Concha: Media Must Set Higher Standard for Reporting Career-Ending Accusations
Conservative political commentator for The Hill and host of “What America’s Thinking,” Joe Concha, penned an Op-Ed that highlights the ills plaguing the media in America today.
The mistrust of the media, which has been growing over the past decade or more, took off when President Donald Trump began to call out major networks for their questionable journalistic ethics.
Concha began his analysis of what is wrong with the coverage of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, and the accusation made against him by Christine Blasey Ford, by pointing out that the facts themselves can be presented in a dishonest way.
“The public is presented with information by media that invariably takes a side based on the three furthest things from the pillars of sound journalism: sensationalism, dishonesty and an ideological tilt while being hopelessly pious in the process,” Concha said.
As an example of this type of bad journalism, Concha castigated MSNBC for their choice to run a story that he calls a “third-party tale” by someone who vaguely remembered Ford, but didn’t actually know her. The benefit of that story is that the “witness” claimed that Ford’s story was indeed true.
Concha referred to this type of reporting as “gossip treated as gospel.”
In another journalistic faux pas, Concha highlighted a tweet sent by CNN anchor Jim Sciutto in which he claimed that the details of Ford’s potential testimony were offered to her in a much narrower way than Senate Judiciary Chairman Charles Grassley actually offered them.
“The offer to #ChristinaBlaseyFord is blunt: testify in public six days from now while under death threats or your allegation will be ignored in the confirmation of a SCOTUS nominee. That is quite a choice,” the tweet read.
The offer to #ChristinaBlaseyFord is blunt: testify in public six days from now while under death threats or your allegation will be ignored in the confirmation of a SCOTUS nominee. That is quite a choice.
— Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) September 19, 2018
The tweet by Sciutto was retweeted more than 8,400 times and liked 19,000 times as of Friday afternoon.
However, Sciutto’s claim didn’t go unnoticed. Sen. Orrin Hatch’s office replied to that tweet, calling on Sciutto to correct his assertion.
“This is not close to the offer to #ChristinaBlaseyFord,” Hatch’s office replied to Sciutto, who was a former Obama State Department official.
“Chairman Grassley offered an open or closed hearing, reached out to discuss timing that would work for Dr. Ford, has even offered to send staff to California. This deserves a correction.”
This is not close to the offer to #ChristinaBlaseyFord.
Chairman Grassley offered an open or closed hearing, reached out to discuss timing that would work for Dr. Ford, has even offered to send staff to California.
This deserves a correction.https://t.co/DcafA30Y4P
— Senator Hatch Office (@senorrinhatch) September 19, 2018
A day later, Sciutto did clarify his tweet, however, that was retweeted just 157 times and liked just 377 times as of Friday afternoon, which had presumably a much smaller reach than his original post.
“Sen @ChuckGrassley added the option of private testimony for Ford yesterday. New today, the senator has offered to fly staff to California to interview her there. The Monday timeline remains the same,” Sciutto wrote the following day.
NB: Sen @ChuckGrassley added the option of private testimony for Ford yesterday. New today, the senator has offered to fly staff to California to interview her there. The Monday timeline remains the same. https://t.co/Si5gIxaXRz
— Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) September 19, 2018
Concha’s examples aren’t exclusively with the left though. He also highlighted Drudge Report’s lack of due diligence in linking to a false story where anonymous students allegedly gave bad reviews to Kavanaugh’s accuser.
While Drudge later deleted the story, the popularity of the site means that the fake story reached many readers before it was caught.
Concha goes on to explain a few possible ways that the Kavanaugh case could play out. Even in the case of a confirmation, Kavanaugh will have “a permanent asterisk for life despite staunchly denying the claim and offering more testimony publicly.”
Or, if Kavanaugh chooses to withdraw, Concha believes that the Republican base “would never forgive the party.”
Concha ended his opinion on the media coverage of Kavanaugh’s confirmation with a stern reproach for journalists:
“More than a few bad apples in media have handled this story about as poorly as they could. Trust in media is already at a historic low.
“Putting the toothpaste back in the tube will be impossible at this point. To half the country, traditional political media is irreparable. And those people ain’t coming back even when the 45th president is no longer in office.”
Truth and Accuracy
We are committed to truth and accuracy in all of our journalism. Read our editorial standards.
