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gilliam
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by Joe Katzman on June 9, 2005 05:43 AM
(Originally posted June 9, 2004)
Writing in Reason Online, Chris Bray pens an excellent article full of telling bon mots. From the journalist who is awed by the fact that Army Rangers carry machine guns and grenade launchers, to the Wall St. Journal colleague who asked if the Marines fought in WW2, Bray’s article is worthy for its anecdotes alone. But he also has a serious point, and it’s one worth paying close attention to:
"Schneider’s piece is symptomatic of news media that often don’t have the foggiest idea how the military works, and don’t really appear to care… “To many young reporters these days,” said longtime journalist James Perry in a 1997 lecture at Washington College, "wars and soldiers and serving your country are vague concepts…
Reporters who cover the military without understanding it don’t just muff a few basic facts about what kind of soldier carries what kind of gun, or which service does what. They also fail to apply the right skepticism in the right places, or even the right credulity in the right places, and so end up swinging in a wild arc between breathless adulation and naive condemnation. They surrender many of the necessary tools for questioning the authority of the armed forces, and render nearly useless the check and the balance of the Fourth Estate on a major power of government. They create confidence where there should be wariness, and fear where there should be strength.
They get it wrong, and it counts."
They do, often - and it does. Dale Franks of QandO has the links. It seems like a simple problem that could be cured by some basic diligence, research, and professional standards that demand real subject expertise to the same level as, say, sports journalism. But that doesn’t seem to be happening, which leads one to wonder why not.
So it’s doubly interesting to note that this problem may extend beyond the media. Former Clinton NSC staffer (and current blogger at Democracy Arsenal) Heather Hurlburt leveled an eerily similar criticism at the Democratic Party back in November of 2001:
[read the rest! »
](http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/005055.php#005055)
