Comments on: Reporters And Citizenship

By: legion

legion — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 20:00:23 +0000

Anderson, Yeah, the scenario is rather far-fetched... I don't recall many reporters running around with the Chinese army during Korea or the Wehrmacht during WWII :-) They're trying to pose a moral dilemma - if you're reporting on something that could be detrimental to the US, which comes first, your duty as a citizen or your duty as a reporter? Of course, some would argure that there's a massive moral difference between allowing soldiers to be slaughtered and insisting that the gov't follow it's own laws, but that's a debate for a different thread :-)

By: Anderson

Anderson — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 16:39:46 +0000

I'm confused. If America is fighting on the Southerers' side, why are the Northerners letting us "embed" with them and film their surprise attack preparations? Wouldn't the Northerners fear either that we'd tip off our compatriots, or at least that there'd be a spy among us?

By: Bithead

Bithead — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 14:24:33 +0000

Other option:

Advise the Americans and film them winning against the attack.

Gee. Do I have to think of everything?

;->

By: legion

legion — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 14:20:36 +0000

It's interesting that they don't even seem to recognize a possible third option - stop filming and get the heck out of there. It may be a bit of a coward's option, in that it keeps US troops at risk while the reporters cover their own butts, but it also takes away the PR of covering the ambush the bad guys were hoping to get.

By: DaveD

DaveD — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 14:14:53 +0000

You are an American citizen embedded as a reporter with the enemy. You know the enemy's best laid mortal plans against the men and women who are sacrificing their lives for the cause for which your country is fighting. You choose to give no warning of your knowledge. Is this behavior subject to prosecution? Is the threat to our service personnel the same as a threat to the "country" (civilan population, government itself, etc.)? Does a "journalist" get a free pass? Just asking.

By: Bithead

Bithead — Wed, 28 Jun 2006 13:49:45 +0000

First, let me say I recall that one, as well. I happened to run across that one again recently on one of the local access channels, and was facinated to watch Jennings allow himself to be bullied out of his original position. Wallace, IMO was dead wrong in that case, as was Jennings, eventually.

While I disagree with Danziger on the specific matter of the bank records surveillance story, we certainly agree on that reporters, like the rest of us, are citizens first.

Quite... that is the reality of it.. and one that most 'journalists' refuse to face. And here's one of the things that Rand gets wrong; there ARE in fact no disinterested, or 'objective' parties. None. But, in the 'journalist' framework, I guess that to cut both ways. Once we admit that there are no objective people, the only question remaining is whose side they're on. Wallace clearly labels himself in this. To put a finer edge on this, I break out my 1956 Barnhart dictionary, welcoming you to 'words mean things' and look up the word "jouranlist" : "Someone who writes what they think and see." ...versus the definition of "newsman"... "A man who gathers, reports, or edits the news" The picture I'm trying to show you here, with admittedly, marginal clarity, is one of a news profession which has moved away from being American and reporting the news, to being UNamerican, and writing not the news but what they "think and feel"... and writing with an agenda in mind. Thus, I think, do we see better, the reasons behind what laughingly passes for 'news' about Iraq, the Bush administration, and many more items.

By: Right Wing News (Conservative News and Views)

Right Wing News (Conservative News and Views) — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

Wallace is Jewish], currently engaged in a devastating proxy war with Israel and threatening to wipe out the country entirely. But, damn, hes hot! Wallace, though, is a man whose value set I cant quite understand. I call to your attention, again, to a 1987 exchange from a PBS panel discussion. James Fallows describes in hindsight a dialogue between the late Peter Jennings, then anchor of ABC World News Tonight, and Wallace about a hypothetical war they were covering.

By: Blogger: 404 - Page not found

Blogger: 404 - Page not found — Wed, 31 Dec 1969 18:00:00 +0000

James at OTB this morning, brings up an old TV show; Marc Danziger highlights an exchange from a PBS roundtable discussion from twenty years ago that I remember well. James Fallows describes in hindsight a dialogue between the late Peter Jennings, then anchor of