Saving CNN—and the Profession

Date: April 1, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: Cable News, CNN, Good idea, Hypocrisy, NPR, Political Labels, Politico, Television

All right, it’s a grandiose headline, but what CNN might do could at the very least show a way for journalism.

In “How to Fix CNN” in yesterday’s Politico, the only intelligent, original ideas came from Jay Rosen:

[Rosen’s] alt line-up for CNN prime time looks like this: (Please excuse my jokey titles…)

7 pm: Leave Jon King in prime time and rename his show Politics is Broken. It should be an outside-in show. Make it entirely about bringing into the conversation dominated by Beltway culture and Big Media people who are outsiders to Beltway culture and Big Media and who think the system is broken. No Bill Bennett, no Gloria Borger, no “Democratic strategists,” no Tucker Carlson. Do it in the name of balance. But in this case voices from the sphere of deviance balance the Washington consensus.

8 pm: Thunder on the Right. A news show hosted by an extremely well informed, free-thinking and rational liberal that mostly covers the conservative movement and Republican coalition… and where the majority of the guests (but not all) are right leaning. The television equivalent of the reporting Dave Wiegel does.

9 pm: Left Brained. Flip it. A news show hosted by an extremely well informed, free-thinking and rational conservative that mostly covers liberal thought and the tensions in the Democratic party…. and where the majority of the guests (but not all) are left leaning.

10 pm: Fact Check An accountability show with major crowdsourcing elements to find the dissemblers and cheaters. The week’s most outrageous lies, gimme-a-break distortions and significant misstatements with no requirement whatsoever to make it come out equal between the two parties on any given day, week, month, season, year or era. CNN’s answer to Jon Stewart.

11 pm.: Liberty or death: World’s first news program from a libertarian perspective, with all the unpredictablity [sic] and mix-it-up moxie that libertarians at their best provide. Co-produced with Reason magazine.

All good ideas. But let me suggest a re-organization and a few other ideas.

First, shoot the messengers, i.e., the politicians. OK, not actually shoot them or, God forbid, put them in cross hairs. But minimize them. Healthcare, financial reform, immigration, energy realignment, economic recovery—they all are influenced heavily by what politicians do, but the pols don’t inform the debate. People with expert knowledge do. What do those who study healthcare think will decrease costs? How can those costs be impacted by public policy? How do we approach end-of-life care decisions? The people who can answer those questions don’t go to work at the Capitol. They are academicians, doctors, insurance executives, analysts and everyday people who have faced such issues. Three or four sitting around a table with a journalist who listens—rather than jumps in with his next question—can lead to intelligent debate. Sure, some folks will say that’s what PBS does and they don’t attract more than a couple of dozen viewers. But NPR has its largest audience ever. It’s not what I’m proposing but it’s a beacon of light for intelligent information.

Second, label nothing left or right, liberal or progressive, totalitarian or libertarian. Labels close minds. Once you read “the liberal Center for Budget and Policy Priorities” or “the conservative American Enterprise Institute” readers and listeners have already made a judgment about the idea or viewpoint about to be expressed.

Third, don’t aim to make news; instead engender thought. This, of course, is ridiculous to many journalists. Their job is to report news. Fair enough. But I’m thinking of broadcast programs or long-form print journalism. The economics of the business is such that news organizations may need to change deadline driven news hounds into analysts, not of the politics but of issues. Think what would happen if a Congressman held a press conference and nobody came. It wouldn’t be the end of the world.

Fourth, interrupt talking point messengers. The journalists has no responsibility to let drivel drivel. The goal should not be to be “fair and balanced,” but “objective.” That means telling someone, “That’s not true.” Eventually, you may need to simply banish certain guests. Still, the politicians have a role in my programming, but they don’t own the airtime.

So here are my programs: Bob’s Show, Carol’s Show, Ted’s Show, Alice’s Show. In other words, put the focus on intelligent journalists who can foster insightful conversation. That would include the regular host, perhaps with subject specific reporters joining the conversations. The shows could tackle different topics each day. Hot issues, healthcare for the past year for example, might be a topic each night with each show’s moderator tackling a different aspect of the issue. Think “Charlie Rose.”

And here is where I think Rosen’s ideas fit in:

Begin each show with a fact check segment on the last 24 hours’ most audacious claims or charges (also see last three segments for fodder). The segment should pay particular attention to hypocrisy. Instead of “Fact Check,” call the segment “Truth or Consequences.”

Then the roundtable. Encourage participants to talk to each other. The moderator should interrupt for clarification or challenge, as well as follow a tangent when an answer requires it. Don’t book people who are likely to foment argument for argument’s sake but seek passionate viewpoints.

Then “Thunder on the Right,” with the moderator one-on-one with a conservative politician asking him or her to respond to the arguments just elucidated during the roundtable. Again, the questioner must be willing to say, “Stop the talking points,” or “That’s not true.” It’s OK here to discuss the politics of the issue, of course. Why can’t a good idea get done? How does our political system inhibit tackling big questions?

“Left-Brained” is the mirror image.

And finally, “Off the Wall” or “Out of Nowhere” or “A Third Way” (which is not to be confused with the middle way.) Seek out ideas not enjoying widespread discussion. Let it be a two to five minute presentation in any format that makes sense.

Each of the last three segments are grist for the next day’s “Truth or Consequences.”

“Politics is Broken” is not a recurring program but it is a recurring topic or issue. And by the way, it should have a dose of history, both to put the current political environment in perspective and to clarify what the Founding Fathers founded.

These shows may not fit into an hour-long format. Some topics may need 90 minutes. And CNN, with its broad resources for breaking news, can always preempt the regular line-up to cover such news.

My concern for Rosen’s program ideas is how long will people want to listen, for example, to a program that is solely dedicated to knocking down political myths. That may be too cynical for the most cynical among us.

Journalism was never meant to be fair and balanced between fact and fiction. It’s supposed to uncover truth. As the preamble to the Code of Ethics of the Society of Professional Journalists states:

…[P]ublic enlightenment is the
forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues.

News That Makes My Day

Date: March 31, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: Blogs

Jay Rosen is back. At least his blog PressThink is again active after no posts for almost a year. I’m not sure why. He’s one of the most thoughtful (if slightly long-winded) media commentators out there so I’m thrilled to see him posting again (since late February but I missed his return). His latest is about the challenge—and his solution—for CNN, which is hemorrhaging viewers.

Understatement of the Day

Date: March 31, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: Bad idea, Morphing News, Racism, Right-wing echo chamber, Tea Party

Further assessment – this took longer than I should have spent on it.

Above is the last sentence in a long, detailed explanation with electronic images of why the author (Mediate’s Philip Bump) thinks the now infamous photo of Tea Party founder Dale Robertson is not a fake. Robertson had said he never seen examples of racism at Tea party events. Then this photo of him was circulated.

In today’s media environment, just by spending so much time and energy debunking the myth that it’s a fake reinforces the message that it’s a fake.

A Freelancer’s Ethical Problem

Date: March 31, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: Bad idea, Ethics, Freelancers

A private investigator hired a freelance writer to dig into the background of two FDA officials. The firm, Kroll, was hired by drug maker Amphastar Pharmaceuticals that was frustrated that its generic drug wasn’t getting approval fast enough.

At one point, the investigators hired a freelance reporter to file Freedom of Information Act requests, using her status as a journalist to request Woodcock’s emails, phone records, voicemails, calendar and expense reports, among other documents – without mentioning that she was being paid for her efforts by a private investigative firm.

“I am making this request as a journalist and this information is of timely value,” Melanie Haiken, a San Francisco-based freelance reporter wrote to the FDA. “As a journalist, I am primarily engaged in disseminating information.”

Haiken did not disclose that she was working for the private investigators at the time. In an email explaining its fees, Kroll told Amphastar that the expenses related to the FOIC covered “the cost of the person we are using to make the requests untraceable to you, the client.”

…Haiken, the freelance journalist, confirms that she filed the FOIA on behalf of Kroll. But Haiken said her intent was journalistic, and that she hoped the FOIAs would yield an interesting story. “I’m not really an investigator, I’m a health writer,” she said. “I have a right to get a story tip from somebody, even if it’s somebody at Kroll.”

This is a horrible breach of ethics for a reporter—freelance or not.

NPR Ditches ‘Democrat Party’

Date: March 30, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: NPR

The NPR ombudsman has made it official: the network is no longer to use the improper term “Democrat Party.”

What, you say, even its correspondents use the disparaging name Republicans use for their opponents? Sadly, yes.

[Linda] WERTHEIMER: Now, he announced his decision just before the filing deadline for candidates to enter the race. So does he hurt the Democrat Party with this timing?

~~[Ken] RUDIN~~: Recyclable. I’m just – I just can’t get over what’s going on here. But anyway, Ritter was in trouble with his own party. Basically what happened, when Ken Salazar, the senator, resigned to become the Interior secretary, Ritter named somebody named Michael Bennett to the Senate seat held by Salazar, and half the Democratic Party was unhappy about that.

[Update: I must have been bleary eyed as Rudin’s remarks do not use the term “Democrat party.”

Black Journalists: Wanted! Needed?

Date: March 29, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: "Liberal Media", Newsroom Diversity, Politico, Washington Post

The Washington Post ombudsman Andy Alexander thinks the paper doesn’t have enough minority reporters. He makes a good case. But he buries the lead. In his blog post today, he narrows in on the key problem: Not talk, but story decisions.

Some minority staffers have told me they have considered leaving The Post because they feel that white assignment editors too often won’t embrace their story ideas. They believe the reason often is that the white editors simply don’t buy into the coverage idea because it’s on a topic that isn’t familiar to them or is uncomfortably outside their cultural environment.

Bobbi Bowman, a former Post reporter and editor who now is a diversity consultant to the American Society of News Editors (disclosure: I sit on its board), said it’s a problem in newsrooms. Frustration often builds among minority staffers “because they don’t think anyone listens to them” when they propose story ideas or new areas of coverage. In rejecting these ideas, she said, assigning editors often are saying to themselves: “This hasn’t happened to me, so it isn’t ‘news.’” The remedy, she said, is for editors to think outside their cultural comfort zone and be more willing to “accept other people’s definition of news.”

That becomes easier as newsroom diversity grows and minorities move into supervisory positions where they can shape news coverage. But in the current financial climate, when the Post is still struggling to return to annual profitability, expanding diversity is an extra challenge because staffing levels are being further trimmed.

All the more reason to expand newsroom conversation around the issue. Talk is cheap, but critically important.

Talk isn’t a bad idea. And in this way and at this level, it may not be cheap. But at the end of the chat, it takes a newspaper’s commitment to cover the stories of minorities, which will include stories about depravation, hopelessness and prejudice as well as inspiring ones about overcoming the challenges or the experiences of those who’ve inherited a leg up. In any case, a newspaper making that commitment must come first.

That’s hard to do in today’s news environment, especially if The Post sees itself as the newspaper of political record. You can’t have reporters investing time to find out what’s happening in minorities communities and explaining why it’s important, if you’re assigning “he said, she said” stories and covering or covering tea party rallies.

And what would that change in focus bring? Before anything else, charges of “liberal media!” Are the Post editors ready take the heat, or will they stick to stories of Clarence Thomas clones?

Not only is it safer to be the stenographer of the political elite arguments, it’s cheaper. Plopping a reporter in the White House briefing room or sending one to a Congressional press conference costs less that sending a reporter into a community to enterprise stories, for which even the minority reporter requires time to build trust among communities that don’t necessarily crave news coverage—and return with the best stories.

So before they count face colors in the newsroom, they’ll need to decide whether it will make a difference.

UPDATE: Seems like Politico is catching flak about the predominance of white men at the top.

Measuring Healthcare

Date: March 29, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: Healthcare, Polls

As I reported last week, the level of displeasure over the recently passed healthcare reform legislation is often overstated. The impetus for that post was the CNN/Opinion Research poll of last week.

There’s another CNN/OR poll this week. Here again is a key data point.

"Thinking about the health care bill that Congress passed this week, which of the following statements best describes your view of what Congress should do in the future? Congress should leave the bill as it is. Congress should make additional changes to increase the government’s involvement in the nation’s health care system. Congress should repeal most of the major provisions in that bill and replace them with a completely different set of proposals." Options rotated

Leave as is……………………………….23%

Increase govt. involvement…..27%

Repeal and replace………………..47%

Unsure……………………………………..3%

So 50% like it or want more govt. involvement.

Another question:

"Which of the following statements best describes your views about the health care bill that Congress passed this week? You approve of the bill becoming law and have no reservations about it. You approve of the bill becoming law but you think it did not go far enough. You disapprove of the bill becoming law but you support a few of its proposals. You disapprove of the bill becoming law and oppose all of its proposals."

Approve, no reservations………………….15%

Didn’t go far enough………………………….27%

Disapprove, but support some of it….31%

Oppose all of it……………………………………25%

Unsure………………………………………………….1%

So 74% like at least some of the reform.

Here’s the way the CNN’s polling director interprets the poll.

The 47 percent who favor "repeal and replace" is significantly lower than the 56 percent who say they disapprove of the bill’s passage last week.

"That’s because opposition to the new law comes in many different forms and not all of them benefit the GOP," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Some Americans continue to say that they disapprove of the bill because they want even more government involvement in health care than the bill created. Only a quarter are against the entire bill; one in three support at least a few proposals in the new law. [Emphasis added] And a handful of Americans appear to dislike the bill but don’t want Congress to spend any more time on health care."

When will the press get it?

Cross posted on News Commonsense.

Measuring Healthcare

Date: March 29, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: CNN, Healthcare, Polls

As I reported last week, the level of displeasure over the recently passed healthcare reform legislation is often overstated. The impetus for that post was the CNN/Opinion Research poll of last week.

There’s another CNN/OR poll this week. Here again is a key data point.

"Thinking about the health care bill that Congress passed this week, which of the following statements best describes your view of what Congress should do in the future? Congress should leave the bill as it is. Congress should make additional changes to increase the government’s involvement in the nation’s health care system. Congress should repeal most of the major provisions in that bill and replace them with a completely different set of proposals." Options rotated

Leave as is……………………………….23%

Increase govt. involvement…..27%

Repeal and replace………………..47%

Unsure……………………………………..3%

So 50% like it or want more govt. involvement.

Another question:

"Which of the following statements best describes your views about the health care bill that Congress passed this week? You approve of the bill becoming law and have no reservations about it. You approve of the bill becoming law but you think it did not go far enough. You disapprove of the bill becoming law but you support a few of its proposals. You disapprove of the bill becoming law and oppose all of its proposals."

Approve, no reservations………………….15%

Didn’t go far enough………………………….27%

Disapprove, but support some of it….31%

Oppose all of it……………………………………25%

Unsure………………………………………………….1%

So 74% like at least some of the reform.

Here’s the way the CNN’s polling director interprets the poll.

The 47 percent who favor "repeal and replace" is significantly lower than the 56 percent who say they disapprove of the bill’s passage last week.

"That’s because opposition to the new law comes in many different forms and not all of them benefit the GOP," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Some Americans continue to say that they disapprove of the bill because they want even more government involvement in health care than the bill created. Only a quarter are against the entire bill; one in three support at least a few proposals in the new law. [Emphasis added] And a handful of Americans appear to dislike the bill but don’t want Congress to spend any more time on health care."

When will the press get it?

Cross posted on Commonwealth Commonsense.

The Power of Three

Date: March 29, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: Healthcare, Protests, Right-wing echo chamber, Washington Post

The Washington Post covered a protest over the weekend outside the home of Rep. Steve Driehaus (D-Ohio).

They showed up to decry the freshman congressman’s vote for the overhaul, standing in the chilling rain most of the afternoon Sunday holding signs that read: "Driehaus Voted to Destroy Our Children’s Future" and "Remember in November."

How big a story is this?

Sunday’s gathering, which never included more than three people at a time [Emphasis added], was anchored by Jim Berns, a libertarian who has run for Driehaus’s seat three times and for the state legislature 10 times. He wore a suit and waved at the congressman’s neighbors — a couple of whom greeted him with a middle finger, others with a thumbs-up.

What do you think the likelihood is of The Post covering a three-person protest in favor of healthcare?

Asleep at the Printing Press

Date: March 26, 2010

Author: Bob Griendling

Categories: Healthcare, Washington Post

While The Washington Post—and most other major papers—were writing stories about the to and fro comments, slanders, strategizing and complaining of the politicians considering healthcare, it missed something.

Whenever a newspaper uses the term “little noticed” in a story after a piece of legislation was passed, it’s a tacit admission that it didn’t do a very good job of informing its readers.

A little-noticed provision of the health legislation has rescued federal support for a controversial form of sex education: teaching youths to remain virgins until marriage.

The legislation restores $250 million over five years for states to sponsor programs aimed at preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases by focusing exclusively on encouraging children and adolescents to avoid sex. The funding provides at least a partial reprieve for the approach, which faced losing all federal support under President Obama’s first two budgets.

Not everyone is thrilled.

"To spend a quarter-billion dollars on abstinence-only-until-marriage programs that have already been proven to fail is reckless and irresponsible," said James Wagoner of Advocates for Youth, a Washington group. "When on top of that you add the fact that this puts the health and lives of young people at risk, this becomes outrageous."

During President George W. Bush’s administration, abstinence programs received more than $100 million a year directly in federal funding and about $50 million each year in federal money funneled through the states. But the effort came under mounting criticism when independent evaluations concluded that the approach was ineffective and evidence began to emerge that the long decline in teen pregnancies was reversing.

This should be embarrassing—for The Post.