“You might not like it, but it’s smart politics.”
Recently someone asked me why, in facing up to the realities of the Trump presidency, the press has not broken with some of its more destructive habits (For what I mean by “destructive habits,” see...
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Two paths forward for the American press
As the results of the 2020 election come fully into view, I am asking myself what will happen with the American press after Donald Trump leaves the White House. Most of the commentary on this question...
View ArticleThe coming confrontation between the American press and the Republican Party
First published in a slightly different form as “America’s Press and the Asymmetric War for Truth” at the New York Review of Books site, Nov. 1, 2020 In my last post before the fateful election of...
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Tim Lambert and Scott Blanchard of WITF.org explain why they decided to...
WITF.org is the public broadcaster in the Harrisburg region of central Pennsylvania. On January 28 the newsroom explained a new policy toward those in public office who spread the election fraud lie...
View ArticleIf you’re worried that journalists have learned nothing from the Trump years.
Even after all that has happened from the escalator to the insurrection, you’re worried that the American press has learned nothing from the Trump years. You’re seeing it fall into old patterns. Your...
View ArticleA current list of my top problems in pressthink, May 2021
1. We have a two-party system and one of the two is anti-democratic. The Republican Party tried to overturn the results of a free and fair election. When that failed it did not purge the...
View ArticleThe “here’s where we’re coming from” statement in journalism
Eleven years ago I published at my site, PressThink, an FAQ about The View from Nowhere. There I tried to explain what I meant in adapting that phrase to press criticism. This post is a companion to...
View ArticleThe savvy turn in political journalism
For 15 years I have been writing about what I call the savvy style in the American press. This post is about the moment when a journalist goes there. Or refuses to. But first: what is the savvy style?...
View ArticleAnswers to Craig’s Questions
I have known Craig Newmark for a long time. He’s the Craig from craigslist.org. Now he’s best defined as a philanthropist. Craig supports a lot of journalism projects, including one named for him: The...
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He used to edit political stories at the Chicago Tribune. Now he says the...
In the autumn of 2021, I began noticing threads like this from Mark Jacob, a former editor at the Chicago Tribune and the Sun-Times. It’s not uncommon for journalists to become more critical of their...
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