Saturday, December 03, 2005

The Baron on Offense

A recent exchange with a simian tête-de-cul commenter at Roger's Place resulted in his espousing the sentiment that "real" journalism is not practiced by bloggers. Leaving aside trying to define of "real" journalism (do you have to have a gold plated set of anonymous sources to practice?) I started looking around to see what was happening at various places of high repute that I am wont to visit.

I came accross this series of three separate pieces which continue an investigation that the Baron began some time ago. I had never heard of Jamaat-ul-Fuqra prior to reading his first two pieces and had certainly never heard of Tablighi Jamaat. The material that the Baron is assembling is somewhat troubling but even more troubling is the lack of coverage in the dying media.

Real investigative journalism is being practiced all of the time on blogs. Reading Baron's series leaves no doubt of that. Just as reading the general press leaves no doubt that it is undergoing a slow transition to complete stasis.

8 comments:

Unknown said...

Rick:

That is creepy. I wonder how many of them are here and what they are waiting for?

I also wonder what the Brits can do about the Mosque being constructed? I am not so sure that I would feel comfortable going to the Olympics with these guys next door.

truepeers said...

I agree. We at YARGB should all give some thought to how we can emulate the Baron and get in on the groundfloor of a new kind of investigative journalism.

Rick Ballard said...

Terrye,

It's not just creepy, it's flat out crazy. Between watching swarthy individuls with funny accents walk past Swedish grandmothers being wanded by somewhat less than diligent airport security personnel and idiots calling for a stupid wall on the Mexican border as an "anti-terrorist" measure I think I may be living next to Alice in Wonderland.

I'm trying to figure out additional methods of gathering information on these creeps. No overt acts does not mean that there have been no covert acts committed, nor does it mean that there are no overt acts planned. They certainly bear watching.

Unknown said...

I can't help but watch.

The last time I got on a plane, there was a beautiful young Arab on the same flight. He smelled like flowers, he had a perfectly trimmed beard and his hair was oiled. He had no hair on his arms and he was very well dressed.

I remembered Atta's instructions to his goons to shave and perfume their bodies and I could not help but watch this guy.

Nothing happened obviously...but I noticed the men on the plane were watching too.

Rick Ballard said...

"I noticed the men on the plane were watching too."

While mentally reviewing Chapter 8 of the Boy Scout Manual - 'How to use your belt or tie as a garrote.'

Unknown said...

rick:

yes, something like that.

Man that guy at Roger's is an idiot. I wonder if he will link to one of us and come potty on our blog.

monkeys are not always house trained.

Anonymous said...

Re. Roger's place - I just don't see how you guys can constantly summon up the mental energy to battle people like that. But more power to you.

Shifting gears, if I understand what truepeers is suggesting on this thread, I do like the idea of a collective research / reporting capability.

MeaninglessHotAir said...

Re: investigative journalism.

I've been thinking for a long time that witht the blogosphere there is the possibility of a new news medium. There are all these people all over the place--why can't they report on what they see locally and aggregate it, thus bypassing the MSM?

I think the problem is that it's harder than it looks. What the blogosphere is, almost entirely, is opinions rather than reporting. And we all know what opinions are like.

Another problem is that a blog, or at least a conventional blog like Instapundit, is just one consciousness. It can only go so far, can only look in so many directions. The trick will be in hooking up multiple consciousnesses, possibly millions of consciousnesses. This is where the blogosphere has real potential, because it can in theory bring in an endless supply of consciousnesses from all over. But the organization will have to change. People don't want to run all over looking for things. They want to go to one place and look for things.