Carnal Reason

Irresponsible journalism breeds irresponsible opinion. ABC News moderators George Stephanopoulos and Charles Gibson ambushed Barack Obama with grossly inappropriate questions concerning his ties to Jeremiah Wright, Jr. and dynamic social activist William Ayers. This is the fruit of ABC News’ shoddy and despicable moderation of Wednesday’s Democratic debate.

Consider this thought experiment: Assume that a conservative candidate for the GOP nomination spent two decades at a church whose senior pastor was a white supremacist who uttered ugly racial (as well as anti-American) epithets from the pulpit. Assume, too, that this minister wasn’t just the candidate’s pastor but also a close friend, the man who married the candidate and his wife, baptized his two daughters, and inspired the title of his best-selling book.

In addition, assume that this GOP candidate, in preparing for his entry into politics, attended an early organizing meeting at the home of a man who, years before, was involved in blowing up multiple abortion clinics and today was unrepentant, stating his wish that he had bombed even more clinics. And let’s say that the GOP candidate’s press spokesman described the relationship between the two men as “friendly.”

Do you think that if those moderating a debate asked the GOP candidate about these relationships for the first time, after 22 previous debates had been held, that other journalists would become apoplectic at the moderators for merely asking about the relationships?

The question is rhetorical. Were this the case, there would be no other news.

ABC News needs to be reminded of its duty to journalistic ethics, and to democracy itself. Here is the proper way to conduct a debate. Tina Fey’s reaction at time 2:27 should be the opinion, indeed the duty, of every journalist and every true American.

Posted on April 19th, 2008 by pwyll
Filed under: politics