Michael Isikoff Quotes

Online journalism has always had a sourcing problem. From using unverified 'anonymous tips' to repeating whatever rumor or speculation people are chattering about, the general ethic is, 'We'll publish just about anything.'

I do think that there are gray lines of morality in a newsroom, when it comes to some stories. The best-intentioned journalist still has a difficult mission, to try to boil down people.

Journalists do not live by words alone, although sometimes they have to eat them.

There's usually one piece in 'Vanity Fair' every month that grabs me, but when it presents hatchet jobs without substantiation to impress its liberal friends, I laugh first, then toss.

There's no worse crime in journalism these days than simply deciding something's a story because Drudge links to it.

Walter Cronkite had a golden rule for all wartime reporters: never self-aggrandize.

I was a bad journalist.

The media does play a vital role in our democracy, and if we cannot depend on journalistic ethics, the nation's in trouble.

I am not responsible for all the journalists in the past that have told lies.

The press these days should be rather careful about its role. We may have acquired some tendencies about over-involvement that we had better overcome.

We in the media should be breaking the news and not making the news.

We need ethical journalism. There is also capacity limitations in journalism.

Everyone is free to express their opinions, but I think that journalists should do it with more responsibility. They lack accuracy.

I know Fox News is the target of criticism but we take it in stride. Our No. 1 goal is to be accurate.

I think the 'New York Times' would rather be offended than dead.

Larry King and his producers ought to go back to school and learn what 'fair and balanced' really means.

My humble request to journalists - It only takes one phone call or an email to check facts.

When you are a journalist, you have a big responsibility towards your audience and it is important to respect that responsibility.

Journalists justify their treachery in various ways according to their temperaments. The more pompous talk about freedom of speech and ‘the public’s right to know’; the least talented talk about Art; the seemliest murmur about earning a living.

I treasure the fact there's media freedom, but with that goes responsibility. I think that there should be a self-regulatory organization and that they should start to think about standards. Because I think a lot of people say, "I don't know how to read what is true versus somebody else's interpretation."

I am a journalist and, under the modern journalist's code of Olympian objectivity (and total purity of motive), I am absolved of responsibility. We journalists don't have to step on roaches. All we have to do is turn on the kitchen light and watch the critters scurry.

The media owes the responsibility to constantly tell the public the truth.

First and foremost, I'm a journalist. My business is the truth. Now, I happen to be other things, too - a pop-culture phenomenon, the most in-demand speaker on the campus lecture circuit, whatever.

[Some outlets] shouldn't even call themselves news providers; they're just entertainment gossip without any sort of accountability or fact-checking.