Journalism 101: Sources of Misinformation

 
From Billy Wilder's Ace in the Hole to the final season of HBO's The Wire (with the chillingly prophetic Network in between), there has been a large number of narratives spelling out the numerous dangers that can occur when members of the free press lose sight of the discipline their vocation requires and start playing havoc with the rules. Think about this, the journalists' role as laymen who speak truth to power and the populace is so vaunted that they have become an archetype that could be used in cautionary tales.

Given that, how did we come to this?

For the click-averse, the link leads you to Richard Pérez-Peña's NYT article about the, admittedly brilliant, hoaxters Eitan Gorlin and Dan Mirvish, who have created a conservative mouthpiece (serving several roles in the movement, from simple Giuliani supporter, to McCain advisor) out of whole cloth. With this simple, yet elaborate, ruse, they managed to snooker a surprising number of political publications and legitimate news sources; this list includes MSNBC, The New Republic, the LA Times, and Mother Jones.

What's alarming about all of this is that the tenet being ignored here is one of the most basic in the world of journalism: Verify Your Sources. Here's a question: If this essential step is being played fast and loose with, what else is going by the way side?

Obviously, there are many factors at play here. The institutional desire not to miss out on a hot story, and the 24 hour news cycle's dependence on said hot story in order to remain relevant play a large part in the problem. So does the Atwater/Rove/Cheney/Schmidt school of manipulating the media; and it's doubtful that we would be this far gone without the existence of Rush Limbaugh, G. Gordon Liddy, Ollie North and FOXNews.

However, the real problem here is that it's been around for so long that we have become somewhat inured to it. This problem first reared its head when Rush and Newt's army caused a stir with Vince Foster's suicide and other Whitewater insinuations; they took a situation that looked somewhat hinky and turned it into Something Very Shady. The media bought in not long thereafter by colluding with the right wing and creating the hugely overblown Lewinski scandal (no pun intended), where an intern's stain on a dress almost got a president impeached. The French still chortle about this one.

From there it was a mere hop, skip and a jump to having Rove and Cheney feed items like "flip-flopper," "invented the internet," "president you could have a beer with," "Hussein supports Al Quaida," "yellow cake," "mission accomplished," Valerie Plame, "Swiftboat Vets," et. al. directly onto the front page.

You'd think with this track record, in addition to the enormous embarrassments that were Jayson Blair, Stephen Glass and Jeff Gannon (along with the recent bit of Bush White House chicanery, the placing of Pentagon mouthpieces in positions to spout right wing propaganda directly to news organizations), that responsible journalists in the media would've learned their lesson. Alas, as Salon's Glenn Greenwald often points out, there are no repercussions for these failings.

What used to be grounds for dismissal is now dismissed with a shrug and a handy platitude for an excuse; either "we should've done our job better" or "we only report this because it's what people want to know," depending on the situation. Then it's only a matter of coasting along until the next kerfuffle pops up.

Seems like all of that fun had at Sarah Palin's expense for not verifying they were speaking to Sarkozy was a bit premature, eh, guys?

Then again, if offenders were forced to adhere to a month of Limbaugh's diet, we wouldn't have to worry about the problem for too long. (See what I did there?)
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Update - For the record, Gorlin and Mirvish did not fabricate the "Sara Palin did not know Africa was a continent" story. Apparently, that is still all too real. - TBO