(THE HILL) -- Doing journalism is difficult work. News organizations make countless decisions each day that affect the nation’s news agenda and subsequent civic discussions. Today’s technology-driven world means those decisions are made quickly. Every second provides a new deadline. Having acknowledged the challenge, however, doing solid journalism shouldn’t be impossible. That is what it seems like these days, as the news industry continues to stumble with self-inflicted mistakes and colossal errors in judgement.
News media blunders over the last several weeks dishearten even the most ardent defenders of journalism. The damage done at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner will take years to undo. The vulgar display by a so-called comedian was only part of what ails this overblown tribute to journalists’ self-importance. That our nation’s top journalists and news executives want to hob-nob with the powerful politicians, corporate fat cats and entertainers that should be the subjects of news coverage is the real mistake. This event demonstrates that the news industry is firmly entrenched in the elite establishment, living in an alternative universe disconnected from real people.