Arthur Christiansen Quotes

More than illness or death, the American journalist fears standing alone against the whim of his owners or the prejudices of his audience. Deprive William Safire of the insignia of the New York Times, and he would have a hard time selling his truths to a weekly broadsheet in suburban Duluth.

Newspapers should have no friends.

I'm very much in support of the free press, but the free press ought to be educational and informative. And I believe they have fallen down recently on that.

Journalists are accused of being lapdogs when they don't ask the hard questions, but then accused of being rude when they do. Good thing we have tough hides.

By freedom of the press I mean that no influence, whether of money or power or any other thing, either directs its policy or inclines it to suppression, or advocacy, for any consideration except the common good.

We have pledged our honor that the paper we edit will discuss any subject we have a mind. ...

For my part though silent I have at times felt that I would prefer to be governed by Davis, Beauregard & Bragg, [than] to be thus abused by a set of dirty newspaper scribblers who have the impudence of Satan. They come into camp, poke around among the lazy shirks & pick up their camp Rumors & publish them as facts.... They are a pest and Shall not approach me, and I will treat them as spies, which in truth they are.

A journalists's job is not to be balanced. It is to be accurate.

I don't want to paint everybody with the same broad brush. But I do think that the majority of folks now in the briefing room, that are going into journalism - they're not there for the facts and the pursuit of the truth.

I was increasingly disappointed in how so many of the members here of the media do their job or, rather, don't do their job: the bias at which they come from it at.

Even if you had the wherewithal to embarrass a reporter, there was no mechanism to do it. And in most cases, you might as well save your breath because the reporter had no shame anyway.

Newspapers in this country are famously independent of politics.

The 'Guardian''s unique ownership structure safeguards our editorial independence from commercial or political interference and means we can reinvest any money we receive into this journalism that matters so much.

The editors are committed to nothing save this: to keep common sense as fast as they can, to belabor sham as agreeably as possible, to give civilized entertainment.

To the best of my knowledge and belief, the average American newspaper, even of the so-called better sort, is not only quite as bad as Upton Sinclair says it is, but 10 times worse

I got a letter one day from somebody saying, 'You're always criticizing the press. Why don't you talk about what Clay Felker is doing to your own paper [The Voice]?' And my 10-year-old son Tom, now with Williams & Connelly, put in a legal opinion, not - an opinion from the back of the car saying, 'You know why? What are you, afraid?' So I wrote the column. I - you know, - the column simply said that Felker is destroying this paper.

I have so much more compassion for journalists and the work that they have to do, in order to do the jobs that they have to do. I am much more in awe of and am celebratory of great journalism when I see it, and I'm much more critical of bad journalism, or crap masquerading as journalism.

I had grown up as a feature writer, and basically my career had been in The National Lampoon and as a magazine editor, and I'd never been a reporter.

I want to see an honest press.

The American press is, and always has been, a booster press, its editorial pages characteristically advancing the same arguments as the paid advertising copy.

The media are very dishonest. In fact, in covering my comments, the dishonest media did not explain that I called the fake news the enemy of the people - the fake news. They dropped off the word "fake." And all of the sudden, the story became, the media is the enemy. They take the word "fake" out, and now I'm saying, oh, no, this is no good. But that's the way they are. So I'm not against the media. I'm not against the press. I don't mind bad stories if I deserve them. And I tell you, I love good stories, but we won't - I don't get too many of them.

Journalism is just the art of capturing behavior.

It is completely irresponsible, if not worse, for members of the media to be calling our press secretary a liar and worse. On Twitter and Facebook and elsewhere. And in articles. That is not the way to start relationships with the press.