Jumping the Gun and Rank Yellow Journalism

[talon]

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/07/22/politics/main6704381.shtml?tag=stack

"Mr. Obama told ABC News in an interview that Vilsack acted in part because the current media climate requires everyone to "scramble" when something goes up on YouTube or a blog."

Wrong.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

When something goes up on YouTube or a blog, the first political reaction should not be to immediately jump on the bandwagon and bash the subject of the video or post. The first reaction should be, "Let's investigate." If a media response is required, the response should be, "We are aware of the [video/post] and are conducting an investigation into the matter. We will get back to you once we know the truth."

And then follow up - investigate the matter, discover the truth, and then issue a statement that won't have to be retracted, that doesn't destroy an innocent person's career and possibly their life, and that builds trust.

The media, of course, is responsible for this fiasco because they didn't bother to investigate before attacking the subject of the YouTube video. The media immediately went, "Juicy!" and didn't care if it was true or not before they spread it around and called for immediate action.

Now, the media once again has egg all over their face, in their hair, and blocking their eyes and ears, because they just cannot see that what they did was wrong. They are hemming and hawing and saying "We were just reporting what we saw" and completely ignoring the fact that what they actually were doing was spreading unfounded rumors - indulging in the worst of high school gossip shark feeding frenzies.

Reporters, at least the ones who wish to be trusted, have a responsibility to report not just a fragment of what they see or hear, but to delve until they have the complete story. That's what they report on. Reporters who consistently jump the gun and give rumors and twisted facts have to then retract what they reported, and their readers and followers lose trust in them. We do not need to know half-assed rumors and theories - that's what the National Enquirer used to be for - over-inflating half-heard, eaves-dropped tidbits into some sensationalist headline that fails to deliver in the body of the column . We don't need our "respectable" media employing the same trite, simplistic tactics. We can wait for the facts to come out, and the facts make for a much more satisfying story.

The politicians didn't get their positions through education, knowledge, and experience; they got it by winning a popularity contest. And when they show just how ill-equipped they are, if they can't keep convincing people they deserve their position through charisma, lies, and good looks, the voters will oust them. Sadly, too many voters vote based on looks and charm and rumors, not solid backgrounds.

I'm not too surprised the politicians jumped the gun and went blaming the subject. They are too invested in being in the public eye - good or bad - to care about trivial things like facts, or the lives and careers of anyone other than themselves.

I am rather appalled that her co-workers were as eager to vilify her as strangers were based on rumors, innuendoes, and lies. Did her co-workers not trust her? Did they not bother to look at her lengthy career with them and see that what was being portrayed on YouTube was twisted out of context and not the truth? Could they not trust her years of actions over a brief, less than 5 minutes YouTube uploaded by some stranger with an agenda?

Much as I despise politicians and the media for their willingness to cut any throat they can if it gets them attention, I absolutely loathe her supervisors and co-workers who attacked and vilified her based on a brief YouTube video instead of their years of affiliation with her.

Those supervisors should have stood up and said, "This video was taken out of context and is not the full speech she gives. Here is her full speech. See it and know what a good employee she is."

A career based on twisting truths and attacking hard-working honest men and women is a sham career, hollow and worth less than an overripe zucchini.

Journalists like Breitbart are precisely what's wrong with our American media. He is a yellow journalist of the vilest sort. He has the resources and ability to research the truth, yet he doesn't. He doesn't care that he causes far more harm than good, that the information he spreads is questionable, so long as he gets his moment in the public eye. This is not the action of a great, or even a merely good, journalist.