Thanks to all who shared their recent flu experiences. At least I know I’m not alone.
One health indicator–I didn’t start even checking emails until late yesterday. As a laptop-iPad-iPhone guy, I’m normally not many minutes out of touch. But this week it just seemed hopeless. I’m still catching up only very slowly, so there may not be much heavy lifting today, either. We’ll see what happens here.
To tell the truth, I missed the Washington Post’s round of coverage of it’s big bash commemorating the 40th anniversary of Watergate, which is really quite stunning.
I saw it reflected in a Wall Street Journal “Marketwatch” column (“Watergate at 40: A legacy of courage/Commentary: ‘Woodstein’ feared for their lives“).
Jon Friedman writes:
I wish today’s crop of young journalists had the commitment, not to mention the courage, of Woodward and Bernstein. It’s possible that Twitter and other electronic innovations have devalued the art of investigative journalism today.
Social media make it so easy for today’s journalists to vent or give opinions instead of getting off their butts and knocking on doors, the way Woodward and Bernstein did it during the Watergate caper.
“The way the world receives information today would be very different,” Bernstein pointed out, as he pondered whether journalists could crack a similar story today.
Likely, Watergate would simply become a feature of the blue states-red states arguments that permeate every political and societal discussion today. Woodward and Bernstein stressed one thing to their fellow journalists: The Internet or social media won’t do the work for you.
“People think they can Google ‘secret fund,’” he smiled.
Bernstein turned serious as he discussed the age-old importance of shoe-leather reporting, of making the extra phone calls and knocking on sources‘ doors.
“There is no substitute for the basic methodology,” he said.
From Andrew Beaujon at Poynter.org:
• There was a substantive discussion of journalism. Woodward and Bernstein talked about their “serious error of attribution,” in an October 25, 1972, story that claimed a grand jury had heard testimony that Nixon chief of staff Bob Haldeman controlled a secret slush fund. The story was true, but the attribution was wrong, and Bradlee stood by them as they corrected it, they said. “We weren’t happy that we’d screwed up,” Woodward said. “But we were happy we didn’t get fired.”
When Rose asked how Watergate might play out today, Bernstein said he thought every word they wrote would be scraped for potential bias. Later, in a discussion of the Internet, Woodward again trotted out his “magic lantern” argument about the Internet, that young people think they could Google “secret fund” and find the answers. The Internet is great for databases and looking up stuff like phone numbers, Bernstein said. But “in terms of going out and getting the information, there’s no substitution,” he said, for shoe-leather reporting.
I’m certainly not gonna argue with these guys on that point, but I suspect they’re still operating with a conception of the Web as search-based rather than as a social tool that quickly lays bare the connections between people. I certainly use that functionality a lot when reporting, and I also appreciate how available many people you’re trying to reach are because they are shackled to their mobile devices.
Be sure to check out: “Watergate at 40: digital footprint of a scandal” on Storify.
And there’s a good MSNBC video, “Watergate Revisited“, well worth watching.
Please dig in. There’s lots of good stuff here, even some older collections like that found at Watergate.info.
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The Internet is great for databases and looking up stuff like phone numbers, Bernstein said.
He forgot Angry Birds.
I am dinosaur. Here me roar.
Did you also miss the carnage at the New Orleans Times-Picayune and the other newspapers owned by Advance. Looks like another round in the (maybe not so) slow demise of the print newspaper.
Since we’re celebrating anniversaries, let’s remember that today is Flag Day — the 235th anniversary of the official adoption of the U.S. flag by the revolutionary Second Continental Congress on April 14, 1777. I’m proud to be an American and to pledge allegiance to the flag, even though some today hold opposite views.
A watershed event, for sure. Dubious it ever will be duplicated
I do not completely know what comprises good or great journalism. If you address that in one of your coming post, I am sure there would be quite a response. Also, what would be prime examples of good and bad journalism right here in Hawaii?
For me, good journalism is about balance and thoroughness. A journalist, like a scholar might get into the field of journalism because they have very definite political beliefs, but their methodological thoroughness and their looking at all the angles elevate their reporting to a level of objectivity. Also, good journalism, like good scholarship, open up the possibility that the journalist might change his or her mind on the subject after pouring over so much data and interviewing so many people. Good journalism is self-critical and potentially self-transformative, I think.
I think that Civil Beat’s Chad Blair is a fine journalist in that respect. He does those comparisons of Hirono and Case, and I find it hard to pin down his own position of who he supports. Reading one such article, I suspected that he was pro-Hirono; but in the comment section, someone wrote that he is “obviously” pro-Case. Blair is very fair minded in that respect. Really, a lot of good, hard work on Blair’s behalf. I appreciate it.
On the other hand, there is Michael Levine. He recently wrote an article with a title to the effect that “Cayetano’s poll ratings slipping”. Cayetano’s poll ratings fell from 60 percent to 55 percent in comparison to the other mayoral candidates, Caldwell with 24 percent and Carlyle with 20 percent. One of the comments noted that Levine failed to mention that Cayetano’s ratings are still greater than those of his two opponents combined.
But for me, the real story that Levine missed is the ascent of Caldwell. Calwell personally owed something like $80,000 from his past mayoral bid, and some critics noted that he had to run again to raise money, even though he had no real platform (e.g., providing soap in public bathrooms). But to stake out a distinct political identity, he has taken an ambivalent position on the rail project, and some people have gravitated to that. So the poll ratings might seem to reflect an ever-changing attitude toward rail: most people opposed, some people ambivalent, fewer people for it. The question now is whether Caldwell really believes that he might now have a chance, or if he is still going through the motions.
No mention of any of this by Levine.