In the Newsroom, Packing Up an Era of Journalism

John Kelly's Washington
In the Newsroom, Packing Up an Era of Journalism

An Excerpt :

There are empty boxes around The Washington Post newsroom. They're those smallish cardboard boxes you get from Staples and assemble yourself: Tab A into Slot B.

People are on the move here at The Post. Some of us are moving from one floor to another as the newsroom is reorganized, the physical manifestation of an intellectual reorganization that's in the offing. Others are moving out of the newsroom forever. Their boxes contain more than coffee mugs and paperwork. They hold memories.

Some of the Posties who have taken the company's latest early retirement offer are people you know, with bylines you recognize. Many of them are people you don't know. They were part of the journalistic iceberg that's below the waterline: assignment editors who direct coverage, copy editors who polish prose and write headlines. I'll miss all my colleagues, and I wish them well in the next chapters of their lives.

Ah, Those Were the Days

People say that now is not a good time to be a journalist. But it's probably not a good time to be a lot of things: a construction worker, a telecom lawyer, a Detroit auto executive, a South Carolina governor. In other words: Boohoo for us.

Of course, the cardboard box and the regretful exit have been a part of newspapers ever since the first editor tapped a red pencil against his teeth. I'm reading a book called "Lessons From the Past: Journalists' Lives and Work, 1850-1950" by Fred Fedler. I've learned that there's never been a good time to work for a newspaper, a profession with about as much job security as a narcoleptic circus aerialist.
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Fedler has an entire chapter called "Getting Fired." It begins: "The country's first reporters are sometimes portrayed as a carefree bunch, drifting happily from job to job." In fact, they were booted more often than they drifted -- and often for the flimsiest of reasons. Fedler writes about a publisher named Frank Munsey who couldn't abide the sight of fat men, believing they "spoiled the appearance of an office." After buying one newspaper, Munsey walked through the newsroom, spied a fat man seated at a desk and had him canned on the spot.

Capricious? Well, Wilbur Storey, publisher of the Chicago Times, fired an employee whose new boots squeaked.

O.K. Bovard, managing editor of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, threatened to fire a reporter who wore a cap instead of a hat. He believed that no man who wore a cap could become a good journalist. Ah, those were the days.

Charles E. Chapin of the Evening World in New York was notorious for the way he bullied his staff. Still, he had a certain sadistic flair. Once, when a reporter called to say he had failed to get the story he'd been assigned, Chapin asked: "Your name is Smith, isn't it? You work for the Evening World?" When the reporter answered yes, Chapin barked: "You're a liar. Smith got fired from the Evening World an hour ago."

Of course, back then there were enough newspapers that you could be fired in the morning and hired by the afternoon. Fedler mentions a reporter named H. Allen Smith who by the time he was 19 had worked for nine newspapers. Are there still nine newspapers in the United States?

What's the most interesting way you've been fired? Or were you the terminator, not the terminatee?

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A nation and the role of a Newspaper
The Italy That Pulls Through

Moments of collective grief have brought with them indelible images of Italy’s solidarity, efficiency and unity of purpose. Two stand out. The dignified composure of those who have lost loved ones under the rubble, and the generosity of the many nameless volunteers. Yet there is absolutely no reason for the surprise we have been expressing over the past few days. Italy has not changed, nor has it discovered a new quality. It has merely demonstrated one of its many virtues. This Italian spirit, the real one, has been well described by the Corriere’s reporters. And we have realized that news is useful and necessary. We needn’t be astonished. Feelings and emotions circulate with the news. We all feel part of a community, but the media would not be doing their job properly if they did not report the negligence, the flouted laws or the culpably non-compliant buildings. Or if they fail, when the emergency is over, to spread the mentality of prevention and maintenance that gives us the measure of our own civic culture.

We only need the example of the last few dramatic days to illustrate the public function of a good daily. On paper and online. It is honest, serious, constructive, like the Corriere della Sera, an institution safeguarding Italy, which from today will bear the signature of the present writer. Very briefly, the pledge to readers is this. Ours is an open newspaper, where ideas are compared and respected. But we are moderates – and I stress moderates – proud of our heritage, and of our independence. An open newspaper is a fruitful meeting place for secularists and Catholics. It is a place of tolerance and reason where efforts are directed at building up, not tearing down. The Corriere is on Italy’s side, not hostile to the nation. It aspires to represent the Italy that pulls through, the Italy we have seen in these days of Passion in Abruzzo. An Italy aware of its resources, producing, investing, studying, rolling up its sleeves and taking pride in what it is creating. A country that needs not just to be informed correctly, but also represented, and defended. A modern newspaper is a mirror reflecting the reader’s identity.

The Corriere judges on the evidence – and sometimes gets it wrong – but it is not biased in favor of anyone. If it had ever been at anyone’s beck and call – even of its shareholders – the Corriere would never have been able to play its historic role. It would never have been able to anticipate many of Italy’s choices regarding culture and development, its opening up to Europe and the free market. Paolo Mieli, from whom I am taking over for the second time, has cherished those values in a period of challenging relations between the press and the powers that be. He deserves credit and will continue to write for his paper.

I will pause here and change register. I would like briefly to tackle two issues. My first question is why is a free, independent, responsible press good for democracy? It is not rhetorical.

Without an informed, aware public opinion, a nation is not only less free: it is also less just and slower to develop. Citizens have fewer reliable tools with which to make decisions about voting, or even about everyday situations. Its governing class struggles to identify priorities. As in those companies where everyone agrees with the boss, the government has greater difficulty in distinguishing good actions from those that are less good. The consumer is less protected, the saver more threatened. Public life is dominated by the futile and the ephemeral.

Much is said, and rightly so, about the excesses of the press. These exist and they are serious. We have our share of blame. Yet little is said about the costs of non-information. Where there is opacity, merit goes unrecognized. Where there is little transparency, the best companies and professionals are penalized, honest workers marginalized and talent excluded. Rights are denied. The quality of the citizenry is modest.

It is striking that not just Italy’s politicians, but its entire governing class views information as a necessary evil, underestimating the role of an authoritative, independent press. Everyone values and appeals to the press when it concentrates on others, their adversaries and competitors. Otherwise, they detest the press and are suspicious of it.

Many confuse information with propaganda, or view it as the prosecution of advertising by other means. A governing class that fails to acknowledge the tutelary role of the press evinces a lack of maturity, as well as a fair dose of short-sightedness. Leadership in global processes, particularly in these times of profound disquiet and bewilderment, is made of correct, timely, credible information. Genuine debate brings forth the best policies; insincere or incomplete debate only the most superficially viable policies, those that are apparently the least costly. In short, claques and spin doctors won’t get you very far.

The other question I want to address is how useful newspapers are. It’s true that the press is going through a profound crisis but newspapers have never been so widely read. On paper and online. If internet users browsing for credible news are more inclined to visit the website of a newspaper of record, there must be a good reason. Internet is a huge democratic space but the boundary between true and false, fleeting and substantial, and lawful and unlawful is a narrow one. There is also another reason. Look around you. Which symbols remind you of the heritage, provenance and history of your community? Very few indeed.

Global brands and formats dominate the street, the small screen and the Web. Even your favorite soccer team speaks another language. Sometimes the newsstand or the bookshop have you wondering whether you are in another country. But readers are always at home with their own paper. It’s a comfort zone and a – professional – tool they can rely on to interpret complex events.

Readers feel they are an active part of a community, and also citizens of the world. That’s why a good newspaper will change, reinvent itself and integrate ever more closely with Internet, but it will always be a fundamental piece of our national identity, our soul and the reason we stay together. The Corriere chronicles, and gives a voice to, the Italy that pulls through. The best Italy. The Italy we have seen at work in the past few days of national grief and solidarity. If we concealed its defects and limitations, we would love it the less. Which is not even to be contemplated.

Ferruccio de Bortoli
10 aprile 2009