From David Brooks, the following (emphasis added):
I understand the complaints, but I thought the questions were excellent. The journalist’s job is to make politicians uncomfortable, to explore evasions, contradictions and vulnerabilities. Almost every question tonight did that. The candidates each looked foolish at times, but that’s their own fault.
Uh...no. The job of a journalist is to get to the truth, and then share it with the world. Journalists shouldn't care one way or the other how comfortable politicians are. If discomfort was the end goal of journalism, then Sasha Baron Cohen and Stephen Colbert would win Pulitzers annually.
Of course, the irony in this is that even if political discomfort were the goal of journalism, American journalists would fail on that account just as miserably as they do their more important task.
Posted by Jason at April 17, 2008 12:51 PM