COLUMBUS (TDB) -- TV news health stories that feature medical breakthroughs at Ohio State University's hospital have been paid for by the school. The university forks out nearly $250,000 each year for on-the-air coverage by two local stations in Columbus
Some believe the practice is nothing but advertising being disguised as legitimate journalism, or gussied up payola. The OSU-funded health segments appear on Channel 10 and Channel 4 in Columbus, and disclosures about financial ties has started to raise disturbing questions about paid propaganda and deception. The nub: Should anybody trust or believe TV news if broadcasters take money from those who appear as the subjects of newscasts? Such financial arrangements would appear to undercut any claims of journalistic independence and freedom. It looks like somebody is buying, and the other party is selling.
Gary Schmitz, who is at the University of Minnesota's school of journalism, says OSU's arrangement with the Columbus broadcasters is PR because the medical center paid its way onto the newscasts.
"Columbus residents join the long list of television news audiences all over the country who have been spoonfed one-sided PR and advertising messages from medical centers paying their way onto newscasts. The fact is that a supposed 'news' organization would accept these deals is an embarrassment to the TV news industry."
The story about OSU's payments comes from The Other Paper, where reporter Steph Gregor found marketing execs who said the anchor-hosted health segments play off viewer trust in TV reporters. She also says some of the segments have omitted details like the cost of procedures, or facts like mortality rates. Gregor's story made it clear that the line between marketing and news has been blurred.
Showing posts with label Journalism Ethics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Journalism Ethics. Show all posts
Sunday, December 02, 2007
Thursday, September 13, 2007
Ohio Editor Quits To Teach Ethics At Kent State: Here's A Question, Prof
CLEVELAND (TDB) -- Tom O'Hara steps down today as managing editor of The Plain Dealer, Ohio's largest newspaper, and is headed to academia where he'll teach ethics and open government at the Kent State University journalism school. O'Hara starts in January, and The Daily Bellwether is presenting a question he can wrestle with. Is it proper for an MSM journalist to become so involved in a statewide political campaign that she recruits and participates in the hiring of the campaign manager?
There's more (yes, it's a long question) -- the MSM news outlet has publicly declared its policy is neutrality.
This isn't a hypothetical. Pulitzer Prize winning columnist Connie Schultz did become involved in a campaign while she was picking up a weekly paycheck from a certain large metropolitan newspaper in this state. Guess who was the managing editor at the time? Schultz is the spouse of U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio. Brown ran and defeated two-term Republican incumbent Mike DeWine in 2006, and Schultz has described how she helped put that campaign on track. Up until she helped land the campaign manager in mid-January 2006, she says, "Our campaign was a mess."
Shultz's choice for campaign manager: John Ryan, then president of the Cleveland AFL-CIO. Not everybody, of course, would agree that journalists should keep themselves out of an active role in politics. But it was enough of an issue in December 2005 that the newspaper's former editor, Doug Clifton, wrote na explanatory note to readers:
"She has a keen understanding of the delicate position she -- and our paper -- are in. She understands that she can't both campaign for her husband and write a column. And I understand that she is a supportive spouse who will be at her candidate husband's side from time to time."
Turns out, the understanding apparently was designed for public events, not behind-the-scenes campaigning. Here's what Connie writes in her book . . . and His Lovely Wife about her involvement in the selection process of Brown's campaign manager. The account is on pages 44 and 45:
'John Ryan believes in you,' I said.
'John Ryan believes in the work,' Sherrod said.
'You can trust him.'
Sherrod nodded. 'Nobody works harder than John Ryan.'
Sherrod walked upstairs to his office and made the call.
He came downstairs, his face clouded.
'He's thinking about it,' he said. 'He's not sure he's up to it.'
Connie says that Ryan remembers that she called him immediately. She does not remember the call, but adds that if Ryan says it happened it did.
According to John Ryan, I picked up the phone and dialed his cell number.
'John Ryan?'
'Hey, Connie. Hi.'
'I know Sherrod just called you, and I know what he wants you to do.'
'Okay. Well, I'm going to give it a lot of thought --'
'Look, John Ryan. If this is about your family, then I understand why you can't do this. But otherwise I don't want to hear it. We need you.'
And then John Ryan says I hung up on him.
Ryan took the job. Connie was still working at her newspaper.
Here's some bio and background information about Tom O'Hara that was in a memo to The Plain Dealer's staff. H/T Jim Romenesko who publishes a journalism blog for the Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank.
Again, the question raised by Connie's report of her involvement in recruiting and selecting Sherrod Brown's campaign manager goes to whether a journalist owes allegiance to journalism, or to partisan politics. By day, can one be an MSM journalist working for an ostensibly neutral news gathering organization, and by night be an insider hiring the people who run a U.S. Senate campaign? Are the dual roles inherently conflicted? What has first allegiance; journalism or the campaign?
There's more (yes, it's a long question) -- the MSM news outlet has publicly declared its policy is neutrality.
This isn't a hypothetical. Pulitzer Prize winning columnist Connie Schultz did become involved in a campaign while she was picking up a weekly paycheck from a certain large metropolitan newspaper in this state. Guess who was the managing editor at the time? Schultz is the spouse of U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio. Brown ran and defeated two-term Republican incumbent Mike DeWine in 2006, and Schultz has described how she helped put that campaign on track. Up until she helped land the campaign manager in mid-January 2006, she says, "Our campaign was a mess."
Shultz's choice for campaign manager: John Ryan, then president of the Cleveland AFL-CIO. Not everybody, of course, would agree that journalists should keep themselves out of an active role in politics. But it was enough of an issue in December 2005 that the newspaper's former editor, Doug Clifton, wrote na explanatory note to readers:
"She has a keen understanding of the delicate position she -- and our paper -- are in. She understands that she can't both campaign for her husband and write a column. And I understand that she is a supportive spouse who will be at her candidate husband's side from time to time."
Turns out, the understanding apparently was designed for public events, not behind-the-scenes campaigning. Here's what Connie writes in her book . . . and His Lovely Wife about her involvement in the selection process of Brown's campaign manager. The account is on pages 44 and 45:
'John Ryan believes in you,' I said.
'John Ryan believes in the work,' Sherrod said.
'You can trust him.'
Sherrod nodded. 'Nobody works harder than John Ryan.'
Sherrod walked upstairs to his office and made the call.
He came downstairs, his face clouded.
'He's thinking about it,' he said. 'He's not sure he's up to it.'
Connie says that Ryan remembers that she called him immediately. She does not remember the call, but adds that if Ryan says it happened it did.
According to John Ryan, I picked up the phone and dialed his cell number.
'John Ryan?'
'Hey, Connie. Hi.'
'I know Sherrod just called you, and I know what he wants you to do.'
'Okay. Well, I'm going to give it a lot of thought --'
'Look, John Ryan. If this is about your family, then I understand why you can't do this. But otherwise I don't want to hear it. We need you.'
And then John Ryan says I hung up on him.
Ryan took the job. Connie was still working at her newspaper.
Here's some bio and background information about Tom O'Hara that was in a memo to The Plain Dealer's staff. H/T Jim Romenesko who publishes a journalism blog for the Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank.
Again, the question raised by Connie's report of her involvement in recruiting and selecting Sherrod Brown's campaign manager goes to whether a journalist owes allegiance to journalism, or to partisan politics. By day, can one be an MSM journalist working for an ostensibly neutral news gathering organization, and by night be an insider hiring the people who run a U.S. Senate campaign? Are the dual roles inherently conflicted? What has first allegiance; journalism or the campaign?
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
To Sen. Sherrod's Brown's Spouse: Here's The Story's Other Side
CINCINNATI (TDB) -- The Cleveland Plain Dealer's feature section columnist Connie Schultz sounds cranked off in this item published by the alt/weekly Cleveland Scene. Three journalists on the PeeDee's staff in 2006, including the author of this blog, are scored for "breaking the basic rules of journalism."
What pap. In my case, I sent an e-mail from the Plain Dealer's bureau in Cincinnati -- where I was based before retiring last December -- to then editor Doug Clifton. The e-mail went out in January or February 2006. I cc'ed Connie and noted that newspaper stories appearing in Southern Ohio in early 2006 were pointing out she was the wife of Sherrod Brown, who was on a trip around the state announcing his candidacy for the U.S. Senate. Some of those stories identified her as a journalist employed by the Plain Dealer, Ohio's largest newspaper.
Now, I was not aware of her marriage. I live in Cincinnati and learned of it around the time the campaigning started. Downstate, Sherrod and Connie were not widely known. I also heard suspicions/complaints/snark from Dems in the Paul Hackett camp, and from some Repubs who liked then-incumbent Sen. Mike DeWine, that the PD's coverage would be biased for Brown. After all, they said, his wife worked in the newsroom. She was a columnist. She had recently won a Pulitzer. And she could influence how the campaign was covered.
Hackett was still in the primary and things were growing bitter on the Democratic side. The Republicans expected a tough fight ahead for DeWine. And, the PD was in the bag.
I composed the e-mail to Clifton, the gist of it saying that things were tough for reporters in the field. They should not have to be under a cloud. Connie probably should get out of the way. She should be at her husband's side for the race. My view expressed in the note: Her activity as a columnist/candidate's wife looked like a conflict. I did not want to have to defend myself or any stories I wrote against allegations they were crafted to carry water for Sherrod Brown.
Connie reportedly met with Clifton as a result of my e-mail. She implies that I should have known about her marriage because it was reported in the paper. "Does he not read the paper he writes for?" she says she asked Clifton.
Yes, I read the paper. Somehow I missed her marriage announcement. Perhaps I was in West Virginia covering a flood that day. Or I was in court, or out trailing a candidate around, or wandering around Appalachian Ohio. Perhaps I was drilling down into the baseball box scores. Or reading Phillip Morris. I missed the announcement.
I must add that I was never an avid reader of the features section where Connie toils, a part of the paper that grizzled old newsroom hands like myself called the "toy department." That's a journo term predating myself or Connie, and comes from the era when the City Room was the heart of a newspaper and the "toy department" produced mostly fluff.
So, the "basic rule of journalism" that I broke was to express concern in writing to the editor in chief that the Plain Dealer's coverage of the Senate campaign was being perceived as less than even-handed, to contend that there should be no possible way for Brown's opponents to assert an insider controlled coverage and tilted it toward the insider's husband. To this day, I am convinced I did the right thing to urge that she be eased aside while the campaign unfolded.
That said, I will add this: She probably ought to find a job outside Ohio journalism now that Sherrod is a Senator. I think active newspapering and a political marriage don't mix, and there is an inference that no bright line exists to stop Connie from promoting her husband's agenda. She may not be doing any promotion -- but too many people will always think she is. And it damages the journalists who are dedicated to playing things straight.
What pap. In my case, I sent an e-mail from the Plain Dealer's bureau in Cincinnati -- where I was based before retiring last December -- to then editor Doug Clifton. The e-mail went out in January or February 2006. I cc'ed Connie and noted that newspaper stories appearing in Southern Ohio in early 2006 were pointing out she was the wife of Sherrod Brown, who was on a trip around the state announcing his candidacy for the U.S. Senate. Some of those stories identified her as a journalist employed by the Plain Dealer, Ohio's largest newspaper.
Now, I was not aware of her marriage. I live in Cincinnati and learned of it around the time the campaigning started. Downstate, Sherrod and Connie were not widely known. I also heard suspicions/complaints/snark from Dems in the Paul Hackett camp, and from some Repubs who liked then-incumbent Sen. Mike DeWine, that the PD's coverage would be biased for Brown. After all, they said, his wife worked in the newsroom. She was a columnist. She had recently won a Pulitzer. And she could influence how the campaign was covered.
Hackett was still in the primary and things were growing bitter on the Democratic side. The Republicans expected a tough fight ahead for DeWine. And, the PD was in the bag.
I composed the e-mail to Clifton, the gist of it saying that things were tough for reporters in the field. They should not have to be under a cloud. Connie probably should get out of the way. She should be at her husband's side for the race. My view expressed in the note: Her activity as a columnist/candidate's wife looked like a conflict. I did not want to have to defend myself or any stories I wrote against allegations they were crafted to carry water for Sherrod Brown.
Connie reportedly met with Clifton as a result of my e-mail. She implies that I should have known about her marriage because it was reported in the paper. "Does he not read the paper he writes for?" she says she asked Clifton.
Yes, I read the paper. Somehow I missed her marriage announcement. Perhaps I was in West Virginia covering a flood that day. Or I was in court, or out trailing a candidate around, or wandering around Appalachian Ohio. Perhaps I was drilling down into the baseball box scores. Or reading Phillip Morris. I missed the announcement.
I must add that I was never an avid reader of the features section where Connie toils, a part of the paper that grizzled old newsroom hands like myself called the "toy department." That's a journo term predating myself or Connie, and comes from the era when the City Room was the heart of a newspaper and the "toy department" produced mostly fluff.
So, the "basic rule of journalism" that I broke was to express concern in writing to the editor in chief that the Plain Dealer's coverage of the Senate campaign was being perceived as less than even-handed, to contend that there should be no possible way for Brown's opponents to assert an insider controlled coverage and tilted it toward the insider's husband. To this day, I am convinced I did the right thing to urge that she be eased aside while the campaign unfolded.
That said, I will add this: She probably ought to find a job outside Ohio journalism now that Sherrod is a Senator. I think active newspapering and a political marriage don't mix, and there is an inference that no bright line exists to stop Connie from promoting her husband's agenda. She may not be doing any promotion -- but too many people will always think she is. And it damages the journalists who are dedicated to playing things straight.
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