The Albuquerque Journal has done one of those stories that makes a common practice seem like a crime. They have singled out a guy in Las Cruces for making recommendations to Governor Richardson on who might make a good Judge. Every Governor who has ever appointed judges has always relied on someone to scout out candidates for judicial appointments. But in Richardson's case they try and make it look sinister.
Last night at dinner with friends we took a poll on how many of our children subscribe to newspapers. Not one of the six of them do so. They get their information else where. And so you would think that publishers might find a way of attracting young folks to get newsprint on their fingers. In the case of the Albuquerque rag, nothing of the sort is happening. One of the folks at dinner last night just returned from several years in New Orleans. Their newspaper recently cut down to publishing only three days a week. She said most people didn't even notice.
Here is one way to exhibit some journalism at the Journal. Conduct a 90 minute free wheeling interview with the Governor on the state of the state and publish it verbatim. We all decided last night that she is really in over her head and does not really understand the issues in front of her. She only conducts interviews on her terms and the media should take her to task for not showing her command of the issues and her visions to make our economy a more viable one. I am betting she cant give an answer more than a 15 second sound bite for TV.
Last night at dinner with friends we took a poll on how many of our children subscribe to newspapers. Not one of the six of them do so. They get their information else where. And so you would think that publishers might find a way of attracting young folks to get newsprint on their fingers. In the case of the Albuquerque rag, nothing of the sort is happening. One of the folks at dinner last night just returned from several years in New Orleans. Their newspaper recently cut down to publishing only three days a week. She said most people didn't even notice.
Here is one way to exhibit some journalism at the Journal. Conduct a 90 minute free wheeling interview with the Governor on the state of the state and publish it verbatim. We all decided last night that she is really in over her head and does not really understand the issues in front of her. She only conducts interviews on her terms and the media should take her to task for not showing her command of the issues and her visions to make our economy a more viable one. I am betting she cant give an answer more than a 15 second sound bite for TV.
6 comments:
At least they buried the lead, to use some journalism jargon.
They are trying to prove that it was a pay for play situation, but that isn't even mentioned until paragraph 5.
They never do prove it, like you say. They go go on and on about these emails they got their hands on, which they got, ironically, with requests under the freedom of information act, a law conservatives detest and are always trying to overturn. But it looks like the Journal is so tickled with itself for getting them that they inadvertently made the story about themselves. Their emails that they got.
If the lead is buried like that, many readers will lose interest before they figure out the point of the story, and will have moved on before the paper gets around to letting them know.
This was essentially an editorial mistake. Someone should have noticed the lead was buried and rewritten it or had the reporter do it.
In the end though, it's just a weak story. As you point out, it's written in a way that inflates the importance of what they found, and they use innuendo to make up for what they were hoping to find, the elusive and probably non existent "smoking gun."
If fact, the absence of a smoking gun might have been the reason they buried the lead, so people wouldn't notice that they didn't prove what they were hoping to. Either way, they buried the lead.
I'd seen one on camera interview with the governor, with a young local TV reporter, and she looked very uncomfortable. Here's another one I did not know about, with a national Fox News person who's had some bad plastic surgery, from December '12.
http://gretawire.foxnewsinsider.com/video/uncut-gov-susana-martinez-on-the-record/
This goes on for 30 some minutes, but you can click forward. December was shortly after the election.
Here, too, she is very uncomfortable unless giving a sound byte answer to something she's prepared for.
It could be stage fright but sometimes that comes from not knowing your lines, or not knowing what you're talking about.
The Santa Fe Reporter has many emails posted on its website about the susana2010 email exchanges to include a batch from October 2011 from Paul Kennedy advising the Gov about certain judges. He even mentions that Julie Altweiss from Metro Court isn't highly respected. The emails are still on the website under their story about the Gov's lack of transparency. They even posted Mr Kennedy's cease and desist letter.
"Mainstream" reporters have proven repeatedly they are simply corporate hacks and suck-ups to the powerful. Young people, and a lot of us older people, threw the Journal out a long time ago. It's corporate "infotainment", designed to sell the latest products, wars, etc.
My eyes!!!! I watched the Fox Insider interview.
Here's another wacko Journal story from today.
http://www.abqjournal.com/main/2013/05/11/news/new-dual-credit-high-school-to-open-in-albuquerque.html
Tacked onto the front of a story about the opening of a new high school that lets gets get college credit while they're still in high school is some gratuitous PR for Governor Martinez.
The governor showed up, which is fine. She made some remarks, which is fine. She may have even helped promote the idea that's being tried out here, which is fine. But that's not the story. It wasn't a campaign stop, except in the Journal management's fetid imagination where everything is either for or against the politics of conservatism.
At least the lowly copy editor who wrote the headline got it right.
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