Broadcast Journalism

I remember as a child watching the CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite. I remember all of the old guard journalists, Cronkite, David Brinkley, Howard K. Smith, Harry Reasoner, and Eric Severied to name a few. These men and others were exceptional writers. Unlike the journalists and news people of today. Bob Simon was an old school broadcast journalist who was an exceptional communicator. Broadcast journalism was better for his having come, and will be a little less exceptional for his passing.

Broadcast journalism today in general, and news dissemination in particular, are more about entertainment and politics and less about substance. Today broadcast journalists have to entertain us with, as well as deliver the news. Broadcast journalists today have a political agenda, and as such are less objective. Where once reporters just reported the story, today they have become the story. Once they were in genuine harm's way, now they just pretend they were to get the news. Attributes like strong writing skills, and integrity, have lost their favor, because to remain relevant and thus on the air, journalists must be personable, and good looking, and pander to a political ideology. Some have strayed from the concept of news to one of news and entertainment. Much to the detriment of broadcast journalism as a whole.

Broadcast journalists such as Dan Rather and Brian Williams, and Andrea Mitchell, have done a disservice to the profession, from falsifying documents to outright lying. Broadcast journalistic integrity today has given way to political agendas, personal vendettas, and TV ratings. Bob Simon was one of the few remaining broadcast journalists to put integrity above all else. He is also one of the few remaining broadcast journalists that is a writer, not an editor. Get ready for the Las Vegas Strip incarnation of TV news, all lights and no substance or soul.

 This week we lost two broadcast journalism veterans. Bob Simon is being remembered, as a professional, with honesty and integrity, and Brian Williams is being remembered for his sense of humor, his lack of integrity and as an editor, not as a journalist.  Bob Simon was a writer, a journalist with soul Williams was not. That is the difference. Brian Williams might be back, but Bob Simon won't be. That is most unfortunate for the news viewing public and profession as a whole. We will see more Brian Williams' of this world, but not many more Bob Simons. Our loss is greater than we imagine. So rest in peace Bob Simon, you earned it. As for Brian Williams, well, just go rest.  

 

 

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