Comments on: Have reporters “played poodle to their sources” on global warming?

By: Deep Climate

Deep Climate — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 19:51:46 +0000

But the truth is that many of these same bloggers produced their own exaggerations, distortions and corruptions, and unlike most reporters, there was no effort to correct the record once the truth came out — because for many, the truth was not the object of the game.

The Daily Mail and the Times have made no effort to correct their reporters’ mistakes, distortions and fabrications in their IPCC attacks, as you should be well aware by now (see my comment on Phil Jones’s piece, for instance). I don’t believe the “truth is the object of the game” for many of these newspapers, including the Daily Mail and the Telegraph. Not to mention the National Post, the Wall Street Journal and Fox News. If it were, they would not continue to propagate, and refuse to correct, so many falsehoods.

By: juandos

juandos — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 20:38:02 +0000

Well Mr. Tom you forgot the most basic premise of even the most mediocre of reporters, "FOLLOW THE MONEY!"... Amazingly you stepped right around that huge boulder in the road with the adroitness one expects of a progressive who's desire to see the facts is less than nil... How many millions if not billions of dollars of EXTORTED TAX DOLLARS went to funding these FRAUDS East Anglia, Penn State, and other places? Note this OUTRIGHT LIE from Mr. Tom: "But the truth is that many of these same bloggers produced their own exaggerations, distortions and corruptions, and unlike most reporters, there was no effort to correct the record once the truth came out..." Well Mr. Tom neither have most of the SCARE MONGERS who were foisted off as science journalists retracted and apologized for their nonsense either... Take a gander at today's New York Times in fact, the drum beat still pounds on... The fact of the matter is that amateur bloggers can't drive up the cost of living through schemes like Obama's Cap & Trade nonsense... Mr. Tom asks, "Have Ridley’s blogger heroes been able to do anything even remotely resembling something like this?"... Well Mr. Tom as a matter fact the bloggers have done the job the Guardian was loath to take up but finally did...

By: Raven

Raven — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 18:25:09 +0000

You say:

“But I’d rather it be this way than to emulate the unrelentingly cynical and negative orientation of political reporters.”

IOW, you agree with Ridley that the science press plays poodle to its sources because it is unwilling to risk upsetting its sources by asking tough questions or, worse, not accepting an evasive answer. You can’t be a good reporter unless you assume that your sources will lie to you into to advance their own agenda. Cyncism is a job requirement.

This in turns means science journalists are completely unreliable as a source of information on the topic and the public has to rely on bloggers to get the ‘rest of the story’.