Jeff Gannon, or whatever your name is
I was going to write a big heaping spoonful of wrath about this whole Gannon scandal. Yesterday, as I read more about the fall-out and the larger mosaic of implications, I got ornery. I could punch steel. But today, instead of flowing outrage, I just sat at my desk on the edge of a depression. In short: I was a journo at one point in my life. I find it shocking that there isn't more outcry from reporters that a complete fraud posing as a journalist made it past the White House security and sat in the press pool, giving softball questions at press conferences. If I was covering the White House, I'd be livid about a faker in my midst. I'd phone my editor and scream that this was a huge story, that the White House had a ringer in the press pool, and I'd follow that lead in the same way a couple reporters in the 1970s carefully linked an office break-in to the White House.
But no. The press in this country appears to just be sitting there and taking it. They don't acknowledge the contempt to their profession. Look, politicans are always going to lie, cheat and steal. Journalists are supposed to know better. Glad I dropped out of the game when I did.
4 comments:
Surfdork from Atrios:
John, the paranoid part of my nature is glad you removed photos of you and your partner from your blog.
So, what is the cure for the sorry state of journalism in Amerikka?
Uh, a cure. Hm.
Local, grassroots media organizations with an Internet backbone. Foreign news services with American TV/radio outlets for competition. Anti-trust laws for the media. A complete "re-booting" of the Washington press corps. Return of the Fairness Doctrine. No more pundit TV shows on the networks. A return to "labor" business writing. The end of the "Today" show.
i see that we have a few others coming over to see how it goes in here, john. i told you you'll be a smash ;)
and i'm glad that you wisened up when you did and decided to pursue the real writing. about jeff gannon, i thought this sort of thing happened only in the philippines. it's good to know we're not totally hopeless.
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I just missed you, it seems. Hope you are well.
As for Gannon, the whole thing is just disgusting. The press and the government has always had a little filthy under-the-table thing going on, but it was usually done as a gentleman's agreement (as in the press never mentioning that FDR was in a wheelchair because, well, there were more important things to talk about). It wasn't until Reagan got in that the press's moral compass started to stray into "vapid sycophant" territory. More than anything, I blame them for the state of our nation. The press informs.
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