That Leading Headline
Okay, folks. Have a look at this article from the Associated Press. Now, call me crazy, but "Bush Teleconference With Soldiers Staged" doesn't exactly match up with the description, at least not the way I see it. According to the article, a couple of items (water bottles) were moved out of the picture, and there was instruction prior to the teleconference regarding who would answer what type of questions, and how the microphone would be passed. To me, that doesn't constitute "staged" or "choreographed". Were these soldiers scripted? It doesn't sound like it. Were they instructed to provide answers that backed up what President Bush had to say? Nope.
You have to dig to the bottom of the article to find this clarification:
This is just ridiculous, and it's yet another reason why I don't trust journalists. When I read an opinion piece, at least I can usually tell what the author's bias is. In these "hard news articles", it's not so cut-and-dried. They plaster a misleading/totally untrue headline like "Bush Teleconference With Soldiers Staged" up there, as if it's some scandal. Knowing that most people only read the first three or four paragraphs of a hard news article, they hide the truth - that this is common when teleconferencing and doing group interviews - in the middle of the article.
As someone who's studied journalism now for eight years as a serious academic subject, and written for several publications, instances like this from so-called "professional journalists" absolutely make my skin crawl.
You have to dig to the bottom of the article to find this clarification:
White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Thursday's event was coordinated with the Defense Department but that the troops were expressing their own thoughts. With satellite feeds, coordination often is needed to overcome technological challenges, such as delays, he said.
"I think all they were doing was talking to the troops and letting them know what to expect," he said, adding that the president wanted to talk with troops on the ground who have firsthand knowledge about the situation.
This is just ridiculous, and it's yet another reason why I don't trust journalists. When I read an opinion piece, at least I can usually tell what the author's bias is. In these "hard news articles", it's not so cut-and-dried. They plaster a misleading/totally untrue headline like "Bush Teleconference With Soldiers Staged" up there, as if it's some scandal. Knowing that most people only read the first three or four paragraphs of a hard news article, they hide the truth - that this is common when teleconferencing and doing group interviews - in the middle of the article.
As someone who's studied journalism now for eight years as a serious academic subject, and written for several publications, instances like this from so-called "professional journalists" absolutely make my skin crawl.
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