Food Police Run Out Of Things To Say; Repeat Story From 1992

[MrMon]

Of course the media slavishly reprint every press release from the Food Police, but even this story acknowledges it's a repeat from 15 years ago.

Chinese Restaurant Food Draws Criticism

In other news, sun rises in east. Expected to set in west later today. Scientists expect daily zenith to be reached around noon.

How is this story any different from the one they released 15 years ago? Why is this news? If someone can pull up the original story from 1992, it's going to say exactly the same thing. To me, this is irresponsible journalism. CSPI is free to rerelease old news wrapped in new packaging, but the media also has a job to say - been there, done that.

Exactly how lazy is the press? The older I get, the more I realize that, with rare exception, they are among the laziest, most irresponsible profession around, who simply report what's handed them, regardless of their political persuasion. (I've done it myself, by pointing them to stories I want to see printed. If they were on the ball, they would have known about the story, but had to have it handed to them or they would have missed it.) It's no wonder the people don't trust them any more, people rate politicians higher than journalists.

Anyone here have any stories about manipulating the media? With all the experience people have, certainly some of you made the 5th estate dance to your tune.

[El Diablo]

Mon,

I don't know that much about the press in general, but I know tons about the tech press. Much tech reporting is a complete joke, basically just repurposing tech releases and positioning them as stories. The amount of actual reporting done as comprared to regurgitating is pretty embarrassing. Stories are often barely written with "reported" sentences quoted almost verbatim from company issued press releases. Of course, companies don't care about that sort of plagiarism.

[NajdorfDefense]

[ QUOTE ]
Mon,

I don't know that much about the press in general, but I know tons about the tech press. Much tech reporting is a complete joke, basically just repurposing tech releases and positioning them as stories. The amount of actual reporting done as comprared to regurgitating is pretty embarrassing. Stories are often barely written with "reported" sentences quoted almost verbatim from company issued press releases. Of course, companies don't care about that sort of plagiarism.

[/ QUOTE ]

The financial press is no different. They also repeat rumors and call it 'news' quite frequently. The WSJ ran a news story that the Large Firm I was at was closing down our entire division. They weren't and didn't. It's still there, 10+ years later. And the WSJ News Division is one of the best out there, much better than anyone else save maybe the FT. They get paid to sell papers, period.

[nineinchal]

My doctor told me to lay off the the fatty foods and beer. Of course he was sitting back in his chair, smoking a Marlboro Red (softpack) and drinking Johnny Walker Black, straight up, while reading the results of my glucose tolerance test. I was choking on the smoke, it was that thick.

I asked him point blank "John, (I can't call him doc since he is drinking and blowing smoke in my face), if I was a smoker would you tell me to stop that too?" He replies "I have to tell you to cease and desist from smoking, I'm a doctor." He says to me " does it offend you that I smoke?" I say, "no, I'm not offended at all, Phillip Morris sends me the dividend checks every quarter, I really don't want anybody to stop smoking Phillip Morris products, including my doctor."

So he tells me to come back in another month, exercise more, quit drinking (I made up the deficiency by smoking weed again), and exercising more. I have to take an EKG in a month too.

Next visit, he hooks me up to the EKG electrodes, with that gooey stuff all over my fat, pale, overly-white and all too hairy body. A lit Marlboro Red is dangling out the corner of his mouth. He does the EKG while holding the electrodes in place, since the hair on my chest won't allow for a complete thorough flush contact with my skin, all while keeping the cigarette going. I am sucking down his second hand smoke, with the ashes on his cigarette almost an inch and a quarter long, about to fall off onto my naked chest; I'm inhaling the fragrances/odor of the Johnny Black as well(he did'nt quit drinking since last month either). He gets done and he says my EKG looks normal. ?????????????????

I mention that possibly the results are skewed due to the fact that he was forcing tobacco smoke down my lungs.??????????????

Then he takes my blood pressure and says "I'm concerned,your pressure is a little high, any changes since last month, you start smoking or something?" I said yeah, I started smoking cigarettes again when I walked into my doctor's office."

[wacki]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Mon,

I don't know that much about the press in general, but I know tons about the tech press. Much tech reporting is a complete joke, basically just repurposing tech releases and positioning them as stories. The amount of actual reporting done as comprared to regurgitating is pretty embarrassing. Stories are often barely written with "reported" sentences quoted almost verbatim from company issued press releases. Of course, companies don't care about that sort of plagiarism.

[/ QUOTE ]

The financial press is no different. They also repeat rumors and call it 'news' quite frequently. The WSJ ran a news story that the Large Firm I was at was closing down our entire division. They weren't and didn't. It's still there, 10+ years later. And the WSJ News Division is one of the best out there, much better than anyone else save maybe the FT. They get paid to sell papers, period.

[/ QUOTE ]

The press are also far more likely to get something wrong than something right when it comes to environmental stuff, pesticides, global warming, firearms, etc.

It never ceases to amaze me that an actor (Meryl Streep) can uproot and discredit the entire scientific community and get a perfectly safe plant growth regulator (Alar) banned. Yet when the best and the brightest from Berkeley try to get dangerous herbicides regulated they are shunned away.

[MrMon]

I think it's pretty well acknowledged that the trade press is there primarily to print press releases and not question anyone in depth. No real opposing news is going to come out of any of the papers you get for free by sending in a card once a year that says you qualify. Not that they don't provide some useful info for people in the industry, but don't expect to see any negative reviews either.

The real problem is that the regular press has become this too. I'm not sure if it ever was what is claimed, but the only source the press is ever suspicious of is Republican-led government (or Democrat-led governement if you're talking about talk radio). Anyone else releases something, and they couldn't possibly be lying or have an agenda, could they? And these groups know this, they intentionally create sexy headlines in order to get printed, and the press falls for it every time. And what could be sexier than a celeb promoting a cause. Even with the Al Gore story yesterday, there's been no real coverage of the science debate, just coverage of Al Gore the rock star.

Between sheer laziness on the part of the press, celebritology replacing news, and self-censorship of not criticizing major advertisors (when was the last time you saw a critical story about car dealers), it's no wonder I found my local rag worthless and gave it up years ago, and stopped watching local news as well. Thank God someone like Perez Hilton has the guts to print the truth or I'd have nothing to read outside of 2+2. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[Jack of Arcades]

[ QUOTE ]
The real problem is that the regular press has become this too. I'm not sure if it ever was what is claimed, but the only source the press is ever suspicious of is Republican-led government (or Democrat-led governement if you're talking about talk radio).

[/ QUOTE ]

You're giving the press too much credit. They usually don't scrutinize republican-led government, either.

[El Diablo]

Mon: Amusing anecdote. I turned on the TV yesterday and a feature story on the evening news was the high calorie content of Chinese food, haha.

ND: I posted this in the Cramer thread. Interesting Cramer comments re: stock and press manipulation: http://youtube.com/watch?v=708wDFX28lc

[octopi]

Although I've just gotten into the field I can tell you there is very little investigative journalism going around these days. Mostly covered by the more esteemed and heavy hitting publications such as the New York Times, or Telegraph etc. Something has to fill the paper, though.

However, that being said, the scientific research was also recently 'redone' so I don't think the blame can be totally placed on the media for running with this one. It's all been said before, it's all be done before. That 'consumer interest group' that did the study gets a lot of their funding from stories like that I'm sure. PS: Fries are fried in oil and are bad for you, and so is drinking too much wine, but not too little, that's bad for your heart. I'm sure there will be plenty of stories about that in the coming years as well.

I already have a few good stories about manipulations or reporters spinning things from my new job at a newspaper...but then again, it's sometimes in the eyes of the reader to really investigate things and gather as many facts as they can. I remain even more skeptical of the news agencies after starting work in journalism.