If a Tree Falls in the Forest...

If a tree falls in the forest and.... The New York Times fails to report it, did it really fall?

Clearly there is a recent and very disturbing trend of the major media that leans leftward to downplay or even ignore rather major news stories.  To be certain, news organizations whether they lean left or right have always modified their reporting in a way that places their philosophies and political leanings in a more favorable light.  Fox News does it and so does NBC News.  This leaning, if you'll pardon the pun, is not news.

But now we see major news organizations simply fail to report news at all, ignoring it as if it doesn't exist.

MSNBC is especially bad about failing to report news unfavorable to Democrats or the Obama administration.  Often, when major news breaks, most people channel surf to get the best reporting and the most viewpoints.  When they reach MSNBC they find there is no story at all, no coverage.  It's not that a story is painted in a positive light, it's that the story doesn't exist.

I'm not sure the public is harmed by this practice as there are many options for news and most people do scan the channels and surf the news websites.  It's not a cover-up.... well, at least it's not a successful cover-up.  

But to see this happen again and again in The New York Times is disturbing.  And it's a well documented and pervasive problem.

There is an example happening right now.  Our nation has been plagues with mostly teens committing assualts on primarily elderly white adults in what has been dubbed "Knockout Games."  The New York Times basically hasn't reported on this nationwide trend beyond a snippet claiming that such attacks doesn't exist or are an "urban myth."

This is all the more funny because even as the Times denies their existence, while city leaders denounce the growing attacks in New York as Hate Crimes. Here's just a small a report from CBS News Channel 2 in New York

Police have arrested four men in connection with an assault in Brooklyn. The suspects allegedly hit the victim without warning, similar to recent incidents related to the so-called “knockout game” in which mobs of young people randomly sucker-punch innocent people for fun.

Around 2:45 a.m. Friday, investigators said a 24-year-old Jewish man was surrounded by four men and punched in the face on 18th Avenue in Borough Park. NYPD officers were nearby in an unmarked police car, commissioner Ray Kelly said Friday afternoon. The victim told investigators he heard one of the attackers say, “I’ll do it to this guy,” right before he was surrounded and punched, sources told CBS 2.

 The suspects fled, but were quickly apprehended and taken into police custody, sources said. The victim identified the suspects, police said. “I commend the excellent police work that we saw this morning,” Assemblyman Dov Hikind said in a statement. “I am grateful that these four thugs are off the streets and am hopeful that they will be treated with the severity of the law. I urge continuing diligence in dealing with this issue.”

Hate crime detectives were interviewing the four suspects — three Hispanic men and one Indian male — and the victim at the 66th Precinct, sources said.  The four men face assault charges, but those may be upgraded, CBS 2′s Don Champion reported.

The suspects range in age from 28 to 38, police said. There have been seven so-called “knockout” or “polar bear” assaults in the Crown Heights and Midwood sections of Brooklyn since October, Kelly said Wednesday. The alternate name “polar bearing” comes from the fact that the victims are white.

Councilman David Greenfield said the attacks have targeted Jewish people, with victims ranging from a 12-year-old boy to a 78-year-old woman. “These are anti-Semitic knockout attacks and it’s not a game,” said Councilman David Greenfield, who is calling on the men arrested early Friday morning to face gang assault charges.

Conservatives are enraged that The Times, Slate Magazine and MSNBC continue to deny the attacks and to deny any racial overtones, in spite of overwhelming exidence.

As Liberals we ought to be even more enraged.  After all it is the Liberal Media denying us the news we need to make intelligent decisions and provide balanced responses to conservative hysteria.  The answer is not to cover-up the news but to cover it fairly.

Why I'm Disappointed in the News Media

I listened to National Public Radio's Morning Edition this morning as I do every morning.  What a superb news organization!  The news stories presented are in depth, thoughtful and thorough.  I'm convinced there isn't a finer news organization working today.

However.......

Today and all this week there hasn't been a single story about the most important new event since the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.  I'm referring, of course, to the 9/11 Anniversary attack on the  Consulate in Benghazi, Libya including the rape, torture and murder of our Libyan Ambassador AND the subsequent bizarre cover-up of events by a White House in the middle of an Election Year Crisis. 

This is a news worthy story. In fact there isn't a single story that even approaches this in terms of importance.  Yet there is no coverage.  No one on NPR is asking the important questions. No one is asking any questions.

This isn't a news blackout.  The New York Post ran the story on their front page.  There have been stories on CBS and ABC News.  And FOX NEWS has it properly positioned as the single most important story of this decade.

FOX NEWS ratings are going through the roof.  The public recognizes the importance of this story.  When the story is completely ignored by MSNBC and only minimally covered by CNN, the audience goes where they must to learn the facts.

Of course FOX NEWS is presenting this story with a distinctly Republican spin.  That makes the FAILURE of NPR and other major news organizations even more disturbing.  The public needs an objective, dispassionate and in depth look at the facts and the White House Spin.  NPR could do that.  But someone, somewhere high up in their news organization is blockading the story.  WHY?

The cheerleader news groups (MSNBC and FOX) do their loyal viewers no good by eliminating news unfavorable to their candidates.  Better they should face the bad news head on and over it properly.  But the other news outlets who claim to be unbiased really betray us all by covering up a story that they will eventually be forced to cover.  All they do is lose credibility by being late to the scene.

Why is The Drudge Report the Single Most Important News Site?

This morning The Drudge Report is trumpeting a study that has determined that the Drudge website DRIVES MORE TRAFFIC than Twitter and Facebook combined!!

The same study by The Outbrain Publisher Network also confirms that Drudge drives more traffic than CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times or The Huffington Post. In fact only the three major search engines, Google, Yahoo and Bing! drive more traffic.

And Drudge is getting more powerful. The report indicates that both his traffic and his referrals are growing. Because of that Drudge, with just two employees aiding the eccentric Matt Drudge, is also increasingly influential. By his simple choice of stories and his paraphrasing of headlines, he becomes an opinion maker!

Because I work in the Internet Industry I am surrounded by "experts," including some of my own employees, who dismiss, criticize and even ridicule the outdated, simplistic, format of the website. To listen to these "experts" it's even a mortal sin to actually use Time New Roman as a font.

"Where's the flash? Where's the javascript? Where's the big pictures, maps, head shots, video, or audio? Where is the comment's section to "engage the loyal readers?" Where is the sacred "Like" button for Facebook? Or even a little "ReTweet" link? The site is circa 1990. It's an embarrassment to the profession of Web Design!!"

So why IS Drudge the premier News site? Actually it's because of all the reasons listed in the two paragraphs of criticism listed above. By eliminating all the add-ons and busy distractions, Drudge presents, in a quick glance, every single important news story of the day.

To be certain, Drudge has a keen instinct for the news that matters. And his super-quick updates often mean he has the important news first (at least before the other aggregation sires).

Most importantly you never need to dig to find a story. It's all on one page. By concentrating on political news, world news and business news, he covers the core of the news. Everyone is content to move on over to Entertainment Weekly or The Sporting News to get the non-essential stories of the day.

Finally, Drudge has enough tabloid flair to amuse the reader and keep the site compelling. If I'm honest the MSNBC, FOX and CNN websites are just as boring as hell. The news isn't there, it's on page whatever. And the home page puts you to sleep, even on a big news day.

So, even as a liberal, I turn to Drudge first, at least 6 or 7 times every day. It literally takes one minute to get up to date on important events.

The Drudge Report ain't broke. Thank god he hasn't tried to fix it.

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Here's another short analysis from several months ago that draws the same conclusions: The Incredible Drudge Report You'll note I borrowed their artwork for my blog entry today.

That's The Way It Is

Today the cable news networks, the big three broadcast networks, virtually every major newspaper and thousands of blogs are all remembering and honoring the legendary CBS News Anchorman Walter Cronkite. Cronkite passed away last night at the age of 92.

Today he is remembered as, perhaps, the last and greatest honest, trusted and impartial news reporter. Almost every story, blog, commentary and tweet says, "He will be missed."

The truth is that he has already been missed. Cronkite's last broadcast was in 1981 and I daresay 95% of those writing, blogging and reporting today never actually saw Cronkite at the anchor's desk. It's been 28 years since Cronkite set a standard that, today, absolutely no one attempts to live up to.

If anything it is a shame that Cronkite outlived journalism, the profession he so loved.

Scott Simon, this morning on National Public Radio, presented a thoughtful tribute to the man who was the face of news in America for over 20 years. You can and should listen to Simon's entire essay here. In his essay Simon made an astonishing honest observation (the editing and emphasis are mine, please listen to Simon's entire tribute):

Millions of people wouldn't believe that President Kennedy had been shot, or men were on the moon, until they heard it from Walter Cronkite. No one person in news will probably have that kind of audience and authority again. There are almost a dozen different national TV news operations now, plus radio, Internet sites and citizen journalists who blog and tweet in real time, and often with real attitude. Today, so much media doesn't try to reach a mass audience, with all its unpredictable diversity and variations. They look for like-minded people who want a view of the news that will reassure them that they're right. If the moon landing happened in today's media landscape, you might have one network trumpet the accomplishment as a triumph for the American way of life. Another might say: impressive, yes, but a victory for the crew-cut military-industrial complex that sucks money for shock-and-awe adventures from social welfare programs. And bloggers might bleat: It was all staged on a set in Roswell, New Mexico.

So today, tonight and tomorrow, as you watch newscaster after newscaster, pundit after pundit, and blogger after blogger, pay loving tribute to a man they never actually saw practicing his craft, ask yourself why no one is attempting to emulate him.

That's the way it is.

In Praise of The Huffington Post

The Wizard is praising The Huffington Post?

O.K., O.K., I know it's impossible, but it's true. I have been a harsh critic of Arianna Huffington and her cadre of Hollywood Glitteratt for years. At times her corral of bloggers smell a lot more like a pigsty, wallowing in a mud hole of hate. A quick review of today's blog posts show that nothing much has changed.

But let's give Arianna and her news staff a great deal of credit and prise for their 24 hour a day reporting of the Iranian Election and subsequent protests. While our cable news networks slept and generally ignored this extremely important story, The Huffington Post was all over it.

Using every resource available to them from bloggers, to Twitter, to international news networks, including al-Jezeera, Huffington has continuously put together one compelling story after another.

A great deal of praise and credit goes to the legions of people worldwide who contribute daily or hourly to Twitter. The Twitterati have provided much needed information and solidarity and support for the people of Iran. Twitter has been so fascinating it is literally difficult to turn off at night. It is our window tot the world. Literally.

Which brings me right back to The Huffington Post. I've "tweeted" several times in the last 72 hours that Nico Pitney deserves and should win a Pulitzer Prize. In fact, if he doesn't win, they simply need to throw the prize away, because it will be meaningless. He writing and editing of video, stories and tweets has been nothing short of masterful. Using the methodology often referred to as "live blogging" he has chronicled the unfolding story in the way television should, but hasn't.

I believe we have actually learned the weakness of television. It is a singular medium, video only. Pitney can seamlessly combine video, written word, audio and still images to a maximum effect.

We can only hope and pray for a good and safe outcome for the people of Iran. But I am certain this is the event that changed the nature of news forever.