Ralph Peters on Journalism

Always direct and clear in his opinions, Ralph Peters lets fly his remarks on journalism in this Morning's NY Post. (registration required).

A SPECTER is haunting journalism: the specter of Watergate.

Three decades ago, two young reporters became the story and crippled American journalism.

Budding yuppies who avoided inconvenient service to the state needed heroes they could call their own. And they got them.

Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman played Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein on-screen. It was as if Mike Bloomberg was portrayed by Brad Pitt. Overnight, journalism became an upwardly mobile profession — and our country is much the worse for it.

In place of the old healthy skepticism, we have arrogant cynicism. The highest echelons of the media and government became preserves for America's most-privileged. An Ivy League degree was the ticket to a reporting job on a major daily. And incest produced the usual ugly results.

"Mainstream" newspapers lost touch with American workers because the new breed of journalists didn't know any workers.

After journalists became matinee idols, every bright young reporter had a new career goal. Forget honest, get-at-the-facts reporting. Henceforth the crowning ambition in the field was to bring down a president — especially one who wasn't "our kind." Failing that, turning the tide of a foreign conflict against Washington would do.

Go a head and register at the NY Post. Read Ralph for his direct style, even if you disagree with him.