Was the ABC Debate the Death Knell of American Journalism?

The evidence has been building for quite some time that journalism, as this country has known it for half a century, has been marching feebly toward the Garden of Gethsemane.

For years now, major newspapers have been closing bureaus, trimming editorial staffs to the bone and otherwise turning the once proud craft of news gathering into a happy hunt for the easiest-to-shoot prey.

But Wednesday night's performance by Charlie Gibson [photo, right] and George Stephanopoulos [photo left] was like the final walk to the cross; and agony-soaked screams of many heart-broken journalists could be heard in the background.

ABC, the sponsor of that debate between between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, became the XYZ of American journalism.

Over the past 24 hours, the chorus of embarrassment and outrage has been building, with many in the media declaring themselves to be shamed at the pandering, cheap, gotcha questions hurled at the candidates, especially Barack Obama, by questioners Gibson and Stephanopoulos.

Adding to the outrage was the fact that Stephanopoulos was a communications director for ex President Bill Clinton, and thus owes his rise to fame to the husband of the candidate he is supposed to be covering with a veneer of impartiality.

Under the rules of journalism as it was practiced in the days when the "appearance of objectivity" was taken seriously, Stephanopoulos would have either graciously recused himself from this assignment, or would have been pulled from it by a higher-up.

But those days are gone, and so is American journalism as we once knew it.

Writing for Editor and Publisher, Greg Mitchell put it this way:

"In perhaps the most embarrassing performance by the media in a major presidential debate in years, ABC News hosts Charles Gibson and George Stephanopolous focused mainly on trivial issues as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama faced off in Philadelphia."

What made the performance especially pitiful was that the ABC duo seemed intent on sticking it to Obama, hitting him with the hardest, most embarrassing questions (particularly the effort to link him to  leftist radical bombers).

This is something (one would think) that Stephanopoulos in particular would have avoided if he had any interest in trying to invite a bit of journalistic credibility.

It has to be said also that the coverage of the debate by the Times seemed also slanted toward Clinton.

One of the most striking moments of the debate - when Clinton tried to explain how, a number of times, she had spoken of dodging sniper fire on a trip to Bosnia, when in fact there was footage showing her walking calmly from the aircraft to her destination - was strangely downplayed in the main Times article.

The reporters who wrote the main Times article on the debate, Adam Nagourney and Jeff Zeleny, chose to focus instead on Obama's string of uncomfortable moments. (read)

 

Comments

[Evelyn Wangari]

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