Down the tubes

GREENSBORO, NC -- I know a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do and, sometimes, circumstances make it hard to stick to one's principles; but the fall of John Hammer, former publisher of the Rhino Times and now-editor under new ownership, is remarkable to behold and a sad loss for Greensboro.

Always a staunch conservative, Hammer used to have going for him a tenacious allegiance to transparency and authenticity. It used to be that Hammer was a bulwark against public malfeasance and shenanigans that tried to deceive the people—often standing alone against powerful and entrenched interests in doing so. Whatever one thought of his politics, one could always admire him for that.

No longer.

Update: Doug Clark has more.

Ladd on fire

GREENSBORO, NC -- The News & Record's Susan Ladd is making the most of her new position as an advocacy journalist. In just a few short weeks, she is raising the bar for both her editorial and news reporting colleagues. I have not agreed with everything she has written, and some topics are more serious than others, but she is singlehandedly slaying stupidity and deception in a way I thought I'd never see at the News & Record again. It's refreshing, inspiring and, if she keeps it up, Greensboro will be better by her efforts.

Today, on developer Roy Carroll's furtive plan to reduce the number of Greensboro City Council representatives, Ladd writes:

What he wants on the council, Carroll wrote, is a “diversified majority of business executives and owners.”

Really? Why not a majority of environmentalists? A majority of preservationists? A majority of educators?

A majority of any one constituency would unbalance the council. The council needs members from diverse backgrounds and different segments of the community to represent the people it serves. A council dominated by business owners might well make decisions that disenfranchise all the other groups, including homeowners and neighborhoods.

“The simple answer is that a business professional would rather be part of a smaller decision-making group in which that person could effect change,” Carroll wrote.

Is effecting change anything like getting your way? It sure sounds like that.

Maybe, for example, it would be easier to get the city to close a street to benefit your development. Or to convince the city to enact a noise ordinance that placates your condo owners but hurts nightclub businesses.

Oh, wait. Carroll won both of those battles despite the objections of residents and other business owners.

How much more power does he need?

And just how is a plan to change the council’s size going to guarantee a body dominated by business people?

Oh, right. Donations.

It’s worth noting that Carroll contributed $5,300 to Wade’s campaign last year and $9,000 to the campaign of state Sen. Phil Berger (R-Rockingham), who has said Wade “may very well be on the right track” in proposing a smaller council in Greensboro.

But what’s good for Greensboro is apparently not good for Eden. Berger has made no attempt to reduce the size of the council in his hometown, a city of 15,000 residents represented by a mayor (elected at large) and seven council members.

The fact is that the Greensboro City Council, aside from an occasional spat, is a high-functioning body that broadly represents the residents of Greensboro.

This district-and-at-large system was created to ensure minority representation, and it has resulted in a more balanced and representative council, which currently has four women, four men, three people of color and a woman as mayor.

If anyone decides how and if that body is going to change, it should be the voters, not a lone senator who can trade favors in the legislature to ram through a partisan plan that helps only a select group of businessmen.

Especially when most of those businessmen hide behind cloaks of anonymity.

[Read more]

"I don’t have to look in the rearview mirror to see racism, and neither do you."

"I don’t have to look in the rearview mirror to see racism, and neither do you."

— Susan Ladd

Great writers can say a lot in a few words. Such is the case with this outstanding piece by Susan Ladd in which she demonstrates the moral and intellectual superiority attainable when talking about racism in Greensboro when one rises above generalities, pettiness and tired old rhetoric. It's one of the best things I've read at the News & Record in a long time. Read it.

Horrible, horrible; just pathetically and absolutelty the worst

GREENSBORO, NC -- Yesterday, the News & Record reported of a robbery in which a gaming console was stolen at gun point:

"Armed men tried and failed to rob two people... The suspects ran from the scene without taking any property." (Emphasis added.)

That story is still online.

It's bad enough the News & Record turned a press release from the police advising of a "robbery from person" into a fiction completely contrary to the facts, but today, when the police issued another press release about that crime, consistent with their first but adding new suspect information, the News & Record "reported" it again, this time writing that one of the suspects pulled a gun and took the gaming console:

"[O]ne of the two men pulled a handgun, took the system and the two alleged suspects ran off."  (Emphasis added.)

So now, at the illustrious News & Record, one can simultaneously find two accounts of the same crime, one where suspects fled without taking any property and one where property was taken. Both contradict each other, only one is accurate, the other remains uncorrected and yet both are online together.

It Matters

For all the thought and effort that various people and institutions put into advancing Greensboro, I am firmly convinced we will be forever held back from making the kind of progress we could as long as we are burdened by the dung heap that is the News & Record.

How can we as a community ever properly address our shortcomings and understand our strengths if our primary "news" outlet is a sloppy and indifferent pustule of perpetual misinformation and ignorance undemanding of itself and deceiving us about who we are and what's going on?

Day after day, the News & Record offers up mistake after mistake and each reveals a troubling fact: Our daily newspaper is not careful, not a checker of facts, rarely a source of insight or enterprising inquisitiveness* and not even any good at the simple task of regurgitating press releases.

Greensboro deserves better.



* This makes the situation even worse—that there are one or two reporters there who manage, against what must be monumental institutional momentum to the contrary, to occasionally deliver some quality reporting. I feel as bad for them about the burden of the News & Record's institutional incompetence as I do for my city.

Making it up: Another day, another News & Record fail

GREENSBORO, NC -- It's pretty bad when your local newspaper cannot even accurately regurgitate information from a press release.

The News & Record "reports":

"Armed men tried and failed to rob two people who arranged on Craigslist to sell a gaming system, according to a police news release." 

and:

 "The suspects ran from the scene without taking any property, police said."

The police did not say that. The robbers did not fail. Exactly the opposite. The suspects did not flee the scene without taking any property. They took property. That's what made it a robbery and thus the headline on the police press release: "Robbery from person."

All of this was clear in the police press release. It only became confused when the News & Record put their hands on it. From the police press release (emphasis added):

"Officers discovered two victims in the parking lot who stated that they had been robbed at gunpoint during the sale of a PlayStation 4 that had been arranged on Craigslist. No one was injured and no other items were taken."

I wonder what the News & Record sees as their mission and if they think they are doing a good job at whatever that is.

News & Record's huge error on drunk driving stats

GREENSBORO, NC -- There is a certain type of reporting error that astounds me, I call it an affront to common knowledge, where an assertion goes unchecked even though, on its face, it seems to violate common sense. It is the kind of thing a reporter or editor with general curiosity and some basic knowledge of the world would be compelled to stop and double check.

Today at the News & Record:

"In the United States, a drunken driver causes someone to die every 52 seconds." 

Reporter Danielle Battaglia doesn't cite a source for that tidbit but, on its face, it sounds hard to believe.

Just some quick math challenges the possibility this is true: If there is a drunk driving fatality every 52 seconds, then that's 69 drunk driving deaths every hour; 1,661 a day; 11,630 per week; and 606,000 per year. 

And here is where a lack of general knowledge comes in: That is a huge number of deaths per year for any single cause. It should jump out to a professional reporter and her professional editors as extremely unlikely. 

A quick search of "leading causes of death" would show that such a number would make drunk driving fatalities the leading cause of death in the United States, ahead of the roughly 598,000 per year from heart disease, the 577,000 from cancer and the third place 143,000 from lung disease. (source: Centers for Disease Control)

The fact is, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, "In 2011, 9,878 people were killed in alcohol-impaired-driving crashes." That's far from insignificant, but it is nowhere near the hysterical one every 52 seconds the News & Record reported. It is about one every hour to give you a sense of just how far off the N&R is.  

And a big thumbs down to WGHP MyFox8 who copied and pasted this error to their website from the News & Record without correction.

For Pete's sake

GREENSBORO, NC -- The News & Record mocks congressional candidate Laura Fjeld today "for thinking she could carry the primary victory into the general election in a district that has been a Republican stronghold for decades."

A Republican stronghold for decades?

Sigh...

No.

If the staff at the News & Record are going to belittle someone, they might want to make sure they aren't making fools of themselves in the process.

The district in which Fjeld ran was newly drawn in 2012.

As of 2012

Prior to that, it included much of the Democratic leaning 13th district, held by Democrat Brad Miller for a decade.

Through 2011

Fjeld was not running in a district that has been a "Republican stronghold for decades." It is a newly drawn district in existence for only two years and which actually has more registered Democrats than Republicans.

Fjeld was not crazy for thinking she had a shot. On the other hand, what does it tell us about those on the political beat at the News & Record that they are so ignorant of their home turf?

News & Record contradicts itself

GREENSBORO, NC -- This is why reporters should not make assertions without attribution.

From Danielle Battaglia in the News & Record today: "Williams walked off the property only to return to the hospital's entrance"

Yesterday, Sarah Newell Williamson wrote in the N&R: "He [Williams] got within 150 yards of the entrance, on hospital property."

Which is it? If two sources are contradicting each other, that's one thing; but without attribution, the News & Record is contradicting itself. These are the reporters' assertions, the reporters are claiming responsibility for their veracity and one of them must be wrong.

2014 Reckless Reporting of the Year Award

GREENSBORO, NC -- The long knives are out at the News & Record for those currently in control of the International Civil Rights Center and Museum (ICRCM), and it's not pretty. It's embarrassing. Reckless, actually.

On the heels of last week's political hit piece based solely on anonymous sources taking aim at the controlling majority of the ICRM board, reporter Margaret Moffett launches another unfounded salvo so preposterous it seems as if it should be beneath even the very low standards of the very terrible News & Record.

Let's break it down (it won't take much). Moffett begins with:

"The sit-in museum's chief financial officer and interim leader may be violating North Carolina law by representing himself as a certified public accountant."

Says who? Nobody. Although Moffett has demonstrated her willingness to print unfounded assertions* in the past, this one isn't just unfounded, it's unattributed—to anybody. So it is Moffett's accusation. Can she make her case?

For all the rolling around Moffett does in the law and regulations, it all is predicated on one criterion. It's what we programmers recognize as a conditional statement: If a is true, then b; Moffett writes it like this:

"[A] CPA licensed in another state who moves to North Carolina to practice accounting 'must obtain a certificate of qualification from the board prior to using the CPA title in any way in this state,' according to the law."

What is the condition? What is the if that must be true for the law to apply? "WHO MOVES TO NORTH CAROLINA." If a person does not move to North Carolina, the laws Moffett says Swaine may be violating do not apply.

So has Swaine moved to North Carolina? Has he satisfied the condition that would make these laws apply? No. According to whom? According to Moffett herself, who writes:

"Swaine, who commutes to Greensboro from his home in Roanoke, Va., has held a CPA license in Virginia since 1999."

Her conditional fails. MOVED TO NORTH CAROLINA does not equal true. So all that stuff about what is required of a CPA who moves to North Carolina—those laws Moffett says Swaine "may be violating"—do not apply.

Additionally, Moffett cites as examples of Swaine "representing himself as a CPA" in North Carolina posts to Twitter and Linkdin. That's absurd. Such posts are no more "in North Carolina" than they are in Texas or Sri Lanka.

Moffett doesn't let logic and the facts get in her way though. With no regard for whether or not the law even applies in Swaine's case she doesn't hesitate to write that he "may" be breaking the law. Maybe—maybe he's double parked—but Moffett offers nothing to back up her suggestion that Swaine may be breaking the laws pertaining to CPAs. This is the kind of untenable character assassination that has had bloggers kicked off of Greensboro 101. It is shocking to find it in the "professional" media.

Whatever one's opinion on the best policy for the ICRCM, and there are advantages and disadvantages to the options on the table, we cannot allow slander to influence our decision making. Advocacy journalism has its place, but to do it, one must get her facts straight and think.

This is not journalism, it is a horrible and unconscionable smear piece. Greensboro deserves better.


* Moffett is Margaret Banks in the post at this link.

Why the mystery?

GREENSBORO, NC -- On the mysterious genesis of state legislator Trudy Wade's idea to monkey around with the make up of Greensboro's city council, News & Record reporter Amanda Lehmert writes:

"Council members, former elected leaders and political wonks have been left to speculate which one of them poked the bear."

Add to the list of those left to speculate News & Record readers — which is not where a news organization should want to leave its audience.

A few days ago, Lehmert reported:

"Wade said she was prompted to consider the issue by local business owners, who she said asked not to be identified."

That's fine and dandy, but a reporter should not acquiesce to a preference for such secrecy; in fact, a reporter should challenge it vociferously. Who are the people pushing these proposed changes to city government and what are their motives? If only we had some kind of person whose job it was to challenge authority, to investigate and uncover information for the public benefit.

Communications with Wade on this matter would be public record. They would likely end the "speculation" and fill the gaping hole in this story. A professional reporter covering this should not hesitate to ask for them.

Malpractice: News & Record prints Anthony Bundros' plagiarized falsehoods

GREENSBORO, NC -- Allen Johnson, editorial editor of the News & Record, when recently called on the carpet by Ed Cone for publishing falsehoods on the editorial page (previously and previously), responded with:

"The News & Record’s policy is to screen and edit letters for factual errors."

He's not doing a very good job. Today, he publishes a letter that is both false in its assertions and plagiarized. The News & Record gives it credibility by adding the title: "Our inept president has changed the U.S.."

The letter is signed by Anthony Bundros of Greensboro. It offers what the author suggests is insight into the thinking of Barack Obama, which he advises can come from understanding the "the eight levels of control to create a socialists state," from, Bundros says, Sal Alinsky.

Two problems: Bundros did not write the bulk of his letter and the "eight levels of control" are not from Alinksky.

Plagiarism
Descriptions of the "eight levels of control" Bundros includes in his letter, can be found word-for-word from other sources. The earliest I could find was in an unedited public forum on the Beaufort Observer's website on January 13, 2014 by a Joseph Leary. Bundros did not write what he represented as his own.

Falsehoods
Although Bundros describes what he says are Sal Alinsky's "levels of control," fact-checking Snopes says these are not from Alinsky and Snopes can identify no source beyond chain emails. Snopes rates as "false" an email circulating since January of 2104 that attributes these to Alinsky and which includes, nearly word-for-word, the "eight levels of control" cited by Bundros. Snopes discredits it as:

"[A]nother example of a political linking of the names of Saul Alinsky and Barack Obama. It's not something taken from the actual writings of Saul Alinsky, though, and to those familiar with his background it doesn't even sound like something he would have written.  

When the needle on my (amateur) B.S. meter is jumping off the scale, one would expect the seasoned professionals at the News & Record to have been at least a little curious. Curious enough to take two minutes for a web search. It's what they get paid for, right? Editing. It's what distinguishes them as professionals, right?


Anthony Bundros was hoodwinked to mistakenly believe, we assume, the falsehoods he read. Who knows what motives he had for signing his name to something he did not write? But for the News & Record to publish this claptrap, for it to escape their notice that the piece was not only plagiarized but that it also asserted demonstrable falsehoods, is nothing short of malpractice. For them to slap a headline on it that gives the fabrications credence is egregious. Greensboro deserves better.

N&R Plagiarism

GREENSBORO, NC -- Although they've seemed to avoid it for a little while, the News & Record has resorted, yet again, to publishing the writings of others, word for word, under the byline of News & Record "staff reports." (Previously)

The News & Record did not "report" this. They, like a bunch of others, received the press release from the City of Greensboro. Then they copied it, pasted it and claimed it as their own—and they didn't fact check it, as is evident by them repeating an error of fact that appeared in the press release but that would have been discovered by the most cursory of fact checking.

Here's the "report" as it appeared on the News & Record. The highlighted portions were copied word-for-word from the press release.   
------------------

Vickeé Armstrong new general manager of Greensboro ABC

Staff Reports

GREENSBORO — Vickeé Armstrong has been appointed the new general manager of the Greensboro's Alcohol Beverage Control (ABC) Board, according to a news release from the city.

Armstrong is a seasoned senior executive with over 25 years of diverse experience in all sectors of commercial property operations, retail/mixed-use management and development, the release states.

During her career, Armstrong has spearheaded the grand opening of the Mall at Stonecrest, a 1200-acre mixed-use district near Atlanta; was a regional director for Tanger Outlet Centers; general manager at Oak Hollow Mall; and district general manager/development officer with the Virgin Islands Port Authority at Crown Bay Center, a deep water cruise ship port in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, the release states.

While with the Virgin Islands Port Authority, she improved occupancy from 60 to 100 percent, and initiated a $200 million joint venture development project, while launching numerous other economic impact models throughout the territory, the release states.

ABC Board Members cited Armstrong’s diverse and extensive retail experience, senior level management skills, and familiarity with North Carolina’s ABC industry as important factors in their decision to offer her the position.

Armstong [LOL! They even copied a spelling error.] is a multi international MAXI winner, International SASI winner, a recipient of letters of commendation from both the President of the United States and the Department of the Army for marketing/public relations and support of military personnel and their families during Operation Desert Storm. She holds three ICSC, (International Council of Shopping Centers) designations -- CRX, (Senior Certified Retail Executive) CSM (Senior Certified Shopping Center Manager) CMD (Senior Certified Marketing Director).

She is a graduate of the University of Maryland, attended the International Theological Center in Atlanta, and the John Wesley School of Management in High Point, NC (now Laurel University).

Armstrong assumed her new role on September 29, 2014.

--------------
Here is the original sent by the City of Greensboro:

Vickee’ Armstrong Tapped as General Manager of Greensboro ABC Board

GREENSBORO, NC (October 9, 2014) -- The City of Greensboro Alcohol Beverage Control (ABC) Board has appointed Vickeé Armstrong, CRX, CSM, CMD as its new general manager. Armstrong is a seasoned senior executive with over 25 years of diverse experience in all sectors of commercial property operations, retail/mixed-use management and development.

During her career, Armstrong has spearheaded the grand opening of the Mall at Stonecrest, a 1200 acre mixed use district near Atlanta, GA, was a regional director for Tanger Outlet Centers, general manager at Oak Hollow Mall, and district general manager/development officer with the Virgin Islands Port Authority at Crown Bay Center, a deep water cruise ship port in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. While with the Virgin Islands Port Authority, she improved occupancy from 60 to 100 percent, and initiated a $200 million joint venture development project, while launching numerous other economic impact models throughout the territory.

ABC Board Members cited Armstrong’s diverse and extensive retail experience, senior level management skills, and familiarity with North Carolina’s ABC industry as important factors in their decision to offer her the position. The Board conducted a lengthy public search and interview process for the general manager position.

Armstong is a multi international MAXI winner, International SASI winner, a recipient of letters of commendation from both the President of the United States and the Department of the Army for marketing/public relations and support of military personnel and their families during Operation Desert Storm. She holds three ICSC, (International Council of Shopping Centers) designations -- CRX, (Senior Certified Retail Executive) CSM (Senior Certified Shopping Center Manager) CMD (Senior Certified Marketing Director). She is a graduate of the University of Maryland, attended the International Theological Center in Atlanta, and the John Wesley School of Management in High Point, NC (now Laurel University). Armstrong assumed her new role on September 29, 2014.

So sad

GREENSBORO, NC -- Ed Cone on the News & Record::

The news hole is up for sale, and the opinion section is on autopilot. It is what it is. Move on.

He's right.

Now THIS is journalism! Kudos News & Record

GREENSBORO, NC -- From the News & Record today:

He came back to life, according to a story Bonnke tells, when his wife took the body to one of the crusades.

Some critics are skeptical of that account.

See? Very balanced. A dead man may have come back to life but, maybe not. You decide, it's not a reporter's place to say.

Top notch!

I'm looking forward to these upcoming reports:

Sasquatch may be headed to the N.B.A., critics skeptical.

Flying carpets to become popular mode of transportation, critics skeptical.

Alien spacecraft causing global warming, critics skeptical.

</sarcasm>

This is the kind of tripe the News & Record thinks people will pay to read.

The News & Record: safe haven for mediocre journalists

GREENSBORO, NC -- It's one thing if a reporter might not have had an opportunity to get up to speed on a community's history or has yet to develop his own professional standards. It is quite another thing when a news organization coddles those inadequacies. That's an environment for professional decay.

Robert Lopez writes a piece at the News & Record today that is so sub par, it should not have been published -- if the News & Record itself had any standards.

The story, about the City of Greensboro settling a police officer's discrimination suit for $25,000, suffers from two grave deficiencies, both, unfortunately, not uncommon at the News & Record.

The first is the despicable, deplorable, lazy and amateurish deployment of he said,she said reporting in place of the facts. Renowned journalism professor Jay Rosen has referred to this technique of pitting the claims of one person against another without aligning their claims to available facts as a wholly inadequate vestige of the pre-internet age of journalism. It's too easy for such reports to be revealed as deficient on the web—"lame," Rosen calls them—as is happening here.

When Lopez reports that police officers who sued the city said a lineup book containing their pictures was used to "frame" them and that the former chief of police said otherwise, leaving it at that, Lopez is positioning his reporting as nothing more than stenography, a regurgitation of competing claims and not a source for fact-finding despite widespread public knowledge that such facts exist. Lame.

In fact, the use of the line-up book was thoroughly investigated by the FBI, the SBI and the Department of Justice. None found any wrongful use of the lineup book. The City of Greensboro swore in an affidavit it had no evidence of misuse of the lineup book and, indeed, none has ever been produced. Lopez fails to report these salient facts. Lame.

Lopez also lacks a knowledge of local history and, here, his editors should have helped him out. When Lopez writes that the officer who sued the city claimed that a tracking device was put on his car and claims that his picture appeared in the line-up book, without reporting how those claims align with the facts, Lopez reveals himself to be ignorant of the facts found in the history of this matter. It was widely acknowledged and reported that a tracking device was placed on the officer's car. That's a fact, not just an individual's assertion, as Lopez would have it. Lame.

Additionally, city council members, some still on council (Zack Matheny and Yvonne Johnson), saw the line-up book in question. There are two credible sources with first-hand knowledge who are in a position to say whether or not the officer's picture was in the book. Lopez ignores those sources, leaving the officer's assertion unchecked. Lame.

Lopez reports as if there is no truth, no facts; only assertions. The worst part is that his efforts pass muster with his editors. That is not only lame, it's common practice at the News & Record. It's bad business too and it's bad for the professional development of the reporters who work there. A reporter who wants to be a mediocre journalist and stay a mediocre journalist will find accommodation at the News & Record.

The News & Record stinks so bad

From Joe Gamm in the News & Record today, reporting on the City of Greensboro settling a lawsuit brought by former police officers:

"[Former Police Chief David] Wray resigned in 2006. Plaintiffs alleged he maintained a “black book” that was used to unfairly investigate black officers. Wray contended the department used the book to investigate a sexual assault."

The News & Record continues their atrocious willingness to let competing assertions substitute for fact, but the truth is the realities of the "black book" are far different from what the News & Record portrays. It wasn't just Wray who said the book was a legitimate investigative tool, it was the City of Greensboro, in a sworn affidavit, signed by the very city manager who locked David Wray out of his office, who said the book was compiled for the purpose of solving a crime.

Furthermore, the city also admitted in that affidavit, that it had no evidence of the line-up book being misused. Finally, the use of the book was investigated by the SBI, the FBI and the Department of Justice, all of whom found no improper use of the book. Only one police officer was tried as a result of investigations into the "black book"—for improper use of a federal computer—and he was acquitted.

The News & Record ignores the context of these details and reports the purpose of the black book as unknown beyond the competing assertions of two parties. There is no truth here as far as the News & Record is concerned, they are content to commit what renowned journalism professor Jay Rosen calls the ethical lapse of he said/she said reporting. It makes them look incompetent, or worse, contemptuous.

Just the worst. News & Record's ethical lapse

GREENSBORO, NC -- I know newspapers are stressed. I know that, for years now, they've been trying to do more with less — or even less with less, without folding. And sure, entrenched old fogies paralyzed by shock and lacking new ideas but unwilling to relinquish the reins carry plenty of the blame for being slow to innovate. Nonetheless, a certain level of quality requires nothing more than conscientious attention to some basic standards and it is something a news enterprise can do immediately with no cost.

As Jay Rosen argues, the days when it was enough to just give both sides of a story — without providing any additional viewpoints or fact-checking — are over. He said/she said journalism is both an ethical lapse and a failure to understand how the media business itself has changed. -- Matthew Ingram 

I first started paying attention to local media about the same time I started seriously paying attention to local public policy. It was around 2000, when Greensboro went all out, successfully, to recruit what was then supposed to be the mid-Atlantic overnight cargo sorting hub for FedEx. I won't re-litigate the arguments for and against here. Suffice it to say that there were people with concerns that this city, desperately watching the last vestiges of its once solid furniture and apparel manufacturing evaporate, was investing all hope in lofty promises of great benefit while avoiding any serious consideration of costs. Fourteen years later, the worst fears have not materialized—attributable to the fact that the hub's promised activity has not materialized, never getting close to the projected 126 flights per night.

Terribly frustrating during the period of public debate was that the local media, the News & Record in particular, clearly took the pro-hub side and subtly but effectively marginalized the opposition. That's when I first noticed the insidious he said/she said "reporting" tactic in action. It's simple. Lazy, misleading and simple. Instead of reporting empirical facts as facts, report them as the assertions of someone. Then report someone else "arguing" against them. There is no need for fact checking, when both "sides" have been reported. Where do the facts lie? Who knows?

This is, unfortunately, exactly what Taft Wireback brings us with his Sunday front-pager "How dangerous is coal ash? Well, that depends," inspired by the recent Duke Power coal ash spill into the Dan River.

Wireback begins by posing the question:

Is this power-plant byproduct the “toxic sludge” so threatening to the state’s ground water, streams and lakes?

Wireback never gives his readers a real answer. He could have reported the results of water quality studies conducted after the Dan River spill for some actual empirical measurements of toxicity but, instead, he is content to let two parties duke it out, each with his assertions and giving the largest megaphone to "coal ash expert" John Daniels, a UNC-Charlotte professor who has consulted with Duke Power and who is working on making useful materials from coal ash. It is the perfect bad example of the ethical lapse of he said/she said journalism. Thus, Wireback "reports" such demonstrably false and grossly misleading nuggets as this.

The 1 percent of coal ash with a potential to harm involves such metals as arsenic that humans ingest routinely in small doses every day, Daniels said.

“You could have drank a liter of Dan River water on the day after the spill and close to the spill, and you would have consumed less arsenic than you usually ingest from other natural sources” daily, he said.

Reporting unchecked assertions was never good journalism, even back in the days of the FedEx hub debate. Its deficiencies are even more obvious now in an age where people have empirical sources at their fingertips. The News & Record should ask itself just what benefit this kind of he said/she said reporting, free from fact checking, brings to its audience. The answer is none and continuing it puts an unnecessary obstacle in the path of an already challenging future for the News & Record. It should stop, once and for all.

It's opposite day for News & Record headline writer

Greensboro, NC -- The headline from a News & Record article:

N.C. plan would join states ending teacher tenure

From the article:

"Only Florida has succeeded in eliminating teacher tenure protections, according to the Education Commission of the States."

"Join states" sounds like we are part of a crowd, a trend — a movement. A more accurate headline would have reflected just what the article reported, that North Carolina's "plan" would make us exceptionally unappealing for teachers.

Journalism

“Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed: everything else is public relations.”

— George Orwell 

Not dead yet

GREENSBORO, NC -- Just as I was observing that the News & Record seems to have become incurably infected with a preference for the laziest substitutions for journalism, along comes reporter Joe Killian with an exceptional glimmer of hope. In covering the defamation suit by Conservatives for Guilford County against a local blogger, Killian takes a story tailor made for the he said/she said trap, gives each side its due but firmly stakes the story down to the pertinent and independently researched empirical facts. Journalism, not stenography.

Update:: There was an error in the link to the Killian article. It has been corrected.