Cranberg quotes the ethics code of the Associate Press Managing Editors Association (APME), as it was between 1974 and 1994:

The newspaper should background, with the facts, public statements that it knows to be inaccurate or misleading.

For some reason, this was dropped.  And that, I feel, is a contribution to the malaise that has grown in journalism, one leading to the attitude, "Don't blame me, I just report what they say."

An attitude easily abused.  Just consider Fox's "We Report; You Decide."

This is a meaningless claim, when you don't report "truth."  At least, it is when you don't bother to fact-check the statements you are reporting on.

But, of course, you know that.  That's what led to the creation of ePluribus Media.  When, last January, "reporter" `Jeff Gannon' asked a question of George Bush which itself contained claims needing fact-checking (that were spurious, 'we' quickly established), our soon-to-be founding director SusanG sent out her call on the Daily Kos for just that: fact checking on `Gannon.'  The newspapers and TV networks didn't respond; 'we' did.

When I do my interviews now, or any of the rest of you write your articles, our wonderful fact checkers make sure that nothing we say and nothing we report goes through without challenge.  So, three cheers for ePMedia.  And four, for our fact-checkers!

What has surprised me is that it has taken so long for the major news outlets to catch on to the need for this (if they have at all; if Cranberg isn't just another voice in the wilderness).  Cranberg writes:

Given that hoodwinking has become virtually a way of public life, something like the defunct APME language deserves to be dusted off, copied widely, and conscientiously applied.

Uh... Gilbert... that's just what we've been doing since our organization was established.  Sure, it's only been six months... but we have been doing it.  How about you?  Or are you all talk?

In today's world, fact-checking is not an expensive or time-consuming activity.  Yes, it takes care and considerable knowledge--but it's not that difficult, once you know what you are doing.  Gilbert, you finish your piece by asserting:

Unless news organizations develop the competence and will to correct the record, the press will continue to be hornswoggled by the politicians.

Brilliant.

What we found, starting with the whole Gannon affair, is that the press won't.  The press is too connected to the politicians to be willing to stand up to them--and the people know that (why do you think there was no popular support for Judith Miller?  We, the people, have never seen her as our champion but as part of the power elite).

If there is no divide between the politicians and the press, there will never be a "will" on the part of the press to challenge the assertions of the politicians.

That is why we, at ePMedia, "citizen journalists" all (though quite a few of us do have backgrounds within "your" medium), have taken up the task on our own.

You had your chance; you failed us.  Your CJR mea culpa isn't going to change that.  You lost when, in 1994, you decided as a profession that it wasn't important to stand for truth, that all you need do is simply "report."

And so, a new type of home-made journalism is now growing, one that will eventually move your corporate journalism to the side, one that will keep in mind its responsibility to the people, for it is part of the people--and we, the people of ePMedia, intend to be a part of that movement.