Contemporary television news spews from a toilet filled with misinformation, exaggeration and plain old distortion—a crude metaphor, but I’m a crude dude. Actually, I don’t qualify as a dude. I’m more of a dirty old man, or a whining old codger when it comes to  journalism critiques.

Take, for example, the recent mini-scandal referred to as “Muffingate.” The Inspector General released an audit accusing the U.S. Department of Justice of paying sixteen dollars each for muffins at a hotel conference. Outrageous! But inaccurate. 

The hotel chain pointed out that muffins were only a fraction of a continental style array of pastries, fruits and beverages. In fact, the cost amounted to $14.74 per person, including tip and taxes—a sum two cents higher than allotted for such conferences. 

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/09/22/2420516/16-muffins-no-says-hilton.html

One does not have to read the Miami Herald to get their facts correct about “Muffingate.” The story was distributed nationwide by Associated Press.  Based on my experience of having stayed in scores of upscale hotels when spending network money during my muckraking career, I believe the justice department got a helluva bargain. 

But sadly, television news and the vast majority of newspapers are not going to allow facts to get in the way of a good story. A glaring example is CBS Nightly News. In the weeks since Scott Pelley replaced Katie Couric as anchor, the network has bragged about its “original reporting.” Obviously, Pelley and his producers failed to do any ”original reporting” relating to “Muffingate.” Or even bother to fact check story.

The day after Associated Press corrected the erroneus interpretation of the audit, Pelley repeated the sixteen-dollar distortion as an established fact—a reminder of the journalistic laziness of inaccurately reporting that former Vice President Al Gore claimed to have invented the Internet, a myth that is still repeated by so-called journalists.

 Much of the slipshod journalism we see today can be traced back nearly two decades to the presidency of Bill Clinton. I think it was syndicated columnist Gene Lyons, who coined the term, “Clinton Rules.” It described the shoddy and superficial reporting of the Whitewater “scandal.” 

As I wrote in my non-best selling memoir, Odyssey of a Derelict Gunslinger, the use of Lyon’s term encompassed television, newspapers and magazines.

The “Clinton Rules” exempted journalists from asking questions and providing context that would have exposed Whitewater as a hoax in its early stages. Instead, the bogus scandal increased the influence of the extreme right-wing by adding momentum to Newt Gingrich’s ongoing “Republican revolution” in Congress. The low journalistic standards in covering the story also contributed to the early growth of Fox “News,” and ultimately led to the election of George W. Bush.

Throughout Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr’s sex-obsessed, hatchet job investigation of Bill Clinton, cheer-leading journalists lost sight of context and proportion. Dozens of reporters on temporary assignment in Little Rock were expected to quickly develop stories. And nearly all relied on a highly inaccurate New York Times article that was the genesis of the Starr charade.

Very few news people assigned to the Whitewater beat tried to substantiate the reporting of Times “investigative reporter” Jeff Gerth, the man most responsible for launching a Republican-inspired waste of more than seventy-million taxpayer dollars in an investigation of Monica Lewinksy’s knee calluses. Instead, reporters―especially television correspondents— wrote stories built around trivial tidbits interwoven with recaps of the Times stories and subsequent inaccurate reporting by the Washington Post. 

While covering Whitewater as CNN’s Senior Investigative Correspondent, I tried to provide context to the investigation, and ongoing abuses by Starr and his little band of voyeurs. My effort earned me an Emmy nomination. But it also earned me the label of Clinton apologist—facts be damned.

Unfortunately, the 1990’s tradition of journalistic irresponsiblity continues today—only it’s considerably worse because of the Internet,  Fox “News,” and the popularity of right-wing radio nuts  like Rush Limbaugh and the looney dwarfs—Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage and all the other Limbaugh wannabes.

No wonder we now have a Tea Party and a group of GOP Presidential candidates who make comedy writers wet their britches in excitement over the abundance of material these clowns provide.

My memoir, Odyssey of a Derelict Gunslinger: A Saga of Exposing TV Preachers, Corrupt Politicians, Right-Wing Lunatics…and Me is available at amazon.com, soft-cover or Kindle and at independent bookstores like the Cottonwood in Baton Rouge. It offers $19.99 worth of laughs and much more. The book is an account of my illustrious (I choose the adjectives) investigative reporting career. jblisscamp@aol.com.