Where Were the Media as Wall Street Imploded?
There are plenty of people to share the blame for the collapse of the nation's financial system.... But what about the self-described watchdogs in the media? Full Story »
Posted by Dan KennedyReview
This is one of the highest ratings that I have given on NewsTrust because the author's analysis mirrors my own, not only as a journalism director but also as a researcher specializing in the failure of news media to cover top stories. My conclusion after several years of research is that reporters, downsized and pre-occupied by new media, neglect increasingly to follow up on stories. So yes, some reporters did document the failure of the U.S. economy. But no, they did not follow up persistently as watchdogs are supposed to do.
“So, as long as the stock market is going up, people don’t really pay attention to a lot of other things,” says Gretchen Morgenson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning business columnist for The New York Times. She has covered the slow-motion train wreck of the subprime mortgage market extensively, and she has also obsessed about executive compensation for years. “The fact is many, many banks took on far too much risk in the interests of trying to juice their profits,” Morgenson said. “Often one of the results of juiced profits is higher pay.” Morgenson said she began to piece together how those two dynamics interwove starting in 2007, thanks to her sources. Her ensuing coverage has understandably won wide praise.
She deserves another Pulitzer for her coverage. One of the few business reporters I trust.
As a prime example of how the news media fails to follow up, I'll include a link to one of the biggest and yet unpursued stories in recent years: the military's allowing deserter Marine Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun to walk away after one of the biggest hoaxes since Orson Wells' 1938 War of the Worlds. Only this war was Iraq.