(Not Exactly) Breaking News: CNN Has Become a Journalistic Embarrassment
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It’s not exactly breaking news that CNN is no longer in the news business. I know this because I possess a television and every now and then it’s tuned to CNN. Now, the network that once bragged that it was “The most trusted name in news” has become a journalistic embarrassment. There’s enough blame to go around, but Jeff Zucker deserves most of it. He’s the leader of the gang that couldn’t shoot straight. When I covered stories for CBS News, CNN was a real news organization, a worthy competitor. And when big news was breaking, Americans didn’t tune in to CBS or ABC or NBC. They were entertainment networks. CNN was the place to go to find out what was happening -- any time of the day or night. CNN may have had its biases like other news organizations, but they weren’t blatant. For a long time, CNN at least appeared to be non-partisan. That was once upon a time. Now CNN has embraced a new role. It proudly sees itself as the media arm of the anti-Trump “Resistance.” If you have doubts, stop reading this column, turn on your TV, tune into CNN, and there's a good chance that you'll find someone on screen saying something about Donald Trump, and that something won't be good. It’s not only the commentators who hate the president. They’re no different than the commentators at Fox who have fallen madly in love with the president. They’re two sides of the same coin. But at Fox, news correspondents, by and large, keep their opinions to themselves. At CNN, the line that separates news from opinion hasn’t been blurred; it’s been obliterated. “It is difficult to convey in words just what the candidacy and then presidency of Donald Trump have done to CNN.” That pithy observation comes from a
(Not Exactly) Breaking News: CNN Has Become a Journalistic Embarrassment
(Not Exactly) Breaking News: CNN Has Become a…
(Not Exactly) Breaking News: CNN Has Become a Journalistic Embarrassment
It’s not exactly breaking news that CNN is no longer in the news business. I know this because I possess a television and every now and then it’s tuned to CNN. Now, the network that once bragged that it was “The most trusted name in news” has become a journalistic embarrassment. There’s enough blame to go around, but Jeff Zucker deserves most of it. He’s the leader of the gang that couldn’t shoot straight. When I covered stories for CBS News, CNN was a real news organization, a worthy competitor. And when big news was breaking, Americans didn’t tune in to CBS or ABC or NBC. They were entertainment networks. CNN was the place to go to find out what was happening -- any time of the day or night. CNN may have had its biases like other news organizations, but they weren’t blatant. For a long time, CNN at least appeared to be non-partisan. That was once upon a time. Now CNN has embraced a new role. It proudly sees itself as the media arm of the anti-Trump “Resistance.” If you have doubts, stop reading this column, turn on your TV, tune into CNN, and there's a good chance that you'll find someone on screen saying something about Donald Trump, and that something won't be good. It’s not only the commentators who hate the president. They’re no different than the commentators at Fox who have fallen madly in love with the president. They’re two sides of the same coin. But at Fox, news correspondents, by and large, keep their opinions to themselves. At CNN, the line that separates news from opinion hasn’t been blurred; it’s been obliterated. “It is difficult to convey in words just what the candidacy and then presidency of Donald Trump have done to CNN.” That pithy observation comes from a