Journalists for Hire
Posted: Sun Feb 20, 2005 12:49 am
There was some justified concern here that a liberal journalist had helped formulate a question for Rummy about having to protect Hummers with scrap. What do people make of this mess?
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington ... ouse_x.htm
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/ ... index.html
http://www.showmenews.com/2005/Jan/20050129News009.asp
http://www.365gay.com/newscon05/02/021005whReporter.htm
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/01/27/mcmanus/
An example from the Washington Post:
In 2002, syndicated columnist Maggie Gallagher repeatedly defended President Bush's push for a $300 million initiative encouraging marriage as a way of strengthening families. ... But Gallagher failed to mention that she had a $21,500 contract with the Department of Health and Human Services to help promote the president's proposal. Her work under the contract, which ran from January through October 2002, included drafting a magazine article for the HHS official overseeing the initiative, writing brochures for the program and conducting a briefing for department officials.
"Did I violate journalistic ethics by not disclosing it?" Gallagher said yesterday. "I don't know. You tell me."
Yes!
Perhaps the most interesting one is Gannon/Guckert. Here's a gay prostitute who managed to become a favorite in the White House press room without journalist credentials, delivering softball questions on cue while using an alias. Letters back to Salon on their reporting raised the interesting point that perhaps the administration's "moral" issues with, I dunno, gay prostitutes become less important if that prostitute is providing a useful service.
How would people regulate the use of your tax dollars to promote policies through hired journalists? Or would you?
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington ... ouse_x.htm
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/ ... index.html
http://www.showmenews.com/2005/Jan/20050129News009.asp
http://www.365gay.com/newscon05/02/021005whReporter.htm
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/01/27/mcmanus/
An example from the Washington Post:
In 2002, syndicated columnist Maggie Gallagher repeatedly defended President Bush's push for a $300 million initiative encouraging marriage as a way of strengthening families. ... But Gallagher failed to mention that she had a $21,500 contract with the Department of Health and Human Services to help promote the president's proposal. Her work under the contract, which ran from January through October 2002, included drafting a magazine article for the HHS official overseeing the initiative, writing brochures for the program and conducting a briefing for department officials.
"Did I violate journalistic ethics by not disclosing it?" Gallagher said yesterday. "I don't know. You tell me."
Yes!
Perhaps the most interesting one is Gannon/Guckert. Here's a gay prostitute who managed to become a favorite in the White House press room without journalist credentials, delivering softball questions on cue while using an alias. Letters back to Salon on their reporting raised the interesting point that perhaps the administration's "moral" issues with, I dunno, gay prostitutes become less important if that prostitute is providing a useful service.
How would people regulate the use of your tax dollars to promote policies through hired journalists? Or would you?
It shouldn't be that way ideally and most people feel like the media/journalism outlets are biased one way or the other... in many instances the bias is extremely blatant. 
