Walter Cronkite
was a true journalist, a real TV anchor, and editor of his nightly
news broadcast. So were many others, including Chet Huntley and David
Brinkley. But that's not the case anymore.
An anchor was
what the word implied: an anchor, anchored in a newsroom, sometimes
in New York and other times in Washington, D.C. They relied on a
network of reporters worldwide, who gathered the information, put it
together for a piece of the airtime their anchor afforded to it.
A recent
promotional spot aired by NBC (recent to me, it may have been aired
many times before and I just didn't see it) the network referred to
Lester Holt as their “NBC Nightly News” anchor.
That made me
think about the structure of the broadcast news organizations today.
Lester Holt is
not an anchor in the true sense of the term. I would bet he isn't
even the editor-in-charge of the program's content. It shows how
distorted and diluted the news has become overall.
There was a day
when the news was presented through the anchor by reporters on the
scene, without opinion or slant, and left up to the viewers to make
up their own minds about the information they are getting.
It was a direct
reflection of the guidelines of earlier newspapers: News presented
“without fear or favor, bias or prejudice.”
Now I must admit
the newspapers, even the largest of them, have been constantly
violating those principles over the last decade. Even if the stories
presented were on facts alone without the interjected opinions, quips
and odd looks by the reporters, newspapers and television have
slanted their coverage by omitting and ignoring covering some
stories.
It is a sad day
for dedicated journalists such as myself. Because, as a retired
journalist, I see how stories or ignored, and others skewed to direct
the readers/viewers opinions to a pre-determined judgment that may or
may not be accurate or true.
If you don't
believe me, record a television newscast, put all the words into
writing. The, strike out all the “descriptive” and opinionated
words that are not actual facts and see what you have left. The
half-hour broadcast would be reduce to less than 10 minutes.
The rest is
opinion terms, sometimes mostly uninformed and inaccurate predictions
of what would happen next, and statements how good or bad people
should feel about what happened.
Back to the
original focus of this editorial.
Lester Holt is
NOT a news anchor. He IS a corporate showboater. NBC flies him and a
crew to the scene of a developing story they think will highlight
point of view to be promoted later. Besides the fact that officials
have to spend time and support (funded by your tax money of course)
to a crew for TV coverage that could have been better spent taking
care of the event, it appears to demonstrate to viewers that the
network doesn't really believe their local level reporter cannot
handle the coverage they are paid to do, or just plain showboating to
the public to try to get higher viewer ratings which, in turn, of
course, translates to getting more money for commercials.
Either way,
officials should not be cooperating in providing and supporting a
“glamorus production” of a broadcast by any network. They should
give reporters the facts, of course, but not assisting in a
production.
No, Lester Holt
is NOT a new anchor. He IS a showboater. The true facts of the news
are buried beneath the haze and sour smell of the show coating.
If the other
news “anchors” and going on scene on the other networks, then
they fit into the same category.
So, a word of
advice to you: Do NOT believe everything you are hearing and seeing
on the network news shows. It doesn't have the credibility of true
factual news content anymore.
