Journalistic etiquette dictates a decorum that eliminates ad hominem attacks. Words like stupid and crazy are generally unacceptable. That politeness has been stretched thin by the spate of right-wing news stations, blogs, radio, and podcasts that have worked to divide us purposefully. Some would say the elimination of the Fairness Doctrine in 1987 was the beginning. Others might argue the emergence of Fox News broke the glass typewriter in 1996. In any event, the spread of seedy misinformation has served to turn legitimate news into ratings’ whores. The big three network channels, ABC, NBC, and CBS, would proudly brag about the money they lost for their stations in exchange for editorial integrity.
Once the major networks breathed life into the merger of news with entertainment, the exhale left us gasping for clean air. Can you imagine Walter Cronkite reporting on who got the last rose; or Chet Huntley and David Brinkley nervously waiting to tell their viewers if Omarosa would be fired. I remember an evening in November of 1963 when Cronkite adjusted his glasses, finally removed them, cleared the tears from his throat, and announced that President Kennedy had died from an assassin’s bullet. Just sixteen years later, Ted Koppel brought us nightly, sponsored reports from Iran, counting both revenue and days American hostages were being held.
From there, CNN, MSNBC, and FOX dropped the pretense of the nightly news and became live blogger comments sections. I will admit I am partial to CNN and MSNBC because they, at least, make an effort to fill in the blanks with facts. Fox has told us Dr. Fauci has been a bioterrorist for the past two years. Donald Trump’s call to Ukraine President Zelenskyy was perfect, not extortion, and the violent insurrection and deaths at the Capitol on January 6th was just an overzealous tourists outing. Fox has decided that lying to an audience of angry 70-year-old white men and selling them pillows and gold is a good business model.
America, writ large, does not want the abolishment of abortion. America wants sensible gun control. The majority of the people defend LGBTQ+ rights. America favors the honesty of history taught in schools. Still, the mainstream press ceded ground each time, fearing the label ‘liberal.’ Facts are not a liberal agenda, so why are we so willing to accept alternative facts as truth? I cannot think of a more stark example and change in the mixture of investigative journalism approaches than the late Tim Russert and Chuck Todd in how they handled the venerable Meet the Press.
Mr. Russert would force politicians to debate their own words using homespun naivety and video clip after video clip. His style was not to allow a pol to say something, just for the consumption of the current audience, sidestepping truth. Former VP Dick Cheney said of Russert following his death, “He would ask you tough questions, he would remind you of quotes you made previously in other settings or on earlier shows, so you never got away with anything going up vis- à -vis Tim.” He made me applaud when he confronted those opposite my political leanings and grimaced when he challenged those with whom I agreed. I have grimaced at almost every Todd utterance since he told the world during the Affordable Care Act debate [Republicans] “have successfully messaged against it.” But[it] wasn’t journalism’s job to expose misinformation?” Mr. Todd has tried to clear up his words in the intervening years but still quiets himself when a politician interjects blatant misinformation.
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