I spent my life working in network television news. In its heyday, between its quality and its reach, I was glad to be a part of it. Today, I’m glad I’m now talking about it in the past tense.
It’s a painful admission. But I’m not proud of where my business has gone. We all suffer because of it.
In the good old days, TV news was a dependable force to be reckoned with. At the two networks for which I worked, we covered the world and, within the limits of a broadcast, we did it pretty well. But thanks to the proliferation of internet-based news organizations (some honorable, some not) and the consequent loss of audience for any one news outlet and the resultant cuts in ad revenue for almost everyone in the news business, those good old days are gone.
The mainstream media today still serves a purpose but— in terms of both quality and reach— it’s a shadow of its former self. Part of that was brought on by the inescapable consequence of cuts, which are common to broadcast, print, and internet newsrooms alike. But some was brought on by the endeavors of news organizations to reinvent themselves, which many haven’t done very well. Especially in broadcasting. Too many focus groups, too little focus on what matters. The unmentioned motto of many local news organizations is, “If it bleeds, it leads.”
The upshot of that is, people often get too much of what they want to know and not enough of what they need to know.
Which brings me to an op-ed written in The Denver Post this week by the senior congressional representative from Colorado, Democrat Diana DeGette, who bemoans the national equivalent of “If it bleeds, it leads,” namely, political coverage of the eye-catching over the constructive.
— Congresswoman DeGette —
In her commentary, she points to the most recent case (which surely will soon be eclipsed), the “inexcusable” Islamophobic remarks of another Colorado congresswoman, Republican Lauren Boebert. “With all the very serious issues facing our country,” DeGette declared, “the last thing any of us should be focused on right now is her childish, hate-filled behavior. With the constitutional right to seek an abortion under attack and a potentially dangerous new variant of the coronavirus now spreading around the globe… not one, not two, but four pages of the newspaper I opened were dedicated to Boebert's outrageous remarks.”
She went on to cite some “bright spots of bipartisanship” that, contrary to the conduct of a bomb-thrower like Boebert, don’t even make their way to any page at all. For example, a bill the Colorado Democrat co-sponsored with a Michigan Republican to create an advanced research agency to cure diseases such as diabetes, Alzheimer's, cancer, and more. And another, a bipartisan bill to help alleviate the pressure frontline health care workers are feeling from the pandemic. Another, a bill to prevent major corporations from “venue shopping” for a favorable bankruptcy judge. And another, to help protect credit unions.
But as DeGette wrote, “When a lawmaker makes a racist, bigoted remark or says something that is ensured to inflame tensions throughout this country, it is often shared, repeated, reposted and reprinted by major news outlets across the nation.” However, when these beneficial bipartisan bills and others like them make their way through Congress, she laments, “Not a peep.”
More’s the pity. Even though there are legislators on both sides of the aisle who are actually working to make our lives better, we hear little or nothing about it because… well, the Lauren Boeberts of the world drown them out. And they do it through the media’s megaphone.
In a democracy— and this is true for Democrats and Republicans alike—we need to know what politicians are doing in Congress or the Statehouse or City Hall so that we can make intelligent choices come each election day. There’s no debate about that. But I’d argue that we also need to know what firebrands like Boebert are doing because, if a member of Congress has a following beyond the borders of his or her district, as she does, then when she spouts her repugnant rhetoric— or sends a holiday photo showing her surrounded by her four young sons in front of a Christmas tree, each holding an assault-style weapon— she is speaking and acting as we nowadays painfully understand for millions of Americans.
— Is this really something we need to see? Maybe the answer is yes —
We need to know— and this too is true for both sides of the aisle— because there is nothing more dangerous than failing to understand how the other side thinks.
It’s not clear whether Congresswoman DeGette is advocating some sort of values-based censorship by the mainstream media, or just more balance between the thoughtful and the titillating. In my view, there’s a place for coverage of bipartisanship bills and Boebert’s behavior. What we don’t want is having journalists decide what’s worthy and what’s not, who’s good and who’s not. The news you don’t get one day because it comes from a dangerous demagogue might be the news you need the next.
In those good old days, the mainstream media (which was pretty much all we had) saw public service, and the transmission of information, as priority number one. Cover every issue, hear all sides, let the public figure it out.
Those good old days are gone. Only the news organizations themselves can bring them back. Until and unless that happens, I’ll still be glad to think about my own proud years in the news business in the past tense.
For almost five decades Greg Dobbs has been a correspondent for two television networks including ABC News, a political columnist for The Denver Post and syndicated columnist for Scripps newspapers, a moderator on Rocky Mountain PBS, and author of two books, including one about the life of a foreign correspondent called “Life in the Wrong Lane.” He has covered presidencies and politics at home and international crises around the globe, from Afghanistan to South Africa, from Iran to Egypt, from the Soviet Union to Saudi Arabia, from Nicaragua to Namibia, from Vietnam to Venezuela, from Libya to Liberia, from Panama to Poland. Dobbs has won three Emmys, and the Distinguished Service Award from the Society of Professional Journalists. Some of his writing also appears on a website he co-founded, BoomerCafe.com.
I notice you didn't include the anti-semitic and anti-American shots by Representative Ilhan Omar (and a couple of other Congresspersons). Perhaps leaving material for another essay?
In the heyday of broadcast TV news consumption there were limited sources of news information. Also entertainment. In this environment it was extremely important for those sources to present multiple or at least fact-based information. I suppose most tried to the extent that editorial opnion, advertisers and the culture at large afforded them to. Today almost as much information is created in a year than in the history of mankind. People in America are basically free (if they pay) to choose (unfortunately many unknowingly) their preferred flavor of news, infotainment or digital entertainment. Not easy and probably not very desirable to try and regulate this. I believe education around what news is and isn't and how it can be biased and/or distorted is critical. Not just to adults but to kids in school as well. Some will choose to support media groups like AllSides that present the news for you to consume as a dragonfly would see the world. Most probably will opt for lean-back infotainment. Maybe labels are another idea - this is what some of the social media companies have been experimenting with when they for example label an Facebook account, "Russia State Controlled Media".