MSM Journalism has a generic problem — Journalism degrees. Back in the olden times, it seems, Reporters came up through the ranks (remember Jimmy Olsen, cub reporter?) from copy boy. Few print reporters had “degrees in journalism.” They didn’t exist. The few with degrees had English or something similar. Thing in MSM started going to heck in a handbasket when Journalists replaced Reporters. And colleges everywhere started Journalism degree programs (look! It’s like Liberal Arts except you don’t need a foreign language!)

MSM has a general credibility problem with me dating back to 1968. I was over in Vietnam serving with the Army during Tet. It wasn’t until I got back that I found out Uncle Walter Cronkite had declared us at a dead end/quagmired/whatever. I also remember rolling through Camp Schmidt, up in Pleiku, by the press camp (nice facility) where I never saw anyone. And finding out that when Journalists were killed in the field, it was normally a Chinese Nationalist or Japanese film crew member who was the lost journalist. The round-eyes stayed close to the bars an’ wimmin down in Saigon/Cholon. Some made obligatory forays out, but their reportage wasn’t any more accurate than the Five O’Clock Follies given at MACV.

If fair reporting and quality of journalism were mandatory today; we would see a greater power for addressing the unfairly imprisoned, and silenced; which span the globe. Rick Moran gives a to-the-heart explanation of the changing nature of journalis…

But they are still a NEWS SOURCE. Just as a physician should practice by the oath “Do No Harm”, any news source should always practice by the oath “Never Deceive”.

If a news source has a bias, they should proudly admit it. I believe bias is not a problem. You can be biased and still rigorously report the news, so long as you are careful to not deceive. But I am becoming more and more convinced that the AP and other MSM outlets are engaged in deliberate deceit.

There are Muslims who believe that deceiving the kaffir is perfectly acceptable under Islam, so long as their agenda (the spread of Islam) is the goal.

Deceit is always driven by an agenda.

I am convinced that most of the MSM have an agenda, and they are perfectly comfortable in the use of deceit to achieve the agenda.

They have a bias, but they claim to be objective - while knowing they are not objective; the DENIAL of bias, not the bias itself, is another deceit. The slanted coverage, the suppression of truths, the use of propaganda, the DEFENSE of that propaganda even when it is shown to be faulty or deceptive itself… these show us what they are really up to.

There was a time, not too many decades ago, when an industry practioner would have been horrified to be found to be violating industry standards. I suppose this was caused by Shame, which is being purged from Western Civilization. Nowadays, industry standards are given only lip service; and the standards are usually ignored, and the noble spirit behind them is even mocked.

Deceit, not bias, is the assassin of Truth. Our MSM are now openly deceitful.

Nikolay, can’t you see the double standard here? I accept that you do not trust MOI (and probably not the MNF either), but what has the AP (or MSM in general) done to make you trust them so blindly that anything they claim was stated by an anonymous, untracable, unlocatable source is accepted despite the absense of any corroboration by MOI, MNF, NYT or any ancilary evidence (funerals, pictures, testimonies, speeches, reprisals, etc.). If you think the MOI (and possibly the MNF) are spouting propaganda why do you not believe the enemy is doing so as well? Since when has there been an obligation for anyone to disprove what is, to a critical eye, little more than a rank rumor, a proposition that is logically impossible, rather than an obligation by the reporting agent to prove its claims?

For your talk of jumping to conclusions before the facts are presented, the only conclusion I see being jumped to is that the facts in this specific case (like many others) are very sparse and misrepresented. The only facts we know from the AP story are that Iraq is experiencing sectarian violence, an anonymous source claiming to be associated with the IP claims the event happened. Other facts are that there is no physical evidence to corroborate the story, the NYT could not obtain independent reports (and in fact received denials) and both the IP and MNF claim the named source is not affiliated with the IP in any way. Unless there are other “facts” you know please explain why these should lead to the conclusion that the AP is right and the MOI/MNF are covering it up.

Even the seemingly lone dissent to Mr. Moran’s original piece had his eyeballs fixed on yet another diversionary topic before (it seems) even digesting what was actually said in the original.

Back in college we’d call it “wetbrain”- the inability for one to remain focused on any issue long enough to see it thru. The distracted mind syndrome. Since this war began the mainstreem press has been in high gear to create this sort of mass-morasse of self-curtailed and tailored items of timing in order to keep the “wetbrains” looking at “the next” big ticket news item- rather than keeping their eye and focus on point- unless and only if that point were to undermine support for the war. And in particular this President.

I’m tired of not being able to trust the press. THEY, I dearly pray, are the ones who will wake up.

…not holdin’ mabreath tho. Great piece Rick- I feel ya.

I don’t think that’s true. Didn’t the New York Times say they investigated the story but were unable to find witnesses? Ok, not quite the way I remembered it, but more or less the same. It’s here

(For its part, The New York Times took note of the incident on Saturday, in a larger story about the mosque burnings, this way: “In the evening, a resident named Imad al-Hashemi said in a telephone interview on Al Jazeera, the Arab news network, that gunmen had doused some people with gasoline and set them on fire. Other residents contacted by telephone denied this.”)

Does that have any bearing on this to you?

I think, it’s really funny how blogosphere
goes into overdrive over any such event, with all the judgments passed before any facts are presented.

And there’s no way you can prove that misinformation presented by MSM (which Malkin &friends sees only as some vast conspiracy) could compare in scale with misinformation presented by the officials.

For me this just borders on demented, the way they are focused on supposed hidden terrorist agenda in anything liberal, while paying almost zero attention to the fact that, for example, Iraqi policy was, in effect, about turning a secular country into Islamist one, dividing Iraqis into Sunnis and Shias, putting terrorists into power and so on. That’s way more important, isn’t it?

Anyway, speaking about MSM, I prefer to read Iraqi blogs. They are usually several months ahead of MSM, which, even with the best intentions, tends to oversimplify matters.

According to you there are people who want to downplay the problems in Iraq. Doesn’t it stand to reason that there are also people who might want to up-play the problems in Iraq.

As somebody who is so sensative to being told “lies,” shouldn’t you be at least a little curious to know if the AP is publishing lies?