President Obama
I’m still pinching myself every time I hear a news anchor refer to President Obama, or when I see a picture of the president with a caption that describes him as such. In some ways I feel as if I woke up in a dream. I watched history be made last Tuesday along with millions of others. Then as Barack and Michelle Obama made their way along the post-inauguration parade route, it seemed so surreal. Yet I am filled with hope for this country’s future despite the overwhelming nature of problems the U.S. (and the world) faces. But to be optimistic is the only wise course at this time. If there is a chance that we all get through these next few years or decades, we have to be optimistic that true change will come. I just hope it all translates into reality.
Notes and Beats 
What is journalism today? I have scanned a few of your posts and I have yet to find you making a substantive assertion.
I may be a Republican, but I know a fact when I meet one. (Do you really suppose you are fighting “racism” — you seem to be indulging it.)
The facts are scarce in these pages ….
Thanks for your comment, “Ann’s New Friend,” even in your cloak of anonymity, which you seem to enjoy wearing. My policy, however, is that you should reveal who you are. Especially when you make, what you call, “substantive assertions” such as “The facts are scarce in these pages.” I don’t claim to know everything or even to present the facts. I don’t think anyone can.
You ask, “What is journalism today?” I guess I would argue that it is what it’s always been: People telling other people stories. Trying to discern facts from spin… but everyone has biases, that’s just a reality. Including me, including you — which is crystal clear from reading two posts on your blog. Re: the racism part, give me some specifics if you’d like and we can converse…. until then take care and good luck.
Obviously “objectivity” is an ideal. News writing format used to be “who, what, where, when, how and why,” with facts front-loaded in an article. Nuances came later. If text needed cutting (for mundane reasons of design and allocation of column inches) the having the facts at the front preserved the news element of a report.
How many “news” stories today begin a la Tom Wolfe with a description of someone’s tie? The cutsy-ing of journalism has led inexorably toward opinion and away from information. I remember reading newspapers that looked very different from the so-called “news” of the present.
I do enjoy anonymity and for quite a good reason. I have a one-of-a-kind name, and I have an occupation in the commercial world that has absolutedly nothing to do with politics. I am loath to alienate people from my product simply because of differences about political ideas.
Nevertheless, I want to contribute to political debate — hence the pseudonym that announces itself as such. I could have adopted a real seeming but fictional name. I want people to know that I write anonymously — it’s more candid to acknowledge the disguise.
Frankly I would urge others to consider that anonymity puts the emphasis on the ideas and moves away from an ad homimen element. Young people in particular should be aware that they might not always have opinions identical to the ones they hold now. However, once on the internet may very well be “forever” on the internet, and some ideas can come back to bite a person in the derriere.
I note that the journalism profession is top heavy with democrats and lacks a conservative balance — not simply in articles that are overtly opinionated but more significantly in the arena of news reporting.
You tell me. When the criterion is skin color, we allow ourselves to suspect racism in a work place that “attracts” only whites. But a profession that “attracts” only Democrats seems perfectly okay — to Democrats, that is. Racism?
I cannot believe that conservatives are any less interested in writing and reporting news than Democrats.
Cheers.