Subject: off topic - recommended reading
Name:
ludicrous Date: 10/20/2001 10:03:30 AM (GMT-7)
IP Address: 138.67.74.229 Message:
the title sounds a bit salacious, but the book isn't --
One Scandalous Story
Clinton, Lewinsky, & 13 Days That Tarnished American Journalism
by Marvin Kalb
The Free Press: New York, NY, (c) 2001 by Marvin Kalb
Just finished reading it myself, and if you want to understand how journalism ethics have been slipping in the past decades -- as well as the incredible impact the media has on politics -- this is a great book to go through.
The author, who is a distinguished and respected journalist, goes through a day-by-day analysis of how the story was discovered, broke, and the ways in which the various news houses were treating it. He starts with Michael Isikof's investigative reporting for Newsweek proceeds from there, analyzing the wave of copycat journalism that lead to hearsay and gossip garnishing the headlines and front pages of many respectable media outlets including the New York Times and Washington Post.
In 275 pages there are about a dozen instances of profanity in the form of a direct quote, which struck me as very odd in a book decrying the lapse of journalism ethics, but otherwise it is very well written and enjoyable to read.
|