Bias? What bias?

PressThink refers to Vodkapundit's - Pay No Attention To The Arrogance Behind The Curtain, in which Will Collier refers to an e-mail from Steve Lovelady of CJR Daily. I believe the order of events is: this post, then this one, and finally this one.

VodkaPundit's (Mr. Collier's) commenters have some fantastic things to say in response to a comment posted by Mr. Lovelady.

(More below....)

Mr. Lovelady's second comment provoked the most response, particularly this this statement:

1 -- We are not talking about "news reports" aired by CNN here. We are talking about interpretations of one man's offhand comments at a supposedly off-the-record session where people were encouraged to think out loud.
Have you seen any "news reports" on CNN asserting the worst of what Eason Jordan is alleged to have said ? I haven't.

One of the other commenters, Jay King, fisks this excerpt beautifully:

"We are not talking about "news reports" aired by CNN here. We are talking about interpretations of one man's offhand comments at a supposedly off-the-record session where people were encouraged to think out loud."

Now I'm going to assume that you wrote that with due care and consideration, and that it wasn't you just thinking out loud. Fair enough?

Interpretations?
Oh, you mean biased conclusions drawn to fit a preconceived (right wing?) agenda? Or multiple on-the-record reports from eye witnesses, including two DEMOCRAT senators?

One man's?
Oh, you mean some random 'man on the street' guy? Or a key news executive of CNN, a global news organization?

Offhand comments?
Oh, you mean that Mr Jordan's words were just thrown out there, without a care, and were inconsequential? Or were they a very serious charge against the USA, and in line apparently with Mr Jordan's follow-up statements in Davos, and certainly with his earlier on-the-record comments about the USA abusing journalists?

Supposedly off-the-record session?
Oh, you mean some chat over a few beers in the local bar? Or a carefully planned meeting moderated by David Gergen, and including a top BBC executive, a top CNN executive, and two US senators, at the World Economic Conference?

...where people were encouraged to think out loud?
Oh, you mean that Mr Gergen was encouraging the participants to speculate based on their prejudiced agendas? Or that he would have expected, especially from a journalist of Mr Jordan's stature, facts to be the basis of the discussion; and was, by all reports, dismayed at the accusations levelled by Mr Jordan? As were Senators Frank and Dodd?

I note that "CJR's mission is to promote better journalism." Does that include deliberate distortion of reality by careful selection of words?

I couldn't find a better example than [that which] you have supplied if I tried. Is someone PAYING you to illustrate how to slant a story by cunning choice of vocabulary and phrasing? If so, they're getting their money's worth.

Let's see now: given a choice, would I rather sit down and have a beer and a chat with Senator Franks, Senator Dodd, and Mr Gergen: or with you and Mr Jordan?

Ouch! Slam dunk!

Later on, Frank Rachelle makes a beautiful analogy:

With all due respect I am absolutely stunned that Mr. Lovelady, a former Philadelphia Inquirer editor and current editor of Columbia Journalism Review would make the kind of comments he's making here.

Sir, let's suppose you were still an editor at the Inquirer and you were faced with this possible story:

A blogger from the New York Times writes that Donald Rumsfeld has made a statement at an international event that "we have to torture terrorists to get information" The statement is made at what is supposed to be an off-the-record event.

But now it's out there.

What would you do? Would you task any of your reporters to check out the story or not?

Now let's go one step further, same scenario. There's no transcript or tape of Rumsfeld available, but numerous credible witnesses, including a Republican U.S. Senator and a conservative Republican congressman have verified the story, on the record, at Daily Kos and Atrios' blogs.

Would you get your reporters on the story now?

Next you find out that there is a TAPE available of Rumsfeld's remarks. But the event organizer won't release it and the DoD is issuing backpedaling statements about Rumsfeld's comments.

Now what? Would the Inquirer demand that the event sponsors release the tape? Would you insist that the DoD release all information about the remarks?

But let's say you did NONE of these things and passed on the story.

Then Rumsfeld resigns, without your paper ever running a story during the heat of the controversy.

Do you think that CJR would write that your paper did a great job on the story?

Do you think the editor of CJR would complain that Daily Kos and Atrios were a "lynch mob" read by "salivating morons" because they broke the story?

Do you think CJR would lament that Rumsfeld was taken down by a bunch of "Lilliputians"?

Or would you be worried that your paper, and all the others who sat on the story, would be ripped by CJR for being so incompetant as to get beat by a bunch of bloggers?

It'll be really interesting to see how CJR covers this latest failure by major media to report a story on one of its own.

But I think the outline for it is already prepped. Just like Corey Pein's absurd essay last month on Rathergate, it isn't hard to guess how CJR will cover the Eason story. Bloggers are bad, they're not pros, a great journalist is ruined over nothing, etc. etc...

If you ever wonder why respect for journalists keeps collapsing, you've got a great example in the Eason Jordan story. I'll be fascinated to see what you do with it.

Great reading - especially with the commentary after the posts. This is the power of the Blogosphere: almost real time discussion, additional information, and points of view.