Reporters as Consultants Is a Bad Idea
Let's think of ways to make journalists even less credible than they already are. Hire them out to give advice to corporate brass in trouble with the media. This proposal is the brainchild of former MSNBC chief Dan Abrams, who lost his show to the more popular host, Rachel Maddow, and has now left the cable news network.
Abrams's idea, according to the Wall Street Journal, is to assemble a roster of "thousands" of media headliners from print, broadcast, and online, to swoop in (for a hefty fee, of course) and help uncertain penthouse suite occupants. His firm, Abrams Research, might, according to the Journal, "marshal a mock jury of bloggers, TV personalities and newspaper or magazine editors to weigh in on how media outlets would likely respond to different PR strategies."
While assembling this firm, Abrams is renegotiating his own media contract as an outside legal analyst for NBC News. How will we ever know if his firm is getting money from a law firm or lawyer for its services? Abrams says his "strict ethical guidelines" (again according to the Journal) will bar full-time journalists from consulting with companies in their areas of coverage. He, as a presumed freelance or part-time cable consultant, would be free of his own ethics guidelines.
I do not know Abrams nor would I ever hire myself out in such a fashion. I'm a full-time journalist covering issues affecting women, families, communities of color, and politics. Could I work up guidelines under which I could accept such corporate fees? Of course! Would I be further blurring the line separating journalism from greed in the so doing? Yes. Worse yet, I couldn't live with myself. I believe I speak for most journalists who've never passed through the revolving door between (or among) journalism, politics and the corporate world. We're a dying breed. No wonder the American public has so little faith in its media.
Tags: consultants | journalism | media
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Reader Comments
does abrams not know?
that this stuff exists in a thousand places already and do you not know that hundreds of ex reporters have been doing this for decades?
wake up please. this article should have been written thusly.
"abrams, out of work, decides to follow path hundreds of journalists have been taking for decades."
please
go to any big pr firm or big corporation and you'll find a former journalist.
Erbe is a Misandrist
We all dislike misogynists, at least those of us who are mentally healthy. Occasionally, though, we run across someone with the opposite problem, misandry (hatred of males). Erbe is one such individual. Case in point: take another look at her comment about Abrams and Maddow. Personally, as radio personalities, I like them both. I'm glad Rachel Maddow has a new show. But Erbe can't conceal her utter delight at taking a shot at Abrams--she's like a pig in a new pigpen, rolling with glee. It's contemptible.
I wonder if Erbe has any sense of how utterly unappealing and small she looks to the general public. Sorry, Bonnie, this drivel won't fly beyond the small and bitter readership that approves of this slop.
Male Media Man-Crush on Obama Member Chris Matthews.
Many of members fo the press (too many) made their preference for Obama in the past election the centerpiece of their reporting on actual events. Chris Matthews, who I used find informative and interesting, turned into a meanspirited, middleage grump with a man-crush on Obama (yuck), and that's with Obama winning. Frankly, there is a lot more of John McCain's temperment in Matthews (sans any real courage or humor) than he thinks the public can see. I used to watch MSNBC (I was one of the very, very few who did) but no more. Matthews is just one of the media boot lickers who lost all professional appeal with their Omamadoration based coverage of the past election. Having failed to stand up to Bush until the public turned against him, now many of media resemble members of the O.J. Simpson acquittal jury. Everything Obama does will be perfect and when he fails in anything that will be blamed on everyone or anyone elese. Yeah, like maybe them for failing to be objective, and impartial and the media wonders why many of the voters rally around politicians who diss the "media". Tim Russert, we miss you so much!
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