Common Sense: The Path Back to Credibility for the Media Starts With “We Were Wrong”

There is no way to sugarcoat any of this.  If the legacy linear media has any hope of regaining the trust of the public, it starts with loudly saying “WE. WERE. WRONG. WE ARE SORRY. WE WILL DO BETTER.”   Attempts to escape blame for replacing their historic standards for the practice of journalism with shrill partisanship is seen for what it is. 

“Who, what, where, when, why, and how” served as the enduring guiding light for journalism for many, many years.  Did platforms have ideological leanings?  Absolutely.  The idea within the MSM that they might be central to their current problem of lost trust by the public because of abandoning those principles is a foreign concept.  

Pick your topic.  The active participation by the MSM in selling a singular narrative is all too obvious.  Think back to their behavior in real-time.  Smugness, arrogance, and certitude defined their behavior.  

The grandest of malfeasance by the MSM has been their approach to Joe Biden and Donald Trump.  The New York Post broke the story about Hunter Biden’s computer on October 14. 2020.  Five days later, 51 intelligence community officials signed a letter claiming it had all the earmarks of Russian misinformation.  No need to question their motives. Biden used the letter in a debate to dismiss any concerns over the computer. NPR took pride in not running a story because it might have been helpful to Trump.   All the time, the FBI was fully aware the computer was real and said nothing.  

Of course, the worst of the worst is the media’s coverage of Biden’s obvious loss of cognitive ability this last election.  Were it not for the June debate debacle, we would still be listening to sharp as a tack, cheap fakes, and other nonsense.  After the debate, we went from “just a bad night” to being shocked by being misled by those dastardly Biden people.  

Jill Biden’s former press secretary has revealed members of the media agreed to scripting their questions in advance and allowing the White House to approve quotes used in their stories.  Journalists who trashed those questioning Joe Biden’s ability to walk and chew gum are now writing books about how those clever Biden people deceived everyone. That ignores one simple reality.  I defy any reasonable person to view the multiple public instances where it is nuts to debate whether or not Biden was lost in space.  Only those who were brave enough to think preserving our democracy did not depend on defeating Trump were able to muster the courage to point out the obvious.

It is far past the time for the MSM to loudly say: “WE were wrong.  The reason we were wrong is that we substituted the traditional standards for reporting events with attempting to further a partisan agenda.  We are asking for a second chance.  We will do better.”  

Anything short of that, much less the continued practice of being self-righteous absolute, rigid, and partisan, falls short of the mark.  Let MSNBC and Fox fight it out.  Try caring more about what is true than who benefits or loses from that truth being reported.  I am a Republican, but I believe there was a time when multiple points of view had something resembling a fair chance.  There were self-imposed boundaries by the media.

Will I take a level of joy from hearing a mea culpa from the always so serious MSM platforms?  Yes.  Is it proper to apologize based on the facts of the matter?  Yep.  Is it in their self-interest to take the approach I am advocating?  It is.  

It provides them the chance to fill a void—journalism as historically and traditionally defined and practiced.  Real journalism has a higher calling than advancing a partisan agenda.  By focusing on who, what, where, when, why, and how, they are putting the pursuit of the truth ahead of partisanship.  Will it ever be perfect?  No, but the closer it is to fact (as determined by those traditional standards), the closer it will be to the truth.  This Republican will take his chances with this way of doing things.

Common Sense: For the MSM to recover the traditional place it occupied for years within the ever-changing current information ecosystem, there are three keys.  Admit you screwed up.  Account for doing it.  Promise to do better as a result of returning to the traditional standards for practicing journalism.  If you want to be viewed as a straight shooter, start shooting straight.