The NYTimes Has It's Head in the Sand

I wrote the Public Editor of the NYTimes a couple of emails yesterday. They were in response to his column on the very slow reponse of the NYT to the ACORN storeis that have been all over the news the past several weeks. Here are the texts to those two emails that I sent to the Public Editor of the NYT yesterday. The first, I titled "Head In the Sand"

Dear Mr. Hoyt,
This is in response to your editorial on the NYT being slow off the mark. You, as a paper, are institutionally unable to answer anything that is in criticism to Mr. Obama. You as a paper have done everything in your power to get him elected and have so much invested in the success of his administration, you will ignore anything that doesn't reflect well upon his administration.

For this reason and this reason alone, 84% of the country believes that "journalists" are literally in the tank for this administration and will do their utmost to "bury" any story that doesn't fit the narrative chosen by both your publisher and by your editorial board. Most of the stories that you have written in the past week concerning the alleged criminal activities of ACORN, have been skeptical at best, to down right critical of Ms. Giles and Mr. O'Keefe. This particular article and your review of the facts as you understand them...,

"Finally, on Sept. 16, nearly a week after the first video was posted, The Times took note of the controversy, under the headline, “Conservatives Draw Blood From Acorn, Favored Foe.” The article said that conservatives hoped to weaken the Obama administration by attacking its allies and appointees they viewed as leftist. The conservatives thought they had a “winning formula,” the article said, mobilizing people “to dig up dirt,” then trumpeting it on talk radio and television."
...merely shows your institutional bias to an extraordinary degree...and your critique only emphasizes that bias. Until you, as a paper, eliminate (or at best minimize) any bias (every reporter from the left or right has bias, the best ones minimize it in their reporting) that is currently present. It's time to stop the ideological reporting and report the facts. Leave editorialization for the editorial page.

It's time that the NYT STOPS treating the GOP as an evil enemy to be eradicated, but merely as a different point of view. Hire reporters who AREN'T so ideologically oriented to the left (if not far left), but have a (for your paper) more conservative view.

Unfortunately, I don't think that the NYT will do any of the above...after all, you're the "Gray Lady" why should you listen to anyone who isn't from your socio-economic strata...but then, your stock has plummeted to record low. You haven't listened in the past, you're not listening now, and you won't in the future. Remember the Rocky Mountain News...where are they now? That is the direction your paper is headed since you have literally angered 50% of your audience.

Sincerely,

Richard A. Vail

followed several hours later by this that I titled "Perceived Bias":

Dear Mr. Hoyt,
In follow up to a previous letter from earlier today wherein I quoted some poll numbers in how badly the journalists are viewed in the country at large. Perhaps you might want to take a look yourself. You've elected a president whom you refused to vet and now the country no longer trusts you...

http://www.sacredheart.edu/pages/30046_shu_national_poll_trust_and_satisfaction_with_the_national_news_media.cfm

Via Newsbusters.com comes a VERY frightening statistic...
“A new national poll finds most of the people surveyed think the media helped get President Obama elected,” FNC's Bret Baier noted in his Thursday night Grapevine segment in highlighting a September 8-11 national survey of 800 Americans by Sacred Heart University

http://www.sacredheart.edu/pages/30046_shu_national_poll_trust_and_satisfaction_with_the_national_news_media.cfm

which discovered “a large majority, 89.3%, suggested the national media played a very or somewhat strong role in helping to elect President Obama.” (Noel Sheppard's earlier item on the survey's finding: “Almost 90% of Americans Think Media Helped Get Obama Elected.”)

Baier related how the university in Fairfield, Connecticut also determined “almost 70 percent think the 'media are intent on promoting' his presidency and 56 percent say the 'media are promoting his health care reform agenda without objective criticism.'

I've included the root to the Sacred Heart College's poll for you to look up the numbers for yourself...I think that "Major Media" had better get it's act together and actually start vetting Mr. Obama and his associates NOW...even though it's basically too late. You've spent your shot...and the country has lost confidence in you.

Richard A. Vail