leak

SCOTUS: The Same Emphasis

“The one function that TV news performs very well is that when there is no news we give it to you with the same emphasis as if it were.”

David Brinkley, broadcast journalist

The American press is dying of suspense, and it serves ’em right.

After reporting on the May leak of a draft SCOTUS opinion on abortion as though it were a done deal when in actual point of fact it’s not, American broadcast journalism has placed a massive critical spotlight on the Court and its opinions. Every week they don’t release the final judgment, the tension continues to build and speculation to circulate, until now, when there’s nothing new left to say and no fresh pundits to say it, they’re forced into invention to satisfy an audience ravenous for blood (or whatever it is that jurists use these days).

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Did Russia Hack The Election?

The Washington Post broke a story on the 9th to the effect that Russia hacked the American presidential elections this year.

As is becoming the new normal in modern journalistic practice, the story has several different headlines, each fine-tuned to appeal to the target audience.  The main print version was released as “Obama Orders Review Of Russian Hacking During Presidential Campaign”, but the regional headlines differ slightly.  The online version was titled the eminently clickable “Secret CIA assessment says Russia was trying to help Trump win White House”. (more…)