The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

BREAKING: Cable TV News Airheads Screwed Up a Major Story, Again

Posted on | April 17, 2013 | 25 Comments

So, I was working on this story:

Chinese Student Lu Lingzi, 23, Identified as
Third Victim Killed by Boston Marathon Bombing

When a certain blonde woman on cable TV news began informing me (and you and a lot of other people) that a suspect in the Boston marathon bombing had been identified from video. And I kept working on the story I was working on, because that’s what you do: Finish one story before starting another. Besides, after years in this business, I’ve gotten used to the rapid-fire breathless bulletins on TV news. It’s what they do, and their 24/7 urgency does not impose on me a necessity to react with panic.

But then the phone rang: “Are you watching this?”

Yeah, I said, I’m watching it, and I’ll get on it as soon as I finish the story I’m working on. The lunatic idea that we have to update faster than the Drudge Report, on a story that everybody in the freaking world is covering,  is a misconception that needs to be explained, but I don’t have time for that today. As of this moment, here’s the headline:

BREAKING: FBI DENIES ARREST OF
BOSTON BOMBING SUSPECT REPORTEDLY
IDENTIFIED FROM VIDEOS

Right now, I’m watching CNN, where Anderson Cooper is trashing the sources who gave him the bad tip. Here’s the FBI’s official denial. A press conference is scheduled at 5 p.m. ET. I’ve been tweeting my frustrations:

You’d think these people would learn something from this, but then I guess I still haven’t learned that “CNN reports” doesn’t really count for much . . .

Journalism and terrorism: Related phenomena? Discuss.

 


 

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Category: Journalism, Terrorism

Comments

25 Responses to “BREAKING: Cable TV News Airheads Screwed Up a Major Story, Again”

  1. AnthonyAbides
    April 17th, 2013 @ 4:13 pm

    RT @smitty_one_each: TOM BREAKING: Cable TV News Airheads Screwed Up a Major Story, Again http://t.co/SqWYMme7G4 #TCOT

  2. smittyjr33
    April 17th, 2013 @ 4:15 pm

    @smitty_one_each hard to report a real news story when your trained to report propaganda all the time.

  3. Josh_Painter
    April 17th, 2013 @ 4:15 pm

    RT @smitty_one_each: TOM BREAKING: Cable TV News Airheads Screwed Up a Major Story, Again http://t.co/SqWYMme7G4 #TCOT

  4. matthew w
    April 17th, 2013 @ 4:19 pm

    Honestly, I see little benefit of a “24 Hour” news network.
    Too much fluff and useless, inaccurate crap put out.
    TELL US WHEN YOU KNOW A FACT !!!!

  5. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    April 17th, 2013 @ 4:24 pm

    I have been doing a better job (and I am just a cow). Moo.

    The difference between me and CNN: CNN gives only opinions; I give opinions, milk, butter and cheese. And my opinions are better. http://evilbloggerlady.blogspot.com/2013/04/the-leftist-media-in-anticipation-maybe.html

  6. Steve Skubinna
    April 17th, 2013 @ 4:28 pm

    When do they start reporting on the gang rapes and cannibalism in Boston?

  7. Bob Belvedere
    April 17th, 2013 @ 4:31 pm

    Oh, you didn’t know: that happens every day.

  8. TC_LeatherPenguin
    April 17th, 2013 @ 4:40 pm

    Class, what have the cable news people taught us today?
    ->Speed Kills
    ->There are various J-Schools that need to be burned
    ->The Make Believe Media can beclown themselves better than I ever could

  9. Rob Crawford
    April 17th, 2013 @ 4:46 pm

    So…. shouldn’t they be releasing the names of the sources that lied to them?

  10. Scribe of Slog (McGehee)
    April 17th, 2013 @ 5:30 pm

    “I’m here in Boston in a boat rowing across the river of blood flowing from the victims of last Monday’s — ”

    <small group of people wades through the shot right past the boat>

  11. Neo
    April 17th, 2013 @ 5:33 pm

    Just In —–
    Judge Crater found alive !!!     … or not

  12. GAHCindy
    April 17th, 2013 @ 5:35 pm

    Professional media. Fact-checking. Multiple layers. Like an onion. Makes ya cry like an onion does, too…

  13. Zilla of the Resistance
    April 17th, 2013 @ 8:05 pm

    They cut off the end of Days of Our Lives so ill informed NBC jackasses could blather on about NOTHING. Jackasses.

  14. jsn2
    April 17th, 2013 @ 8:06 pm

    I stopped watching Fox News last year, stopped watching CNN sometime during Clinton/Lewinski and MSNVC (not a typo) never had a chance. I come here for my news and look out the window for the weather. I’m a much happier person.

  15. DaveO
    April 17th, 2013 @ 8:51 pm

    At least when you’re done crying over an onion, you have chili. With these a$$clowns we just get sh*t passed off as filet mignon.

  16. Wombat_socho
    April 17th, 2013 @ 9:56 pm

    No, that’s Chicago. In Boston, it’s drunken brawls and attempted rape.

  17. Wombat_socho
    April 17th, 2013 @ 9:57 pm

    And when you say “various” you mean “all”, right?

  18. WarEagle82
    April 17th, 2013 @ 10:43 pm

    Anderson Cooper seems to have really gone way off the deep end since Kathy Griffin sexually assaulted him on national TV.

    No, wait. He was always that way…

  19. Adjoran
    April 17th, 2013 @ 11:47 pm

    Stacy’s coverage has been among the best – but just like Bob Knight’s excellent color basketball commentary, it won’t get him a contract offer from the networks, because he only posts when he has something to offer, like Knight.

    But the most informative headline of the day was Ace’s “Nobody knows what the hell is going on in Boston” – by a long shot, and with a rim shot.

  20. TC_LeatherPenguin
    April 18th, 2013 @ 4:21 am

    Pretty much… there might be one or tw– oh who am I kidding? “Kill ‘Em All!”

  21. Quartermaster
    April 18th, 2013 @ 7:20 pm

    Cows don’t give butter or cheese. They do give the raw materials for same, however.

  22. Quartermaster
    April 18th, 2013 @ 7:22 pm

    Your headline is quite redundant.

  23. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    April 18th, 2013 @ 8:20 pm

    That is true, but I churn my own milk into butter and curdle my own milk into cheese.

  24. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    April 18th, 2013 @ 8:21 pm

    And mass depression when the Pats and BoSox lose.

  25. Evi L. Bloggerlady
    April 18th, 2013 @ 8:23 pm

    And public urination to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day.