Lies, Damned Lies, and the News
The Goldbricker watches all the Sunday morning network news interview shows (the broadcast times overlap, apparently; so, he tapes the first half of one while watching another in real time); thus, though I don't watch them I overhear them during breakfast and while washing the brunch dishes. This past weekend, on ABC's This Week, hosted by the reptilian George Stephanopoulos, a reporter was featured in the "In Memoriam" segment, which covers the previous week's notable deaths. David Rosenbaum had been a reporter for The New York Times for thirty-five years, though he was retired at the time of his death. Mr. Rosenbaum did not die while covering a story, he was not killed for being a journalist, he appears to have died a victim of ordinary, though monstrous, street crime.

I intend no disrespect toward Mr. Rosenbaum or any offense to his family, but how many 63-year-olds die in New York City every year as victims of crime? And how many of those lamentable deaths merit mention on This Week? Mr. Rosenbaum's is the first I have ever heard of, which strikes me as being quite offensive. I would understand This Week's attention if Mr. Rosenbaum had been killed covering a story for the Times, or if he'd been kidnapped by jihadists and murdered like Daniel Pearl. And I would understand the media frenzy surrounding the death of an aristocrat of the Fourth Estate, for example Dan Rather's eventual death, hopefully of natural causes. But David Rosenbaum was not famous. He did not die, as it were, in the line for duty. He was an unfortunate victim of the too-common violence that plagues our streets. So, what exactly made him worth of a tribute on This Week when so many other victims of violent crime, both young and old, are completely and utterly ignored by Mr. Stephanopoulos and his masters? David Rosenbaum was a reporter; so, in the eyes of certainly ABC and perhaps the rest of the media, too, his life was worth more than yours or mine.

Journalists claim to do what they do in the service of the Republic, to further the common good, to champion the little guy against the powers-that-be. Of course, that;s not actually true. If it were, David Rosenbaum's murder would have received no more coverage that any other random street crime, and he certainly would not have been featured in "In Memoriam." I am not generally fan of populist rhetoric, but it happens to fit this gcase like a glove: the media see themselves as an elite, that is why the death of one of their own is news while the death of your grandfather is not. They think they're better than you.

Who Watches the Watchman?
Last week or the week before the ombudsman of National Public Radio, Jeffrey Dvorkin, said in an interview on the program Day to Day that, and here I am forced to paraphrse as I do not have a transcript in front of me, there may be ways for NPR's reporters to arrive at the truth without having to be objective. Sweet. Merciful. Crap. I guess this in an admission that NPR's reporters don't need to base their stories on objective facts, those terribly inconvenient things, because "the truth" is made up of more than just "the facts." In the absense of objectivity, by definition subjectivity reigns. Mr. Dvorkin also said that "balance," in context he was referrign to balance between the two poles of the political spectrum, was not necessary for good journalism. A tactless way of summarizing Mr. Dvorkin's statements is that NPR's reporters don't need to report the facts and they don't need to pretend to not favor one political part over the other.

I am ashamed to have ever donated money to help support my local NPR station. I am ashamed that a portion of my federal taxes goes to pay the contempable Mr. Dvorkin's salary. NPR is a monstrosity, one that Congress must starve of funds. If it is the last thing I do, I will see that NPR is shut down permanently. Damn them all.