Changing The Game

Some may wonder after what Jon Stewart did to Jim Cramer yesterday if we will see a change in journalism for the better. I know its a flight of fantasy that overnight these people will start to actually do their jobs, but Spencer Ackerman has a post up that I think might reveal the motivation for why they might step their games up.

It's really not enough for journalists like me to applaud Stewart and then go back to collecting anonymous spin-quotes from officials. Much like how Stewart-the-non-financial-reporter considers Cramer's way of doing business to be malpractice, look at how Glenn Greenwald-the-non-political-reporter, responding to some good operational points raised by my friend Julian Sanchez, considers widespread journalistic habits to be malpractice. The internal professional standard for us -- and these are the things that really do light a fire -- in the wake of the Stewart interview should be, Do you want to get Jim Cramer'd, where all you have in the face of simple and commonsense criticism, is the abject plea that they lied to me or I tried. The uncomfortable truth is that a lot of the times you can't find out the truth. But that has to be thoroughly clear to your audience, or you're peddling Cramerism. /sermon.

Well at least we can dream right?