Why Mainstream Media is in Trouble - exhibit 1 - Chris Matthews

exhibit 2: Judy Woodruff.

Hugh Hewitt writes in the Weekly Standard today that a week (04Feb) after Eason Jordan's verbal diarrhea (literally and figuratively) in Davos (28Jan) and three days after the blogsophere had started debating it in earnest that Chris Matthews, host of Hardball, hadn't heard of the Eason Jordan story.

Chris didn't know anything about it, and apparently neither did Howard Fineman, nor Katrina Vanden Heuvel, nor Sam Donaldson. But the story was still somewhat young.

Monk first commented on the scandal here on 04Feb and we're a very modest blog.

Howard Fineman of Newsweek, Katrina Vanden Heuvel of The Nation and, well, we know Sam Donaldson.

Even worse, Judy Woodruff, the CNN anchor hadn't heard of the story the following Monday.

On Monday, I was part of a panel put together by Campaigns & Elections Magazine on blogging's impact on campaigns. The panel before us had been moderated by CNN's Judy Woodruff. One of my co-panelists, Jon Lauck of South Dakota Politics, asked Woodruff in the hallway outside of the meeting room what she thought of the story. "When I talked with Woodruff, she did seem simply stunned that Jordan could have said something like he did." Her reaction is similar to most of the reactions of those present at Davos, but again, the striking thing is she hadn't heard of the story. Of course, Woodruff works for CNN.

Folks like Chris Matthews, a former speechwriter for Carter (ick) and Tip O'Neill and Judy Woodruff are in the news business. The fact that they aren't reading even the major blogs is irresponsible. One of the inherent strengths of the blogosphere over the MSM is that they have contribution from a far larger universe.

How many reporters does CNN have?

How many readers does Charles Johnson of LGF have? A good amount of LGF's material comes from his 'lizardoid' army and he tirelessly researches and posts the relevant ones.

By only reading their own dispatches and those of other 'mainstream' outlets folks like Matthews and Woodruff miss a lot of news. And for Matthews and Woodruff, et. al. that's unforgivable.