Not all the news is able to print

This story was published in the NY Times. What's wrong with that?

Larry Langford, the former mayor of Birmingham, Alabama, was sentenced to 15 years in prison and a fine of $ 360,000 by a federal judge after his conviction for corruption. Mr. Langford was convicted of several counts of corruption after a federal jury found that there accepted more than $ 230,000 in cash, expensive clothing and jewelry as president of the Jefferson County Commission, in exchange for $ 7.1 million in business management Province to deposit a leading investment banker Bill Blount called. Blount and lobbyist Al LaPierre, were sentenced to four years and four months and four years imprisonment respectively. Some residents have expressed their sympathy for Friday, when former mayor. In a beauty salon in the majority black district where the owner had hung a sign in the window reading: "We support our mayor," said Charles Hicks was disappointed by the recent behavior of Mr. Langford, but he was the former mayor was well intentioned and has been corrupted by wealthy businessmen.

The journalists were learned once to give the who, what, when, where and why. All people want to know what basic information, regardless of the subject. teachers often tell students writing they need to answer all the questions readers ask. Every story can not have a who, what, when, where and why, if where they should be included.

Therefore, Langford, the former mayor of Birmingham, Alabama, was sentenced to 15 years in prison and Blount LaPierre has about four. Langford was fined $ 360,000. If Blount and LaPierre fined? No se. Langford was convicted of accepting more (how else?) $ 230,000 in cash, expensive clothes and jewelry. Blount County has sold 7.1 million bond. What are the commissions on the sale of Blount? No se. What LaPierre paid too much? No se. If so, How? I do not know. Who was the judge? No se.

Why is it important to know all this? Well, if you won a million Blount or colder in commissions and has not been fined? Langford has won $ 230,000 and was fined $ 360,000. Would not you wonder about the fairness for this process? And if so, do not know the name of the judge? If the people of Birmingham right who believed that the former mayor has been corrupted by wealthy businessmen? The nonjudgmental support and encourage political corruption by issuing more severe punishment and a fine of more than accepted bribes in the official website of corrupt and the issuance of a lighter punishment and no punishment for corrupt business men? How many people are willing to spend four years in prison if they could pocket a million?

When the legal system is unjust, justice is canceled, and corruption is encouraged. That's why political corruption is so widespread?

Mainstream American journalism has been under sharp criticism from the American public. For example, we recently published piece states that are five reasons why the media is useless.

1. Self-censorship by journalists

As former Washington Post columnist Dan Froomkin wrote in 2006: "Journalism mainstream media-policy is in danger of becoming increasingly irrelevant, but not for the Internet, or Comedy Central. The threat comes from within. Comes journalists being afraid to do what journalists were put on this green earth to do. . . . "If journalists from traditional media non-political start calling bullshit more often, we risk losing our primacy, if not for the actors, then the bloggers. "

2. Censorship by rising-Ups

The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who has discovered the torture scandal at the prison in Iraq and the slaughter of Mai Lai in Vietnam, Seymour Hersh, said: "All institutions that we thought we protect – particularly the press, but also the military, the bureaucracy, the Congress…. The biggest failure, I would say that is the press, because it is the most obvious. . . .

3. Battery support for war

Bill Moyers criticized the media for companies such as parrots obviously false link between 9 / 11 and Iraq (and false accusations that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction), the administration is in the context of the war in Iraq, and concluded that false information was not challenged because "the news [] Ordinary had been cheerleaders at the White House from the beginning and were simply following rally the public behind the President – no questions asked. "

4. Access

For $ 25,000 to $ 250,000, Washington Post. . . lobbyists and executives of the association that offers "off the record, access, non-confrontational" Those who are not very powerful "officials Obama administration, members of Congress and reporters, even initially own the newspaper and the editors. . . . The offer, which is essentially a new organization a facilitator of private interest groups in formal meetings. . . .

5. Censorship by government

Finally. . . the government has exercised enormous pressure on the media to do things a certain way. In fact, sometimes the government has established media owners and journalists in jail if they were too critical. Media companies have felt great pressure the government to kill any real questioning. . . . Dan Rather said in the U.S. media, "What we have is a miniature version of what you have in totalitarian states.

Without doubt, all these criticisms are very valid, but there are two more.

The media is not new and has never been dedicated to "news." Newspapers have always been a mix of news, sports, opinion, entertainment, health, entertainment, human interest, "do it yourself, and even puzzles. When the news was a video, all these have been deferred. The evening news is not "new"! And the time constraints of television news reports of the reduction of no more than a series of documents sound.

Finally, there is only poor reporting as evidenced by the story that begins this room.

Not all the news fit to print by any means. No to the New York Times or elsewhere.

© 2010 John Kozy

Gary Locke: US Secretary of Commerce, Former Governor of Washington State

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