The following is an excerpt from OpinionJournal.com’s “Best of the Web” written by the editor, James Taranto.
Transparency for Me, but Not for Thee
“Last week, the Gannett Wisconsin Media Investigative Team broke a story that appeared in The [Appleton] Post-Crescent, exposing 29 circuit court judges who signed petitions to recall Gov. Scott Walker,” boasts Genia Lovett, the paper’s president and publisher. “It was a story we were proud to bring to you. It was watchdog journalism in its finest sense, a role we take seriously.”
Just one problem:
Today, in the interest of full transparency, we are informing you that 25 Gannett Wisconsin Media journalists, including nine at The P-C, also signed the Walker recall petitions. It was wrong, and those who signed were in breach of Gannett’s Principles of Ethical Conduct for Newsrooms.
There follows a lot of self-important verbiage about journalistic ethics, The folks at Gannett turn out to have a “core belief” in “journalistic neutrality,” which makes the incident “disheartening.” You will be relieved to hear that “it has caused us to examine deeply how this happened” and that the Gannetters “are now in the process of addressing discipline and presenting supplemental ethics training for all news employees.”
But this is priceless [the paper says]: “First and foremost, we decided to inform our readers and be as open as possible. We have decided not to name the employees.”
So when journalists expose improper political activity by nonjournalists, that’s “watchdog journalism in its finest sense.” When journalists themselves are caught engaging in improper political activity, they get to remain anonymous and claim they’re being “as open as possible.” If you think there’s something wrong here, you probably just need “supplemental ethics training.”
(NOTE: James Taranto is traveling today. The excerpt above is from the 3/26/11 BOTW archives.)
For more “Best of the Web” click here and look for the “Best of the Web Today” link in the middle column below “Today’s Columnists.”
