And to think I wanted to be just like them.
I wanted to be like Carl Bernstein and Bob Wooodward; I wanted to be like Max Robinson and David Brinkley. Instead, all I've seen the past few months (years) are pretenders and fake prompt readers who couldn't investigate a story if it bit them in the behind. I used to think I was something if I read the New York Times on a daily basis or check out Time and Newsweek; I used to think watching PBS made me smarter if I caught the McLaughlin Group every so often to shore up my knowledge.
These days I keep waiting for the punchline and realize I don't have cable or satellite anymore and the folks posing as news reporters are actually news reporters and not John Stewart or Stephen Colbert. So I am silently making my own private MSM protest by reading the blogs and checking out credible outlets overseas and independent journalistic sites.
Sounds silly huh?
I mean what does my protest mean in light of ill-timed covers of Barack and Michelle Obama looking like they turned the White House into the set of "Good Times"? What does it mean when at some point I'm going to have to break down and watch a segment of NBC or CBS cause there's a breaking story going on? I won't even watch ABC News anymore after the rake job they did on Obama during the primary debates. So does putting myself on a strict diet of international news outlets and independent journalist the way to go?
Reading hit job after hit job from the MSM on all the blogs I read (AmericaBlog, Crooks and Liars, Democratic Underground, The Huffington Post, and Kos) it makes me want to just turn the news off and just say forget it. If this is what they want to call "news" they better take a good hard look at themselves cause I'm not taking in that pablum they call "news".
And don't get me started about newspapers.
I LOVE newspapers!
The feel of the paper, the freedom to browse from page to page, the stories unique to each area and each populace, all of it was what I lived for. I even studied to work in the newspaper business till I figured out that the industry is on the verge of extinction. More corporate control, more automation, less community input, and more information posted on the internet is killing the industry. The other thing going is the quality of the story. With all the cuts made in some of the major news outlets we are seeing some of our best talent whittled away before our eyes.
Funny thing, I understand the technology changing and the newspaper business having to make tough choices. It is the natural evolution of business and technology adapting to the human experience. What is troubling to me is how things like objectivity and the use of valid source are going out the window.
I guess my lack of faith in the MSM ended when few reporters actually reported the flaws in the Bush administration prior to the beginning days of the Iraq War. The "fourth estate" failed the nation and now the cost will be devastating. If not for the Amy Goodman's, Bill Myers, and Jim Hightowers of the world I would totally just live in a shelter and let the world destroy itself. But thankfully a few are out there not playing into either political parties hand but are calling what is wrong wrong.
I guess this diary is a question to any out in Kos land. Are you reading less of the MSM or more? If you are avoiding the MSM what ARE you reading to keep informed? Are newspapers--local and national-on their way of the dinosaur or is there hope credible reporting and support can once again save this aging giant?
No answers here, just huge disappointment in the one occupation I felt highly about just a few years ago.
Sad.