Tom Brokaw: Evening News Today Is "A Struggle"

The only network news source inside the US that has any remaining credibility is PBS. The NewsHour is still providing in-depth analysis and commentary. Even the main right-wing commentator on the show, David Brooks, is at least smart and occasionally disagrees with the party-line.

Frontline on PBS.org is now streaming it's episodes and some of them are quite watchable.

The problem with the New media outlets like HuffPo, (aside from the fact that they let jackasses like me comment) is that there just aren't any actual journalists reporting on the news, they rely heavily on the reporting already being done by the MSM and just change the headline.

There are journalists out there, like Dexter Filkins and John Burns, both covering Iraq, that are doing excellent jobs, but you won't see them often on camera anywhere except PBS.

I get such a kick out of the media critics on this message board acting as if the Huffington Post is actually an authentic source for the news when it's really nothing more than an online version of the National Enquirer - the distorted, screaming headlines, the photoshopped pictures, sensationalizing every trivial happening that might make Hillary Clinton look bad while inflating every minor positive murmur from the Obama camp to make it sound like the messiah has arrived.

I check in regularly to offset some of the Hillary-bashing garbage, but it's a losing battle.

I've always rather liked Tom Brokaw, nowadays I see him mostly in a pundit role, and find him to
be both honest and intelligent. I think the main problem with the media these days, is the
continuing concentration and control into a few corporate hands, where even the NY Times I've
come to regard as a bad joke. If it weren't for the internet, where I can access foreign newspapers,
and look at Huffpost, Politico, and Salon, I'd probably just go and bury my head in the sand.

Tom,

The nightly news is a "struggle" because boobs such as yourself, Dan Rather, Peter Jennings and a host of others completely lost the respect of thinking American viewers.

If you had been newscasters instead of shills for the the Democrat Party, the nightly news would not have become such a struggle.

I remember the evening after Reagan beat Carter in 44 out of 50 states & turning on NBC News to (I assumed) see Reagan or some of his people being interviewed about his victory. Instead, I saw you with Tip O'Neill & Teddy, the whole content being about how the American voters "really had not meant to do what they did."

That was the last time I turned on NBC News, evening or otherwise (no joke).

The market simply applied its own "fairness doctrine" to nightly news.

I am beginning to think ABC has a not so hidden agenda in this campaign season. They seem determined to sway voter opinion. From several "stories" presented by George Stephanopoulos to the story that was presented on 20/20 tonight I have a nagging suspicion that there are those at ABC who are engaging in political manipulation vs. journalism. The story on 20/20 tonight concerned an explosive story surrounding the death of a young man at the hands of a father interested in protecting his home and family. The young man --an Italian American 17 year old and the father --an African American in his 50s came together in a set of events surrounding a prank myspace message. The story is tragic for all involved. Read it here: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/03/03/080303fa_fact_trillin?currentPage=1


My point about the story is the timing. Maybe ABC had planned tonight to be the time it would air the story long ago or it may be that someone at ABC thought they could impact the opinions of the much ballyhooed "blue collar white" voterr in PA by running the story. Perhaps I am being paranoid "perhaps not in this age of faux news. I would like someone to look into the decision to air the story because I am curious about the thought process --curious enough to post this comment. ABC are you becoming FOX --oh what a fall from grace that would be.

I am sorry to say that modern television network news is a barely visible shadow of what it once was say 20 years or so back. I was young, but I can recall the way the press covered Vietnam--the coorespondents were right in there when there were battles going all around and they did long form segments on what was going on----they also did reporting from other places in the world that was much more detailed than what we get now. I also recall those great documentary programs that each of the big three networks used to have in primetime like the NBC "White Paper" reports that covered a wide variety of subjects-----I can hardly recall such programs being on in the past decade or so. Once in a long while they might have some sort of long form report but it seems that since the death of Peter Jennings, and the retirement of Brokaw and Rather---those sorts of reports have gone away now too.

Damnnnnnn, you can sure tell Brokaw, gets his "bacon" (still) from the same franchises, wouldn't you say? Talk about CHEAP PLUGS! Wish he had listed thee biggest struggle; getting ( MEANINGFUL TRUTH) past the right-wing editors and those other snot nosed glorified copy brats who impede the nightly snews. Tom, when you gonna stop speakin' with forked tongue and use that 5 gallons of white wash on the fence at the ranch --not these (yellow journalistic) stories/pieces.

Why is telling the truth so hard.....oh, I see, they DO NOT want to tell the truth...

I guess they get lost in their web of lies and are cautious what the next one should be?

The very idea of the evening network news is obsurd today. They are to wrap up and tell the daily news in 20 minutes (10 minutes go to commercials)! Can't be reasonably done.

The network new programs are insipid, off target and annoying. Two minutes praising Bush' s phony war and a minute praising his wonderful economy and the rest of time devoted to corporate sponsors praising their products and covering the lives of Britney Spears, Hilton and some sporting events. Fortunately, the locals offer a full hour of Two and a Half men re-runs during these network time wasters called news programmming and then shortly after the real news is delivered by Keith Olbermann.

"Medical news," you got that right. Every other goddamn day, it's a story on hormone replacement therapy and/or breast cancer, for some reason. Plus EVERY ad in between is for drugs.

At this juncture in our society the nightly news is a dinosaur and has lost all relevance to the educated tv consumer. The Huffington Post, Drudge and various other Blog sites have in effect captured the American psych. Wake up NBC, CBS, etc. it is different World now.

Today I received my DVD copy of Norman Solomans 'War Made Easy'. After watching it, excellent by the way, I come back to this brokaw thing. I would love to sit down with brokaw, watch the video together and then question him on the indictment of news reporters as well as the networks in the documentary. It shows just how much the news media is involved in selling the war from our lying leaders. Again and again they have been part of the criminal acts and show no remorse. They are despicable!!!

MSM is broken.They are only looking for news stories that boost their ratings and do not conflict with their owners other business ventures.

TV has never in its history come up with a viable means to distribute valuable news (i.e., news that affects the viewer and can be voted on or influenced by citizens in some way). It has always been tied to sponsors or to media moguls. Making the news available 24 hours on a news-dedicated station has been even worse. We still get all the ads but without the in-depth reporting one would expect, in part because the last 20 years' worth of anchors have been TV personalities rather than reporters.

Brokaw is being too kind. He should ignore people like Joe Scarborough, who's called him "old-fashioned," as in.. "old." We need more of Tom and less of Joe.

The real question is, 'how can they call it news', it's more like the DC Pravda. If you want to hear the 'happy talk' then the brokaws will be happy to keep you happy and ignorant. Just look at the NBC desk man now, williams. Look closely and you'll see dollar signs in his eyes. These people continue to say 'black is white' against all evidence. You'll never hear an honest evaluation of the Iraq situation from any of the MSM main desk sitter. You will hear the quotes from the embedded reporters who are quoting the military who are quoting the administration.

When news and public affairs, instead of being a tacit acknowledgement of the media's use of the public's airwaves and its implied license to print money, as they say, there seemed to be a germ of legitimacy in the process, but when the process become focused on creating profits for the network's owners and investors is when the news became just another freakshow on the midway. While I'm not a huge fan of tax dollars supporting public TV for a number of reasons, I recognize the reality of the situation and see that as the closest we have to a news source on TV where the information is only minimally, maybe not minimally enough in my opinion, controlled by corporate interests.
So, in the mean time, the internet comes along and now we can examine issues from many perspective and if the struggle means the networks no longer can overpay and overproduce "infotainment" as it seems the news has become...well, Tom, write a few more books..but don't think that we have much sympathy for the sad state in which so called broadcast journalists find themselves. Maybe your next book should actually address this travesty called "the news".

Hey Tom, good on ya for reading a teleprompter. LMAO

Brokaw begins his day with a boatload of both printed and electronic lies (MSNBC, WSJ NY Post) and I presume he ends it that way as well. MCMLXXXIV.

It's really bullshit posturing on the part of Brokaw and his ilk to act all sad about the state of the MSM.

People like him are the reason the news is complete garbage. They've spent most of their lives kissing GOP ass, trashing Democrats, avoiding real issues, and reporting on tabloid news as if it were the most important story of our lives.

evening news is a 'joke.'

any news in the MSM is a joke. what's it mean when news satire is better than the actual news programs they parody? - Jon Stewart, Colbert Report, Jay Leno.

evening news is a 'joke.'

any news in the MSM is a joke.

"a struggle"? Is that a new word for abomination?

Maybe if the NEWS focused on just reporting the story factually... instead of trying to slant or suppress certain facts... they would find their job easier.