Repost: LA Times Editor Sends Memo to Staff RE: Bias in Stories

Wall Street Journal (various) ^ | 5/29/03 | James Taranto

[Political Junkie Too]

Note: Links were good at the time we posted this column, but they often go bad after a while. We make no guarantees.

BY JAMES TARANTO
Thursday, May 29, 2003 2:51 p.m. EDT

Oh, You Mean Those Liberal Media
John Carroll, editor of the Los Angeles Times, has issued a staff memo warning reporters to keep their liberal politics out of the news pages, blogger Kevin Roderick reports. Here's how the memo begins:

I'm concerned about the perception--and the occasional reality--that the Times is a liberal, "politically correct" newspaper. Generally speaking, this is an inaccurate view, but occasionally we prove our critics right. We did so today [May 22] with the front-page story on the bill in Texas that would require abortion doctors to counsel patients that they may be risking breast cancer.

Because the story is a week old, it no longer appears on the Times Web site, but the Baltimore Sun picked it up. Carroll criticizes reporter Scott Gold for slanting his report in several ways:

• Editorializing by referring to "so-called counseling," a phrase, in Carroll's words, "that is loaded with derision."
  
  
• Failing to quote scientists who think there is a link between abortion and breast cancer (a minority view, to be sure), except for one, quoted late in the story only for "his political views."
  
  
• Referring to one of the sponsors of the bill as having "a professional background in property management," while making no reference to the lack of scientific credentials of the bill's opponents.

[snip]

====================================================

And from Turmoil at the Times, which ran on June 6, 2003:

REVIEW & OUTLOOK

Turmoil at the Times
What now? How about a return to good, old-fashioned reporting?

Friday, June 6, 2003 12:01 a.m. EDT

[snip]

On this journalistic score, a blow for fairer reporting was struck recently at the Los Angeles Times. Editor John Carroll pointedly rebuked a reporter for a story about the link between abortion and breast cancer for loading up adjectives and phrases that portrayed abortion opponents in a negative light. He wrote in a staff memo that he was "concerned about the perception--and the occasional reality--that the Times is a liberal, 'politically correct' newspaper." This is the kind of adult supervision that editors are supposed to provide, and that readers once expected.

As the Jayson Blair saga unfolded, the depressing comment we've often heard has been something like "what else is new. Don't newspapers do that all the time?" Well, no, they don't. The best news that could come from the turmoil at the Times would be a revival of old-fashioned, non-spinning, reporting standards.

[Political Junkie Too]

Based on this past week's reporting from the LA Times, I'd say that Mr. Carroll's memo went promptly into the Circular File!

-PJ

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[EggsAckley]

Pre hot-tub Ping.

Gone for the evening.

[Arpege92]

Either the Circular file or a shredding party!

[JRandomFreeper]

The best news that could come from the turmoil at the Times would be a revival of old-fashioned, non-spinning, reporting standards.

Hell just ordered 11 zillion gross of sweaters.

/john

[giotto]

Failing to quote scientists who think there is a link between abortion and breast cancer (a minority view, to be sure),

He just can't help himself. He just had to add these disclaimers--After all, he wouldn't want to be ill thought of by the females on the staff, all of whom he assumes must be pro choice.

[ex-Texan]

*BUMP* !

[AwesomePossum]

"I'm concerned about the perception--and the occasional reality--that the Times is a liberal, "politically correct" newspaper." Wink, wink, snicker, snicker, wink.

What a bunch of hogwash...............

[ladyinred]

I think Mr. Carroll went right along with his memo down the sinkmeister.

[ladyinred]

Oh,BTW: The Times didn't report the allegations against Davis because "what a politician does in his private life is not the business of the public." Honorable aren't they?

[jwh_Denver]

Hell just ordered 11 zillion gross of sweaters.

Hehe! Made in China just like the Times.

[Sapper26]

"I'm concerned about the perception--and the occasional reality--that the Times is a liberal, "politically correct" newspaper." Wink, wink, snicker, snicker, wink.

What a bunch of hogwash...............



Now be fair. He might have meant that instead of a perception, he wanted it to be obvious that they're liberal. And instead of an occasional reality, it should be regular.