Why David Corn Is Wrong About JournoList

Warning: politics ahead.

Liberal journalist David Corn defends the now-infamous JournoList against charges of conspiracy. He argues that JournoList was simply "progressive journalists hav[ing] progressive ideas and shar[ing] them with other progressive journalists," not some sinister left-wing media cabal. He makes a convincing case--convincing, but wrong.

Understand, I have no problem with the idea behind JournoList. If liberals want to get together and kvetch, fine. They have that right. No doubt many conservative journalists do the same thing.

I don't even have begrudge the JournoListers their sophomoric language. Yes, it is a little disturbing to see adults acting like gossipy teens gathered behind the gym after school. But journalists are verbal by nature. That's why they went into the news business: they get paid for their logorrhea. And because modern media demands some self-control (Glenn Beck and Keith Olbermann excepted) they need somewhere to rant. JournoList gave them an outlet.*

Corn nonetheless makes two false arguments. He writes that JournoList was populated by "predominantly self-identified liberals writing or working for self-identified liberal outfits." In reality, though, JournoList members came from mainstream publications like NPR, the Washington Post, Bloomberg, and Time. Corn is either 1) being very disingenuous or 2) tacitly admitting that many "nonpartisan" organizations are "self-identified liberal outfits."

Strike one. Strike two against Corn is his argument that JournoLists were swapping story ideas, not plotting to deliberately distort the news. Yet in this very column Corn cites a e-mail from Mother Jones' Jonathan Stein: "If enough people--people on this list?—write that the [Palin VP} pick is sexist, you'll have the networks debating it for days." Another JournoLister added "Say it with me: 'Classic GOP Tokenism.'"

If that isn't an attempt to manipulate the news cycle to partisan ends, what is? One journalist is encouraging others to cram the Palin story into a left-leaning narrative. And--at least from what appears in this article--no one disagreed. No one had any qualms about it.

JournoList isn't a scandal. It doesn't reveal anything we didn't already suspect. That's what makes it so disappointing--to paraphrase Dennis Green, journalists really are who we thought they were.

*On second thought, though, aren't these the same people who condemn the Tea Party for coarsening public debate? Most Tea Party signage is G-rated compared to the language on JournoList.