Some Role Models for Journalists
Journalists aren't getting much respect these days, some with good reason. Others are being constrained by cowardly and sycophantic media companies bowing down to MAGA.
When I was in the third grade, my Mom got married to a newspaper reporter. For the next few years we moved all over the state as the chain he worked for kept promoting him from reporter, to city editor to editor in chief. I learned how much work goes into reporting the news as I watched my step dad work long hours at marathon city council meetings for the Gastonia Gazette. I learned how to keep stats at high school sporting events for the New Bern Sun Journal and how to develop film in the darkroom of the Harnett County News. Our family made a trip to Washington, DC once so he could attend a press conference President Ford held just for the NC press. The biggest story he ever worked on was the return of Robert Garwood, an American Marine captured in Vietnam in 1965. Garwood didn't return to the US until 1979. He was sent to Camp Lejeune adjacent to the city of Jacksonville, NC where lived. My step father covered his court martial where he was found not guilty of desertion, the solicitation of U.S. troops in the field to refuse to fight and to defect and of maltreatment
When people criticize everyone involved in reporting the news of being untrustworthy, or sellouts or downright dishonest, I know better. Journalism can be a low paying, thankless job performed ny incredibly dedicated people. Here are a few examples.
Woodward, Bernstein reflect on Watergate reporting 50 years later - ABC News
How investigative master Seymour Hersh broke the story of the My Lai massacre - Nieman Storyboard
The Panama Papers: Exposing the Rogue Offshore Finance Industry - ICIJ
How the CIA Watched Over the Destruction of Gary Webb - The Intercept
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