Demagogue

I agree with John Harris who, in this column at Slate.com, tells ABC News' Mark Halperin:

... I think our failures in campaign and government coverage usually have less to do with ideology and more to do with journalistic conventions. We follow noise, as witnessed by the coverage of the Kerry-Iraq uproar in recent days.

... And our professional habits and stylebook rules sometimes inhibit us from telling the truth — and from saying that someone is lying — in plain, conversational language. We let it become a matter of controversy whether it is sunny or rainy, when sometimes it's a matter of fact.

This is one area of the liberal critique of Old Media that often is pretty compelling.