In an age of rage, Washington Post columnist and MSNBC contributor Jennifer Rubin has long been a standout in her attacks on Republicans and conservatives: “We have to collectively, in essence, burn down the Republican Party. We have to level them because if there are survivors, if there are people who weather this storm, they will do it again.” However, her recent column shows that she has made a clean break not only from Republicans but from reason. The writer (long cited by the Post as their “Republican columnist” for balance) has called for the media to abandon balance and impartiality. Rubin is demanding that the media just become overt advocates in refusing to report both sides in the myriad of political issues in this election.
In her column, Rubin rejects the “need for false balance” because the coverage can suggest that Republicans are “rational.”
“The Kabuki dance in which Trump, his defenders and his supporters are treated as rational (clever even!) is what comes from a media establishment that refuses to discard its need for false balance that it has developed over the course of decades.”
That balance was once called “journalism” but Rubin now calls it facilitating “disinformation.” Balanced reporting is now dangerous and makes the media “a megaphone for disinformation, upholding the pretense that there are two political parties with equally valid takes on reality.”
What is striking is how Rubin objects to the current coverage when many already object to a heavy bias in such reporting. Yet, Rubin believes the media must go further.
Rubin’s attack on disinformation is ironic given her own past controversies in misrepresenting news, cases, and events. For full disclosure, I clashed with Rubin over her personally attacking me for a theory that I did not agree with in a column that I did not write. I also challenged her on an equally bizarre column where she wrote about my impeachment testimony and later column misrepresenting the holding in an appellate case involving Trump. That false account was never corrected by the Washington Post. It appears that misrepresenting the holding of a major case is not being a “a megaphone for disinformation.”
Rubin, however, is not alone in this call to abandon the foundational principle of impartiality in journalism.
We have been discussing the rise of advocacy journalism and the rejection of objectivity in journalism schools. Writers, editors, commentators, and academics have embraced rising calls for censorship and speech controls, including President-elect Joe Biden and his key advisers. This movement includes academics rejecting the very concept of objectivity in journalism in favor of open advocacy.
Columbia Journalism Dean and New Yorker writer Steve Coll decried how the First Amendment right to freedom of speech was being “weaponized” to protect disinformation. In an interview with The Stanford Daily, Stanford journalism professor, Ted Glasser, insisted that journalism needed to “free itself from this notion of objectivity to develop a sense of social justice.” He rejected the notion that the journalism is based on objectivity and said that he views “journalists as activists because journalism at its best — and indeed history at its best — is all about morality.” Thus, “Journalists need to be overt and candid advocates for social justice, and it’s hard to do that under the constraints of objectivity.”
Lauren Wolfe, the fired freelance editor for the New York Times, has not only gone public to defend her pro-Biden tweet but published a piece titled “I’m a Biased Journalist and I’m Okay With That.”
Former New York Times writer (and now Howard University Journalism Professor) Nikole Hannah-Jones is a leading voice for advocacy journalism.
Indeed, Hannah-Jones has declared “all journalism is activism.” Her 1619 Project has been challenged as deeply flawed and she has a long record as a journalist of intolerance, controversial positions on rioting, and fostering conspiracy theories. Hannah-Jones would later help lead the effort at the Times to get rid of an editor and apologize for publishing a column from Sen. Tom Cotten as inaccurate and inflammatory.
These figures are killing journalism. Polls show trust in the media at an all-time low with less than 20 percent of citizens trusting television or print media. Yet, reporters and academics continue to destroy the core principles that sustain journalism and ultimately the role of a free press in our society. The result is to turn newspapers like the Post into echo chambers for the values of its reporters and a core of liberal readers.
For the rest of the country (including roughly half that voted for Trump), figures like Rubin are saying that they should go elsewhere. They are. Media outlets like CNN have faced sharp declines in viewership and are trying to break away from this advocacy model to restore ratings. (The move has been denounced by some in the media as potentially helping Republicans by fairly reporting their side of these controversies). The movement toward advocacy journalism is likely to build in the coming years to remake the media in the image of figures like Hannah-Jones and Rubin.
Viewers clearly tune in to Fox News and MSNBC for their strong editorial opinion and commentators. However, there has long been a line between reporters and commentators in how stories are presented. If journalists want to be advocates, they can shift to the side of commentary. That is clearly not sufficient for some like Rubin who do not want readers to be able to receive both sides of these controversies. Readers are to be shaped in their opinions like impressionable children. That was the message from the conference on disinformation led by media and Democratic figures like the recently fired CNN media host Brian Stelter.
Even as a columnist, I prefer the approach of Theodore White that “when a reporter sits down at the typewriter, he’s nobody’s friend.”
Hey, There’s An Echo Here..!!
Earlier today the distinguished Seth Warner was noting a certain sameness to so many comments on these threads. Confirming this assertion has proved rather simple. A chorus of creepy bots are chirping, “Nazi, Nazi, Nazi!”.
Judith says:
September 24, 2022 at 1:56 PM
Spoken like the nazis that the socialist communist democratic party is.
***
highlyeducatedsuburbanwoman says:
September 24, 2022 at 11:40 AM
She and much of the media are just Squealer the pig. Propagandists for one political party and controlled by that party. Kind of sound like semi-fascism doesn’t it.
***
Margot Ballhere says: September 24, 2022 at 10:06 A
I believe she called for mass arrests after Herr Biden’s famous speech at the Reichstag, I mean Philadelphia. She is as ugly as her words.
***
zzclancy says:
September 24, 2022 at 10:03 AM
If the National Socialist Democrat WOKE Party were able to enslave this nation she would be one of the first journalists to be shot. Along with everyone at CNN and MSNBC.
***
James says:
September 24, 2022 at 10:01 AM
There should be a drawing of Donkey next to ‘fascist’ in the dictionary
Jennifer Rubin who? Why does anyone care what this unstable person think? The news-media elites are disrespected by more than 80% of Americans. They are polling near single digits! Who give a fudge what she wants to do. Let her. She hasnt been unbiased nor factual in years, which is why most Americans loathe them, and this from Jeffrey Bezos billionaire advertising broadsheet for the DNC. She and the rest of these contemptuous jurinalists are blowhards, just like Hillary Clinton
https://www.yahoo.com/news/hillary-clinton-maintains-2016-election-160716779.html
Hillary Clinton Maintains 2016 Election ‘Was Not On the Level’: ‘We Still Don’t Know What Really Happened’
Hillary Clinton is sticking with her conviction that the 2016 presidential election was not conducted legitimately, saying the details surrounding her loss are still unclear.
“There was a widespread understanding that this election [in 2016] was not on the level,” Clinton said during an interview for the latest episode of The Atlantic’s politics podcast, The Ticket. “We still don’t know what really happened.”
“There’s just a lot that I think will be revealed. History will discover,” the Democratic Party’s 2016 presidential nominee continued. “But you don’t win by 3 million votes and have all this other shenanigans and stuff going on and not come away with an idea like, ‘Whoa, something’s not right here.’ That was a deep sense of unease.”
Clinton also offered copious criticism of President Trump, saying she warned the country about her former rival, and “it was even worse than I thought it was.”
“I really did feel sometimes like the tree falling in the forest. I believed he was a puppet of Putin. I believed that there was relevant, important information in his tax returns. I believed he did not have the temperament to be president, he was unfit—not a partisan comment, but an assessment of him,” the former secretary of state said.
At least Adolf Hitler had the common sense to take a cyanide capsule when he admitted defeat.
Hillary opted to nuke our country with funding and orchestrating a coup against a US President, and maneuvered with Barack Obama’s assistance, to turn the FBI and DOJ into a Schutzstaffel (Protection Squadron) and with Eric Holder and now Merrick Garland as a modern day SS Chief Heinrich Himmler.
Resolved: Hillary is a Nazi. It is way past the time to call her what she is, a Nazi.
Hilary, what happened is you lost.
“Militias in Michigan acted on Trump’s tweet and stormed the state capital in Lansing. ”
So ?
Kavanaugh protestors stormed the US capital.
In 2012 Democrats stormed the WI capital and occupied it for weeks.
IN 2022 they stormed the AZ capital.
In Portland Left wing nuts stormed a federal courthouse REPEATEDLY.
Though the 2020 summer of rage we had looting violence arson and murder.
Though suprisingly this political protest did not involve storming city hall or state capitals.
It involved burning and looting stores.
That is what I do when I want to petition government – I go burn down a target or loot a neiman marcus.
Are you saying that people can not petition government ?
You left wing nuts rant about J6.
Why weren’t those protestors allowed to “storm the capital” ? Kavanaugh protestors did.
Are only those people whose views you agree with allowed to “storm the capital” ?
Does the right to assemble, the right to free speech, the right to petition government only exist if you are on the left ?
What exactly was it that J6 protestors were supposed to do when they were unconstitutionally depreived of their right to protest, petition government and speak ?
I would note that in Michigan ARMED protestors showed up ad the capital in May 2020, to protest lock downs.
They spoke their mind,. and they left. No one even suffered a sprained ankle.
Had J6 protestors been allowed to enter the capital – no one would have been hurt. They would have spoken their mind. They may or may not have influenced some legislators, and they would have left.
Had they wanted to force the issue – they would have brought firearms or rocks, or frozen water bottles or lasers all the violent paraphenalia that “protestors” in Portland or at Lafayette park brought.
Yet, few if any had any of these things. Pelosi interfered with the constitutional rights of protestors. and small violence errupted. The worst violence was in the west tunnel AFTER capital police murdered a protestor.
Yes, all of us should laugh and be disdainful when acts of purported terrorism are actually FBI instigated idiocy that no one would go through on their own.
Nor is this new. The FBI was targetting groups for their politics in the 60’s.
It was targetting people for both politics and religion in the 90’s
it was targetting people for their religion in the early 2000’s.
All of this has been WRONG.
Ruby Ridge,
Wacco,
Richard Jewel,
Myriads of targeted muslim teens after 9/11
The Bundies,
and the latest was the Wolverines.
When there are more FBI agents and informants than members of the militia – the problem is the FBI
When there the plot comes from the FBI – the problem is the FBI.
It is the FBI’s job to stop violence – not to cause it.
If the whitmer kidnapping plot is your example – you should be LAUGHED AT.
Turley: “However, her recent column shows that she has made a clean break not only from Republicans but from reason.”
+++
I saw her on a news show several years ago saying nothing controversial but her manner of speaking in peculiar sentences made me think she was nuts even then. It seems a rapidly evolving disease with her.
Elections can be the main reason to persuade parties to govern as previously promised. If not, electorate can shift power from majority to minority.
Do voters know to which agenda they will commit too? Most likely not, in part of BECAUSE votes in huge numbers and lack of unity in calendar. Mass Media could offer an incredible help! Professor Turley singled out individuals’ propaganda, labeled as “advocacy journalism”, published/broadcasted in WaPo, NYT, CNN, MNSBC etc. What he blinked: These huge organizations, referenced as “Fourth Estate” uses their power to unfairly influence voters’ decisions in selecting stories and how they were covered [1].
Where did ’20 electorate read budget implications e.g., that Democrats [2]
* rescind President Trump’s fabricated “National Emergency,” which siphons funding away from our men and women in uniform to construct an unnecessary, wasteful, and ineffective wall on the southern border?
* will immediately terminate the Trump Administration’s discriminatory travel and immigration bans that disproportionately impact Muslim and African people, and invite those whose visas have been denied under these xenophobic and un-American policies to re-apply to come to the United States?
* reinstate, expand, and streamline protections for Dreamers and the parents of American citizen children to keep families together in the communities they have long called home?
* will end the Trump Administration’s shameful efforts to close the door to the world’s most vulnerable refugees?
* will fast-track to provide a roadmap to citizenship for the millions of undocumented workers?
* believe family unity should be a guiding principle for our immigration policy?
* will ensure that law-abiding individuals with TPS are not sent back to countries where they cannot live safely?
* believe in improving and increasing opportunities for legal, permanent immigration
* support policies and programs to make it easier for qualified immigrants and their families to become full and equal citizens?
[1] As in a colorful world “fact-based” journalism is a curious goal, “fake news” is a misguided term and should be replaced with information disorder.
[2] https://joebiden.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/UNITY-TASK-FORCE-RECOMMENDATIONS.pdf
RE:”Do voters know to which agenda they will commit too?..” “Holy ‘we have to pass it so we can read it’, Batman! This ‘Unity-
Task Force Manifesto’, their ‘Recipe for Cooking America’, has been bookmarked in my files since July 2020. It certainly wasn’t intended for consumption by the Democrat proletariat, but they were given a tasting. The Republican’s avoided it like the plague instead of printing it on every roll of Charmin and Bounty they could give away free. It would have formed a perfect backdrop to that ‘Summer of Riot’. But NO!!
After your comment, I feel much more comfortable that GOP establishment [1] dislike working class Americans (instead of “lack of unity” in my post).
Those who are gifted with common sense are aware that there is an economic impact from invasion on the SW border. “W” thinking avoids conversation about what’s in America’s best interests from an nationall economic and “pocketbook” wage perspective.
Those who ran GOP gave us the impression that we are completely deranged [2]: At least since seven years we are aware that “border security” has a much larger impact that immigration has on wages, on social services. public safety, etc. Imigration policy of Bidens handleri is unfairly pressuring down Americans’ wages. It is also boosting rents and housing prices (spiked by five million migrants since last 19 momth) and pushing up inflation for a wide variety of goods, such as used cars and food.[3[
[1] https://www.c-span.org/video/?523029-3/senate-minority-leader-mcconnell-immigration-inflation (Minority Leader’s zig-zag on immigration in his SEN-floor speach on Tue)
[2] Rep Mo Brooks (R-AL # 5) was a ’20 Presidential election casualty:: On 3/21/ 22, he announced his retirement and Senate bid. After Brooks said that GOP “should move on and look past the ’20 election”. Trump yanked his endorsement and sided with “Mitch” who spent millions on opposing ads because of Brooks sensible immigration positions. Brooks, an “America First” candidate from scratch, advocator on election integrity and fighter between 11/3/20 and 1/6/21, lost his primary to Katy Britt by 15p.
[3] The coastal investors in NY and CA who might be tempted to hire employees in KY, PA, OH, and other heartland states now the federal government’s Extraction Migration strategy delivers a new cohort of grateful, reliable, and cheap workers each day.
I remember when Jennifer Rubin wrote for Commentary’s Contentions. I found her daily column the best thing about that blog: insightful and fair, well-written, thoughtful, a bit lighter than the usual fare and thus more readable, and on the conservative side. Then she moved to WAPO with a column entitled “Right Turn.” At that point she was still a conservative. I didn’t read it daily, but enough to get an idea of her take on things. She backed Romney, as I recall. But what really jumped out at me were her readers’ remarks. She was villified, excoriated, smeared, mocked and called out for her supposed double allegiance with Israel. It was a constant (often anti-semetic) hate fest, and there were few, if any, positive comments ever. IMHO, this onslaught of negative commentary was likely enough to destroy any columnist’s belief in herself and make her doubt her sanity. So, my theory about her is that it truly did affect her sanity and she made a sharp, 180 degrees ‘Left Turn’ simply to survive…at WAPO, and in general. Of course you can’t explain things entirely this way, there is also and more importantly her rabid TDS, but I think it does begin to account for, and provide the backdrop for the astonishing transformation that Professor Turley describes.
The key to knowing there will be a peaceful and orderly transition of power from one President to another is the concession from the candidate that lost. Please note that Kerry in 2004 and Clinton in 2016 made their concession calls and speeches the day after the election and Gore did his concession call and speech in 2000 the day after the Supreme Court decision.
RE:”Clinton’s concession speech” …The first candidate in my memory of 12 Presidential elections where the individual offering the concession was dressed as if for a funeral. To this day she maintains that the election was stolen. https://americanvoterpolls.com/truth-check-issued-to-hillary-clinton-after-she-makes-a-big-lie-about-the-2016-election/ As for Gore, he challenged the process and the event was most controversial. Florida has changed the manner in which the vote is obtained and, in 2018, cleaned house in one county. Yet, after 2020, irregularities in some states were still being discovered. https://headlineusa.com/courts-admit-voting-irregularities/ crimeresearch.org/2022/07/vote-fraud21-confirmed-illegalities-irregularities-from-2020-election/
The key to knowing otherwise is using a fake dossier to convince the FBI to give the illusion of credibility to a hoax!
Being objective in gathering and reporting news stories has become a boutique sector. While many want to point the finger of blame onto activists posing as journalists, the deeper problem lies with the audience and its unconscious preference for simplification and drama. Real life factual stories are messy, complicated, and somewhat banal — after all, these are human beings at the center of events, not mythical characters. This isn’t a Shakespearean play.
Starting with myself, I see an all-too-human attraction to that which is dramatic, which offers clear heroes and villains. For the same reason, I can’t resist slowing down to look at an auto accident (just like everyone else).
It’s not rational. But, humans come into this world wired up with cognitive instincts, and when you look at these closely, they are related to tribal loyalty and cohesion. Not surprising, humans survived for 200,000 years as upright hominids living in small groups of between 10 and 250. Certain facts that worked against tribal unity became taboo.
Do you think modern humans come into the world as blank slates?… or born with these legacy brains?
Young children demonstrate all the inborn social-cognitive instincts except the ones that await onset of puberty. To little kids, truth is a learned concept…it doesn’t came innately. Even the most well-informed, evolved, experienced adults have to be on their guard about speaking taboos as defined by their tribal contexts. Yet, note how most of the progress of mankind began with a non-conformist challenging a taboo!
What I learned over many decades is that news is processed through different lenses than I use. The biggest breakthrough for my political consciousness was identifying my direct p2p experience as a more trustable reality than information delivered through a pixelated device.
What’s the difference? In my day-to-day direct interactions and observations, nobody is selecting what is worth paying attention to except me, and so much of my perceptions are automatic — it’s a firehose of experience arriving so fast, there isn’t time to sift it, weigh it, or edit it. So, for instance, let’s say the question is: “How much racial prejudice expressed as outright insults exist today in America?” My brain makes an automatic assessment of this based on my unfiltered p2p experience — saying, I haven’t personally witnessed any such incidents where I lived and traveled in America since the mid-1960s. Now, compare this to what I’m being exposed to via media! How can those 2 versions of “reality” depart so far? Easy, the stuff being published by media aren’t randomly selected behavior….they are highly selected, atypical, aberrant…the more outrageous, the better!z
Today, I want factual, realistic portraits of the world “out there” — the one I cannot be there to experience directly.
The major media are dominated by people who equate Twitter content with “reality”, and tune out their private-life experiences as too boring, too normal, too expected to be of any interest — “not newsworthy.” Theirs is a 100% manufactured, curated, stylized “pseudo-reality”. I call the predominant news-selection rubric “alarmist sensationalism”. You cherry-pick humans having their worst moments, and shove it out to the public. And, never, ever, say how rare such moments and events are in society — that would totally ruin the alarmism.
RE:”Being objective in gathering and reporting news stories ..” Once there’s a ‘by-line’ there’s a personal slant or opinion. I’ve always wondered why NYT articles are so verbose. Are they paid by the word?? Popular culture’s ‘Sgt Joe Friday’ said it best…”Just the facts, M’am!’ “Just the facts’. Let providence dictate the rest.
I assume someone else has noted that there has NEVER been impartiality and balance in journalism
Gut there was once a pretense, even some effort to objectively report outside of opinion peices.
Should there be “balance” in an article about genocide? Are you really going to argue that the side advocating genocide deserves equal time with the side condemning it? Or can you admit that in some cases, one should not strive for “balance”?
Res ipsa loquitur – The thing itself speaks
The question is not one of balance. it is one of reporting actual facts. All of those available.
Not picking and choosing.
Rubin is literally asking to insert opinions into journalism rather than actual opinion pieces.
That is error that will go badly – it already is.
It is the reason we do not trust the press today.
That depends on what you mean by genocide.
Turley doesn’t provide balance in his columns, but thinks others should do what he won’t do?
Another example of his hypocrisy.
Ah, this is an opinion blog, not a news story. A newspaper reporter should report the news. A columnist provides opinion. If you don’t like HIS format for HIS blog, why are you here, reading HIS blog???
I agree that a reporter should report the news, but the news generally doesn’t exist in “both sides” balance. For example, if a reporter reports the news that the 11th Circuit granted the DOJs request for a stay pending appeal on using the documents with classified markings taken from Mar-a-Lago on the August 8 search, what is the “other side” to that fact?
As for your question, since when are people limited to only commenting on things they agree with?
It’s not that you can’t comment on what people say. My question is, why do you read a blog written by someone you constantly criticize?
EconisEasy, this guy is obviously a sadomasochistic.
Journalists are not obligated to report “both sides”
They are actually obligated to report NEITHER side.
They are supposed to report the FACTS.
“Sides” are for the op-ed pages.
Turley’s posts are editorial, they are not news.
No one is claiming that the editorial page must be balanced.
The issue is reporting, not opinion pieces.
Not knowing the difference between opinion and new reporting, skirts precariously close to retard level idiocy.
Then the drivel folks such as she will give others one more reason to NOT consider them to be “journalists.” Just crusaders for their lefty, socialist/communist, anti-USA drivel.
Rubin is correct. The two sides are not even remotely equivalent. Presenting ‘both sides’ implies both viewpoints have equal value—they don’t. Presenting anti-democratic and pro-democratic ideas as if they are equally valid undermines the stability of our country. The press should take a position on voter suppression, inequality, women’s rights, assault weapons, obvious lying.
Total BS.
First gigantic red herring.
Two sides of any issue are NEVER presented equally.
Free speech does not require that you listen, only that you do not silence those you disagree with.
We are not debating equal time. We are debating whether ideas that Rubin does not like can be presented.
I would further note that the labels anti=democratic and pro-democratic are idiotic in so many ways.
We are not a democracy.
The left not the right is anti-democratic.
The argument for censorship is about as anti-democratic as you can get.
“If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”
― John Stuart Mill, On Liberty
JohnB: EXCELLENT quote from John Stuart Mill, thank you. You’re on a roll aren’t you!
If you like Mill
https://heterodoxacademy.org/library/all-minus-one/
“The press should take a position on voter suppression, inequality, women’s rights, assault weapons, obvious lying.”
On the editorial page.
Taking any position in reporting is journalistic ERROR.
1. There is no voter suppression no matter how often idiots repeat the assertion. Voter turnout rates are INCREASING.
FYI, authorities in Germany determined one in six votes cast in Berlin were unlawful and/or fraudulent. That in a country that has no “vote by mail”; requires voters show an ID to vote; does not allow ballot harvesting. Each of those “innovations” increases the risk of greater illegal voting. So just imagine how much unlawful voting occurs in countries that allow them.
2. Your side does not want to end “inequality”. Democrats promote affirmative action to give people advantages based on skin color and gender. Further, Democrats want to buy votes from black people by promising to give them money because they are black and then expect everyone to nod and pretend their vote buying scheme is to alleviate the imaginary pain blacks suffer because a small percentage of Democrats enslaved blacks a century and a half ago.
3. Women’s rights. Name one thing women are prohibited by law from doing that men are not also prohibited from doing.
4. “Assault weapons” is a Democrat propaganda term. No guns are marketed as “assault weapons”. If you don’t like the Second Amendment, then amend the Constitution. Good luck.
5. Obvious lying is referring to abortion as “reproductive rights” or “women’s health. Obvious lying is demanding people use female pronouns to refer to men who like wearing costumes for the purpose of tricking people into believing they are women. Obvious lying is a Supreme Court justice swearing under oath she can’t define what a woman is because she’s not a biologist. Obvious lying is calling the gradual, imperceptible 1.5C warming since the end of the Little Ice Age 150 years ago a “climate crisis”. The so called “climate crisis” just happens to coincide with farmers setting new record yields for grains in most years; the human standard of living has never been higher; weather related deaths have never been lower; after adjusting for inflation and relative to GDP and wealth, weather related property damages have been stable since the “climate crisis” hysteria began 30 years ago.
Ending “obvious lying” will make it impossible for Democrats to participate in public discourse.
About: (per Wikipedia.org)
Jennifer Rubin (1962) is an American political commentator who writes opinion columns for The Washington Post.
Previously she worked at Commentary, PJ Media, Human Events, and The Weekly Standard.
Her work has been published in media outlets including Politico, New York Post, New York Daily News, National Review, and The Jerusalem Post.
A conservative political commentator throughout most of her career, she became a vocal critic of President Donald Trump and in September 2020, she announced that she no longer identified as a conservative.
In 2021, she became a staunch advocate of the Biden administration.
Education: University of California, Berkeley
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University of California, Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism
https://journalism.berkeley.edu/why-berkeley/
Honest, bold journalism is a crucial part of a functional and just society.
At their best, journalists hold those in power accountable, incubate principled reform, and stir emotions that lead to meaningful change. Our programs are designed for the curious, the creative, the fearless – and the resolute.
Who We Are:
Our mission is to expand the worldwide impact of truth-seeking, fact-based and inclusive journalism by training the next generation of diverse journalists to become exceptional storytellers.
Our faculty:
are both thinkers and doers. They embrace their role as mentors to the next generation of ground-breaking journalists. They teach and inspire, imparting skills and energizing vision.
Our students:
Vibrant. Diverse. Curious. Driven. Unafraid. Our students are the future of journalism, compelled by an insatiable desire to investigate and report stories that matter, in any form.
Our alumni:
include some of the leading journalists in the world. They produce award-winning and important work — and are paving the way for our current students.
Student & Alumni Work:
To understand the UC Berkeley School of Journalism, look at the work our students are producing. Our philosophy is to learn by doing, and our students are offered many platforms on which to create meaningful journalism. Areas of skill include: audio journalism, documentary, narrative writing, multimedia, photojournalism, and video journalism.
A Revolutionary Past and Vibrant Future:
On October 1, 1964, Mario Savio climbed onto a police car and ignited the Free Speech Movement, right here in Berkeley. As a catalyst for change, justice and human rights, what could be a more fitting location for a school of professional journalism? And what could be more relevant today, when free speech is under attack from both restrictive algorithms and people in power.
–
https://journalism.berkeley.edu/why-berkeley/a-revolutionary-past-vibrant-future/
A Revolutionary Past & Vibrant Future
Founded 1968
Holding the powerful accountable:
1968. A tumultuous year marked by political unrest, violence and fading trust in the country’s leadership and institutions. Citizens were demanding the truth. And Berkeley was the epicenter of many dramatic events. “We frequently had to evacuate the building because it was full of tear gas,” recalls Edwin Bayley, our first dean.
Berkeley was the birthplace of the Free Speech Movement, a catalyst for the decade’s upheaval. The police car from which philosophy major Mario Savio spoke on October 1, 1964 was parked outside Sproul Hall, then the home of Berkeley Journalism.
A heritage of fresh thinking:
In 1981, the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism moved to its current home in North Gate Hall, which had housed the College of Architecture since 1905. It was the informal home of the Bay Region Style, a movement noted not for rigid principles, but by using the “local truth,” ignoring rules as the space and environment require. For example, the north windows break the roofline, violating the traditions of “correct” architecture for a simple reason – the spaces inside needed light.
It’s a perfect metaphor for aspiring journalists – sometimes, to shed light, you need to re-think traditional standards.
Embracing this principle is central to our heritage:
We focus on practical skills rather than traditional theory.
Our instructors traditionally are celebrated journalists who act as mentors for their students.
We established the Investigative Reporting Program (IRP) in 2006 under Lowell Bergman, the first non-profit newsroom at a university.
In 2007, the IRP hosted the first Logan Symposium in Investigative Reporting, the only one of its kind.
Building on our heritage of encouraging students to publish their work, we launched three hyperlocal news sites in 2008.
These examples underscore why our history matters today. From the start, we’ve been dedicated to helping journalists tell important stories, pursue and disseminate the truth, and act as a catalyst for justice, human rights and meaningful change.
And our heritage is very much alive. We have seen an explosion of new platforms for journalists and storytellers, from streaming outlets for documentaries to all manner of podcasts. In response, we have created new curricular innovations, and also launched initiatives like the Advanced Media Institute offering digital media training to mid-career journalists.
Which shows that our history does not bind us – it frees us to innovate, to get better, to enable like-minded journalists to tell the stories that can change the world.
-30-
She has called herself a conservative but a review of her history would suggest she left that thought process years if not decades ago when discussing American politics if it was ever there. Self identified conservative maybe but unlike any I have ever met or listened to. She obviously has a near terminal case of TDS. There also seems to be a sharp dislike of populism with a strong dose of elitism. It’s unethical of me to make a diagnosis but her writings border on the unhinged.
As far as unhinged lack of objectivity by today’s press is concerned, well that ship sailed long ago.
Not buying the sordid product now peddled as objective news is a good start but even more help might be a Supreme Court decision that loosens the constraints previously placed on slander and libel suits so these unhinged, blatant lying and smearing can more commonly be followed by monetary compensation to those victimized. It might require some real thought processes before printing an article.
It matters little who sits in the White House.
Democrats have total power in the US. Google uses search algorithms that directly benefit the Democrat Party. If you find an article critical of the Democrat Party, you’d better bookmark it, because the opposite view will be all you’ll be able to find later. Democrats control the public education system, and bring political proselytizing to schools. You will send your children to school, paid for by tax dollars, so your kids will be taught to be Democrat voters. By the time they get to college, they will either identify as Democrats, or claim to be, to avoid harassment, violence, and academic punishment. Democrats control Hollywood, so most of the movies your kids will see will promote the Democrat Party and bash Republicans in myriad small ways. Democrats control 3 letter agencies. They use their positions of power to target conservatives and run interference for Democrats through the IRS, NSA, FBI, DOJ, and sometimes the CIA.
There is indisputable Democrat hegemony in the US. There is also a Democrat oligarchy comprised of prominent families, and the heads of major corporations, who coordinate with the government to get Democrats elected and promote propaganda against Republicans. Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Google…all working together as the private industry Big Brother of the Democrat-run US government.
Who sits in the White House at this point is nearly immaterial. If a Republican manages to win with all the mail in voting, unable to be verified, he’ll just be targeted with another Russia Hoax. Or someone will claim she saw him or her standing next to Solo cups.
Democrats push one false story after another, because it WORKS.
It’s exceptionally easy to find columns critical of the Democratic Party. If you have difficulty finding them, then you must be an inept searcher.
Such a mean-spirited “anonymous”.
That mean-spirited person is called by some, Anonymous the Stupid. He is a disreputable fellow.
The irony is that they are all right. The problem (for them) is that the First Amendment allows those who disagree with them to do so and to call them idiots. They are upset because half of the nation (at least) is not in their corner. Rubin is a nutcase.
She’s a day late and a dollar short.
There has been no impartiality in mainstream media for decades. In fact, legacy media, in coordination with Google, social media, and Hollywood, give the Democrat Party a significant, measurable boost by killing stories injurious to Democrats, like Hunter Biden’s laptop, and promoting stories known to be false that hurts Republicans, like pushing the false claim that Trump called white supremacists “very fine people” or the Russia Hoax.
Spoken like the nazis that the socialist communist democratic party is.