Its wildly interesting and unique to spend a good amount of time in the epicenter of a national news story. Especially when it all revolves around small town USA. When youre so focused on whats happening from where its actually happening you get completely disconnected from the perspective the national narrative projects. On the flip side of that, when youre not on location and on the outside looking in, often times your view of the news is significantly different as opposed to being in the middle of it. Every morning (as in... 2:30 am) since Ive been here in Murrieta I decompress and, for the first time of the day, start to digest the national news surrounding what is happening here. And I just see it all so differently. I remember the same vibe from the Doug Hoffman special election for NY23. Our small group of bloggers rented a house in Lake Placid and chased campaigns around in upstate NY for a week. We had the best news available because we were on the ground. And when we took a step back to look at the outside view of the race, we saw a total disconnection with what was really going on. It was the same when I was in Boston back when he won an epic race to replace Ted Kennedy. It was the same when chasing campaigns up near the Wisconsin/Canada border when there were leftist campaigns to recall State Senators who stood with Scott Walker. I can throw out a plethora of examples and then some. And it goes to show that having embedded reporting, on the ground and on location, is really the only way to get the full truth from the proper perspective. Otherwise youre just commenting on someone elses perspective of the news. Shame on mainstream media for abandoning this basic mindset in journalism. They cheat by parking a sat truck on location and waiting for the text message with breaking news before showing up to tell a story. And meanwhile, the story is happening in real time all around them. If only media organizations would actually embed themselves in the full, uncensored story theyre working on, the outcome of narratives would be incredible. I integrated myself with the good people of Murrieta this week and in the process I made great contacts, got a wealth of information, broke story after story, and have a complete handle on what is really going on. Now I do, of course, share their agenda and that helps, but thats not a requirement to get the story right. Knowing what I can get out of being fully immersed in the entire story is not new. Ive lived it many times. But Im now starting to understand why mainstream media gets it so wrong. They cheat, cut corners and refuse to put in the time needed to get the full truth. And our nation is hurting as a result of it. Anyway, thats my midweek rant/observation from Murrieta. From the perspective of a journalist/blogger on the inside looking out.
Posted on: Thu, 10 Jul 2014 09:42:21 +0000
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