behind the news

Second Thoughts

February 14, 2005

Now that the dust has settled on the abrupt resignation of Eason Jordan, the ostensible chief news executive at CNN, the New York Times has weighed in with a reflective piece by Katharine Q. Seelye, with additional reporting by Jacques Steinberg and David F. Gallagher.

Update for those who spent the weekend on Mars: Jordan, speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland in late January, was heard by several present to declare that 12 journalists or para-journalists had been killed in Iraq by friendly fire — and intentionally so. Jordan later “walked back” that statement, in the words of David Gergen, who moderated the panel, and he ultimately issued a retraction and an apology:

“I never meant to imply U.S. forces acted with ill intent when U.S. forces accidentally killed journalists, and I apologize to anyone who thought I said or believed otherwise.”

But neither denial nor apology was enough for the “blogswarm” — a characterization supplied by Jay Rosen, an NYU journalism professor and a blogger himself — nor, apparently, for Jordan’s corporate overlords, so he is now gone.

(Since Davos has yet to release the videotape of the session, on the grounds that anything said was not-for-attribution, bewildered readers were left with an apology for a statement that has yet to be seen or heard by anyone but those present.)

So now, what’s attracting more attention than finding out what Jordan said in the first place is the role that bloggers played in Jordan’s demise; and comparisons to the Dan Rather disaster and last week’s Jeff Gannon fiasco are rife. This author has weighed in with his own initial characterization, but there is more to say while the corpse is still warm. Fortunately, several of the Senior Deacons of the Church of the Poliblog are saying it this morning. Jeff Jarvis told the Times, “I wish our goal were not taking off heads but digging up the truth.” And Captain Ed and Rosen have expressed similar reservations about the gleeful gloating of the moon howlers at all too many politically-inclined blogs.

Sign up for CJR's daily email

The Times sums it up this way:

“But while the bloggers are feeling empowered, some in their ranks are openly questioning where they are headed.”

It’s a question worth asking, but anyone who has recently followed or taken part in the more rabid poliblogs on the web, right or left, has to doubt that the people to whom it’s directed are even listening.

The Captain Eds, Jay Rosens and Jeff Jarvises of this world have always celebrated the blogosphere as a self-correcting perfect democracy where the participants supply accountability and oversight. The other side of that coin is to say that the mob is headless, and that neither the best efforts of the deacons, nor those of anyone else, can mediate the wrath when the headhunters smell blood.

That, in fact, is the problem here. (And that, by the way, is a conservative thought, not a liberal one.)

Meantime, David Gergen, the conservative columnist and panel moderator who does know what Jordan said, and who challenged his statement at the session, is himself dismayed at the end result. He chalks it up “to the increasing degree to which the news media [are] being drawn into the culture wars,” as the Times puts it, and told Howard Kurtz that “[t]his is too high a price to pay for someone who has given so much of himself over 20 years. And he’s brought down over a single mistake because people beat up on him in the blogosphere? They went after him because he is a symbol of a network seen as too liberal by some. They saw blood in the water.” This morning, even the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page reached much the same conclusion — that the punishment here far exceeded the provocation.

But it’s no longer the Jeff Jarvises or the David Gergens or Journal editorial writers who drive these matters to a conclusion. It’s the headless mob.

Some think that’s a good thing, others see anarchy unloosed. As for us, we’re with Gergen and the Wall Street Journal editorial writer. This one is not a case of the wisdom of crowds; it’s a case of the madness of crowds.

Given the fact that we still don’t know precisely what Jordan said at Davos, nor do we know – this is an invitation, mainstream press – what machinations did or did not take place inside Time Warner (CNN’s parent) preceding Jordan’s resignation, the story is far from over.

Meantime, for those interested in what is known about press casualties in Iraq at the hands of U.S. troops, go here (“Permission to Fire”), here (“Two Murders and a Life”), and here.

–Steve Lovelady

Steve Lovelady was editor of CJR Daily.