Pure objectivity impossible, but still a good goal
One question leapt to mind as I reviewed the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform's list of top contributors to the state governor's campaign. I don't care how rich he is, how could James M. Pritzker expect a reasonable return, if any, on the $502,500 he invested from July to October in the political campaign hopes of Republican Bill Brady? It's not far different from the question I had when I learned that MSNBC broadcaster Keith Olbermann had donated about $7,200 to three political candidates in Arizona and Kentucky.
It's cynical, yes. But it's hard for anyone, especially a journalist in Illinois, to process the notion that someone could actually donate money to a candidate without expecting some material reward in return. In that context, Olbermann's measly 7,200 bucks can actually be more troubling than Pritzker's half-million. Actually, Olbermann's situation for which he was briefly suspended skirts the grayest of edges around journalism ethics. While most serious journalists work hard not to compromise the perceived objectivity of their reporting, Olbermann can hardly be called objective. Indeed, he's known most for the brash intensity with which he expresses his personal views.
So, in that sense, the controversy over whether he should be donating money to political candidates seems a bit manufactured. As he himself said, “If I had known that all this would happen, I would have done this years ago.” But as he also said, the situation ought to renew debate over the NBC News rule requiring employees to get permission before they donate money to political candidates and, by extension, the question of how much of his or her politics any journalist should divulge.
Daily Herald policy emphasizes the need for the newspaper to “maintain its independence so that it is free of obligations and able to resist pressures that would obstruct its ability to make news judgments in the public interest.” As that applies to politics, we don't allow journalists to sign petitions, demonstrate, contribute to candidates or, especially, work on behalf of a candidate. Independently, many of our reporters and editors carry this even further, sometimes going so far as to refuse to vote in Illinois primaries because it would require them to declare a political party.
Olbermann's activities have brought up for journalists a term that has long been in vogue for politicians: transparency. A growing line of thought suggests that the issue isn't whether journalists participate in government but whether the public is aware of it. If journalists divulge their political contributions and affiliations, the thinking goes, their audience can judge for itself the objectivity of their reporting. It's a reasonable start, but like the thinking behind Illinois' previous philosophy that no campaign contribution limits are needed as long as the public knows who is contributing how much to whom prone to serious flaws in practice.
Journalists, of course, have political and social points of view, and no amount of pretending can remove from them that most basic of functions. However, there is a demonstrable value in the challenge that they suppress them for a greater public interest. Several times a day, conversations occur between editors and reporters at the Daily Herald, for example, in which someone questions the angle or play of a story based on whether it gives or withholds an advantage for a particular point of view even though the speaker supports the point of view at issue.
It may be unrealistic to expect a Keith Olbermann or a Bill O'Reilly or Ann Coulter, for that matter not to participate in politics. But the public's trust in fair news reporting is still strengthened by the straight-news journalist's quest for objectivity impossible though it may be.