An Unprecented News Report

So, I found this through the worlds greatest political satire blog, Wonkette, and I thought it was pretty funny.



I don't know how many of you are Grey's Anatomy fans, but I recall a similar video montage a few years ago highlighting the overuse of the word "seriously" on that TV show. Apparently we have similar concerns for our president!

Don't get me wrong, if there's something going on with the Obama administration, I want to hear about it. But, really. They counted how many times he used the word?

xoxo
DG

Media Credentials

Media credentials for bloggers?

The best way to predict the future is to invent it.
- Alan Kay

Question: Should the Utah Legislature issue some kind of credential to citizen reporters?

If so, what privileges should a citizen media credential imply? What responsibilities would it imply? What would differentiate a "citizen journalist" from a random dude with a blog? Is the distinction important?

What policies should we have in place?

Utah has a thoughtful, fairly cohesive New Media community. Let's flesh out a proposal that 1) makes sense to Utah's citizen journalists and 2) is palatable to Utah lawmakers.

Or not. It's possible that any added freedom of movement would fail to mitigate the bureaucratic hassle of credentialing.

Is anyone interested in the discussion? Leave your thoughts here. Or Email me.

You know what they say, never bring a knife to a gun fight.
I've thought about this as the White House/Fox News war has finally entered an apparent armistice (with the exception of recently departed Anita). I've contemplated the wisdom of the White House in engaging Fox in a war they couldn't have hoped to truly win and couldn't end with anything less than a major bump in ratings for Fox and major loss of prestige for the White House and especially the President.
I will readily admit that Fox News cannot be called an impartial media outlet. I don't think that its actual news shows are as bad as some would say, but any station that airs Sean Hannity and his edited riots, Glenn Beck and his condescending lectures, or Bill O'Reilly and his outrageous no-spin zone as officially cast itself loose from any neutral moorings.
However, I don't think that Fox is any less legitimate source of news than MSNBC or CNN. If we're talking strict impartiality, at least Fox reported as many negative things about McCain as it did about the President (compared to the outrageously biased coverage of CNN and MSNBC). The bottom line is, although Fox is a conservative news program, it still is a news program. I may choose to shun it like the plague, but that's a personal preference, I'm also not going to read the New York Times over the Wall Street Journal, it's a matter of taste and presentation.
So let me say that I think the attacks of the White House by Dunn, Axelrod, and Emmanuel were terribly bad form and have done much by way of lowering the prestige of the President, which is a big deal. They unleash this offensive in which they expect the other media organizations to just jump in and join the frenzy, what were they expecting CNN and MSNBC to do? This was a manifestation of either terrible political calculating or gross hubris. Anita Dunn especially perturbs me. She said a lot of things that damned her, but forefront on the list would be her statement that Fox News should not be compared to CNN or MSNBC (as though they are the models of news purity) as a legitimate news organization and that the fact-checking of the Assistant Secretary of VA by Chris Wallace was a bad idea. These are things you just should not say. For one thing, CNN and MSNBC are not models of media chastity. Both have flaws and slants in their coverage, and ere long both shall become even more slanted one or multiple ways as media develops. For another, telling any news organization how to report is like asking for a kidney punch. It just looks bad.
This will end just as how we expect it to end. With Dunn's departure the White House can drop it, Fox News' ratings will continue to rise, and Beck and Hannity will gloat for a year about how they stuck it at the White House. It's all kind of infuriating really.

In response to Dunn's departure (and some barbs she let fly at a conference), a Fox News spokesman quickly corrected her more egregious errors of fact and then said, "We wish her well."

this means war!

http://rawstory.com/2009/11/fox-shuts-liberal-bloggers/

....

you must read this. you will laugh.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/13/palin-i-did-katie-couric_n_357317.html

FAIL.

Sean Hannity uses Glenn Beck's protest footage.