There are some words in the English language that can generate impassioned opinions and discussions just by uttering them.
Abortion. Bush. Iraq. Social Security.
You can now add the word "blogs" to that list.
Blogs first became common in mid-1999, when Blogger, the most major Web-based blogging tool to date, was released. The field grew slowly and steadily, but blogs really took off when it was found that Howard Dean, who ran for President in 2003, was getting much of his donation money via the Internet, especially these blogs.
However, many journalists look down on blogs. Helen Thomas, a White House columnist, recently attacked Blogger and White House correspondent Jeff Gannon, who Thomas says is "known in the press room for asking softball, right-leaning questions." Thomas asks where the line is between "legitimate reporters and anyone who has a laptop computer or a Web site." She also prides "professional" news organizations on their need to not take sides and find a "verifiable truth" in news stories.
This is an interesting argument from someone who, during one White House press conference in January 2003, asked these two questions: "Why does [President Bush] want to drop bombs on innocent Iraqis?" and "Is this [war] revenge, 11 years of revenge?" While many bloggers may tend one way or the other, at least they are admitting their bias. Also, the majority of the time, bloggers are not just voicing their opinions, but using actual quotes from news stories to back up their arguments. Thomas holds an obvious liberal bias and yet, for some reason, continues to operate under the guise of being a "professional" news reporter.
One of Thomas's "legitimate reporters" is former CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather, who, according to an MSN article, "has been accused of liberal bias by every GOP administration since Richard Nixon's." In fact, one of his many showdowns was with George H.W. Bush, the 41st President, while he was running for office. Bush was thought to have a "wimp factor," but his ability to withstand Rather's partisan attacks regarding Iran-contra -- "You made us hypocrites in the eyes of the world!" -- shook that reputation and helped him win the presidency.
Of course, Rather is better known for Memogate, where he ran a story regarding memos about current President Bush's service in the Alabama National Guard. Just 36 hours after the program first aired, the New York Times and the L.A. Times were on the case and claimed the memos to be hoaxes.
Another group that said the memos were probably frauds? You guessed it. The blogosphere. Almost as soon as the story aired, bloggers noted that the memo looked exactly like something that could be typed using the default settings of Microsoft Word --- which, of course, was not around when Bush was in the Guard.
But Rather and his CBS News cronies took nearly two weeks after the fact to admit that the memos did not have enough validity to be used as a news story. However, no one from CBS has yet offered an explanation as to why they continued to run with this story when it was so obvious that they could not be proven to be real.
Perhaps, as Helen Thomas claims, bloggers do not deserve the term "journalist." But if they don't deserve it, then neither do she and her left-wing group of "reporters."
Write to Andy at
ndistops@hotmail.com
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