Well maybe not everything, but as W. Joseph Campbell recently discussed in a new podcast over at PJM HQ, if you rely on the MSM’s interpretation of history as your own, you’d have quite a skewed view of events. Campbell, a veteran former AP reporter turned communications professor is the author of Getting It Wrong: Ten of the Greatest Misreported Stories in American Journalism, and as he notes during the interview, the MSM and its enablers have quite a predilection towards making itself the focus of news, and encouraging sweeping myths about their power to shape events.
And that’s far from a new development. No, the Washington Post didn’t single-handedly bring down President Nixon, despite how the film All the President’s Men appears. No, their coverage did not single-handedly cause a large spike in journalism students. No, Edward R. Murrow didn’t finish off McCarthy, despite what George Clooney and Mark Cuban told you. No, William Randolph Hearst didn’t get America into war with Cuba, despite Orson Welles’ line in Citizen Kane about, “You supply the prose poems, I’ll supply the war.” (And speaking of Welles…) No, the first 1960 television debate wasn’t a TV TKO for JFK. And no, Cronkite’s famous on-air op-ed about Vietnam didn’t cause LBJ to bail on a second term. But yes, they really screwed the pooch during Katrina — wonder why?
(Oh, and speaking of getting the last century wrong, Richard Cohen to the tie-dyed courtesy phone, please!)
It’s an engaging 17-minute long interview, and if you haven’t already followed the links above, Campbell’s blog, Media Myth Alert, filled with meaty posts on topics both in his book and beyond is all well worth your time.
The interview aired (in edited form) on Saturday’s PJM Political on Sirius-XM’s POTUS channel, which is also online here.
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