"Kerry should apologize" : Thinking Out Loud : Blogs : News-Record.com : Greensboro, North Carolina

Lex said:

And by all means, let's dwell on the fact that John Kerry, who isn't on anyone's ballot this year, is a lousy stand-up comic, rather than dwelling on Iraq, the economy, the environment, Social Security, torture, illegal wiretapping, congressional corruption, contractor corruption, abandoning a U.S. soldier in Baghdad to the tender mercies of kidnappers just to make our Iraqi client leader happy, or any of dozens of other topics that, you know, matter.

You want to know why we're losing readers? Cuz we're not keeping our eyes on the ball.

Posted on November 1, 2006 10:53 PM

Sue said:

New media: listen/watch. Then decide if "Kerry should apologize."

Posted on November 2, 2006 7:24 AM

Mick said:

I too believe Sen Kerry misspoke and flubbed an attempt at a joke. Is this all overblown?Entirely. But... tis' the season. Lets not forget Dems jumped ship just as quickly as the Reps boarded. Please do not pretend it was just the vile GOP which "misunderstood". He screwed up. Then screwed up again by getting his back up and refusing to apologize. Also, he took the easy way out by issuing a press release. Looks cheesy to me. Like many in his position (R & D) he is a pompous @$$ and it really showed through this time.

And you will just have to pardon me for not getting my news from Mr O. I just dont. He should have retired with "en fuego".

Posted on November 2, 2006 8:51 AM

Jon said:

Well, looks like Hillary has one less competitor to be concerned about for her quest of the Democratic Presidential nomination in 2008.

Posted on November 2, 2006 9:15 AM

jaycee said:

Lex wrote:
"You want to know why we're losing readers? Cuz we're not keeping our eyes on the ball."

Really? And how is your obsession with destroying the Bush administration through rants and raves on your blogs and thinly veiled attacks in your "news" articles accomplishing this?
I noticed, once again, that your N&R blog has the LEAST comments of any. Lex, you're not relevant.
What'll keep your readers coming back is news stories on local topics they're interested in, not you trying to cram your liberal political agenda down their throats every time they open the newspaper. Heck, they can watch CNN if they want to be treated that way.

Posted on November 2, 2006 9:48 AM

jaycee said:

Kerry's apology just barely qualifies. Barely.
He doesn't have enough respect for our troops or citizens, or his constituents, to do it personally. He had an aide write an apology for print.
He will not face our troops and apologize.
He will not face our citizens and apologize.
He will not face his fellow Senators and apologize.
His so-called apology will not reach 1% of the people around the world who've seen and heard his disparaging comments.
His conduct in this disgusting and despicable slandering of those who fight and die for our country make most of us grateful Kerry is not our President.

Posted on November 2, 2006 10:09 AM

Stormy said:

Sue,

The answer to your question is "Yes". You can twist yourself into pretzels trying to say what Kerry meant to say, but the bottomline is he said what he said. Note the video, he referred to his notes just before he said "you'll be stuck in Iraq". There was no mistake. And, that tortured "apology" was a joke. It was not an apology, but the old classic that says you are sorry because your words were misrepresented. In other words, I am sorry that you twisted my words, not that I am sorry that I said them. It's someone else's fault.

And, frankly, the site and people that you referenced don't qualify as independent sources. Olbermann is one of the greatest hit artists going right now, along with Chris Matthews. MSNBC and CNN are doing their best to undermine the Bush Administration. If you like that, then that is fine, but not everyone considers them to be an unbiased authority on the subject.

Posted on November 2, 2006 10:35 AM

Stormy said:

jaycee,

I agree. Lex has no clue why they are losing readership. "Not keeping your eye of the ball"? Nah, it's because he has a biased view of things that he and others keep pumping out. Sure, there are a few who buy it, but there are many others, who don't.

Posted on November 2, 2006 10:38 AM

just saying said:

The notion of Lex writing political news stories came up on Doug Clark's blog a while back.

While he certainly has the right to his opinions, I question why the N&R would put someone with such an obvious and public axe to grind in a position of reporting news. Like I said then, you can either be a political advocate or you can be an objective journalist - you can't be both.

And, no, this isn't a "Shoot the messenger" argument. Other journalists manage to report news without commentary and opinion. Why not shift Lex over to the Editorial Dept., where he can voice his opinions as much as he likes without undermining the credibility of the news pages?

Posted on November 2, 2006 11:14 AM

brian444 said:

The N&R has a magic line separating the editorial and news departments. Once a writer passes over the line to the news department, his or her opinions cease to influence his or her selection and execution of news stories. For this reason, complaints of liberal bias are wrong. The magic line does not, however, erase skin color, and so it is necessary to institute a quota hiring system so that persons of color can write the "black news." John Robinson has explained all of this on his blog.

Posted on November 2, 2006 11:36 AM

Lex said:

hey, "just saying," if you think I'm so biased, by all means point to examples of bias in my printed work.

Go on. I'll wait.

Posted on November 2, 2006 12:25 PM

Lex said:

While we're waiting for "just saying" to come back from that snipe hunt, let's address the notion that suggesting that we worry more about big issues than about a minor gaffe by a guy who's not on any ballot this year somehow constitutes bias of any sort, rather than a discussion of journalism.

Someone want to explain to me how that works, exactly?

Posted on November 2, 2006 12:49 PM

just saying said:

The problem isn't bias - it's the appearance of bias.

A small difference, but an important one. I don't doubt that Lex tries to be objective when reporting, but knowing his outspoken beliefs, it's hard not to read anything he writes without wondering "What's his agenda this time?"

I would have no problem if Lex expressed these opinions and wrote, say, sports stories or feature stories. But when he writes about politics, how can you not suspect the story will be slanted? Isn't that a reasonable question to ask?

For example, say you read a story by Joe Smith in the Smallville Tribune. Then Rush Limbaugh or Al Franken tells the exact same story on the radio. The facts are the same, but wouldn't you view the two stories differently?

The appearance of objectivity matters and quite frankly Lex, no one thinks you are objective, even if you really are. That's all I'm saying.

Posted on November 2, 2006 12:55 PM

Lex said:

No one's objective, js. I've long been on record as saying that true objectivity is rarer than true love. I'm not. You're not.

But that's OK, because objectivity of *outlook* is irrelevant to journalism. Journalism relies on a different kind of objectivity, which rhetorician Andrew Cline explains here.

There's also objectivity of method, explained, with exercises, here.

Finally, yeah, appearances matter, but in the age of blogs and Web 2.0, they matter less than the work itself. Maybe I'm out ahead of our audience on this. Our whole news operation is experimenting, as JR has acknowledged on more than one occasion. But for everyone who says we reporters should say nothing about our opinions at all, there's someone who wants us to put all our political and civic affiliations and leanings on the Web so as to create a filter through which our work can be read. And the kicker is that these folks are making these diametrically opposite requests for the same reason: They think it will lead to better understanding by the public of our news coverage.

Look, in most things journalistic I'm about as old-school as they come, pint of whiskey in the bottom desk drawer excepted. But a lot of the old school was killing our business and endangering the survival of independent, local, accountability-focused journalism. So, to stay viable, we're trying new things.

Posted on November 2, 2006 1:26 PM

Lex said:

(Coincidentally, I just stumbled across some thoughts from reporter/bloggers for London's Telegraph newspaper on how and why they blog, here. A lot of what they say is relevant to what we're doing.)

Posted on November 2, 2006 1:28 PM

jaycee said:

Lex, I'd point to your recent series of "news" articles on the VA situation as an example of your bias bleeding over into your news reporting.
It's a thinly veiled way for you to poke a stick in the eye of the Bush administration by proclaiming, "...and look at what else they do wrong!"
It's a very nice series, blah, blah, blah...but it's really just a subtle way for you to get in your "digs" at people you hate.
Don't expect to pee on everyone's head and have them believe you when you say it's raining.

Posted on November 2, 2006 2:49 PM

Lex said:

Oh, that's right, jaycee -- I did it JUST TO BASH THE PRESIDENT. Helping out a vet or three never crossed my mind.

One of the hallmarks of the delusional is that they must impute the most outrageous motives to those with whom they disagree, speaking of peeing on people's heads and all.

Posted on November 2, 2006 5:03 PM

brain444 said:

Here's an example: Lex recently writes of a 28% (isn't that right??) drop in Greensboro's median family income. It's a bizarre number, given that (according to the US Census Bureau), from 2005 to 2006 MFI rose 1+ %. That contextual information isn't provided. Why? Because all economic news needs to be bad news. Of course, this is a "Fact." Lex didn't invent it; he "just reported it." And MFI is the favored number for the mainstream press because, since all economic news needs to be bad news, it's always a worse number than median personal income (an equally bizarre 9% drop in Greensboro, right?). That number, as I recall, is buried in the story, but it's a more useful number because it's an apples-to-apples number, whereas MFI trends lower because families (and hence wage-earners per household) have gotten smaller in recent years. (Did Lex explain this reason? I don't recall. Probably not.)

Why put MFI before MPI? Because it's worse news. Why do we want worse news? Because it fits the liberal paradigm of Al Gore's two Americas.

Claim: Lex privileges the worse number because of liberal bias. Claim: Lex fails to interrogate the bizarre numbers in context of broader American trends (or local ones: with such depression-like numbers, one would expect, for example, the housing market to crash, not just stall) because the numbers fit a liberal paradigm and hence appear self-evident.

Conversely, if one reads Larry Kudlow, for example, economic news is usually good. He's a conservative.

Posted on November 2, 2006 9:19 PM

Stormy said:

brian444,

Actually, it's John Edwards that always gives the Two Americas speech. It's funny because he lives in the Rich America with his $50 million, so are we to take him seriously about his concern for those that live in the Poor America?

After all that's been said above, I still can't take a news story seriously without considering the bias of the reporter, if his political biases are so obvious. Sure, every reporter has personal biases and may try very hard to keep them out of news stories, but when you know that the person has and speaks so openly about his political biases, it just has to color his reporting. You need to be a reporter or an analyst. It's impossible to be both at the same time.

Posted on November 2, 2006 10:32 PM

jaycee said:

One of the hallmarks of a persuasive and biased journalist is that he presents his articles in such a manner as to subtly sway the reader to his point of view. You are such a writer, Lex. As many have pointed out recently, your news reporting is slanted to push your personal liberal agenda. You can't fool all of the people, no matter how hard you try to be subtle and smooth about it.
Another telling indicator is that you claim "I was only trying to help a vet or three!" while avoiding the issue that your writing was slanted to paint the Bush administration in the poorest light.
Most liberals think the "little people" out here are too stupid to realize they're being played by liberal journalists. I'm not one of them, and neither are many of the readers here.
Stick to opinions, you're good at that.

Posted on November 2, 2006 11:47 PM

George Washington said:

Lex, saying you don't have a pint of whiskey in your drawer...does this mean you don't drink or you only have a half-pint bottle? If you have the half-pint, you aren't really lying, but you may still be obfuscatory.

Posted on November 3, 2006 10:08 AM

brian444 said:

You're of course right, Stormy: I had forgotten the fine distinctions. Al Gore was the divisive class warfare guy, not the two Americas guy.

Another obvious way liberal bias affects news is in the determination of what's deemed newsworthy. Lex, after all, starts out by saying that the Kerry flub isn't news, that it's being overcovered. That's a political judgment, since it's an inconvenient claim with an upcoming election. Look at this other stuff, Lex says, that paints the Republicans in a worse light. When editors hold such values, it affects coverage: witness the fetishization of Bush's national guard service.

Posted on November 3, 2006 10:35 AM

Stormy said:

brian444,

The liberal media wants to declare the Kerry "joke" as a non-story, but the truth is that it is a major story to Americans in the service and their families. Americans in the military voted about 4-1 against Kerry in 2004, and Kerry just accelerated that number higher in voting against the Dems. The truth be told, Kerry was just speaking from his long-held belief....that people who serve voluntarily in the military in a time of war are just dumb and can't do anything else. His views are widely held in the Left Wing of the Democrat Party. That's why the shoved Joe Lieberman out of the party.

Posted on November 3, 2006 12:38 PM

dfc said:

Posted on December 6, 2006 11:13 AM

dfc said:

Posted on December 6, 2006 11:14 AM

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Thinking Out Loud

Thinking Out Loud

Kerry should apologize

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