New kids in our neighborhood

AS THIS SPRING ISSUE of The Masthead goes (God willing) to the publisher, the forces of old journalism and new journalism are colliding, with some nasty results.

Rathergate, the great clash between a network television titan and the pajama-clad kneecappers from the Internet, came crashing to its predictable conclusion.

At the same time, columnist Armstrong Williams was dropped by his syndicate after it was revealed he was on a $241,000 retainer to the Bush administration to promote No Child Left Behind education reform. Which he did, enthusiastically, in his reputedly independent columns.

When not column writing or hosting his television talk show, Williams owns a public relations firm that scored a subcontracted job from the Department of Education to hype NCLB. As unfortunate as the No Money-grubbing Left Behind incident proved to be, it is an unsurprising consequence of a journalism world in which highly paid partisans of all stripes move seamlessly among advocacy and campaign work, network gigs, and opinion writing. That flow has complicated the opinion-penning business enormously.

Back at Black Rock, investigators Louis Boccardi, former head of The Associated Press, and Dick Thornburgh, former Republican attorney general, found what we knew they would find: that CBS rushed to air a story about President Bush's Vietnam-era service that barely qualified as half-baked. And, to boot, they gave us a colorful new phrase, "myopic zeal," to help us remember the infamous journalism disaster. Who could ask for more?

Actually, Internet bloggers-the same "pajamahadeen" who started the CBS meltdown with their instant incredulity regarding the purported Texas Air National Guard memos-wanted a whole lot more. Boccardi and Thornburgh refused to gavel down on Dan Rather, Mary Mapes, et al., for rushing the story for political reasons. Not enough evidence to make that judgment, the investigators said. Sorry, guys.

In the Symposium for this spring issue of The Masthead, we've collected essays from a variety of those people whose Internet "blogs"-websites dedicated to the exchanges of ideas-helped change the dynamics of opinion-framing in the last election cycle.

While what they do is not precisely what editorialists do, our goals are similar. I used the phrase "opinion framing" very precisely in describing the purpose of the Symposium. As editorialists, we attempt to frame issues as we see them, and so impact the direction of the political process. So do they. And, just like us, they are very clever girls and boys.

This is just a hunch, but the impact of the blogosphere on the 2004 elections is just a subtle hint of how these often-combative, always enterprising people are going to impact elections to come. And affect the opinion-framing business for many years to come.

As you might have noticed, by the by, the esteemed Frank Partsch is no longer editing your quarterly magazine.

How this noble duty fell from the grasp of a remarkably skilled editor like Frank and into the lap of an Arizona Republic editorial writer whose management skills are nil is a Lovecraftian tale of casual horror. I got a call. Franks two-year gig is up, I was told. Interested? "Sure. Why not?"

Then, the beast moved into my cubicle.

-Doug MacEachern

Copyright MASTHEAD National Conference of Editorial Writers Spring 2005
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