Transcripts For CSPAN Key Capitol Hill Hearings 20240622 : v

CSPAN Key Capitol Hill Hearings June 22, 2024

Should probably make it more difficult for the United States to exercise its will in the world. People think that is a good thing for us to do. I have tos imagine that would be the case. And for americans, it has become an extremely difficult to do their job in these countries. They can be arrested. They can be harassed. They can be prohibited, as the New York Times has not been able to receive visas for its journalist to go into china. They have been denied visas because the Chinese Government is upset about very good reporting about corruption there. And that is true in other countries as well. Thereof been several questions about the fine line between reporting the news there have been several questions about the fine line between reporting the news and shaping the news. When it comes to questions about American Power abroad, fox news and msnbc tell different stories. They seem to be trying to shape peoples perceptions. Is this right . Well, yeah. Its not whether it is right or wrong. It is what they see as their audience. Msnbc on the left and fox on the right. You can just see it on msnbc you can see it with rachel maddow, especially in the evening, all of the host to have a very liberal bents. Hosts who have a very liberal bents. Msnbc has always felt that it works for them, especially during political campaigns. I cant speak for them. At it certainly works as you go into the political campaign, and again, to watch programs that reinforce your beliefs, make you feel good. Right in the middle and sometimes it struggles with an obvious, although it is doing much better now because it presents itself as straight on reporting. That is the calculation. The senior people at both of those that is the calculation the senior people of both of those networks have made about the segments of their audience. Whether it is right or wrong, it works for them. Tom marty . Have i do not think they thought about whether it is right or wrong. I think they have thought about whether it is their business model. It is the case that many people, if not most people are drawn to news organizations that affirm their existing points of view. They feel comfortable with it. They feel their views are validated. And they believe that others are just wrong. Its not our business model, for the two of us appear or the organizations we represent. Thats not who we want to be, and we think people come to us for different reasons. Tom related to that is a question about journalists, prominent journalists invited to go on to talk shows. On one hand, that helps the brand of the the washington and the New York Times, but on the other, you have opinions being formed. Do you have around rules that you tell your do you have ground rules that you tell your reporters, going into the situations with george will and all of these opinions. How do you tread that line between reporting and opinion when your byline appears in these newspapers . Elisabeth i used to go on television a lot when i was covering the white house. Now that in inside the office all day, quite a bit less so. Do notes are, you express opinions and you do not predict. You do not say soandso is going to win or whatever. We are also kind of boring. Like today. I mean, marty and i have both said things that were taken out of you know, were just taken and people ran with them. So, you are very careful. It is an issue. You are on the shows because of your suppose it supposed expertise. I would say this is what my reporting has told me, and yes on the one hand, democrats say this, but of course, republicans say that. I try to be measured. Its an issue when youre on those shows and you have people like george well, opinion people, expressing strong views and you were sitting there in the middle of this fight and you do not want to take sides, but, you know it is an issue. No, im not going to do that. Its too hard. Im going to tell them no. We have a reporter go on meet and isss all the time very careful. You are never as fiery or provocative or interesting as the opinion people on the shows. Tom marty . Marty just to keep it brief, our approach is the same. Basically do not say anything on the shows you would not say in the paper or on our website. Those are the standards we use. Of course its a difficult environment in which to operate. It is like locker room conversation. So it gets tricky with the risk of getting carried away. Bit st to flip this a should the press be more biased by not giving people equal time to Climate Change deniers, it antievolutionists, etc. . To answer thatnt question. One of the people i edit, davenport, the great Environmental Writer you , our and Margaret Sullivan public editor is big into this notion of fault equivalency. To be an unbiased reporter you have to say one hand, a vast majority of scientists think that there is clearly im a change caused by humans. On the other hand, these other people say, we do not know for sure. We dont do that anymore on Climate Change. Its 99 or whatever. We basically say because of the established science, humans caused Climate Change. We dont do that. Other issues we do that is one where we have moved beyond what i would call the fault equivalency. Marty we treat Climate Change as real and serious. That is where, as she said, where the vast majority of the scientists almost unanimously view the science rests. So, we treat science seriously and respectfully. And that is how we write about it. Now recently we ran a piece from someone who had an alternative point of view, but that is their job. To be open to all points of view. Should the u. N. Be open to global agreements, and how can the United States inspire such a global agreement . Elisabeth you are going to answer that one. Marty what was that . Internet bethe governed by global agreements . Marty there is a lot of discussion, i gather, about therer as i said should be standard rules of behavior for the internet, the way that we deal with space, international laws, the high seas, things like that. Be ould probably certainly a better system than regimesuthoritarian close off the internet, have their own rules for each of these individual states. And we see what the consequences of that are. That is a brutal repression of free speech in those countries. It denies citizens of those countries access to information that is available to millions and billions of people around the world. It is certainly better than a country by country internet. 24 hour news channels. Do they do more harm than good . Too polarizing . You talkedwell, about msnbc and fox. I think they are repetitive. You cant watch for more than i mean, they chew over the same developments over day every day over and over again. Marty brain damage. Right. Th yeah. You could go berserk watching them for that long. I dont think they are harmful. Theyre just really hard to watch. Especially sometimes cnn in the middle of the day breaking news. They are really shifting the standards for breaking news. Developing now is really not. We keep it on in the Washington Bureau and the newsroom in new york and we keep an eye on it. You can see the absinthe flows. If you can see the ebbs and flows. If they find a plain part, its a very big deal. [laughter] oh, they found a plane part. You have to watch for a while. Ok, marty, this is for you. As expressed by the budget, please compare what was spent by the post in 2015 by decade earlier. Come on, mcnamara. Marty i have no idea. Im sure it is less. About 30 people overseas and 15 euros. Not as much as the New York Times, but substantial. A decade ago, we were covering some wars, so it was probably substantially more expensive to cover the wars in afghanistan , and it was a Huge Investment of resources of every type. So, you know, its less, but still substantial. Tom ok, this question is for both of you. And that relates to the coverage of the president ial election for 2016. Kennedyrage of the election in 1960 was revealed through teddy whites book the making of a president , a classic, and another, the boys about how the press handled that. I wonder how you view the coverage of this current cycle from your two perspectives, and what are the challenges the newspapers face when dealing with this . Elisabeth i am not responsible for the president ial campaign coverage, but i will talk about the question. You look at teddy whites book the boys in the bus first of all the boys in the bus, that changed. Inas on the Mccain Campaign 2008, and things have changed drastically even since 08. First of all, there are girls on the bus. A thousand things that are different. Back in those days, yeah, there middleaged guys covering these campaigns, and they would file one story a day at 5 00 or 6 00 at night. I think they were filing on typewriters i guess they must have dictated by phone . They dictated. There was a dictation room at the New York Times and the washington post. Copy iread your actually did that that was how you got your stories in. But the main difference was the resort storage a m1 deadline. Now these campaigns are brutal. The main difference was there was one story a day and one deadline. Now these campaigns are brutal. The Mccain Campaign tweeting constantly, feeding the web, feeding the first draft, which newsletter, morning but it is also received all day long as items from the campaign. Theres also 17 candidates. I look at how these reporters work now. You are filing all day long. You are tweeting, filing, posting. At the end of the day, after all of this, you have to come up with an intelligent, thoughtful New York Times story for later additions for the web and for itions of the paper. It never stops. You was getting to me on the Mccain Campaign. It is hard to find time to think, i think. In this kind of process. To step back and to write bigger stories about what it all means. I mean, reporters do it. The demands on them are way beyond what it ever was on the boys on the bus. I actually like the direction of some of the reporting. Minute toytoday, minute reporting we all do now that we did not have to do in the past. Had a way, the times dictation room. They were the last to eliminate it. I find news organizations like have decided a lot of our resources should not be dedicated to following the candidates as they move around, but should stand back and pursue the kinds of stories that should be pursued. Theres a lot more investigative reporting. We go deep into their backgrounds. We go deep into their financial connections. We go deep into their donors in a way that we should. And we do what we call enterprise reporting. Where we are not just the daily reporting. We are actually being enterprising about it and finding deeper stories that require more time and actually break news. Not news that the candidate happened to say this or there was this malapropism on the part of this candidate or whatever it might be, but actually much deeper stories than we have had in the past, and im pleased with that on average. Coupleere were a questions about radio. Is radio still strong, vital, and global . There used to be the voice of america, which reported americas stories and values abroad. Does this exist anymore . Well, yes. Mvr is bigger than ever and has a much stronger resins overseas. Here in the United States. I am sure that many of you listen to npr. Debate in constant congress about what its mission should be. Obviously the voice of america journalists want to keep it completely separate, objective news organization, and there is a move in congress to make it as the United States is coming under siege from all of this ice is propaganda, there is a move in congress to try and make it more reflective of American Values and american foreignpolicy issues. Obviously the journalists at voa are totally opposed to that. Reallyhink npr is a strong presence here and overseas and has continued to grow and flourish. Very largeis a organization. They have a difficult relationship with their affiliates all over the country about who should be covering what and how big npr itself should become, which some theirates feel may be at expense. They are working through that situation right now, but they are a very substantial news organization. And i would point out they are very dependent on other news organizations like ours. I you listen to npr, and , you a lot of you listen will hear as guests, reporters from the washington post, from the wall street journal. They do as they are, not have a staff as substantial as hours to do the reporting that we do. They do good work and they do a fair amount of original reporting as well. But they are highly dependent on others, and we are part of that ecosystem. Om yeah this question relates to elisab eths comments about the Baltimore Sun closing its Foreign Bureau and other newspapers doing the same. It is about the second tier newspapers, not the post and the wall street journal. Do you have views about these chicago, milwaukee him of these kinds of things . Elisabeth like all newspapers, they are struggling with their print editions and trying to make their digital editions profitable. Hit harder and they have cut back the newsrooms quite a bit. Has an advantage because of its size and reach around the country. Hometownmoving my up, wewhen i was growing had two cartons that said post, and now its just this little tiny tabloid with what looks like an advertiser. You know, they have all shrunk. Locally andd in greatnow about this detail but there have been a lot of local websites that have really sprung up, sort of hyper local coverage of the cities around the country. But i dont what paper was it . I was at a seminar this past papers, aone of the lot of the people who were there , the reporters were doing they were self editing. They had no editing staff. And i thought, oh, my god. [laughter] happening atis some of these places as they cut staff. Reporters are editing themselves. Imagineorter, i cannot that. As an editor, i cant imagine it either. Tom that goes to a question someone had about the vetting. Traditional newspapers like the post have good sub editors to check the facts. Is there any vetting on the web, the news outlets that people read these days online that you know about . Marty when you talk about the web, that is a very big space. Different people have different policies. You know, we have a stated policy of trying to read everything, have at least one other person read something before it is hosted. I am sure that the times has something similar. Rings happen at such a speed im sure it is not reviewed as closely as it was in the past. Things happen at such a speed. They do not get the same level of editing as you had in the past. A day newspaper or twice a day newspaper. Now youll are talking about things being posted 24 hours a day, including at night, all the e, evan days a week. At seven days a week. If you are not the first with the story, theres a good chance you will not get the traffic. For our editing, the question about writing for the web and posting it online we have a system. I am sure the post is the same where you have you have 223 editors look at it, edit 2 to it, edit itok at before he goes out. Then there is a copy editor who looks at it, and there might be another editor if it is a particular important story. Theres a lot of pressure to get things up quickly. Huge amounts of pressure. So, there is constant tension between we have got to get this out, but weve got to make sure it is right. You know, it can be nerveracking. The way that we did that in washington sometimes, its a really big deal story and it has to go right away, but if its very competitive, we will have to get editors read it simultaneously. You can have another editor read over his shoulder. But it is still, you know the later versions of this story is the day unfolds, developments happen, these tory can change a lot the story can change a lot. Theres a lot more scrutiny given to the story at the end of the day as it goes into print. Can i go back to the previous question about regional papers, if i might . Involvedy career was with regional papers. I was the editor of the boston globe, the miami herald. Feel very strongly they do face and normas pressures. They do face enormous pressures. I eliminated foreign coverage at the boston globe in 2007 or so when we were going through the great recession. Anyone with in a management role , you do what you have to do. You have to make tough decisions. We going to cover our local region . The answer for an institution like the boston globe was we are going to cover our local region. There are other places that will cover the world. Nobody was happy with that. I was not happy with that. Sharply criticized. Free much all of the people overseas at that moment left the boston globe to do other things. But i think those institutions there are still many good newspapers out there. Does aston globe still great job. The l. A. Times does a great job. And its critically important that they succeed. We at the boston globe launched an investigation of the Catholic Church that exposed the sex abuse scandal the church is dealing with even today. Tom you got a pulitzer for it. And if we marty had not done that, that story would not have been done. These newspapers have to be the eyes and ears. We cannot be everywhere. Regardless of our size. Even if we were double the size, we would not be able to do that. I think it is absolutely critical that they succeed. Their financial challenges are greater than ours. There is no question about it. We have the capacity to create National Products or as shetional products, was talking about before, how the New York Times is trying to get international subscribers. Newspapers, that is much were difficult and they face the same competition with google and others for advertising. They just do tremendous work under very difficult circumstances and very often write very important stories that all of us learn from. Tom well said. Thank you. Im going to ask one more before we close. We are getting to the end. Before i do, i want to ask both of you if there was something you thought was going to be asked, but wasnt . Or should have been. The final question has to do with the future. I wonder if you both can talk about the recruiting of the

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