NYU's Jay Rosen takes on Howie Kurtz, and Kurtz responds

[DeepModem Mom]

WP, Media Notes, Howard Kurtz
Bush vs. the Media, Part 2
Tuesday, Mar 08, 2005; 8:34 AM

The esteemed Jay Rosen, NYU journalism czar and PressThink blogger extraordinaire, is chiding me for not being tough enough on the Bush administration....

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All right, here's Rosen's take:

"In my view Kurtz's judgment on this is wrong-- very wrong for a beat reporter with his experience. His attempt to de-excite us about de-certification deserves to fail."

That's a reference to the Jeff Gannon business (which I've written about more than any other newspaper reporter). I'm not trying to "de-excite" anyone (didn't know that was a verb), just offering some perspective.

"But Mike Allen of the Washington Post, Kurtz's colleague, did not forget what administrations do. On October 8 he wrote: 'Although all presidents are kept somewhat removed from reality because of security concerns and their staffs' impulse for burnishing their image, Bush's campaign has taken unprecedented steps to shield him from dissenters and even from curious, undecided voters.'"

Yes, Bush has taken the practice to absurd heights. But keep in mind that John Kerry wouldn't answer questions from his traveling press corps for six weeks during the campaign....

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"There's a difference between going around the press in an effort to avoid troublesome questions, and trying to unseat the idea that these people, professional journalists assigned to cover politics, have a legitimate role to play in our politics."....

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Again, I couldn't agree more. We're not there for the fun of it; we poke and prod on the public's behalf, but it's a public that is increasingly losing confidence in us, and that's not primarily the doing of George Walker Bush....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/nation/columns/kurtzhoward/