Today, though, something caught my eye, and I have to admit I'm impressed. Howell Raines, former executive editor of The New York Times, has a piece entitled "Why don't honest journalists take on Roger Ailes and Fox News?"
Through clever use of the Fox News Channel and its cadre of raucous commentators, Ailes has overturned standards of fairness and objectivity that have guided American print and broadcast journalists since World War II. Yet, many members of my profession seem to stand by in silence as Ailes tears up the rulebook that served this country well as we covered the major stories of the past three generations, from the civil rights revolution to Watergate to the Wall Street scandals. This is not a liberal-versus-conservative issue. It is a matter of Fox turning reality on its head with, among other tactics, its endless repetition of its uber-lie: "The American people do not want health-care reform."
Fox repeats this as gospel. But as a matter of historical context, usually in short supply on Fox News, this assertion ranks somewhere between debatable and untrue.
Sometimes you get struck by something you read, and this is one of those times. Now, in part or perhaps even as a whole, this article is directed more toward journalists (which one could guess, I suppose, from the title) than the general, non-journalistic audience. Even as Raines tosses comity and politeness out the window, the non-journalist gets the impression that some taboo has finally been shattered; the complaint against FOXNews that has heretofore been part of the narrative of the liberal internet has crossed - finally, and with the full force of a former editor of the NYT - to the mainstream in a huge way. Furthermore, he does not mice words, talk around his subject, or attempt an "on the one hand, on the other hand" approach that might mitigate some critical takes on FOXNews.
Why has our profession, through its general silence -- or only spasmodic protest -- helped Fox legitimize a style of journalism that is dishonest in its intellectual process, untrustworthy in its conclusions and biased in its gestalt? The standard answer is economics, as represented by the collapse of print newspapers and of audience share at CBS, NBC and ABC. Some prominent print journalists are now cheering Rupert Murdoch, the head of News Corp. (which owns the Fox network) for his alleged commitment to print, as evidenced by his willingness to lose money on the New York Post and gamble the overall profitability of his company on the survival of the Wall Street Journal. This is like congratulating museums for preserving antique masterpieces while ignoring their predatory methods of collecting.
Why can't American journalists steeped in the traditional values of their profession be loud and candid about the fact that Murdoch does not belong to our team? His importation of the loose rules of British tabloid journalism, including blatant political alliances, started our slide to quasi-news. His British papers famously promoted Margaret Thatcher's political career, with the expectation that she would open the nation's airwaves to Murdoch's cable channels. Ed Koch once told me he could not have been elected mayor of New York without the boosterism of the New York Post.
--snip--
Under the pretense of correcting a Democratic bias in news reporting, Fox has accomplished something that seemed impossible before Ailes imported to the news studio the tricks he learned in Richard Nixon's campaign think tank: He and his video ferrets have intimidated center-right and center-left journalists into suppressing conclusions -- whether on health-care reform or other issues -- they once would have stated as demonstrably proven by their reporting. I try not to believe that this kid-gloves handling amounts to self-censorship, but it's hard to ignore the evidence. News Corp., with 64,000 employees worldwide, receives the tender treatment accorded a future employer.
What is most interesting about the arrival of FOXNews and Roger Ailes is the similarity, in many respects, to situations in Italy and, now, Chile, where the rise of media moguls portended big political changes. It can be no accident that American conservative politicians have at least one eye trained on Italy's Silvio Berlusconi, and Chile's new President (inaugurated this week quite literally during a major aftershock from the horrible earthquake of a couple weeks back), Sebastian Pinera (my keyboard, alas, does not have a tilde for the "n" in his last name). While Murdoch cannot run for office, and Ailes has always enjoyed the kingmaker role (he came to prominence during the Nixon Administration), his promotion of various right-wing political candidates has that same air about it as Berlusconi's and Pinera's channel's promoting their owner's political ambitions.
I think a kind of Rubicon in discussions of journalism, public discourse, and the relationship between journalism and politics in this country has been crossed. A major figure has said what many on the internet have been saying for years - FOXNews doesn't "do" journalism, and even its news department is nothing more than a promotional vehicle for the Republican Party and its talking points. This is a good sign.
