News-Record.com

I'll agree on a specific point and disagree on a more general point.

I was on the staff when baseball was the talk of the Triad, and you're right -- the toughest questions were side-stepped. Having seen baseball tease various expansion and relocation sites (just look at the extortion they used against the D.C. Council to get a budget-strapped city to shell out the megamillions), I felt all along that the Triad was being used. To this day, I doubt that a baseball team would ever have made the move, no matter what everyone had voted.

In the more general sense -- we do too much conflict in the news today. That's why I've started to tune out the A section of most papers. Whatever national and world news I don't get from work I get from a quick glance of BBC headlines and The Economist, which often takes a broader view that shows where progress is being made and where it isn't.

The other point about civic discussion is this -- are you getting the silent majority of people who fall somewhere between the two extremes?

My town just had an interesting election in which one blog said all sorts of mean and nasty things about one side. Town gossip said all sorts of mean and nasty things about the other. The local media -- which consists of a couple of small weeklies and the very occasional mention in the Post -- ignored all this. I'm not saying the coverage was perfect, but I think it was better in the sense that it paid little attention to the noisy extremists. The stories weren't sensationalized, and the process was better.

"Newspapers are expected to hold the powerful accountable and to give voice to the voiceless."

Really? I thought they were supposed to report the news. Why only hold the powerful accountable? Why only take up the cause of the voiceless? Why not just report the news and if you aren't, at least let your readers know that you are doing some things as advocacy?

You always claim to be only reporting the news in an unbiased fashion, yet what you just wrote contradicts that.

Did you decide somewhere along the way the James Hinson was voiceless, but David Wray was not? Or that the false allegations that Wray was a racist was such an important position held by the unnamed "voiceless" that it required such prominence in your paper as to warrant destruction of Wray's reputation on this issue?

Have you ever said "we got it wrong" on the race angle to Wray story?

If you want to talk about the voiceless (those who aren't heard often)- why not add an apology to the list. We don't hear that often, either and I'm sure it's unpopular in some segments of the newsroom at the N&R.

I liked your last paragraph best. Thinking, talking, reading, writing, and thinking, talking, writing, reading and thinking again should come before action.
We can work it out if we try.

I liked your last paragraph best. Thinking, talking, reading, writing, and thinking, talking, writing, reading and thinking again should come before action.
We can work it out if we try.

Sam, I'm unclear on the connection you make between holding the powerful accountable and bias. Same with giving voice to the voiceless.

James Hinson was under surveillance by his own police force. That has little to do with who has a voice, but all to do with news. David Wray was being criticized by some of his own officers. That, too, was news. And, while I understand that you and others blame the newspaper for Wray's career turn, it is hardly the case.

Beau, you're absolutely right about the people in the middle who see the shades of gray. We do pay too much attention sometimes to the more vocal elements on both sides. Part of that is because it's easy. But most of it is because the rabble-rousers are the ones who are raising questions that demand answers (and they're making the news).

I'm largely in agreement with Sam.
I belive that often the N&R gets it's opinion tangled up with it's news.
Writing a new article is one thing, slanting and biasing it to push an agenda is quite another.
I know you have an "Editorial" page designed to "stick it to the Man" but it seems those sympathies carry over deeply into local news reporting.
I'd prefer to see a sharper delineation between news and editorial comment.

Did we have an article or articles in today's edition that is slanted and biased to push an agenda, jaycee?

Mr. Robinson, I would point to the entire Chief Wray coverage by Lorraine Ahearn and most everything written by Lex Alexander.
Lex's bias about the TRC and his subtle slams at the Bush administration by virtue of his series on veteran's treatment are just two examples.
Today? Nope, haven't seen anything *today.*

I know you've got an issue with our police investigation coverage and with Lex. I was trying to determine how insidious you think the bias is in terms of how deeply and how often it affects our coverage.

Mr. Robinson, I read the online addition and a few blogs. I generally read Lorraine's articles, and I understand that her regular column is more sappy editorial than news.
I think that with many inflammatory local issues you guys are picking sides, especially if it involves race or the schools. It's common to see one side presented as "more correct" than another side, instead of giving equal weight to each position and letting the reader choose his own side. I'm not sure if it's just a general liberal nod to "political correctness" you feel is necessary, or if there's something else going on behind the scenes that causes you to choose. At any rate, I prefer not to be told what or how to think. I feel many other readers also have a brain and would rather read facts and judge for themselves.
I think lots of articles written by your reporters that focus on local issues reflective of national issues show a liberal bias. Global warming, the War, immigration, racial bias, etc.
As I've said before, both you and I could probably write a news article on an event and someone reading both would not realize we were talking about the same event. It's a matter of perspective and "wordsmithing" to make the reader think or feel a certain way. Reporters excel at this, the best ones make the reader "feel" they're right there in the middle of the article. They make their readers care. But sometimes the path they lead the reader down goes to a point of view designed to further an agenda being pushed by the reporter.
A prime example of political agenda disguised as truth is Al Gore's movie, "An Incovenient Truth." Students all over the country are being forced to watch this movie, sometimes many times, regardless that it's one-sided speculation. Unfortunately, many will believe it's the unvarnished truth, and make life and lifestyle choices based on their trust of the info in the movie. It's a classic example of a "reporter" twisting facts to present the viewpoint he wants the reader to believe in, regardless of the truth or opposing facts.

Thanks, jaycee. What I've been looking for and listening to is an example from a recent paper. It is most helpful to me to hear it the same day or even the same week. Some have done this in the past and it helps me "get" the bias you refer to.

Sorry, but I won't take blame for Al Gore's movie. :)

Jaycee and Sam:

What does the average reporter stand to gain by seeking out conflict and bias for its own sake? Or even taking a biased political point of view? If I did that, I’d never get it past the four or five editors who read the copy after I do.

Some stories are one-sided, but bias is far from the intent or the origin. When I was covering Toyota’s interest in Davidson County, for example, I had several interviews with landowners who thought the county might be going behind their backs to survey land and do other tests against their wishes.

Did that make the county look bad? Certainly. But I repeatedly called the county’s chief economic developer for his side of the story and he never returned calls. Would I have given his side of the story if he had called? Certainly.

In addition, I went out of my way to call county commissioners and others a little farther out of the loop to give the county’s point of view. And if I hadn’t, one of those five editors would have sent me back to do so.

That is our typical process. And it becomes more intensive as the stakes rise for a given story. Believe me.

Is it presumptuous of me to wonder whether your criticism might be better informed if you took the time to learn about our procedures and intentions a little more thoroughly?

Mr. Barron, I don't know you. However, I dealt with media reporters for 20 years in a professional capacity. I've given interviews and not recognized what I read in the paper the next morning. I've been taken out of context, misquoted, and had my words used to convey the exact opposite of what I meant.
I've attended news conferences on public safety incidents and my colleagues and I have gone away shaking our heads at the utter ignorance of the reporters. Sometimes I wonder how they find their way back to their office.
I've read news stories about events in which I was involved and seen facts used sparingly to jerk tears from the reader when the subject needed to be shot on the spot, not pitied.
I've had reporters try to pigeonhole me, back me into a corner, and ask questions designed to elicit a response *they* want so they can present the story in the light they desire.
I was once asked to represent my group at work for press releases because I handled press interviews well. I declined, no thanks, because I don't like reporters and didn't want to have to deal with them even more than was already required.
I made my living writing reports that contained facts, not opinions, and learned early on to differentiate between the two. The mark of an accomplished wordsmith reporting news/facts/incidents is to get the facts down in a cogent, concise manner without injecting opinion, speculation, or innuendo. Unfortunately, I look for that same impartiality in news reporting, lately recognizing it as a quirk I have that causes me only gastric discomfort.
I read some of the N&R reporters on a regular basis. I think it's not so much a failure to understand your procedures as it is a familiarity with a reporter's writings over the years that leads me to recognize their subtle biases and opinions in straight news stories.
But, that's just my opinion, and it's worth every penny you paid for it!

John, I don't blame your paper for what happened to David Wray's career. I've never met David Wray. I have no vested interest in his career. I do blame your paper for putting out the false notion that he was motivated by racism and that his actions were based on race and I dare you to deny that your paper did just that.

Haven't we been over this ground before? Our paper reported what some officers were saying at the time. In the original column Lorraine wrote about the tracking device found on Hinson's car, she quoted the attorney for the police officers association as saying that "there's been some very questionable discipline of African American officers." She quoted Wray as dismissing suggestions that black officers were targeted.

Throughout the early coverage, Hinson and others brought up race, and Wray denied it as a motivator. We put both those positions in the paper.

Did we put out the "false notion that he was motivated by racism and that his actions were based on race?" I suppose that by publishing a newspaper with those comments above we did put out that notion. (I still don't know how race factored into his thinking so I can't say it is false with the certainty you seem to be able to.) Of course, ignoring a major part of the comments by Hinson and the lawyer of the police association would have been derelict on our part. We might have been accused of excluding some of the detail.

Jaycee:

You make a good point about the adversarial attitude of some reporters. I've seen that especially in TV reporters, because they have to get the drama down on video.

Some people I've interviewed and written about, however, are determined to argue with a story because they don't like the fact that we put opposing facts in. As JR noted, FedEx thought we were biased when we reported on the protesters; they were mad when we wrote about FedEx.

I call that carefully reporting the facts. Our biggest disadvantage is that we've got to cover a variety of viewpoints, and we become the target in the middle.

I hope this helps to know where we're coming from, and feel free to e-mail me if you want to talk about it more. dbarron@news-record.com

Yes, your paper reported what officers were saying at the time. But your paper is not reporting what Wray's responses have been, nor did your reporters investigate the claims made by some of these officers to see if they had merit.

I don't fault you for reporting what was said, I do fault you for not considering the motivations of the people saying it and ignoring the facts that contradict those assertions. If one was worthy of reporting, so was the other.

Yes, your paper reported what officers were saying at the time. But your paper is not reporting what Wray's responses have been, nor did your reporters investigate the claims made by some of these officers to see if they had merit.

I don't fault you for reporting what was said, I do fault you for not considering the motivations of the people saying it and ignoring the facts that contradict those assertions. If one was worthy of reporting, so was the other.

Sorry about the double post, I needed to get the name corrected. I don't use a pseudonym on any of your sites.