Editor’s note: Michael Ackley’s columns may include satire and parody based on current events, and thus mix fact with fiction. He assumes informed readers will be able to tell which is which.
The old riddle goes, “How can you tell when a politician is lying?”
The answer is simple: “His lips are moving.”
There is a corollary to this with a more subtle, although simple, response. The second riddle is, “How can you tell when the news media are stacking the deck?”
The answer: “Pay attention to the words.”
Every would-be newshound is taught – or should be taught – how to avoid loaded words that might prejudice the reader. Lamentably, it is a lesson that many forget or disregard as soon as they receive that first byline.
We also must face the fact that journalism, while perhaps one of the most self-congratulatory of professions, is peopled by practitioners who display the same range of abilities that characterize folks in any line of work. Some are excellent, some are very, very bad, and in the middle is an abundance of mediocrity.
One would like to think the old bell curve is shifted to the high side for journalists, but publishers – who likely reap greater profits than any other industry – assure this is not the case by paying so poorly that many bright students, who otherwise might consider reporting careers, opt for better salaries in less entertaining endeavors. (See Lord Byron’s revision of John 18:40: “Now Barabbas was a publisher.”)
Anyway, let us look at some examples of word choice in post-hurricane reporting last week: A CBS radio report said President Bush “conceded” that relief efforts had not gone well and “admitted” more help was needed.
Now, the reporter should have used the less colorful “said” for the quoted words. For the former implies Bush had taken the opposite view and the latter implies a confession of error. Neither was accurate.
The most charitable conclusion to be drawn from such word choice would be that the writer, instead of recalling what was taught (or should have been taught) in his elementary journalism course, instead remembered that his seventh-grade English teacher told him using a variety of attributive words leant color to his work.
Another example is to be found in references to the president of the United States. Throughout his tenure, Bill Clinton was uniformly referred to as “President Clinton” by radio and TV network broadcasters. This is a courtesy seldom accorded the current resident of the White House, who regularly is called “Mr. Bush.”
This example also shows how easy it is to slant journalistic writing. Yours truly can attest to this ease, for I must (choose one – confess, admit, concede) that in my youth I succumbed to the temptation to incline my reporting toward my own views. Of course, with more maturity, I repented, but I doubt I attained perfection.
The point is, reporters should attempt perfection. Too many don’t even make the attempt.
Our top award for Smarmy Exploitation of Tragedy goes to California Democrats, who last week said the $50 million for November’s special, government-reform election would be better spent for Hurricane Katrina relief.
Of course, in their view, it would be better to spend the money on research into the relative merits of Gouda and Edam cheese than to clean up Sacramento.
We reiterate: If we really want to move toward energy independence, we need to free up offshore oil drilling on the West Coast.
Our comments on the surfeit of return address labels from various charities brings this response from Kenny Stultz, who wants to add promotional calendars to the Do-Not-Send List.
He writes, “I have received about a dozen, truly beautiful (no naked moles – yet) full-color calendars – with a request for money (usually $20 minimum). I usually get free calendars from my local funeral home. But unlike the labels, I can only use one or two calendars … Perhaps I can use the (return address) labels to stick up the pictures …”
Joan E. Battey has a pro-active approach. She lectures charity phone solicitors, mails comments to organization VIPs (“not to the box numbers on the envelopes”) and refuses to send money to her political party. She says, “I tell them, ‘no money until you do more than hire people to slit envelopes and remove the checks and discard all the input.'”
Another activist – who had best be unnamed – says, “A friend of mine loads his own ammo, so I got him make me some lead sheets about 3/8-inch thick. Then I open a letter from Company A … put in … a sheet of lead, then mail it. Since these are prepaid, they have to pay the postage of around a quarter pound … I know that it is mean, but I enjoy it a lot more than I enjoy getting their unwanted mail.”
Mean, indeed, but a weighty protest.
