Objectivity in the Media (Re-Run)
ON THE CORNER OF 32ND street and Broadway in New York City, not far from where once a year floats and inflated Bart Simpsons roll down the street for a parade, near an area known as Herald Square, lies a dark green satute of a an old man with spectacles on, leaning back in a chair, his arms slouched over the armrests of the chair. The average passerby certainly has no idea who he is, disregards the statue, sees it as little more than a stoop for birds.
If they cared -- and they certainly would not care -- to inspect its base, they would find that it is a statue of Horace Greeley, an icon of 19th Century American journalism. And his roller coaster of a life is a lot more interesting than the boring statue he got.
Herald Square is an interesting Memorial point for Horace Greeley, who was the former editor of the newspaper the New York Tribune. He couldn't stand the New York Herald, and spent a good chunk of his ink attacking down that paper's editor, William Bennent. Nor did the Herald love him back, with Bennent refering to him in his pages routinely as a "wretch" an "ogre." Yes, this was good old fashioned objective journalism in the 1850s, with all the professionalism of the WWF.
Greeley's paper supported the Whigs, then later the Republicans. Politically, Greeley's tribune was for a protective tarrif. And very much abolitionist. Personally he had socialist view; he was concerned about the slums and bettering the average working people of New York City.
If you know one quote of Greeley, and that is 'Go West Young Man!' which was not the celebration of Manifest Destiny that it might be seen as today, Greeley did not really mean to call America to explore her interior from ocean to ocean. It was his exhoration to the working poor he saw around him and suggestion on how to improve their lot -- by getting out of the city and getting land west. But he didn't want it to be an empty promise. He also argued successfuly for a Homestead Act to provide free land for the downtrodden western newcomers.
Greeley argued against the Mexican War which he spoke of in terms its doubtful few published newspapers would refer to the Iraq conflict today. Greeley called the Mexican War a "fatomless abyss of crime and absurdity..." The fact that it was a war we were easily winning did not detur Greeley. He called President James Knox Polk the Father of lies, and blared headlines across his paper Sign Anything, Ratify Antything Do anything to end the guilt the bloodsheed and the Shame!!
In 1848 Greeley himself was appointed by Whig leaders to Congress, and he railed against abuses in that body. He at once saw injustice in a law that compensated legislators at a $8 a mile, getting a reporter to track the average congressman's route compared to the postal routes and finding that most were padding (with the exception of a young congressman named Abraham Lincoln and 11 others who he found were actually owed money). He took the hosue floor "I know you know not of saving, he decried the members. ''Your gentlemanly work is Spending, Taking, Distributing.' His fellow members did not change the compensation scheme and threatened to expell him, later allowing him to end his unlected term.
Greeley's paper was influential and important, his comments were often reprinted in other papers, which was a common occurance at the time - paper exchange and reprint was kind of like an early World Wide Web -- and he played a role in the founding of the Republican party and later was very influential in drumming up support for Abraham Lincoln.
Greeley was impatient and impuslive, and his newspaper reflected that. Prior to the Civil War, Greeley resisted calls for peace with the South or war with the South, saying simply, let them leave. But after Fort Sumter, Greeley became a war monger...put a headline in the paper for a solid week, saying Forward to Richmond, in huge block letters.. Forward to Richmond, the rebel Congress must not be allowed to meet there on the 20th of July! By that date the place must be held by the National Army. With words Greeley sought to order an army, and some blamed Greeley for inciting public opinon and encouraging the Lincoln Administration into hurrying a show of force at the battle of Bull Run, which ended with Union forces in disarray. Greeley was devestated when that battle didn't work out.
So powerful was Greeley's paper that when he addressed an open letter to Abraham Lincoln asking for emancipation, the man in the White House actually felt the need to reply to this editor. That is the quote you may have heard where Lincoln said 'if i can preserve the union by freeing the slaves ...if i can preserve the Union without i would..."--that was a letter to Greeley. Greeley backed the Commander in chief when he issued the emancipation proclomation, syaing GOD BLESS ABRAHAM LINCLOLN, but then the next year said he feared there could not be a good war or bad peace...
Greeley attempted to work out a peace deal with confederate agents who were operating out of Canada. After the war, the one time great abolitionist called for mercy for slaveowners of the Confederacy and a pardon for Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee.
During Grant's presidency, Greeley was upset by the corruption in his administration and tired of Union troops in the South and joined the 'Liberal Republican' movement of 1872 and joined the Presidential race as the anti-Grant candidate, accepting the support of the Democratic party that he had trashed his entire editorial career... He was ridiculed as a turncoat and a crazy man. which turned out to be somewhat true. Following his defeat on election day, he checked into a sanitarium, and he died before the electoral votes could be counted in the Presidential race.
If the fact that Greeley ran for congress while being an editor seems shocking, it was not so at the time. His rival Raymond was the chairman of the republican national committee and ran Lincoln's re-eleciton, all while remaining editor of the NY Times. Later in the century both names associated with tabloid journalism -Pulitizer and Hearst would both serve in congress at different times, with Hearst also running for New York governor and new york city mayors, both realizing they had more power in ink than in office as one vote of hundreds.. Joseph Medill, the publisher of the Chicago Tribune and another Lincoln backer, later became Mayor of Chicago. Two of our Presidents, William McKinley and Warren Harding were newspaper editors prior to running for office. When Harding ran for President, he faced off against Governor James M. Cox of Ohio, who had also build up a name that remains today in the newspaper business, making the 1920 election a battle of newspaper publishers.
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I agree that most people understand today that no one can be 100-percent objective.
Even casual reading of political fights in colonial newspapers shows that "going negative" is as old as the hills.
During the 20th century, journalists began to pursue the idea that it was indeed possible to be obective. And they sold this idea pretty successfully to mainstream America, as reflected in the media campaigns and what was taught in most high schools.
On their own, most college-educated folks began to discern for themselves that "objectivity" was not quite what they had been taught to believe. And those who took a few basic philosophy courses learned to even challenge historians for their bias.
The current trend is toward "full-disclosure, subective journalism." The idea is that it's ok to be subjective as long as you admit your biases (at least to a degree).
The main stumbling block to this approach has been, and probably will continute to be for the foreseeble future, not what defining what "news" is, but defining what "opinion" is.
The "objective model" newspapers created departments--for example, News on the Front Page, subjective ideas on the "Opinion" page etc.
In working through what "opinion" is, some media critics are making the case that the emphasis should be on "fact-based opinion" not simply "value-based opinion".
For example, I think pink houses are best and you think yellow houses are best. This can never be resolved by "facts" or "debates."
I always like to think about John Edwards and his political downfall. Was it real news that brought him down? I think this was a half and half situation. Another situation is Palin's daughter. The only thing I can think of that would make it newsworthy would be that Palin supports teaching of abstinence and so the question should be raised, does that program work?
However, because it involves a young girl I agree with the mainstream media's decision not to pursue it.
It's akin to protecting the names and identities of child victims of crime. You must way the public good with what's best for the children involved.
That said, to drop the "issue" completely I think is poor journalism. They can question the policy without making it personal. They could even do it in a nonpartisan way in order to bring people's attention to this legitimate political debate.
Just leave the kids out of it.
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