This is the nation's most famous media critic?
October 19, 2009 11:39 am ET by Jamison Foser
Lots of people, including those at "Good Morning America," have been asking me what I think of the media's role in the balloon hoax.
...
I don't blame television for carrying the two-hour balloon extravaganza that turned out to be an utter sham. ... In 24-hour cable, you put the live pictures on the air first and seek explanations later.
Left unanswered -- unaddressed, even -- by Kurtz: Why? Also unaddressed: Is this a good thing? Kurtz is supposed to be a media critic, but he omits any criticism. He just offers the circular statement that he doesn't blame "television" for what it did because it did what it does. Huh?
Kurtz continues:
Any producer who cut away from the balloon, saying his news team wanted to gather more information first, would have been fired on the spot.
I do not believe this for a second, and I don't think Howard Kurtz does, either. He's spinning on behalf of cable news, not offering a serious, rational assessment of what happened.
Speaking of Kurtz just making things up, here he is last week:
In retrospect, you could say the cable channels went wild covering the flight of an empty balloon. And technically, that is true. But cable doesn't have the ability to say, You know what, folks? We're not sure what's going on here, so we'll check it out and get back to you. I mean, there are times when you can do that. A runaway bride says she was accosted by assailants, you check it out first. But not a runaway balloon. Who among us wouldn't have switched channels if the one you were watching dropped the subject? The ratings, forgive me, must have soared.
First, of course cable has the ability to do that. They choose not to.
But that part about the ratings at the end is what really stands out. Howard Kurtz is Howard Kurtz. Surely he can find out if the ratings did, in fact, soar, and give us a sense of what that meant for the cable channels' revenue. But he didn't last week, and he still hasn't. I suspect that's because two hours of live balloon coverage didn't make the cables much if any money.
Again: Kurtz is spinning for the cable news channels -- one of which pays him.
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How was the balloon story important to anyone outside of the immediate area ?
The only thing it could do is for those few people who get to tell the ratings folks what they're watching each week - they'd see a higher than normal attention to those cable news channels during that time. I have to admit, my TV that's always on in the background had the view of the balloon from a helicopter on it last week for quite a while, and the week before it was a car chase in the suburbs and rural areas around Dallas.
I do watch those things, as do many people. But that doesn't mean that a responsible cable news network has to provide continuous coverage for it. But I sure can understand why they do.
He said you could condemn certain individuals on the network bot not the network as a whole. He also implied that the dispute was good news for Fox. (Of course, it always is.)
So if he's too blind or disingenuous to admit what's demonstrably obvious about Fox, why should we believe him about anything else?
Complain but cover it by covering the coverage.
Had any news medium bothered to consult an expert - starting with the local high school science teacher - the hoax would have been exposed.
But that would involve actually investigating the situation, wouldn't it?
But then, I'm old enough to remember when journalists actually did such things...
I think that is yet to be determined. From my standpoint he is on way too much now, as it is, and he doesn't know what he is talking about most of the time.
Other than that, he does make a good point, even if it wasn't the point he thought he was making.
The ratings, forgive me, must have soared.
Whether this is a true or false statement doesn't matter. This is what the news media has degenerated into.
Should they have shown the balloon chase?
Sure it was "breaking news".
Should they have nothing but that on air?
Give me a break.
Show the balloon, cut back to studio, update as needed, go on with the rest of the news.
As others have already stated, if anyone had asked someone with some knowledge: "Could this balloon possibly lift a 35 lb child." I think that they could have "broke" a more important part of the story but; hey, they were busy shooting the balloon chase.
A more important part, that didn't come into play in this instance, is "What to Show?".
In it's rush to be the first with the most news directors don't always think out the consequences.
What if there is a hostage situation, car chase, or terrorist attack?
Do you show only on scene reports with no visuals?
What about criminals, terrorists, or rubber neckers.
You may be causing more trouble by airing footage than you would by not airing it.
Think of all the car chases in L.A. where the T.V. coptors get in the way, or by standers go for their 15 minutes of fame.
You have to be careful how you report the news so that you don't become part of the story.