My Apologies

for losing interest in Wheatpaste for the time being.
Things have gotten busier and Washington Square News has eaten up my Wheatpaste time.
But things can be converged in order to save time and produce more writings.


Today in Foundations of Journalism, we got to speak with Carl Bernstein.
That is, he phoned in for about 20 minutes and answered some questions from a handful of students in a 300-person lecture.


Bernstein.



Whereas the conversation with Mr. Gordon Liddy ("G-MAN") radio show last week during lecture was on the verge of absurdity (LOL, Republican speaking to NYU Journalism students), listening to Bernstein was pretty cool.

[But of course I have to insert some of the gems of the G-Man's quotes during our correspondence with the former Nixon aid:

"Bob Woodward is not a real journalist, he never has any sources."

"America could have won Vietnam had we only “bombed the Red River dykes,” cutting off the food supply and starving the people into surrender."

In response to the student question, Was there ever a point in time during the unfolding of Watergate that you thought to yourself, 'What have I gotten myself into?'

"No. I always knew what I had gotten myself into." (NO REGRETZ!)




Here's NYULocal's story on him:
http://nyulocal.com/on-campus/2009/10/23/g-gordon-liddy-describes-the-alternate-universe-he-lives-on-to-nyu-class/

AAAAAAAND ONTO CARL BERNSTEIN.

There was a sense of gruff brevity about his answers, and although I only got to listen to him for a short time, I got the feeling that surprisingly, he was NOT some sort of narcissistic, self-imposed journalist, smug and haughty for being one of the reporters to break the Watergate scandal.

Instead, when asked by Professor Stephens to expound upon the idea of journalists "going out to change the world" through their reporting, he sounded a little aggravated. He responded, "It's sure a fine endeavor to go into this profession or go into a story thinking you're going to change social norms. But this doesn't serve you very well... this sort of messianic ideal. There has to be a sense of humility about it. It's about giving an accurate picture of what's going on, of factual reporting."

Mr. Bernstein went on to say, "Often the preconceived notion of the story is not where the facts lead you." He explained that during his initial investigations of Watergate he thought it had entirely to do with the CIA. . . You cannot go into a story thinking you are going to expose some huge scandal and automatically be elevated to this ideal world-changing savior, because often times the facts will lead you somewhere completely different, somewhere that may not have any scandals or horrifying truths to expose.

A student asked about his idea of "idiot journalism" today -- focusing on sensationalism, celebrities, rumors, etc instead of what really mattered. Carl Bernstein said that some newspapers like the Washington Post and The New York Times still had solid reporters, but essentially it was up to individual journalists to resist the "idiot" culture, which can be difficult to do.

Man is no Aristotelian god contemplating all existence at one glance. He is the creature of an evolution who can just about span a
sufficient portion of reality to manage his survival, and snatch what on the scale of time
are but a few moments of insight and happiness. Yet this same creature has invented ways
of seeing what no naked eye could see, of hearing what no ear could hear, of weighing
immense masses and infinitesimal ones, of counting and separating more items than he can
individually remember. He is learning to see with his mind vast portions of the world that
he could never see, touch, smell, hear, or remember. Gradually he makes for himself a
trustworthy picture inside his head of the world beyond his reach.

-Walter Lippman