I’ll bet that when our revised Code of Editorial Principles is promulgated in a few weeks, it will include a flat ban on political donations by editorial staffers. . . . [T]he notion that any topic a reporter writes on nowadays can remain sequestered from politics and partisanship is simply an illusion.
That’s “public editor” Don Wycliff in today’s Chi Trib, in “Citizenship vs. the Tribune’s Code of Editorial Principles”. Good. I’m a flat-ban man myself, holding that for newsies credibility trumps all. It’s how they serve the world, even to the point of detachment, if that’s not too ascetical a word. The reporter has to not care (horrors!). Leave passion to the soap opera performers. The editorialist has to make arguments, not just emote. It’s a hard route to go, but the payoff is money in the credibility bank.
