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Old 06-12-2019, 08:25 AM   #24
Pete F.
Canceled
 
Join Date: Jun 2003
Location: vt
Posts: 13,067
There's a reason the media has an issue with opinion pieces and classifying the people who do them as journalists, here is the difference between reporting and opining.

"Anchor Chris Wallace sat down with the Russian president and pressed him about his track record, the statements he made during the news conference with Trump, and why many of his critics often end up dead or near death.

Wallace was unrelenting, asking the questions many U.S. public officials had been clamoring for Trump to ask. It wasn’t easy, it wasn’t pretty, but it was responsible journalism. Most important, Wallace avoided becoming part of the commentary by following the journalistic process.

Conversely, Fox News’ Sean Hannity kicked off his post-Putin news conference interview with Trump by complimenting him: "You were very strong at the end of that press conference," Hannity stated.

While much of the rest of the world reacted in near universal outrage to Trump's performance in Helsinki, Hannity provided an interpretation of what happened through Trump-colored glasses. He didn’t press the president to explain why he sided with Putin on denying Russian interference in the 2016 election, when U.S. intelligence showed otherwise. Rather, Hannity stuck to talking points that supported the president’s agenda.

As the leader of the country’s largest association of broadcast and digital journalists, it is my job to protect and explain the role that responsible journalists play in facilitating the public’s right to know, and how they function as an important balance of power for those who serve on our behalf.

It is also my job to call out opinion media professionals like Sean Hannity. Do not be confused — Hannity is not a journalist. He is an analyst with an opinion. And he has a right to that opinion, but he does not have a right to claim he is reporting on stories that expose problems in our communities, or that he is transparent and unbiased.

Tucker Carlson also distinguished himself Tuesday night as a Trump sycophant with his softball questions and supportive analysis of the president's performance at the Helsinki news conference.

As journalists, our enemy isn’t the president who calls us out. Our enemy is the lack of public understanding about the important role we play.

We, as responsible journalists, must double down on transparency, inviting the public into our process of asking the hard questions and reporting the truth. We must also hold ourselves publicly accountable for any mistakes we may make, as any human being should.

To paraphrase Washington Post Editor Marty Baron: We're not at war ... we're at work."
Dan Shelley is the executive director of the Radio Television Digital News Association.

Frasier: Niles, I’ve just had the most marvelous idea for a website! People will post their opinions, cheeky bon mots, and insights, and others will reply in kind!

Niles: You have met “people”, haven’t you?

Lets Go Darwin
Pete F. is offline