See the attachment for Josh Marshall's apt description of "both sides" journalism.
As I've said before, "both sides" is not primarily a truth-seeking practice, but a refuge-seeking one.
"Press bias avoidance" as Josh calls it, is not about depicting what happened. Not in the main, I mean. Rather it's a pre-response by journalists to criticisms they have anticipated or internalized.
I'm not so sure it's even due to some preemptive attempt to quell criticism.
There are lots of great journalists out there today but there are so many stories going unreported or getting very little attention.
I think horse race journalism takes the focus away from doing reporting that depicts what happened. A lot of the "what happened" part is not even getting reported.
See I tend to think the opposite happens. If the Republican side just won't talk about something then the story won't get coverage. The press doesn't gain permission to cover what happened. It's more likely the press avoids the issue almost entirely in part because it doesn't fit into the horse race narrative news orgs sell because then there aren't two sides to report.
Jay Rosen
noonan