I used to read the paper every day.  Now less so, because I can get the same info on the net.  But when I would bother to read commentary by Cal Thomas, I was nearly always cursing him by the end.  He, and all journalists/commentators, must know that what they say is not going to be accepted by everyone.

So a few years ago the curses were being lost in the living room, without so much as a "what's in the paper today, honey" response. The only thing different now is that we have the ability to email papers and writers, and we have on-line support groups to vet our frustration.  (Thanks MyDD....)

The only difference with response to bad journalism now is that the net makes it more public.  Grow up, Jack Shafer.  Strive to improve, Ms. Howell.  Mediocrity or worse will be noticed.

Amen.

Great, thoughtful post - thanks.  

Emphasizing any so-called "divide" between the ideological and pragmatic is idiotic. Nearly every substantial political movement needs both to succeed. Passing civil rights legislation in the Senate required the efforts and talents of BOTH heroic ideologues like Paul Douglas, Herbert Lehman, etc AND the pragmatic genius of Lyndon Johnson (MLK was both, of course, which was his singular genius w.r.t. those issues). The success of abolitionism required BOTH Wendell Phillips' idealism AND Abraham Lincoln's pragmatism (see Hofstadter, The American Political Tradition - fantastic book).  

The question, then, is this: why are our current Dem pragmaticians so god-damned awful at what they do? Who was the brain surgeon who advised/allowed John Kerry to begin his Alito filibuster push from Davos? Why did Al Gore have clown makeup on during his third debate with W? Etc etc - easy to come up with 20 more examples of this incompetence. LBJ would laugh his ass off at these fools, right before slitting their professional throats.  

What always strikes me about institutional Beltway journalists is their provincialism.  There really is a fairly dogmatic belief that comes through in their writing that Border State Democrats are the epitome of the Democratic Party, that between the Susquehanna and the Rappahannock somehow the full Democratic universe is properly contained and everywhere else is a set of outliers where people are not clued in to political reality as they believe is created by -emanates from- the Beltway.  The blind spots are incredibly apparent in, say, their dreary, persistent, miscoverage and misinterpretation of the Latino-based politics of the Southwest.

Deborah Howell is just fairly typical- she sounds almost exactly like the people I know from upper tier families in northern Virginia or Maryland.  Sure of their place in the local game, sure of what the common view is among their own, assertive of this convention- and then horrified when people tell them that it's not the national reality or even factual, taking it as an attack on their personal credibility and that of their oh-so-elevated social circle.  It's wounded elitism or entitlement.

The simply fact of the matter is that this crowd has internalized the Midwest and Border States as the social norm of the country and Southerners as the institutional rulers.  Lost in this perspective and simplification are the weight and power of the Northeast (whose elites the Beltway crowd hates out of snobbery) and the West Coast.  The building reassertion of the Northeast and West Coast power in Washington in the form of active and energetic Democrats is a challenge to their cozy arrangements and corruption with Republicans.

In short, activist Democrats are endangering the Beltway establishment's comfort and power and status by exposing them and their unregenerate, lazy, selfserving faux elitist ways.  They're obviously resorting to trying to shoot the messengers in order to continue in denial of the message of the next era in politics: serve The People, justify your leisure and status in some fashion.  A political variety of New Economy is starting to engulf Washington's chattering classes, and they hate it.

This part bites me in the chaps:

The discussion started with a thoughtful presentation by Rebecca McKinnnon, who runs Global Voices.  Are bloggers journalists?  Should journalists blog?  What is blogging?  Who's being brought into the conversation?  Steve Clemons chimed in with an excellent comment that blogs present a vehicle for a perfect marketplace of ideas, and allow a way to expand upon the necessary 'cartel' of the Op-Ed pages.  There was a lot of handwringing about media models, and pricing, and whether journalists will survive.  I made the point that I was worried that the blogosphere and the MSM was a framework that was ultimately unhelpful to the development of this important medium, and that it breeds unnecessary hostility between people who have a lot in common.

It never fails to amaze me that we don't push at the MSM about the handwringing on media models on the spot by simply countering with this question:

Is Jeff Gannon/Jim Guckert a real journalist?

If he isn't, why wasn't the MSM reporting about him when he showed up in the White House press gaggle?  It's not like they didn't see him.  Why are we bloggers -- people no different and in many cases far better qualified in terms of actual experience writing and reporting or even education -- considered "non-journalists" by the MSM?

And if he is a real journo in the eyes of the MSM, is there some sort of imprimatur of journalism issued out only by Corporate America and by proxy through the White House?

Is there also an unwritten code of conduct issued only to the annointed journalists that keeps them from reporting on themselves -- even if one of them is a two-day-fiddy-buck-certificate "journalist" moonlighting as a man-whore?

Kind of makes all their whining incredibly facile knowing they are engaging in redirection instead of real introspection or real reporting.

Sorry if I sounded abrasive at the lunch, as you describe me.

I don't think a horrible thing happened to Howell. In the course of her career as a journalist, her ears have felt the sting of words that would make a sailor blush. So the quality of beating she took isn't the issue for me.

Here's what is: Does have the Post have right to dictate the terms of civility in the comments section of its own site? Does that right include deleting or not posting comments that violate its standards? I say yes to both questions.

I never, ever have called bloggers rioters. The "riot" to which I referred was the pack of "commenters" who descended upon the Post Web site, stirred on by various blogs, to record ugly and obscene comments. I wasn't referring to what bloggers wrote about her on their sites.

Most of all, I'm not trying to infantalize anybody. I take blogs and bloggers seriously.

Last, I tried to navigate the room and talk directly to Mr. Stoller at the end of the lunch, but he departed before I could talk to him. I did get to swap a few words with Mr. Krempasky, for which I'm grateful. Next time I'll move across the room faster.

--Jack Shafer

Jack,
  I find it bizarre that you think those questions are of any real importance or relevance to this incident.  To answer them:  of course the Post can dictate the terms of their site and of course they can moderate it any way they want. But those questions just serve to steer the conversation away from the central issues.  The important issue was not that posts were deleted or that comments were shut, the issue that there was a concerted effort to steer the story from "Ombudsman messed up" to "people on the internets wrote obscene things" and then  "how can the Post deal with all those nasty people."

It's just a way to shift the conversation away from the central issue and confuse people about the actual issues being discussed.  Or, in internet speak, trolling.

I suspect much of this hand-wringing is due to the fact that newspapers can no longer control what gets printed for public consumption.

Used to be, if a paper didn't want to issue a retraction, they could simply throw away all letters to the editor complaining about errors without ever acknowleging their mistakes.

The web makes this old approach untenable.

Basically, this whole thing boiled down to the WaPo not wanting to admit they (Howell) had made a mistake.  Before the internet and the blogs, they wouldn't have had to.  And they don't like these new rules.  Which is really too bad, so sad for them, because the good old days, when they owned all the ink....they aren't coming back.

actually, the real question is why people are still showing up for these silly-ass conferences anymore.  

I know that Jones and McKinnon have to hold them -- that's their job.   But really, all the money spent on these conferences would be far better utilized giving computers to inner city kids.  

I complained to Shafer following his recent Slate article about the incident.  His reply said that he wasn't defending Howell, but asked if it would be OK with me to smash the windows of the Post.

He seems a bit unbalanced about the whole thing.  I pointed out to him that nothing like smashing windows happened, but didn't get a second reply.  Perhaps I should have pointed out that smashing windows will get you arrested, but posting an angry email, especially in the context of political speech, is protected by the First Amendment?

What the WP doesn't get is that we're on their side. Print is the last hope of journalism, yet they'd rather undermine the institution for the sake of chasing the affinity of Bushbots who only e-mail to complain because their favorite talk radio host told them to, and have never picked up the paper in their life. Now they're losing us.

I want the NYT and WP to succeed. For the sake of the nation, I hope they do. But instead, they've started a war with us because they think we're taking over their turf.

They chased us to the blogs with their sycophancy! We had no choice! It's the only place we can go to get the questions asked the WP won't. Or to correct the distortions they willingly push for access to print the next distortion before the competition.

If the WP did journalism, I'd defend them, tooth and nail. I'd subscribe five times. It's the right wing who wants to destroy them, and the WP and NYT are happy to oblige.

There is far too much actual Democracy making its way through the Internet. That's what WaPo and others are finding out. They're used to Democracy-flavored dynamics. This whole "voice of the people," and "accountability" thing is just blowin' they mind, so to speak. They're used to being the only spoken word; they're used to being the front page, 2nd page, above the fold, below the fold, and back page. Now they're seeing that they're just one more page in a massive, bristling, writhing, untameable book we can all open up and write in.

Makes me think of the old Leonard Cohen tune... Democracy is comin'....for the U.S.A..

Excellent article, thanks.

I was a "real" journalist; now I am a shrink.

However, a "journalist",(used to be called reporters) at least to my knowledge, was a degree...in almost anything; history, music, political science, etc..  A journalism degree was not required. Being able to write and spell well is a plus.

As for television; look good on camera and, when I was active in the field, be able to write and read a teleprompter.

I always thought it interesting to read their (reporters) bios to see just where they got all that education and what they have written to feel so superior.

Here's what is: Does have the Post have right to dictate the terms of civility in the comments section of its own site?

The issue was never about civility.  Jim Brady kept insisting that the Post wanted a "dialogue" and then wouldn't engage in one while continuing to wrongly insist that the Abramoff scandal was a bipartisan one--even after the Post's alleged correction.

I was monitoring the comments closely and 99% of the comments were from people who were presenting factual, reasoned arguments.  Nobody was throwing verbal Molotov cocktails.

... that they have been duped for the past 5 years by Bush and his 9/11 Kool Aid.  They are starting to realize that the evil lefty blogs have actually been right all along.  For them to admit that their reporting on the Abramoff scandal is nothing more than a Republican talking point, would be the beginning of an admission that they haven't been practicing journalism for the past several years.  At the moment they are trying to shoot the messenger, the blogs.  The problem with this strategy is that every attack on the blogs forces them to acknowledge what the blogs are saying about their reporting, and their reporting still sucks.  

"The trick will be to harness their energy and their money..."

Harness?  Isn't that what they do to horses and oxen and other beasts of burden?

I have been reduced to a farm animal.  

I was part of the mob of rioters tha descended upon the post. No left wing blog sent me there. I left a steaming nastigram there a couple of times. Here is why. I paid for a newspaper in which due diligence was not performed before they printed. Then, the person whose job it was to perform due diligence, did not do so.

I was ripped off by the Post. I was angry about it. No only did they violate our implicite social contract by printing misinformation, but their printed lies harmed our civil discourse in incalculable ways. I have every right to protest loudly when I have paid for the privilege to do so.

I said it before and I will say it again. Deborah Howell is either a liar or she is incompetant. And yes, the Democratic party is a broken institution, but so the electoral process, and the Washington Post is part of the problem. I want a party, and a newspaper that will fight for me against the crooks and liars who successfully game the system to their benefit every day. I can't fight them without manning the ramparts.

In the age of the Internet, my hope is that bad Journalists will simply die off, just like other forms of life that cannot adapt to a changing environment.

Questions for Jack Shafer and all who hold with him:

The large press/media enterprises do not consider determining truth or fact to be their mission.  Representatives of these enterprises have admitted as much in public statements and, more importantly, demonstrated it by their conduct.  So, therefore,

What purpose is served by large press/media enterprises?

Other than printing and broadcasting what government officials say, officially and unofficially, what service do they perform for the public?

Is a lie made more palatable when it is stated in a graceful manner?

Is the truth made odious when it is put forth in a rude manner?

Howell published a lie under her name.  She either told it deliberately or with a callous disregard for the truth.  When that was pointed out, she attacked not just those who exposed her, she attacked the truth.

What good is any press/media person to the general public if they are attacking the truth?

But don't forget liberals, especially rich white, gentile ones, are complete and total idiots, with so much sense of self-worth, that they can rarely handle a spoken beatdown, let a lone a real one. So this sh*t is nothing but par for the course of whiny-arrogant pussies, fraid to say.

A really great post. I've already stolen the line:

"Whether you are inside a big media institution, or inside a big party institution, the path to success involves internalizing a set of tribal norms that bear little or no relationship to reality."

I've been thinking on how best to "externalize" the tribal norms so as to free us from their poisonous influence. Any ideas?

Jack, if you're reading this still,

I was one of those hordes of farm animal rioters, or something like that.  I don't know if my comment ever saw the light of day, but I can assure you, while firm and somewhat snarky, it was not mean slavering vulgarity.  I attempted to be "work casual" in my tone, pointing out that not only was Howell wrong, but that she seemed confused about her function on the Post as the ombudsman, as the Readers Representative, not the Reporters Representative.  And urging her to get it right and stop covering/working for the gop.

If Brady deleted my comment then the only conclusion to be made was that they just didn't like the message, and anything they said to the contrary was a bald faced lie.  And that's the problem.

Howell and Brady lied, (dare I say fucking lied?), got caught, then denied it.  I read those posts, and a lot of them were impassioned, pointed, direct, and very smart, and very few were vulgar, in fact I was surprised by the lack of trolling and vulgarity, truth be told.  

Most of them just nailed the Post for their failures, and their refusal to take corrective action.

The Post, MSM, and the Democratic establishment are inside a  bubble; best schools, good pay, respect of their colleagues, etc., etc.  Most of the folks, for want of a better term lets call 'em blogoids, who read, create and comment on blogs are not.  We don't have the entry fee or connections.  To the folks inside the bubble their differences are deep, endlessly complex and fascinating.  From the outside of the bubble it looks like, though they are indeed different fish, they are swimming in the same water.  When this is pointed out to them by something like the strong response to Deborah Howell's factually inaccurate commentary, they feel marginalized and attacked and seek to gain the respect of the blogoids.  When the 'attacks' are logical, consistent and effective they join to protect their bubble, they have to, they can't survive outside it.  They instinctively realize, even more than a lot of blogoids, how tentative their 'stewardship' of the National Discourse is.  My expectation is that, much like the Republicans, who I consider to be the present day equivalent of the Whigs, the punditocracy is on its way out the door.  Real time globally scaled communication will win in the long run, even in China.  In this great big messy bubble they don't know the rules, that makes them trepidatious and mad.  When 1,000 people write letters to the editor they just disappear into a mailbox.  When they are public comments on a blog they have to be explained away as an orchestrated response. Further, the job isn't for 'us' to fit into the Democratic party scheme, it is for some party to accept and understand the changes that are taking place in political geography.  50% of eligible voters don't think is is worth the time and trouble to vote because they think it won't affect change.  The viral medium of blogs can give them those reasons unfiltered.  Folks judge institutions as institutions,  they judge blogs like they judge their neighbors.  The more the bubble people whine, the less credible they become.  Like millionaires Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly and their ilk portraying themselves as put upon underdogs, like Bush and his Republican enablers claiming the role of victim, like Deborah Howell and an indecorous online 'riot', it is all getting to be a very tired act.  Blogs will save our democracy because they allow all voices, even the crackpots, and you blogoids decide who to respect by their earning it.  Then again that is why the bubble people are trying feverishly to figure out how to harness the blogoids energy, creativity  and their money without looking like they are captives  of the ruling class.  Failing that they will attempt to destroy the internet as we know it.

Steve Elmendorf, a Democratic lobbyist:

"The trick will be to harness their energy and their money without looking like you are a captive of the activist left."

Karl Rove, a Republican Machiavellian, paraphrased:

The trick will be to harness their energy and their money without looking like you are a captive of the religious right-wing extremists.

Get it?

My perspective on the Washington Post Ombudswoman crash event is slightly different from those posted here (although I agree with most of them).  I think what really shocked the Post and its editors and ombudswoman was not merely being caught out using the ombudswoman's post to give cyber sex to republicans (the "stay tuned" comment) but being caught out not knowing who their readers are.  The Ombudswoman and her editor really were shocked to discover that

a) readers read
b) they read critically
c) they are angry when they are lied to and treated with contempt
d) they fight back

Up until blogs and posts, the Washington Post simply had no real idea who their readers were--and as someone pointed out somewhere else the advertisers had no real idea who was reading the advertising.  Now everyone knows, and everyone can see how dissatisfied the readers are. That's got to hurt.

Here's the thing. I'm a reader of the post, and I come from the demographic that they clearly target in their various lifestyle pages, in their knowing (if often inaccurate) political and economic coverage.  The WaPo's reaction to "bloggers" and "posters" implies that these are some kind of uneducated, easily led, hoi polloi utterly different from the "real" and "true" and authentic readers the Post actually is designed to serve/shill to.  But they weren't.  Anyone who reads blogs daily, as I do, and reads comments religiously knows that the posters range widely up and down the economic and social ladder but there are plenty (if not, frankly a predominance) of older, affluent, educated people.

I didn't post anything obscene over at the WaPo, but I might have. Because nice upper class, older, affluent, educated people have wicked potty mouths.

aimai