Editors Grapple With How to Cover Swift Boat Controversy

And speaking of the Elite Media Monoculture, here is an article in Editor and Publisher by Joe Strupp which deals with the subject of swift boat coverage. How well are the elites in the media covering this story and how would they cover it if there were no alternative media? Well we get an answer to that question. And what we find is that according to the mavens in the pressrooms around the country, we would not be hearing about this at all were it not for talk radio and the blogsphere. The Elite Media Monoculture weighs in to say that they would ignore this story if they could get away with it.

Alison Mitchell, deputy national editor for The New York Times, points to the changing media landscape and its impact on what newspapers choose to cover. "I'm not sure that in an era of no-cable television we would even have looked into it," she said. Near the top of a front-page article on Tuesday, the Times referred to the "mostly unsubstantiated accusations" of Kerry's swift boat critics.

But Washington Post Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr. said newspapers can still drive their own agenda. "I don't think we are lessening at all our judgment of the news," he told E&P. "There is much more media, but we still judge for ourselves which facts we report in The Washington Post."

But O'Shea also pointed out that giving the anti-Kerry veterans too much attention, in an attempt to hold them accountable, creates a situation of ignoring other issues. He said this may be an instance of a growing problem for newspapers in the expanding media world -- being forced to follow a story they might not consider worthwhile because other news outlets (in this case, Fox News and talk radio) have made it an issue.

"There are too many places for people to get information," O'Shea said. "I don't think newspapers can be the gatekeepers anymore -- to say this is wrong and we will ignore it. Now we have to say this is wrong, and here is why."