Jane Hamsher has made some fascinating observations about Deborah Howell.  Today she makes a couple of new points based on Howell's most recent column on a Washington Post reporter's appearance on TV.  Jane points out that Howell is quite responsive to right-wing blogs and their readers, complimentary towards them even.  This in itself is not a problem; she is the readers' represenative, but her deference to the right-wing on matters of opinion and style and sneering tone towards the left on matters of factual accuracy is problematic.  On these questions, I'm largely with Atrios, who points out that it's the smallness of Howell's thinking that is at the root of a lot of her problems.

While Howell didn't adequately explain herself in this column, she did implicitly pick an important problem involving what James Fallows pointed out in Breaking the News, that modern reporters are not encouraged to think through the ethics of their profession.  They assume they are on the side of 'the little guy', that their role is as the umpire and that they call 'balls and strikes'.  If they get criticized from both sides, they are 'doing their jobs', and under no circumstances should their work be seen as good or bad for any particular political actor.  As one thoughtful and intelligent liberal reporter who slams liberals all the time told me, the job of the press is 'not to elect liberals'.  Fair enough, I suppose.  But it's not enough to tell me what reporters shouldn't do.

Both the right and the left have done a great deal of theorizing of the role of the media in an internet-enabled age, whether you consider open-communication-as-terrorism, as the right does, or whether you deal with the notion that blogs can be institutional memory for regular beat reporters, as Jane and Emptywheel sort of do for Murray Waas and others on the Plame beat.

However, Howell's instinctive reaction to ethical questions is avoidance.  This is cleverly couched in the guise of social prudishness.

A second question is easier to answer. From reader Eric Welch: "Does Dana Milbank's wearing of a bright orange hat and vest to cover the vice president's accidental shooting of a friend convey professionalism and objective journalism by Washington Post standards?"

Spayd said she felt Milbank "crossed the line" on his TV appearance. "What he intended as a playful joke was viewed by many as mocking and unprofessional, and understandably so." Suffice it to say that he has been taken to The Post's version of the woodshed and told not to do that again.

This is the second time that Milbank's remarks on that show have caused a row. In October, he spoke in a fake Iraqi accent, which many readers felt was over the line. Milbank said he has appeared on the show -- which he describes as "half news, half shtick" -- wearing a Santa hat, brandishing a cigar and having an anvil dangled over his head.

Washingtonpost.com, which is under different management than the print Post, lists Milbank as an opinion columnist. I think that's right. Milbank said, "I realize there's a fine line between making observational judgments and expressing an opinion."

Howell chides Dana Milbank for going on TV dressed in an orange vest and making fun of the Cheney shooting.  That's fair.  But the notion that a reporter can't joke and still do reporting is a conflation of ethical questions.  Should Milbank joke and make the Post look stupid with dumb hackish jokes on Dick Cheney?  I don't know.  But to allege that his clownish behavior implies that he is editorializing is not fair.  One can joke without editorializing.  One can make the Post look dumb with unprofessional behavior without compromising one's journalistic role.  That's what Milbank possibly did here, it seems, depending on your view of what social norms are appropriate.

Howell approves of Milbank being 'taken to the woodshed' for his behavior, without acknowledging that what he did might have nothing to do with editorial versus news judgment.  In her estimation, as far as I can tell, Milbank simply did something that was 'not appropriate'.  Reporters don't do such things, as least not on TV.

Her column is on better terrain where she criticizing Milbank for editorializing, instead of clownishness.  But it's still problematic.  For instance there's this:

He does sometimes cross the line into commentary -- in an Oct. 12 column, he counted how many times President Bush blinked during a television interview, and in a Nov. 3 column he frequently referred to Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito's rumpled clothes and personal awkwardness. Both columns seemed like put-downs. On Jan. 27, he wrote that President Bush gave a "Bourbonic performance" at a news conference.

But I loved his Feb. 1 column about watching Supreme Court justices decide whether to clap, sit or stand during the State of the Union address. And writing about a Jan. 25 hearing on lobbying reform, he followed quotations of senators with mentions of how much money they had received from lobbyists in recent years. Cleverly done.

This too is a neat way of avoiding the real question, which is the definition of modern journalism.  What Howell is criticizing is not editorializing, for that's not what Milbank is doing here either.  It's attitude.  Look at how hypocritical Senators are!  Ha ha!  They take money from lobbyists!  Look at how Alito is awkward!  Ha ha!  I love it!  But seriously, says Howell, those are opinions and deserve to be labeled as such.

Well, not necessarily.  Every reporter picks and chooses a set of facts and weaves them into a narrative.  That's what Milbank is doing here as well.  Choosing to show that Senators take money from lobbyists in a snide manner is a clever way of eliding that they rely on a system they are critiquing.  Is that true?  Well of course it's true.  It's also an opinion, and a narrative.  Does it matter how many times Bush blinks, or whether Alito is awkward?  Not necessarily, but then whole 'personality profile' pieces and 'strategy news' pieces should be consigned to the dustbin of journalistic practices.  Since writing about personality is somehow off-limits in Howell-land, and so is juxtaposing relevant facts against substantive statements, then what exactly can you write about that isn't opinion?

It's not an easy question.  But that's precisely the point.  Pointing at Milbank's orange vest on TV and saying 'look at the clown, he's editorializing again' is avoiding the question.

Contrast this with David Gregory, who is firmly editorializing on the role of the WH press corps on Meet the Press this morning (video on Crooks and Liars):

MR. GREGORY:  Right. And let me just make one other point. Again, it's easy to try to make this a debate about the White House press corps vs. the vice president. No matter how you feel about the White House press corps, and--and we're worthy of criticism, and we can take our lumps--this is about how the vice president chooses to communicate to the American people. We are a proxy for the American people. Whether you have faith in us or not, and we do make mistakes, we are still a proxy. This is about how the vice president chooses to communicate to the public. My view is not that I should have been informed or others should have been informed. It's not about that. It's--it's a question of "Does the vice president have a responsibility to the American people to inform them of his public and private activities?"

That's a clear meditation on the role of the press in a democracy, and it's also an opinion.  Reporters can have opinions.  They can joke.  They can use facts to tell larger narratives.  And what they should do is provide memory and context, and explain the larger dynamics behind any one story, helping the American people in their decisions about public policy.  Did Milbank do that in every case?  Not necessarily.  But does that mean he should be an opinion columnist?  Not necessarily.  I would hope that Howell rethinks her assumptions on who is and isn't a journalist and how journalists can operate within different roles, because we desperately need someone at the Washington Post as a reader representative to help guide the institution.  And right now, that person isn't Howell, however tough-minded a journalist she might be or might have been.