Why blame the blogs?
Erik Gunn e-mailed me last night for an on-the record statement regarding my blog post concerning WTAQ radio personality Jerry Bader’s now-retracted statements about Lt. Gov. Barbara Lawton. I responded and offered to answer additional questions by phone if he desired. Gunn was apparently satisfied and quotes me in his article for Wispolitics.com. Here is my full statement (phone number redacted):
The key word I wrote is “supposedly.” I would have a hard time fathoming why, if someone had that kind of personal life, they would think putting their life under the microscope would be such a good idea. I don’t know if the story is close to true or not. Remember, Edwards denied his affair pretty strongly, too. But I really didn’t care. I try not to care about any politician’s personal life. What interested me that Bader was going out there with the story, and if any of the “mainstream” media was going to go with it.
(Of course, I got called the mainstream media not that long ago. Eeeek.)
Bader was pretty strong in his insistence that he was reporting “facts,” but the story just didn’t ring true enough to venture out onto that tree limb with him. I feel pretty good about what I wrote and how I handled it.
I think any reputation Bader had is ruined. Anyway, I am at home if you have any questions. Call me on my cell phone.
I don’t think I was quoted unfairly, but I do wish Gunn had called me so I could have corrected him on some points before he wrote his article. In it, Gunn tries to make a larger point about blogs and talk radio by quoting Katy Culver of UW-Madison,
But Culver also said that the case isn’t just one of the blogosphere run amok. “These are the kinds of accusations that can come out somewhat regularly in talk radio. This isn’t just a blogosphere question. It’s more of a question about talk radio and about how much we care about the accuracy of information in that medium. Are we just blasting away with salacious comment after salacious comment hoping that at some point we hit a bull’s-eye or are we actually caring about what information is out in the public sphere?”
Gunn does not quote anyone that would disagree with Culver or even that the blogosphere ran amok. Six blogs (Gunn’s count) out of the dozens of conservative blogs in Wisconsin is hardly running amok. Several of the larger blogs did not comment at all on what Bader said, including Althouse, Boots and Sabers, Badger Blogger, Real Debate Wisconsin, and the Spring City Chronicle. Included in the six blogs was my own, and Gunn’s reporting showed I handled the issue with skepticism.
The other blogs that I have seen that did touch the issue, No Runny Eggs, Lakeshore Laments, North Shore Exponent, Dad29, and Fairly Conservative, all quickly retracted what they wrote as quickly as Bader’s retraction became known. Unlike their professional media counterparts, the bloggers’ retractions were at least as prominent as the original blog postings and they all took care to responsibly handle what they originally posted to reduce any possible damage to Lawton’s reputation. They did so even though they all made clear in their original postings that they were relying on information from WTAQ and Jerry Bader.
As for talk radio, out of all of the talk radio hosts in Wisconsin only one went with any story concerning the personal life of Barbara Lawton, and that was Jerry Bader. Compare and contrast that record with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel’s handling of the personal life of a Milwaukee politician in a series of articles that caused Gunn’s editor at Milwaukee Magazine to suggest they print a retraction.
The central issue is Jerry Bader’s credibility, not the credibility of talk radio or the blogs. Bader insisted in the podcast he was being factual and not speculating. He also said there was physical evidence. Bader’s radio station is not exactly a ham radio outfit, so it wasn’t as if Bader’s statement didn’t carry some semblance of a media outlet’s credibility. He also has “mainstream” media credentials given his experience as a news director of WHBL for 16 years. Milwaukee Magazine (where Gunn normally writes the Pressroom column) thought Dan Shelley’s eleven years as a news director was credible enough when Shelley dished dirt on Charlie Sykes.
As long as Gunn was asking questions of the UW-Madison journalism department, Gunn could have asked whether Bader should reveal his sources that clearly burned his reputation. Or what punishment Bader should receive for his podcast. How serious is Bader’s risk of getting sued? How serious is the risk to WTAQ? Did they do enough once Bader retracted the story?
Also interesting would have been a discussion of why the news organizations waited. They were not saints. WTMJ’s John Jagler wrote on Twitter, “the Barbara Lawton rumors have the entire media world freaking out. Who will be the first major news outlet to break it?”
When I tweeted back to him the link to Bader’s podcast, Jagler responded, “that’s not big enough”.
Not that WTAQ and Bader weren’t credible, or that Jagler didn’t believe what Bader said, or that they were trying to verify the story. Just that Jagler was hoping someone bigger would go with the story, prompting my sarcastic reply, “Really? That’s the excuse? (At this point I’ll refrain from making a joke about the shrinking of Journal Communications.)”
Then, when a “mainstream” media outlet did get in touch with Lawton (or was it the other way around), the reporter actually apologized for asking questions about the rumor, which Gunn notes in his article. Really, apologize? Wouldn’t it have made more sense for the reporter to say this was Lawton’s chance to give her side? Also, the reporter could have pointed out that Lawton’s abrupt withdrawal from the race for governor, after she so enthusiastically campaigned for the job up to the announcement, will affect voters’ perceptions of her if she decides to re-enter public life.
Finally, Gunn concludes by quoting Wisconsin State Journal editor John Smalley in an attempt to make newspapers sound superior.
”If it had been on the table we would have asked about it, and if we wouldn’t have been able to confirm it, or if it had gotten blown up as nothing more than apparently what it was, then we could have just let it go and not included it in our report.
”I think the lesson is you can’t leap to conclusions and you can’t publish or broadcast things that you don’t know to be true.”
Bader specifically said there was physical evidence to back up the statements in his podcast. Given that, how does Smalley’s quote apply to anything? It would have served Gunn better if he asked Smalley what if a reporter had “sources” who had evidence of an affair and possible blackmail? How many sources would he need? Would he need ne of them on the record? What kind of evidence would Smalley need to see personally?
But that would not have fit what Gunn wanted to write. Gotta watch those mainstream media types.
To be fair, I did touch on this when Bader “broke” it, it was in a comment on the Lawton withdrawing topic. After the retraction etc. I posted my own thoughts on Bader’s actions and Bruce Redenz posted the dictionary definition for “Factual” for Bader’s future reference. I also edited several inappropriate comments on the issue, even before the Bader retraction.
[Reply]
James Wigderson Reply:
October 28th, 2009 at 9:41 pm
I saw Bruce’s post but I missed the comment. Thanks!
[Reply]
Jim,
I appreciate you noting you were quoted accurately. Frankly, my first take on your original post was that even you were giving Bader’s comments more credence than the available evidence warranted. Your timely response to my email led me to rethink my interpretation and remove it from the final draft I submitted to WisOpinion.
Also, I quite agree that the questions you suggest for John Smalley (or other newspaper editors), and for whether Bader should out his sources, are worthwhile follow-ups. I would have loved to have been able to call more people — you included — and ask more questions in the time I had to work the story. But as the old saying goes in the newspaper biz, that’s why God made second editions… I’m sure there will be more follow-up over time…
[Reply]
Why blame the blogs? Why not, to the extent that bloggers (of any stripe) often inflate themselves with the puffery that they’re the new modern replacement for the kids who went to J-school and learned a craft at the knee of someone who was doing it before they were born.
As for whether a journalist should reveal a source who proved to have inaccurate information… No. The responsibility lies with the journalist. It’s their job to assess sources. It happens all the time: you’re interviewing sources who always have their own motivations, be they political, criminal, personal, delusional, who repeat gossip as truth, whatever, it doesn’t matter. The journalist signed up for a job to assess sources and dare to print what they believe is the best assesment of the truth with demonstrable proof, at least to the extent that they can justify it to their editors and publisher. If they were wrong, they take the blame. Discrediting sources is a slippery slope that’s mostly fueled by the journalist’s pride and the desire to remove egg from their face when last week’s story proves to be wrong. It’s not the story itself. That slope also leads to erosion of confidential sources who might be key to future stories. Even your confidential sources can dry up if they think you’ll hang them out to dry in public if you later don’t like what they said.
If Bader’s excuse is that he had sources who were both (D) and (R), that’s a pretty lame justification. Both might want to torpedo Lawton.
All of which ties back to my first point. If you want to claim you’re doing something equivalent to journalism, then behave according to commonly accepted principles behind that profession. Some bloggers want to behave exactly like Bader. One moment they want to claim they’re reporting factually and enjoy journalism’s accepted privilege of unnamed sources, the next they’re repeating or rephrasing the day’s talking points of the Xyz Party of Wisconsin, the next they’re dodging by claiming it’s just entertainment. Most blogs are the opinion page at best, not the front page, and they routinely repost crapity-crap such as Bader’s report that no newspaper editor would let onto any page without verification to the paper’s standards. What, you think your local newspaper wasn’t receiving a steady stream of scurrilous junk that never made even the opinion page? Of course they did. They just didn’t print it.
I don’t have much sympathy for the claim that BadgerBlogger’s admins are spending a great deal of time policing comments. Gus is still happily posting away and the admins seem to encourage a kindergarten atmosphere of insults, and it even spills into the real world. This summer, I was receiving crank calls at my office that were clearly related to my posts over there.
[Reply]
Gee. Somebody calls bloggers ’self-puffers’ and burns 2000 words to ……do nothing.
Wiggy’s point is this: BADER is a credible journalist with 20++years’ experience. He does have a good reputation, and his former mentor/employer says so on his own blog.
So from here on, John, should bloggers check JS stories before posting them?
Puhleeze.
[Reply]
That was only 470 words, Daddio. Good reputation? They can disappear so quickly. You’re saying this was a JS story? Do you think they’re more careful than Bader was? Than the average blogger is? (You know, among the bloggers who aren’t posting ten times a day by quoting other bloggers who think exactly the way they do.) Do you think journalists should out the sources who turn out to have misled them? That’s half of what I was writing about, above.
I’m eager to read your 2,000 words – or even 470 – about the Catholic theology behind repeating gossip, which, depending on how you look at it, is the other half of what I wrote. How should only strive to reach the truth and in the process, not do harm?
[Reply]
John, You should go onto the stand up circuit with that last post — it is real funny you talking about doing no harm. BTW, what is the address for your WL&P spoof site?
FWIW, I thought your point that the notion of the rumor coming from both sides of the aisle not proving too much was a good and valid point to make. Rumor spreaders will spread them for their own motives. Whether that to damage Lawton or to damage annoying media personalities.
Fact is, not a lot of blogs touched the story prior the retraction. I heard the story firsthand and my reaction was that he had better have it right and even if the story was true, I could not really care one way or another. Now that the retraction is out there there is a firestorm of discussion going on and of course that is not focusing on the rumor. There was no rush of the right wing blogosphere to trot this story out.
[Reply]
Stand up? You want stand up? Wisconsin Power & Light? Aren’t they Alliant now? Oh, Wiggie’s place. Apart from news, there’s entertainment. Parody is even older than Marcus Aurelius. Ridicule is supposed to poke. You think I’m doing harm? Even Owen said it was “pretty funny.” I find Wigderson far less parody-able, he’s more reasonable and less prone to retard-and-poop jokes than Owen. Perhaps he’s blessed by his education in the classics. (P.S., Owen, that means “literature” not “George Strait.”)
You think a reporter shouldn’t think twice and verify potentially harmful allegations? That’s what we were talking about here. As The Chief points out, Bader made several allegations, not just one.
And among the half-dozen conservative blogs who did repeat this, yes, I’d call it an eager rush. Bader stated it in his podcast on 10/26 (whether he stated it in his morning show or just the afternoon release of the podcast, I don’t know), Lakeshore posted it very quickly and perhaps first (no dates on posts), Fairly Conservative had it at 7:38 p.m., BadgerBlogger’s Dorwin posted it as a comment at 7:43 p.m. (and in the ever-classy and erudite BadgerBlogger fashion, the next comment within minutes suggested pictorially that she was sleeping with Hillary Clinton), NoRunnyEggs posted at 11:13 p.m., North Shore Exponent posted that day (but in true conservative take-personal-responsibility fashion has flushed the post down the memory hole to clear their conscience), Wigderson posted it the next morning at 6:08 a.m. after his breakfast martini, Dad29 posted at 8:21 a.m. right after he got back from Mass and his power-walk at the mall, Bader pulled the story at 11:23, and the apologetic please-don’t-sue-me’s began. Did I miss anyone?
I don’t take it as evidence that there was no rush simply because some blogs had the sense to not rush and to wait to see if there was any verification by another source. If there’s any self-examination to be done, why not ask what drives some bloggers to repeat single-source or unverified news within minutes?
[Reply]
Foust, I can answer that question. It’s because the wingnuts run around in circles patting themselves on the back. I cite and praise your irrational paranoia and you return the favor. Sykes is the master at this task. I hope that Jerry “Master” Bader enjoys his well-deserved early retirement.
[Reply]