Newsweek's real sin is 'kissing ass'

[quaoar]

Fascinating article on how nobody complains when the media use unnamed sources all the time in writing fluff pieces and stories that kiss Republican ass:

http://www.nypress.com/18/21/news&columns/taibbi.cfm

The reality is that unnamed sources are used about 10,000 times a day by the more patriotic and upstanding members of our working press, only they're not used to wonder about the goings-on at places like Guantanamo Bay. Instead, they're used to kiss ass and make icons out of morons—to turn George Bush into Winston Churchill, Dick Gephardt into Eugene Debs, Tom Clancy into Tolstoy.

Most consumers of news magazines will recognize the format, which typically involves an unnamed spokesman whispering that such-and-such Croseus-rich politician is a great lover of NASCAR races, or lies awake at night worrying about the poor: "Aides say Kerry is particularly concerned about the plight of the southern white jobless, whose situation deeply touched him when he last visited..."

The practice is especially common in campaign journalism and in the political profile genre, where it never offends self-appointed trade moralists like Marty Peretz. Newsweek, the current "unnamed sources" villain, is and always has been the very worst offender in this area.

No one bitched at the magazine on January 24 of this year, for instance, when reporter Richard Wolffe wrote a slobbering cover profile on the "Bush you don't know" that was filthy with unnamed sources. An example from the text:

Bush's leadership style belies his caricature as a disengaged president who is blindly loyal, dislikes dissent and covets his own downtime. In fact, Bush's aides and friends describe the mirror image of a restless man who masters details and reads avidly, who chews over his mistakes and the failings of those around him, and who has grown ever more comfortable pulling the levers of power.

[DeepModem Mom]

1. Always the double standard -- this article is exactly right --

thanks for posting, quaoar.