Eugene David
...The One-Minute Pundit

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THE NEWS HACK'S CREED:
I know more than you.
I make lots more money than you.
I'm smarter than you.
I'm sexier than you.
I appear on TV all the time.
I work ten minutes a day.
I rule the universe.
I'm going to live forever.
You are an idiot.

THE NEWS HACK'S CREED, No. 2:
A lie isn't a lie when it tells THE TRUTH.

THE NEWS HACK'S CREED, No. 3:
I've come to realize that the looseness of the journalistic life, the seeming laxity of the newsroom, is an illusion. Yes, there's informality and there's humor, but beneath the surface lies something deadly serious. It is a code. Sometimes the code is not even written down, but it is deeply believed in. And, when violated, it is enforced with tribal ferocity.
--JOHN "OMERTA" CARROLL.

THE NEWS HACK'S CREED, No. 4:
News isn't news when we don't report it.

PERMALINKS:

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Monday, October 13, 2003

Posted 4:23 PM by Gene

Reason No. 34861 I HATE NEWS HACKS is their penchant for breathless crisis reporting. Here's an example from USA OKAY: A Crisis a Day™. THERE'S AN OBESITY EPIDEMIC AMONG THE YOUNG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Crisis reporting cannot be taken seriously because often it derives from surveys or from anecdotes, which news hacks combine with the bromides of self-serving experts to solidify their panics, or from special-interest pleadings, which in the end are always about fleecing the taxpayer. Second, it's a manifestation of the biz' ol' Crusading Clark Kent gag, of wanting to do good even where there's no good to be done. Third, QUAGMIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! has thoroughly vitiated it. As I've said ad nauseam, the news hacks have knocked the war effort since day minus-500, and they're doing it for the selfish glee of initiating another foreign policy disaster. QUAGMIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! is just crisis reporting writ large. Finally, you can be sure where there's crisis reporting, THERE ARE SHOW-BIZ PRESS RELEASES.

ANY WONDER PEOPLE HATE NEWS HACKS, SOB?

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