put together:
“Life’s tough……it’s even tougher if you’re stupid.” – John Wayne
“We live in the greatest nation in the history of the world. I hope you’ll join with me as we try to change it.” – Barack Obama
Unfortunately, we are now beginning to understand what the second one means and what the first says about us.
I agree with Ozark_Sunshine.
A true journalist would not buy into Obama’s lies and hype.
A true journalist would not buy into Obama’s lies and hype. A true journalist would not have an agenda other than to publish the truth. That is why NY Times, LA Times, Wash. Post, and every other liberal newspaper is tanking as well as NBC, CBS, ABC, MSNBC and CNN news departments. They are liberal liars who have no credibility.