The always-observant Mark Steyn notes that the lamestream media is (a) quick to criticize the government after a successful terrorist attack, and (b) quick to criticize the government’s attempts to prevent terrorist attacks. He points out that they seem to have two templates ready for instant use:
From “To connect the dots, you have to see the dots” by Mark Steyn:
Template A (note to editors: to be used after every terrorist atrocity): “Angry family members, experts and opposition politicians demand to know why complacent government didn’t connect the dots."
Template B (note to editors: to be used in the run-up to the next terrorist atrocity): “Shocking new report leaked to New York Times for Pulitzer Prize Leak Of The Year Award nomination reveals that paranoid government officials are trying to connect the dots! See pages 3,4,6,7,8, 13-37."
As the Instapundit would say, read the whole thing!
Of course this kind of “reporting” has an effect, and it’s not exactly a subtle one. The majority of Americans get their news from sources using Mr. Steyn’s templates (on all political stories, not just the NSA datamining). Darned few bother to look under any other rocks…
You might well ask what I believe would be the right response from the media in these circumstances. Glad you asked! What they really should do, if they’re positioning themselves as news sources, is to report the facts — without editorializing by omission, without selecting what to investigate by some agenda of their own, and without cherry-picking “facts” to support positions they endorse. Mr. Steyn’s “templates” are, I believe, symptoms of the biased lamestream media.
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