journalistic malpractice: moving from slanting to ‘absolutely lying’
I’m a former drive-by. I’ve spent a lot of my time since leaving the profession shaking my head in disbelief at how far my former profession has fallen.
The news business has always had its share of lazies. Plenty of folks who schmooze and butt-kiss with the hopes of becoming a much-better-paid press secretary for one of the folks they currently cover.
There have been dyed-in-the-wool leftists who bring their cultivated-over-a-lifetime ideologies into their work. There has been some lying to shape the narrative into a direction the drive-bys, their bosses, and / or comrades want.
But – since the 2024 election cycle – the lying integrated into the reporting of the news has reached epic proportions. There’s lying by commission — saying words that are not true. And then there’s lying by omission — not mentioning important stuff that might harm the narrative you’re trying to spin with your reporting.
The practice of pretending there is no primary really got its start in the 2024 race for governor. All reporting focused on “inevitable” Mark Robinson vs. attorney general Josh Stein. Never mind that state treasurer Dale Folwell and two others were also in the GOP primary. The word on the street in Raleigh was that Robinson was “inevitable” — so we were only going to be given a carefully-curated story on Robinson.
If we were given the credible coverage of the primary we deserved, we might have all learned early on about Balanced Nutrition and THIS — both of which led to Mark Robinson’s spectacularly-appalling political collapse in the general election.
For some reason, what’s left of the professional drive-by media is mistakenly under the impression that their job — when it comes to elections – is to pick winners. Not to provide information voters need to make choices for themselves.
In the 2026 race for US Senate, there are two candidates currently fighting for the GOP nomination. Over on the Democrat side, it appears that there are also two folks.
But Raleigh and DC are once again playing the pretend-there-is-no-primary game. On the GOP side, we are being told ad nauseam that Michael Whatley can raise money and is the best positioned to beat former governor Roy Cooper.
Here’s WUNC’s Colin Campbell being a good spinner:
[…] One of the strongest GOP statements in support of the Customs and Border Patrol action came from Michael Whatley, the Republican frontrunner in next year’s U.S. Senate race. […]
The problem? There is no publicly available polling of a primary clash between Whatley and Brown. How do we know Mike Whatley truly is the “frontrunner” or the best choice to win in November?
Every single public poll looking at the general election has Roy Cooper convincingly whipping Whatley. How do you substantiate the claim Whatley is the GOP’s best shot against Cooper?
Harper Polling released a poll of the North Carolina race earlier this month. They apparently didn’t get the memo so they included Don Brown in their polling. They didn’t release a poll on a Whatley-Brown matchup.
But they did release surveys on a potential Brown-Cooper matchup for November, as well as one for Whatley-Cooper. Both Whatley and Cooper were performing equally as well against Cooper as a general election nominee. Oh sure, the GOP loses to Cooper in both cases. But there was nothing there proving Whatley is stronger than Brown against Cooper.
The real story? Michael Whatley has millions in party-provided resources at his disposal. Yet, he’s faring as well as Don Brown and his shoe-string operation are against Roy Cooper.
That didn’t stop The N&O’s Danielle Battaglia from missing the point, butchering the details of the Harper Poll and regurgitating the “inevitable” Cooper v. Whatley spin.
(*And she’s bewildered about McClatchy closing its DC bureau and moving her back to NC.*)
Oh, and the fundraising point. Whatley’s campaign treasury has been stuffed with funds tied to the state party and the national party. Kinda like what happened when he was state party chairman. If you factored out RNC cash and legislators’ shakedown proceeds, the state party under Whatley didn’t perform much different in the fundraising department than under previous chairmen.
Tell us the truth folks. We don’t want you or DC or Raleigh politicos picking “winners” for us. Tell it to us straight, and let us make the choices.
