As ombudsmen see it

(The following is reprinted from the Winter 1994 issue of Nieman Reports.)

In response to a request from Nieman Reports for flagrant judgment calls by editors and reporters, ombudsmen sent the accompanying reports.

Readers’ Caution Exceeds Editors’

By Henry McNulty
The Hartford Courant

The reading public, so we are told, increasingly distrusts and dislikes the press; when it comes to credibility, journalists are right up there (or down there) with used-car salesmen, politicians and televangelists. Much of this antipathy, I am convinced, comes about because journalists and readers inhabit two different worlds governed by different value systems.

If common ground …

Going face to face with readers

By Lynne Enders Glaser
Neiman Reports © 1993

A friend suggested the other day that I was “silly, at best,” to speak before “conservative” groups like the Rotary and Farm Bureau on behalf of the “liberal” media and a “liberal” newspaper like The Fresno (Calif.) Bee.

I not only take exception to her choice of words, but I take exception to her thesis.

First, there’s nothing “silly” at all about schmoozing with readers on the essence of the First Amendment — discussing what an unfettered press means on a personal basis, particularly at a time when people have become polarized, …