If you believe the headlines, the News & Record now has a full-time environment reporter.
The headline in Sunday’s edition of the N&R states, “Meet our climate change, environment reporter.”
However, if you read the article, which is really more of a column, you will find that the headline is misleading. The N&R doesn’t in fact have a climate change and environment reporter, its sister paper the Winston-Salem Journal does. Of course, to be fair, the N&R doesn’t have an editor either, the Winston-Salem Journal does.
So this might be seen as the two papers both owned by Lee Enterprises moving ever closer to becoming one.
But the article also states that the reporter, John Deem, is not like the other reporters for the N&R and WSJ in that his salary is funded, not by Lee Enterprises, but by two far-left foundations.
The article/column that Deem wrote about himself states, “The newly created position, funded by a grant from 1Earth Fund and the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation will be based at the Winston-Salem Journal, but I will be covering stories throughout the Triad and northwest North Carolina.”
Any pretense of unbiased reporting is dead. If Deem’s editorializing on the news pages on climate change doesn’t jibe with the beliefs of the 1Earth Fund and the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, they can pull the funding and Deem is out of work. So who is his boss, the editors of the WSJ or the people paying his salary?
If these foundations are allowed to “hire” their own reporter at the N&R and WSJ, that opens the door for other foundations to hire their own reporters, as well.
Why spend money on advertising, when you can spend that same money to hire a reporter and have the beliefs of your organization reported as news?
The William J. Clinton Foundation or the Bloomberg Foundation could hire a reporter to cover the 2022 political races in North Carolina.
The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative or the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation could easily fund teams of reporters and editors to report the “news” from their point of view.
The Southern Coalition for Social Justice could hire reporters to cover their court cases.
Newspapers that have been struggling financially for years because of diminishing advertising sales could greatly reduce their overhead by having foundations foot the bill for their entire newsroom.
It opens whole new doors. Imagine the Rams Club, the Wolfpack Club or the Iron Dukes funding sports reporters.
Some professional athletes could easily fund their own personal sports reporter.
The Press is no longer trying to inform us, it’s trying to manipulate us (present company excepted).
That National Socialist Joseph Goebbels would be proud.
Na, all editors have their bias. Even Hammer. While a great guy, his bias dates back to the old Clinton Watch column (which as was a huge fan of back in the day). Bias is ok as long as it is clearly understood. FoxNews is a good example. They have always been clear that they have a strong bias for the Conservative’s view as a counter the the general left leaning mainstream media.
It is the backdoor nature of having funding of staff by special interest groups (left or right) that makes modern journalism a joke. There are just as many right wing online ‘news’ organizations that receive funding from sources other than direct advertising dollars as there are left wing ‘news’ organizations.
Just use the old Ronald Reagan method…..Trust but Verify.
With that said, Climate Change is a major issue that needs major change that can only come from Government mandates. The Right is over influenced by big oil to be trusted, and the left can agree on a even the first step to addressing the change that is coming….so….the next presidential election will be one of the most important and I have yet to see anyone willing or able to lead beyond party bickering. Will keep looking…
Anything that this so called “reporter” writes must include a statement that his salary is paid for by these organizations. This is not “news”. It is propaganda. Do not read this dribble and let the newspapers know that this does not adhere to any type of ethics.
Am unfamiliar with the 1Earth Fund, but as a grant writer, I can avow the Z Smith Reynolds Foundation is about as “Left Wing” as the Proud Boys are a Girl Scout Troop. The foundation exists to assuage the guilt of a family responsible for the cancer deaths of millions globally and a corporation that ground up and spit out workers like so many Chiclets. They are greedy capitalists who had their patriarch murdered on his own estate so they could cash in. They need the tax exempt philanthropic status to hide their crimes and make them appear ‘respectable” to other rich white folks they meet at the galas and country/yacht clubs.
RT could hire Clark Curry of the John Birch Society to be its social policy reporter. He’s ready for any excuse to get out of Wisconsin.
The addition of John Deem to the N&R’s list of biased “reporters” shouldn’t shock anyone that’s familiar with their left wing agenda. They’ve had to come up with ways to finance their business through alternative sources (aka liberal foundations) since they have alienated half their potential subscribers and advertisers. Adhering to their biased agenda is more important to them than fairly and accurately reporting the news.
This is as much a right wing issue as it is a left wing issue. There are hundreds of journalist hacks pushing right wing propaganda and unsupported conspiracy theories…..heck even the Talking Head shows on FoxNews had to admit they where ‘Entertainment’ and not ‘News’ to defend their regular use of misinformation to push their right handed agendas.
But even worse are the hundreds of rightwing online ‘News’ sites that are funded by special interest groups versus direct advertising. For example, Alpha News, 2nd Amendment Daily News, American People Daily, or Daily Headlines. There are hundreds of these right wing propaganda ‘news’ sites that make their way to mainstream social media platforms as ‘legitimate’ news stories….All funded by special interest groups…or worse, a single individual with an axe to grind….or the worst of the worst, foreign intelligence services looking to disrupt American Democracy.
Not sure what the solution is to the mess the internet has made of news media but check your sources and verify your sources sources before you share or quote a news article these days.
Who even reads the N&R much less have a subscription?