Bacon's Rebellion

Democracy Thrives in Sunlight

Good News, Bad Reporting

—

by

James A. Bacon
in ,

I’m heading off to Wyoming next week, and I won’t be able to publish the next edition of the Bacon’s Rebellion e-zine until a week after I return. But Ed Risse has a time-sensitive column he’d like to put into the public domain before it gets too stale.

Good News, Bad Reporting

As the economy weakens, you can count on the MainStream Media to defend MassOverconsumption and Business As Usual in a desperate bid to keep the advertising dollars flowing.

In this column, EMR picks through a stack of year-end articles from the Washington Post and other MSM publications on the economy, and interprets them through the prisms of the Mobility and Access Crisis, the Affordable and Accessible Housing Crisis and the Helter Skelter Crisis. EMR argues that the rash of gloomy headlines confirms his thesis that the Business-As-Usual economy is not just environmentally unsustainable but fiscally and socially unsustainable.

EMR also argues that WaPo and the rest of the MainStream Media fail to see the forest for the trees, unable or unwilling to elucidate the common threads that bind these seemingly divers developments. He attributes this institutional blindness to the transformation of newspapers and other news outlets from members of the “Fourth estate” to commercially driven enterprises with a stake in maintaining Business As Usual.

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  1. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    “He attributes this institutional blindness to the transformation of newspapers and other news outlets from members of the “Fourth estate” to commercially driven enterprises with a stake in maintaining Business As Usual.”

    There is also a free-market force at work here and it’s called competition. Media Consolidation, Blogs, news feeds, infotainment (entertainment presented in a news format), etc., have all taken away readership from traditional print media.

    As a result, news and media outlets have been forced to pick sides (liberal/conservative) and then preach to the choir in order to maintain viewers and readers. There are very few “neutral” news outlets left anymore. Most skew either right or left.

    Also, print media has been slow to adapt to the digital revolution and it has cost them money. In order to compensate for the loss they have adopted a “hands off” approach towards their big advertisers so you get very poor coverage of stories that involve the oil industry, the energy industry, the drug companies, big government contractors, the healthcare industry, and the development/construction industry.

    Stay tuned.

    RBV

  2. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    ignorance is the day of the Internet tends towards the willful.

    anyone that knows cursorily how to use search engines, GOOGLE (and Google News) and RSS can easily firehoused with information 24/7 depending on one’s lifestyle and inclination.

    Yes.. one needs to use due diligence to not accept as fact anything (must less the first thing) they find but it’s not that hard to use multiple sources to verify ….much.

    so .. we apparently have this thought that there IS (and always was) a dispassionate, totally non-partisan reporting institution whose job was/is to distill information down to the essence of truth so that the majority of the population can know how to formulate their opinions without spending much time on their own in pursuing information.

    I’m not and never was an instant believer of anything currently or even written much less printed or broadcast.

    the short answer seems to be that it’s the MSM fault that folks are not educated on the issues.

    the truth: is a bit more prosaic – many think that they are already bombarded with too much information but more than that – they really only want to hear the info that keeps them comfortable in their own world view.

    Information that runs counter to many people’s beliefs – rather than being an impetus to find out more and better understand – is instead, troubling and upsetting to them.

    I think blaming the MSM is sorta like hating your parents for telling you there is no Santa – and some of us never ever get over it…

    🙂

  3. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    There’s nothing wrong with reporting something with a point of view, provided the facts are right and the analysis holds water. Many Journalism 101 teachers peddle a phony “balanced” reporting that creates an artificial “two sides” when there may be 15 sides or 32 sides.

    Plus, there is a lot more information available out there than when I started full time in journalism in 1974 back in the days of Watergate and the Pentagon Papers. People did seem a lot more engaged then and aware of what was going on in their country and abroad. That seems to be the big difference.

    I agree that conjuring up demons such as the “Main Streeam Media” (what are they, exactly?) is like Larry Gross says, blaming your parents for everything.

    Media has historically always been for profit but this does not always mean that advertisers dictate content, unless the management lets them. Of all the companies I have worked for, only one has actively let that happen and I had better not mentiuon it because it is in this state and I’ll get sued.

    My chief problems with EMR’s media analysis are that he is far too simplistic in understandinmg the relationship between for-profit and advertisers and that he wants to fit all viewpoints within his land use framework, which is only one of many frameworks that one could use to structure his or her analysis. What’s more, he expects you to go through his tedious “GLOSSARY.” After 34 years in the biz, why would someone like me need to do that? EMR’s points are interesting, but far too limiting.

    Peter Galuszka

  4. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    “What’s more, he expects you to go through his tedious “GLOSSARY.” After 34 years in the biz, why would someone like me need to do that? EMR’s points are interesting, but far too limiting.”

    warning: second barrel .. being loaded, cocked and fired…

    A BLOG is almost the perfect place to expand on, flesh out, further explain, new/different concepts via simple cut/pastes with link references to where they came from…

    .. as opposed to what I call “hand waving” and treating the inquiry as if it came from an impertinent inferior….

    … if one wants wider acceptance of a concept, one must exhibit
    patience and tolerance to engage the issue… rather than be dismissive of scrutiny and skepticism.

    Engagement ultimately gains adherents and supporters and who eventually will spread the word throughout the ether and to EVEN the despicable MSM who more often then not don’t know what the hell the printing half the time anyhow (IMHO).. but if it is “news”, it gets printed.

    To this point, I have yet to see or hear anyone get up at a rezoning proposals and offer comments about how to have it become a better, more “balanced” community.

    I’ve heard developers get up and promote their vision of “smart growth” and I’ve heard citizens get up and slam the proposals but almost never have I heard citizens get up and offer suggestions on how to improve the concept and move it towards a smarter vision.

    I’ve worked with other citizens on COMP Plans and participated in Community “visioning” but I don’t recall ever hearing anyone speak to balanced communities nor NURs.. though I often hear the phrase “New Urban Principles” and to be honest.. more often.. “Smart Growth” mixed-use proposals for Greenfield parcels – 50 miles from where the residents of – will commute to… and not a soul .. pointing out that dense development occupied by 50-mile daily commuters may not, in fact, be “smart” growth or transportation.

    so I get pretty frustrated with the gap between idea/concept and implementation…

    the same way I would sometimes get frustrated with a book or a professor who would depart with the final words of “I leave the rest up to the reader to figure out”.. with the whole darn class – clueless and engaging in group head-scratching..

    🙂

    so methinks blaming the MSM for this.. is a bit of a stretch… perhaps even a … bail….out

    The MSM is what it is.

    It’s .. thank GOD .. a totally free medium in the wild… each opinionated and with it’s own agenda, but far, far better than the “controlled” media in other parts of the world….

    bottom line: if the world is not working the way it should – it’s not the MSM fault; they are, at best – the world viewed through astigmatic lenses…in the first place…

    In the Internet age – it’s hard to conceive of a good idea dying on the vine.. but perhaps so..

  5. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Interesting observations and they all have one thing in common:

    They are based on what you thought EMR says in this draft column, not what he does say.

    RBV said:

    “There is also a free-market force at work here and it’s called competition.”

    Is the perfect example.

  6. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Larry,
    Thanks for warning me about the second barrel of the shotgun.
    However, I do want to point out that some of us do have some experience in the areas discussed ont his blog and we do not need to have that experience, or our own intelligence, insulted.
    In my 34 years in journalism, I have stayed up all night at local planning meetings, have helped cops move dead bodies, have been in war zones, have been the bete noire of politicians for my reporting of projects they favored. I have been shot at, sued and beaten. I have known the publisher of the New York Times since he was a 19-year-old college student who wore an Afro. I have had exclusive interviews in the Kremlin and once cost The Virginian-Pilot a week’s worth of multi-page advertising because I misidentified the strip mall where a woman was horribly beaten by a drugged out convict. I count among my friends journalists from every continent and have known a few who have been killed on the job.

    So, why do I need a GLOSSARY to understand all of this?

    Peter Galuszka

  7. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    re: need a glossary

    if you thought I was suggesting that you needed one.. you definitely misunderstood.

    🙂

    my view is that if a glossary is needed and the guy who wrote the glossary is around.. then I’d rather have a conversation with the horse’s mouth rather than converse with the other end…

    🙂

  8. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    I guess one out of four commentors who have actually read what they are commenting on is not a bad average for blogging.

    RBV’s comment is a classic since THE ESTATES MATRIX and “Good News” re the media is about “competition.”

    Larry G:

    If I have told you once, I have told you a dozen times. I do not have the time, nor the interest in repeating what I have written elsewhere.

    When we started designing communities with high capacity telecommunications to move work to people instead of high capacity roads to move people to work in 1969 no one was standing up at public hearings …

    When we started designing places with more intelligent patterns and densities of land use in 1973 no one was talking about smart growth …

    You may enjoy our discussion of horse manure in PART IV of THE PROBLEM WITH CARS…

    Peter G:

    “My chief problems with EMR’s media analysis are that he is far too simplistic in understandinmg the relationship between for-profit and advertisers…”

    Did you really read THE ESTATES MATRIX from start to finish and then read “Good News” including the two Appendix and can you still say that with a straight face?

    “… and that he wants to fit all viewpoints within his land use framework, which is only one of many frameworks that one could use to structure his or her analysis.”

    If you want to challenge this you need to read with care “The Shape of the Future” and point out why human settlement pattern is not, as we document, the primary factor contorling the economic, social and physical future of society. There are lots of other “perspectives” but none has as much control as human settlement patterns as we define them.

    The longer citizens ignor this, the more control it has.

    “What’s more, he expects you to go through his tedious “GLOSSARY.” After 34 years in the biz, why would someone like me need to do that?”

    So far no one has proven that a consistant Vocabulary is an unneeded luxury if one is to understand human settlement patterns.

    EMR

  9. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Larrry,
    No apologies needed, I did understand but wanted to make a point and not necessarily to you.
    EMR,
    As a favor to you — and only you — I am going to do a remedial read of what you suggest.

    Peter Galuszka

  10. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    “…they really only want to hear the info that keeps them comfortable in their own world view.”

    “My mind is made up, don’t confuse me with facts.” – Curly.

  11. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    “To this point, I have yet to see or hear anyone get up at a rezoning proposals and offer comments about how to have it become a better, more “balanced” community.

    I’ve heard developers get up and promote their vision of “smart growth” and I’ve heard citizens get up and slam the proposals but almost never have I heard citizens get up and offer suggestions on how to improve the concept and move it towards a smarter vision.”

    I tried this once. It was pretty amuzing.

    After listening for 30 miniutes to the usual stream of residents explaining why their road was too narrow, danagerous, busy, and used by too many horses to accomodate traffic to an existing large home proposed to be converted to a bed and breakfast.

    Finally, I took the microphone and said that based on the comments I had heard, whether the bed and breakfast was approved or not, the road needed to be improved regardless.

    At first, this drew a big laugh from the audience. As soon as they understood, the next thirty minutes was taken up with comments as to why the road should NOT be improved.

    RH

  12. Larry Gross Avatar
    Larry Gross

    thanks, Peter.

    I try to hit on ideas.. not people with the exception of my friend RH.. which I tend to tweak personally .. bad habit..

    re: folks complaining about the lack of adequate infrastructure…

    RH.. you misunderstand methinks..

    folks do NOT want wider/better roads where they live if the result is to be able to justify more development that has even more adverse impacts on the existing quality of life.

    They want “growth” of quality of life – better services, better facilities for their tax money – not more roads and water/sewer for even more growth that results in even LESS quality of life.

    If more growth produced more and better services and facilities then folks would favor it.

    But most growth does not benefit existing residents and taxpayers – it actually requires them to sacrifice something they value and do not want to give up.

    Is it hypocritical to move into an area that you really like and then to turn around and try to keep others out?

    Absolutely.

    Will you prevail in policies that force more development in areas where a majority of folks are opposed?

    No.

    Can an area “grow” in both population and services and facilities?

    Yes.

    but it does require the developer and the planners to recognize that proposals need to do that.. and not use deceptive PR to claim something that most folks don’t believe.

    For instance, the bed and breakfast could have offered free or reduce nights for quests of the adjacent landowners…

    or offered it’s facilities for community gatherings..

    or.. any number of creative offerings that allowed folks to consider if, on balance, the B&B would be a worthy (valued) addition to the community.

    This is not blather. I’ve seen it work.

    I’ve seen major commercial get approval when they agreed to substantial upgrades to the infrastructure to be paid for by a CDA – which in the end is STILL paid back by the citizens who the costs are passed on to.

    The difference is – they get something back… instead of being told that it is the “right” of someone else to impose something on them..

    it’s all in how you hold your mouth sometimes…

    if you want into the room with a “I have a right” chip on your shoulder..you’re gonna be sent packing …sometimes..

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