Speed Gibson

In the film “As Good as it Gets”, famous novelist and infamous curmudgeon Melvin Udall (Jack Nicholson) is asked by an admiring fan how he understands his female characters so well. He replies, “I picture a man. Then I take away reason and accountability.” It’s a great line, funny in the theatre, though it could also get a husband severely injured at home. Still, I find there are many useful corollaries, the first of which follows.

I am a fan of old time radio programs, many of which featured newspaper figures as regular characters. “The Green Hornet” was really Britt Reid, publisher of the Daily Sentinel. His crack reporters Axford and Lowry were always on the go chasing a good story, hopefully a “scoop” that beats the competition. “Big Town” followed hard-charging Steve Wilson, editor of the Illustrated Press. “Casey, Crime Photographer” did as much sleuthing and reporting as he did photography for his paper. And let’s not forget the big guy himself – Superman – in his guise as star reporter Clark Kent.

Whether a series star, cast regular, guest role, or bit part, whether in a comedy, drama, adventure, or thriller, virtually every old time radio reporter was cut from the same cloth. As they repeatedly said at the Illustrated Press, “Freedom of the press is a flaming sword! Use is justly … hold it high … guard it well.” They went after their stories with hard work, discipline, and lots of shoe leather. They understood their position of trust and the need to be accurate, complete, and timely. It was in many respects a blue-collar profession, hard-working people who largely developed their skills through an apprentice system of copy boys and cub reporters.

Look at the news business today. Television obviously prefers the pretty to the perspicacious. Radio prefers the poised to the perspicuous. Newspapers increasingly spend more time on personalities, surveys, and various forms of soft news, particularly when the hard news and facts are lengthy or detailed. Fact checking seems to be in decline in every medium. Many discredited ideas, false data, and absurd quotes are routinely cited without comment or even an attempt to obtain an opposing view. A good example of this is “the worst economy since the Depression” refrain, which can be dismissed in two words: Jimmy Carter.

Today’s journalism has evolved into a white-collar profession that usually starts with a college degree. They are now journalists and photo-journalists you see, not reporters and photographers. The reporter’s notebook is now a laptop computer. Phone calls, satellite feeds, and e-Mails replace ever more of the travel and personal interviews that used to consume all that shoe leather. With all that convenience, it gets harder and harder to leave the office air-conditioning and gourmet coffee to chase down an obscure lead. Worse, it seems increasingly important to these journalists to communicate what they think about certain issues over what actually happened and what the newsmakers actually said.

Somehow, perhaps unknowingly, you start writing more about what your fellow journalists are saying about a story, less about the story itself. It becomes increasingly important to “get along” with “everyone” to keep the pleasant exchange going. It takes years to build a good reputation, but in this environment, one politically incorrect story can make you an immediate outcast. Why take a serious look at, say, education vouchers for inner city students? Because if you’re “in with the in crowd”, it’s a career risk if your story strays, however factually, from the politically correct. And of course, these journalists and their editors deny that any of this is happening.

So Mr. Udall, how do you characterize a journalist?

“I picture a reporter. Then I take away reason and accountability.”