At least on the blogs, we are totally up front about our biases. For instance, this blog is progressive and generally pro-Democratic, except when the "Democrat" is Joe Lieberman or the like.  Also, we make it clear when we're in a paid consulting relationship with a candidate, such as Eric and me with Jon Bowerbank and me with Judy Feder.  Apparently this is NOT the practice at the AP!  So much for a journalistic "code of ethics?"

An important distinction is that there are millions of blogs (anyone can start one).  But there are very few wire services, much fewer than in the past.  The Moonies now own UPI.  Reuters is British.  AP is the biggest game in town.  

Additionally, regarding Lowell's distinction between blog and media bias, I heard someone say in a roundtable on media just yesterday that bloggers do not actually go out and research a story.  Sometimes that's true; often it is not.  

Not all blogs purport to do original reporting (most do not, actually).  Sometimes RK does original reporting; sometimes not.  But there are other reasons to blog.  We bloggers often work on pushing backpaged or ignored stories.  Some (e.g., anonymous is a woman or teacherken)write thought-provoking articles.  Some write excellent policy pieces (e.g., Lowell).  Some are moving to include television (Firedog Lake now has a show called Grit with Laura Flanders) on satellite television.  TPM and Glenn Greenwald push videos and Truthout does real reporting along with pushing through the system news and commentary we may have missed.  There's a website called orcinus (which I mentioned with regard to the Unitarian Church tragedy this week).  That blog is trying to shine a light on hate radio (and television).  They've done some outstanding work (e.g. their research on terribly serious problem of "eliminationist" rhetoric coming from the radical right.  My point is there are some real contributions being made.  The point isn't whether or not they are "journalism." It doesn't matter.  They fill a necessary niche.

At a time, when often the prevailing administration view is what's pushed through the so-called MSM, sometimes it serves an important function to keep alternate views, stories, out there, before the so-called MSM buries them.  As I have complained before, often a really important story gets printed and backpaged (sometimes even scrubbed from a website).  The newspaper in question will claim it did its job because at least they published the story, however downgraded its column inches and location are.  But bloggers have found ways to keep the material alive much longer.  It is progressive bloggers who should rightly take credit for bringing the majority of Americans along to the point that they now see what we were saying all along about Iraq.  That is one of the triumphs of progressive blogging.  The only problem is it took until long after the war started to persuade Americans, a significant problem.  But we tried. the so-called MSM did not.

But it is this power of bloggers that has the Republicans pushing back on, finding news ways to enhance control, consolidate ownership, and fire dissident reporters.  1000 journalists have just recently lost their jobs. THIS is at a time when the average newspaper profit is 15%.  That's not such a bad percentage.  But corporate news exploiters and destriyers like Zell want more.  (He also spent too much to buy the newest addition --tribune Company--his media empire.) Meanwhile, the Bushies, Rove and McCain smile as the range of opinion in all traditional media gets smaller and smaller, and as media questions for Barack Obama get framed using the GOP frame.  Obama is pushing back agaisnt that frame and alternating his own.  Folks like Wesley Clark are too (why is he not on the apparent "short list"?)  Obama's media people (when they get heard) do an excellent job.  The question is, will enough people hear them rather than the Republican Noise Machine.

We may have to take our Ipods and MP3s out and start playing some of the material for voters.  I am still waiting for a campaign to capture the added potential of such a strategy.  
 

For instance, Eric and I took a trip to SWVA a few months ago and reported on it with photos and analysis.  The other night I attended the Tysons Tunnel meeting and reported on it. I do stuff like this all the time, and will continue to do it (including at the Democratic National Convention, where I hope to give people a feel for what's going on behind the scenes...). It's interesting, by the way, that there were so few comments on that Tysons Tunnel diary, by the way.  Do people really WANT independent reporting? I mean, that's "only" a crucial, $5 billion project that will affect the entire state and the entire region...whatever!!!  

Hope you get to do more of that in the presidential.  The ninth district swing (Sat and Sun before the election) will occur as usual this year too.

And RK will be at the convention.  (I still think some in the media are just jealous of that, Lowell!)

One other thing, if things were more balanced than they are, blogs and traditional media could complement each other.  It's regrettable that journalists and reporters (they are not the same thing) are so threatened by downsizings and layoffs.  But I think that has made them even more sensitive to the role of blogs.  However, in the best of all worlds we'd still need both.  It's a new world.  There are ways to capitalize on what's best of all media formats.  Let the creative among them do so, as some of them are --on truly fantastic blogs.  More on that later.  I think I may do a rec. blog roundup.  All of us continue to run into new and excellent finds. And we should share that info!  

would counter that it wasn't their job to frame opinion about the war.  But they did, in the most hawkish way.  So any whining about blogs being biased is just downright laughable.

What passes for coverage, even of this election is, for the most part, a mockery of real journalism.   The daily horse race.  Why is this or that canddidate not ahead?  How does Barack Obama defend himself against the latest attack ad of John McCain?  Why won't Obama "admit John McCain was right about the 'surge'"?  The oft-quoted Factcheck.org is funded by the Annenberg (rich backer of Ronald Reagan) Foundation, for Goodness sakes.  It may be at Penn.  But Hoover is at Stanford. So, just how are we to trust it.  But the networks do.  And most liberals I know quote it!!!!!!  Pew is funded by the heirs of Sun Oil.  And Pew is the new "gospel" of surveys.

Meanwhile, John McCain, the serial dissembler still wears the "Straight talk express" mantle, conveyed by the still-adoring media.  We have our work cut out for us.  And, no, we can't depend on the media to tell the truth about any of it.

Some of the junk written during the primary wars, I forwarded the article with my comments.

My email send box is full of these esp. when the AP posts stuff by Nedra Pickler.

It is tiresome how many still refuse to believe how far we are down the road to this kind of partisan-Republican lock on all means of traditional communication.  Just this week, Scott McClellan admitted the White House sent talking points out to the media, esp FAUX "News."  Scotty partially backed off from his remarks when Bill-O yelled loud enough.  But, as the documentary, Outfoxed shows, FOX actually used the talking points.  You can watch that network on a typical day and see it happening.  They all use the same phrasing to boost Republicans and attack Barack Obama and Democrats.  It is also happening on MSNBC and CNN, where routinely, Dems are grilled on why Barack needs to defend himself against the latest McCain attack (using McCain's words).  Doing media watch can really suck sometimes.  

And, as Olbermann noted last night, government propaganda is illegal.  What are the odds anyone will do anything about it?

but I think what he is trying to do is laudable -- that is. look at news critically and report on it from a perspective, rather than the he said/she said kind of vapid, pointless reporting that has come to define objectivity in the MSM.

I don't particularly care for Fournier's POV, as it is fair to consider whether a wire service is better off writing in the anondyne he said/she said style.

The problem with Fournier is that this kind of reporting does not work when the editor is an advocate of a particular candidate or ideology, rather than dedicated to truth and accuracy. It is where Olbermann crossed the line for me, also. He can be fun to watch rant, but it is now a stretch to say that he can effectively report news. The fact that he anchors election coverage is a joke for this reason.