Writes Cal Thomas

The Huffington Post, an Internet blog [,,,]

Is there another kind? At least he didn’t tell us that “blog” is short for “web log”…

To the substance of the piece, his critique that that THP is preaching to the choir:

this blog has an agenda and speaks mostly to people who already believe what most of its writers say.

Increasingly, we are surrounded by people who write and speak to a single constituency - their own.

This ay largely be true about THP, but, to be fair, isn’t limited to that site by any stretch. There clearly is a problem right now with all of us getting our news and commentary from the slice of the spectrum that sounds the most like the voices in our own heads (you, do hear voices too, right?).

Indeed, as a side note, I would encourage every single person reading this to make an effort to read, and thoughtfully consider, sites which may not fully resonate with your own views. And if you have your own blog, I encourage you to make sure you have some ideological diversity in your blogroll.

OK, back to Cal, who does makes some worthwhile points about modern journalism:

When I started in journalism, my superior at NBC told me I would need a college degree and a minimum of five years’ writing experience at a newspaper or wire service to be considered for on-air work. At NBC in those years, every reporter and many producers met or exceeded those requirements. Virtually every journalist wrote his own copy.

Now, none of those things seem to matter. As the quality of stories has diminished and we now fixate on runaway brides, car chases, celebrity trials and other sideshows, serious subjects such as the war and coming conflicts with China and possibly Russia take a back seat.

If the public is unprepared for new threats and challenges, it will largely be the big media’s fault for failing to prepare them.

On the one hand, a lot of that sounds like an older gentleman remembering the good ol’ days, although I do agree that the news seems less interested in covering foreign affairs, as evidenced by the lack of foreign bureaus these days. On the other hand, part of what he is griping about is simply the market at work.

However, he then falls off the turnip truck:

The public will share the blame for fixating on blogs.

It seems to me that perhaps he isn’t reading the right blogs, if he thinks that the quality of discussion on blogs is inferior to that of the nightly news. I beg to differ. Part of the problem is that he seems to be conflating something like THP, which is a combo of an op/ed page with E!, and the medium by which that info is delivered.

Like many, Cal is making the mistake of looking at the delivery device and the content as somehow the smae thing. He also falls into the typical MSM critique:

With blogs, we do not know if what we read is true. For most blogs, no editor checks for factual errors and no one is restrained from editorializing. The Big Media sometime are guilty of these same shortcomings, but at least with them there is a presumption in favor of accuracy and fairness, plus there’s a way to shame them and occasionally force a correction if they mess up. Blogs have no checks and balances.

Shall I point it out again? Blogs, the major ones–the ones that can make a difference, are checked by 1000s of daily readers and 100s of other blogs. On balances, I would say that trumps a couple of editors–especailly if one thinks about the various problems we have seen at places like, well, CBS, the NYT, USAT and other MSM sources in the lat year or so.

Update: James Joyner comments as well.