I know lots of reporters. I've been one & still sometiems dust off a few journo chops. I'm a press romantic: I cherish the image of the daily newsie as a wise-cracking, truth-teller-to-power hero. I'm in awe of the skills now req'd to do serious journalism at the highest level...
2/ But it is tragic that right now we have a technically expert, hugely capable elite press corp who, w. exceptions, are doing fine work on the wrong material--who possess, that is, every skill but that required to see what they're covering, and hence, how it needs to be covered.
3/ That is: w. Pam Bondi's shunning yesterday, is the story that people were rude to her (or that we're polarized)? Or is it significant to discover, and headline, why the incident occured--what Bondi had done to elicit such public protest? Ditto, of course, @PressSec....
4/ The Trump administration is doing all kinds of things that have real effects on human lives. That's the starting point (or should be) for any story pegged to a reaction to such actions. The SC, w. it's stolen justice, just ruled that TX can racially discrimiante in democracy..
5/ When people bluntly (rudely?) accuse the GOP of institutionalized racism, an accounting of the reasons for that harsh judgment is essential to everything that follows. And so on...
6/ @nytimes published a story Sunday on Trump supporters whose support for POTUS goes up when, say, his admin is accused of policies reminiscent of Hitlers with family separation. That's, I concede, a recognizable human reaction....
7/ But if, say, major media included in depth analyses of previous similar exercises, in US history (the Japanese-Americans in WW II; native families; the history of slave families etc.) maybe, just maybe, US voters might have a more complex reaction...
8/ All of which is to say that the competence of the DC press corps isn't in doubt (at least to me). But technical excellence doesn't mean they know what they're doing; and a ton of evidence now suggests that they still have no clue how to cover this genuinely not-normal time.
