A tale of two journalists...

I haven't really been following the whole Eason Jordan thing - but InstaPundit has a huge roundup. I also haven't followed the Jeff Ganon/Talon News kerfuffle either. But it's interesting to contrast the two.

On Wednesday and Thursday, I take grad classes. Because of my schedule, I usually get to campus about an hour or so early, and hang out in a student lounge and drink a cup of coffee while checking email and websurfing on my PowerBook. The last two days, the huge plasma TV in the lounge has been tuned to CNN. And they have had lengthy segments both times on Jeff Gannon.

To me, the Jeff Gannon thing is a tempest in a teapot. A guy who is a "confessed Republican" asks a softball and not entirely accurate question at a presidential press conference. It turns out he also years ago registered some gay porn domain names. He gets accused of being a White House plant, despite the fact that he was on a day pass because the White House didn't think that he was enough of a journalist to get normal press credentials. Enough liberal bloggers start posting his information that he quits. And this is news for days on CNN.

Meanwhile, CNN's own chief news executive - a high level guy in an institution that is the mainstream media, accuses U.S. troops of intentionally killing journalists at a major conference. He stonewalls, refuses to admit anything or allow the tapes to be released, and eventually quits under the pressure from the blogosphere, despite minimal to nonexistent coverage by the mainstream media. Now, it's not shocking that CNN wouldn't air a 20 minute segment about their own chief news executive's stupid and baseless statement, but it's interesting that the ravings and conspiracy theories of the Daily Kos about a conservative blogger/reporter who I had never heard of until a couple days ago merits mutliple lengthy segments.

The campus I go to has CNN on a lot, and many of the segments - like a very lengthy segment about an anti-war mom whose son was killed in Iraq, and who has become basically a career protester - make me cringe. Those who think that there is no "liberal" media or media bias have become blind to how much there is on mainstream stations like CNN.