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Smithville Public Library

Book Review by Jeanne Raley

A Slobbering Love Affair by Bernie Goldberg

A Slobbering Love Affair

by

Bernie Goldberg

Review by Jeannie Raley

Thomas Jefferson once said that he would prefer a press without a government than a government without a press.  Our Founding Fathers believe that it would be the press, not the elected officials, that would keep our government honest and rein it in when necessary.

Many years ago, I went to work for a major financial news publication in one of its offices in the Midwest. Hiring in with the advertising department, I felt honored to work for a nationally known, well respected paper.  It didn't take long for me to understand that when it came to the reporters who worked in the news room, which was right next door to my office, I might as well have been working in Sri Lanka.  Not only did the reporters not associate with us advertising "guys", but they felt so superior they didn't even feel the need to say "hello" in the hall way or in the elevator that took us up to our offices.  They considered themselves the "elite" of the publication and didn't mind letting other departments know it.

When Bernie Goldberg came out with A Slobbering Love Affair my interest was peaked.  I had seen the press, often referred to as the main stream media, seeming selling out, not doing their jobs of reporting the news, or investigating the news, as we have been lead to believe is the job of the press.  Their bias in the election of 2008 were obivious.  The press had picked its candidate and they were not shy about it.

Now we all know that reporters are just as human as anyone else, but the goal of any good reporter should be to keep their personal opinions out of a story.  "Just the facts, mam" should be the goal of any reporter worth the cost of journalism school.  Instead of seeing throngs of reporters descend on Chicago, learning about a candidate who wanted to assume the highest office of our land, we saw throngs of reporters descend on tiny Wasilla, Alaska, interviewing everyone from the waitress at the coffee shop to the local mechanic.

Mr. Goldberg gives a great accounting of how the press sold its soul in 2008.  He lists, in detail, how reporters had picked their man and how they did everything they could to get him elected, refusing to do diligent investigative reporting.

This is not a book about candidates.  This is a book about how the press failed the American people and failed the task that our Founding Fathers, like Thomas Jefferson, had assigned them.

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