A WORD FROM A FORMER COLLEAGUE

Jackie came across an interesting book -- American Carnival: Journalism Under Siege in an Age of New Media by Neil Henry that quotes a former Capitol Bureau partner of mine, Mark Hummels. (Read her post HERE) Mark is cited as an example of a young journalist who got frustrated with "the game" and "the mediocre standards of the newspapers he worked for."

`I came to realize,’ he explained, `that government officials are so well-trained in obfuscation and spin that it’s next to impossible to get a real answer to most questions you ask them. This continues to drive me absolutely nuts with people in general, and with people in positions of trust especially. I came to think of reporting `both sides of the story’ as either 1) reporting `both’ sides of the octagon, or 2) giving `equal time’ for the Republicans and Democrats to tell their lies...’

Jackie also quotes Henry talking about the governor "luring some of the state’s best news reporters by offering better-paying work as public relations officers for the Richardson administration."

But, she notes that "a whole lot of `the state’s best news reporters' stayed at their jobs and kept chipping away tirelessly at the dreck coughed out by the administration in the guise of news."

Bless you, Jackie. Indeed some of the state's best reporters are still reporters. And so am I!