Saturday, November 12, 2005

Hey, wait a minute! That's my idea!

Do journalists "borrow" ideas (and data sources) from bloggers?

Read this Shifting Sands piece of November 7.

And then this WaPo piece of November 12.

Certain aspects of the WaPo piece seem.. um... very familiar.

Decide for yourself.

7 comments:

Jamie Irons said...

Rick,

Hmmm... The resemblance is striking.

But you haven't yet mentioned (I'm pretty sure it has already occurred to you ;-) the upside of this development.

You can begin to implant more conservative (read "more reasonable") ideas in these reporters' "minds."

I would start with a gentle, subtle introduction of the notion, backed by evidence well known to you, that the Iraq war was not "started by a lie."

;-)

Jamie Irons

Unknown said...

First jamie, now you.

You guys seem to think it is all about you.

I am just kidding.

I have noticed this kind of thing before. In fact I wondered if there is some kind of group think that brings people to the same places.

chuck said...

Having an original idea that lots of other people haven't thought of is hard. Really hard. As Terrye says, most ideas seem to occur to several people at the same time. I think this is because events, or technologies, suddenly make certain ideas "obvious".

Rick Ballard said...

Terrye,

Sure, Jamie may have been first but mine's bi.. er.. lon.. more comprehensive.

Chuck,

Truly original ideas are hen's teeth. Different ways of looking at data sets are somewhat more common. I've spent so much time with balance sheets and spread sheets that picking out the anomalies is like a game. Even in Mr. Cilliza's piece, he glided right by the proud statement that $845,00 had been raised by the Dems on the internet in six weeks. I don't want to make light of that accomplishment but the straight extrapolation is $7,182,500 over the 51 weeks left until the election and about half of the 845K came after DeLay's phony indictment. How many times will Earle indict DeLay this year? Seven mil is chump change.

The Dem response to the reporter is similiar to the Captain of the Titanic calming the passengers "Not to worry, we've just stopped to take on a little ice." Right.

MeaninglessHotAir said...

You should all be aware that we have had readers from the Washington Post, from other government agencies including the State Department, and from people's homes in DC. Things we say on here can actually have an impact on the world, it's not just an academic exercise, so we should strive to be circumspect in our declamations.

ambisinistral said...

I can't understand why the papers aren't full of Turkmenbashi articles???

Anonymous said...

HEHE
Per Drudge:

"DNC CHAIRMAN HOWARD DEAN REFUSES TO APPEAR ON SET WITH RNC CHAIR DURING TOMORROW 'MEET THE PRESS', SOURCES TELL DRUDGE... DEAN ONLY AGREED TO BACK-TO-BACK INTERVIEWS ON NBC WITH RIVAL... DEVELOPING..."

I would be a little uncomfortable if all I could do is read poll numbers, spout right-wing hitler lying "we are winning" BS with the other guy who out-raised by half TOO!