Cenk Uygur: The Media's Accountability Moment

[babylonsister]

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/9413

The Media's Accountability Moment
by Cenk Uygur | Aug 17 2007


The traditional media has already blown it on the lead up to the Iraq War - which they now admit. They recently blew it on covering the so-called war critics who said the surge was making progress (they weren't war critics at all, in fact, one of them (O'Hanlon) wrote about what a great idea the surge was before it even started). And so far they are blowing it on the Iran coverage by unquestioningly repeating administration talking points about the threat from Iran, almost exactly as they did with Iraq.

So far, the lesson is that the media has learned no lesson at all. There was a lot of hand-wringing about Iraq, but apparently, no correction whatsoever. But the media has one important moment coming up where they can begin to fix that. This accountability moment is the coverage of the so-called Petraeus Report.

snip//

Here's one of my favorite parts of the LA Times story:

"And though Petraeus and Crocker will present their recommendations on Capitol Hill, legislation passed by Congress leaves it to the president to decide how to interpret the report's data."

So, after they write the report about how much progress they're making, the administration will then evaluate whether they are making enough progress. That's rich. If anyone takes that seriously, they should immediately stop calling themselves journalists. This whole thing is one huge fraud. If the media goes along with this one, then they have learned nothing.

This is an interesting moment because we will find out if the media are actually trying to be journalists, as they claim over and over, or if they have been reduced to stenographers as some critics claim. They have been put on notice. Dan Froomkin of washingtonpost.com has written about it. Atrios has written about it. Greg Sargent of TPM has written about it. And the largest political blog in the country, Daily Kos has written about it several times.

If the media ignore the indisputable facts in this case, you not only have to question their reporting practices, you have to question their integrity. Are they doing news at all?

We'll find out. Stay tuned.