Sad State of News Coverage
How fortunate we are to have someone like Howard Rosenberg to turn a mirror on the news media and so articulately describe how their zealousness to “scoop” the competition too often tends to create, rather than report, the news (“Bomb Suspect Reporting Sets an Ugly Record,” Calendar, Aug. 1). How sad and deplorable the deterioration in the quality of news coverage. Where the standard was once “All the news that’s fit to print,” it now seems to be “Whatever rumor or speculation will promote circulation or increase ratings.” Where once there was competition over the quality of the news reporting, there now is a resort to sensationalism and gimmickry. Sound bite teasers are used to pique our curiosity to watch the news, then our intelligence is insulted with a series of “live on the scene” news reports of events that occurred hours earlier and everyone has now gone home. What next?
MIKE ROSS
Simi Valley
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Howard Rosenberg’s column made me ashamed to be an American.
This essay vividly depicts the process by which hard-hearted media midgets may have destroyed the life of a fellow citizen.
How far away this flock of sheep has wandered from its intended role as our country’s Fourth Estate! And how risky for us all is its disreputable descent. For it is not only the Olympic Village guard, Richard Jewell, who is at risk. After all, a free society depends upon an informed citizenry, and that in turn depends upon responsible reporting quite opposite of the mob hysteria so vividly portrayed by Rosenberg.
HAROLD WILLENS
Los Angeles