Jake Tapper's Defensiveness Highlights Cable News Shortcomings

This evening a friend of the blog called out CNN The Lead reporter Jake Tapper, on a point about terrorists killing other Muslims in the name of Islam. The following was the last paragraph in a blog post on The Lead's blog about online terrorist chatter regarding Malaysia Airlines Flight 370:

"But there's been a very strong push back from some of these jihadist forums that there were Muslims on board, an so taking down an airplane that killed Muslims was at its core an act not supported by Islam," said Jones.

This is a classic bullshit argument by terrorist organizations like Al Qaida, who claim that killing co-religionists goes against Islam and, thus, against their murderous dogma. It is well known that Al Qaida actually murders more Muslims than any other group of people in their terrorist acts, which Nihar called out to Tapper.

A Media Out of Control

Investigators combed through the scene of one of the blast sites on Wednesday morning. (Source: Boston Globe)

If you followed the news reporting on Monday after the bombing on Boylston Street, you would have noticed some very sloppy journalism and wild speculation. While some leeway can be given in times of crisis, the false reports coming out of places like the New York Post and cables news figures's Twitter feeds went well beyond that leeway.

A lot of the reaction was "Oh, well, everyone knows the Post is trash" or "Oh, well most of cable news is garbage anyway." I don't necessarily disagree with either of those sentiments, but at the same time they are news outlets and are looked to in times of information demand (the latter certainly more than the former.)

Today's "reporting" has shown why outlets like the New York Times and the major networks are still the king of clean and polished reports for breaking news. While outlets like CNN and AP and Boston.com were reporting that a suspect was in custody and heading to the courthouse, the Times and the major networks held off on reporting this.

Just for contrast, I'll write what was confirmed, and then in bold what was extracted from that by some irresponsible media outlets:

There is a major breakthrough in the marathon bombing case, as investigators have used Lord & Taylor CCTV to identify a suspect's face in the bombing. Investigators have a face and a name for the marathon bombing suspect and an arrest is imminent. The suspect is in custody and is heading to the Moakley Courthouse in South Boston.

Of course, this led to everyone scrambling to get to the courthouse, amassing outside. Then a bomb threat was relayed to the courthouse, causing a massive evacuation made much more logistically complicated thanks to all of the reporters who were there on false reports of a suspect in custody. It was a microcosm of shoddy journalism complicating legitimate law enforcement activities. A shameful one, at that.

I lump in all of the cable news networks together. If you're a right winger, you watch Fox News. A leftie? MSNBC is where you head. Stuck in an airport? CNN. The one thing all channels have in common is that they are driven by ratings over journalism and are not legitimate sources of good, hard information.

I will take this time to call out the Twitter account @BuzzFeedNews. Tweets like "Police SUV with dark tinted windows just pulled around to the back." or "WCVB: Van back into U.S. Fed. courthouse." are just asinine. Yes, law enforcement vehicles (including tinted SUVs and vans) can be found outside of a federal courthouse, sometimes moving, on any day of the year. To report this as some kind of significant news event is borderline predatory for pageviews and retweets. One thing it cannot be categorized as is news.

A friend of mine made a good point today. Assume that CNN or some other outlet was first in getting the scoop of an arrest. Next week, most people would forget who had it first. But everyone will certainly remember when CNN blasted "SUSPECT ARRESTED" on their website. They'll remember CNN anchors excitedly saying that an arrest has been made in the case. People don't forget that kind of misstep.

So what do we know? Well, for one, CNN learned absolutely nothing from their healthcare misreporting less than a year ago. We learned that for some reason, executives still view CNN as an industry-leader in the breaking news category. We learned that Wolf Blitzer and Jon King should not be on air during breaking news events. Unless you're interested in the relatively mundane traffic patterns outside of the Moakley Courthouse, @BuzzFeedNews probably isn't a good feed to follow. And when someone cites "a source," wait until clearer reports come out, preferable with a named official, before taking something and running with it.

A Quick Word on Boston

Note: I wanted to break up this post into two parts. I had thought about making two separate posts, but I figured it would be a bit confusing. Part I is a personal reflection on the marathon and the inspiration of the event as a whole and the response of people today after the blast.

Part II is about the media response and the irresponsible speculation by journalists to fill air time and drive ratings and social media metrics.

I've written this so the first part is standalone, because not everyone is going to be in the mood to read about issues with today's media after such a tragedy.

Source: Boston Globe

Part I

Having grown up in the Boston area, and spent a decent amount of time on and around Boylston Street in high school, today's events at the marathon have hit close to home, to use a bad cliche. Patriots' Day is a special day in Massachusetts - a day off that most of the rest of the country does not get. Everyone who grew up in and around Boston can remember heading down to the marathon route to cheer on the runners as they go by in droves along the grueling 26.2 mile course.

Today's bombings will change the marathon for the foreseeable future. The openness and carefree vibe of the event will revert to a more closed and tense atmosphere next year and possibly for years to come. For an event with such a rich and vibrant history, from the revolutionary to the bizzarre to the inspirational, the fact that the marathon will forever be tainted with this tragedy is a shame.

Through all of this sadness and anger, watching the video of the scene right after the blast is inspiring in a way. It is inspiring because you see people rushing to the site of the blast, not knowing if there are any secondary devices waiting to take out first responders. It is inspiring to see cops, EMTs, firefighters, BAA volunteers, and runners working together to tear down barricades and get to the injured. Other stories of heroism and kindness coming out of the city do not replace the anger and fear and confusion that follow something like this, but it certainly helps to begin to displace them, which only time and reflection can do.

Part II

Unfortunately, in contrast to the heartwarming response to such evil, is the ridiculous speculation by media outlets. The Post reporting that a suspect is in custody and 12 people are dead (neither of which are confirmed true at the time of this writing and the latter having been reputed by BPD Commissioner Ed Davis multiple times). MSNBC jumped on the suspect bandwagon as well. This is just sloppy journalism with shoddy "sources."

On top of this, there is just wild speculation that has no business in a journalistic environment. I wasn't watching CNN, but from what I heard about Jane Harman she was just spewing speculation with zero basis in fact. Also Luke Russert thought that because he went to a Red Sox game twenty years ago when Waco happened that there could be a link to the marathon bombing.

Let me be clear about this: this could be an AQAP bombing. This could be a home-grown domestic terror bombing. If either scenario is true, Harman or Russert deserve zero credit for saying it on air/Twitter. Their speculation adds nothing to the fact finding that occurs after something like this, it adds nothing to the national discourse, and really only muddles what is going on and further confuses people. I understand there's a drive for ratings and retweets, to be the first to break a story, but that should never supersede journalism. Ever.

In times of tragedy like this there is a human drive to get the facts, to try to make sense of something like this in our minds. We need to see a cause and effect so we can prevent something like this in the future. Unfortunately, rationality and logic are far removed from an event like this and it simply does not make sense. Speculation with no factual backup to try to make sense of it is unfair to both the speculator and the speculatee. We look to the news for information and updates, not ratings-driven false scoops and made-up connections.