What is "news?" While I was growing up, I believed that news consisted of facts told by credible journalists like Walter Cronkite. I can't imagine him or Huntley/Brinkley - or even local journalists - airing "he said/she said" inflammatory accusations that hadn't been vetted for accuracy and credibility. In today's world of tabloid journalism, newspapers print, and broadcasters air, practically anything juicy that someone says about someone else who is famous. It doesn't matter if it's true, it doesn't matter who said it. What matters is that it stirs up controversy and excitement. Case in point: the Milwaukee Journal's coverage of former Trek executives' claims about Mary Burke.
On the front page of yesterday's Journal, next to the big headline about Walker's 7-point lead over Mary Burke in a recent poll, was the headline, "Conservative ex-execs say Burke forced out at Trek." Hmm...conservative former executives said something. That's front page news? Is it true? Who are these conservatives? And if you're a journalist, wouldn't you want to look into this a bit more before making it a major Page 1 news item?
The impact of this way of reporting news is that Mary Burke was knocked back on her heels yesterday because of a story that shouldn't have even been reported by major news outlets. How does one recover one week before an election when the largest newspaper in the state, and every other news outlet, heads their news with a claim that your own family fired you?
Later in the article, it does say that Trek Bicycle denied the charge and called them outrageous, as did Mary Burke. At this point, the reporters knew that this was a "he said/she said" story. At this point, there were no real facts to provide to readers, other than who said what about whom. This is what passes as front page news in my local newspaper.
I should add that Wisconsin radio and TV stations were also all over this like vultures on road kill. It may be unfair to single out the Journal, but that is my main source of news, mostly because I miss people like Walter, Chet and David. Anyway...
Perhaps a more accurate headline would have been, "Trek officials dispute claims about Burke, " or even, "Trek execs differ on Burke record." But no, in big letters on the front page it says she was forced out at Trek, her own family's business! What a loser!
Today's big front page headline is, "Burke hits back at firing claim; former Trek employees had 'an ax to grind,' candidate says." Now we've moved on to "she said/he said." Ah, but wait. In small print, on the front page, it is written, "Anti-Obama comments; former Trek exec's Facebook page full of crude posts," p. 6. Great. Now we have some actual journalism being done by Daniel Bice, who consistently is a very good journalist.
The Journal's editors also stepped up and included great, pertinent facts in an editorial on p. 10. The conservative publication that initially reported the Burke story is partially bankrolled by the Milwaukee-based Bradley Foundation, whose top exec is Michael Grebe, who chairs Walker's campaign committee. And one of the former Trek execs, Gary Ellerman, is the one who posted the crude anti-Obama vitriole that is so common among right wing extremists.
Overall, an excellent editorial replete with journalistic facts. But shouldn't the facts be on P. 1 and the hearsay and claims be buried elsewhere in the paper? Shouldn't today's headline have been, "Source of Trek execs' story tied to Walker campaign?"
Congratulations to the Journal for digging deeper into this story and printing the whole story. However, how they approached the story is so typical of today's news operations: print or air the juicy gossip, THEN find out if it's true or not. And does the truth get its own big headline? No - it gets buried on pages 6 and 10.
Daniel Bice, as mentioned above, does great investigative journalism. The Journal has recognized this by giving him his own column. This time, his column should have been the headline story, along with the information in the Journal's editorial. Instead, the whole thing gets flipped backwards: opinions and hearsay on the front page, real facts in columns and editorials inside the paper.
The end result of this whole smear effort is that the Walker campaign got Wisconsin news outlets to do its bidding for them with less than a week left before the election. Walker's campaign played them like a fine violin. Yes, the Journal recovered today, somewhat. But unfortunately, because of their tabloid-like headline yesterday, Mary Burke may not recover.