LETTERS
LETTERS The political reporters who cover Presidential politics are the cream of Washington’s crop. The fact that even they have a “credibility gap,” in spite of their experience and sense of...
...Its power is particularly awesome because it is relatively tinrestrained, given the constitutional protection and the lessening of competition...
...As I read the magazine, I found myself returned from the classroom and academia to the realities that I knew in Washington...
...and all the other articles are cynical, and make you really wonder is it worth it all...
...The question as to whether those realities are the real ones...
...LETTERS The political reporters who cover Presidential politics are the cream of Washington’s crop...
...I found that my students’ reaction to it was to reject it, be angry at it...
...Admittedly what is described in The Washington Monthly is the way things really happened...
...the various kinds of special assistants that Russell Baker described so well...
...No matter how well intentioned the custodians of relatively unbridled power may be, the problem for democracy created by that power remains a serious one...
...But this immediately raises a question...
...Why not a provision which will permit public figures to sue for declaratory judgments when they believe they are defamed, even if no money damages flow as a legal consequence...
...The press is perhaps the second most powerful institution in the country next to the Presidency...
...I hope that it’s clear why this is depressing to students...
...The fact of the matter is that Title VI was a subject of the Vice President’s meeting with the Governor, with Humphrey rirging that Georgia comply with antidisAdmination laws of the federal government...
...In that connection, I note David Broder’s reference (The Washington Monthly, February 1969 ) to Hubert Humphrey’s walking arm in arm with Lester Maddox and saying nothing about the latter’s racial views...
...The fact that even they have a “credibility gap,” in spite of their experience and sense of ethics, is in itself significant...
...Hopefully then, I would see it as tremendously important to not only have descriptions of Washington’s happenings, but to find ways of confronting the particular pattern of ways of doing things so that new values can be expressed, and, indeed, more rationality and human values be built into the decision-making apparatus...
...Broder is correct in recognizing that the press faces a credibility problem with the people it covers and the public it serves...
...Karnpelrnan is a Washington lawyer...
...Ben Bagdikian once explained that “no one likes to make enemies with the town crier...
...MAX M. KAMPELMAN Mr...
...It would be encouraging if effective and realistic answers to the problems came from within the profession itself...
...Broder’s distinguished newspaper might well follow the example...
...Why not an independent arbitration panel sponsored by the newspaper business itself to consider complaints arising out of alleged unfair press treatment, with a possible monetary indemnity fund...
...Why not a code of ethics and a formula for professionalism which will include a concern for the problem of bias...
...For what else is there...
...It is like the gambler who shot craps with dice loaded against him because it was the only game in town...
...LEONARD J. DUHL Dr...
...The falsity of statistics described in Ross’s article, Boyd’s perceptions of the way a Senator really works...
...Duhl teaches at Berkeley...
...They raise tremendously important questions as to whether indeed it is the way things should happen...
...But its influence remains great...
...Why doesn’t another newspaper follow the lead of the Louisville CourierJournal and appoint an ombudsman “armed with authority to get something done about valid complaints...
Vol. 1 • May 1969 • No. 4
