Jay Rosen says it’s time to get a clue. Rosen gangs up on Len Downie, the Washington Post editor who keeps making these iffy claims that news is news and there’s no politics in the reporting of the mighty Post.
Back of all the Downie doubletalk about “information agendas” and “organic” decisions is a problem more serious: Leonard Downie’s quest for absolute innocence when it comes to having a political thought about journalism. He achieves this innocence by receiving all questions about the inherently political nature of the press as crude demands to politicize the press. … When he does this, he treats his questioners as stupid, or unworthy of respect. But innocence at such an extreme is really a kind of power; and this, I think, is what Downie is saying to us with his bowls of mush: I have the power to say nothing of consequence about decisions of consequence. And the truth is… he does.