Topic: Journalism Schools

The Columbia Journalism School is hosting an event titled "Climate Change is Everything" to create a blueprint for media transformation. The hosts critique the event's goals, which include treating climate change as a story for every beat and debating whether news outlets should accept fossil fuel advertising. They characterize the initiative as a move toward coordinated propaganda involving major outlets like the AP, CBS News, and The Guardian.

The hosts expand on the idea that journalism's decline began when it moved from a creative trade to a standardized profession. They suggest that "J-schools" like Columbia produce "cogs" for a corporate machine, potentially making the industry easier for intelligence agencies to infiltrate, as seen in Project Mockingbird.

A critique of modern journalism argues that the professionalization of the industry through institutions like the Columbia Journalism School has degraded reporting quality. In the past, reporters gained expertise through specific beats like police reporting or by holding relevant licenses, such as pilot licenses for aviation writers. The current system is described as prioritizing narrative over technical knowledge.

An NPR investigation found that more than two-thirds of the 240 school shootings reported by the U.S. Education Department for the 2015-2016 school year never actually occurred. Journalists contacted every school on the list and could only confirm 11 actual incidents. The report highlights significant flaws in federal data collection and the resulting media hysteria.

The hosts discuss the American tradition of high school yearbooks and the social protocols of signing them. They express skepticism regarding the Roy Moore yearbook evidence, questioning why a man in his 30s would have signed a student's book in that specific manner.

Laurian Rose is dubbed Dame DeLorean, a title helping people pronounce her name correctly. She discusses her transition from working at a law firm to becoming a work-at-home mother doing transcription and art. She requests jobs karma for her online resale shop and human resource karma for her daughter, Rayla, born in August 2017.

A discussion on Trump's business record in Atlantic City leads to a critique of modern journalism. The hosts argue that journalism schools like Columbia and Missouri have failed by producing "cogs in the wheel" rather than independent investigators. They note that many major casino operators have faced bankruptcy, challenging the narrative that Trump's casino failures were unique.

The hosts discuss the "nut graph" and the structural requirements taught in journalism schools, which mandate including opposing viewpoints. They argue that this model often creates cognitive dissonance by presenting contradictory facts—such as a report claiming higher speed limits cause more deaths while simultaneously noting record-low fatality rates—without providing a resolution or deeper investigation.

Ben Carson discussed media unfairness with Bill O'Reilly, claiming the press has abandoned its constitutional duty to be objective. The hosts dispute the notion that the press was ever objective, citing the history of "yellow journalism" and the explicitly partisan names of early American newspapers. They argue that modern journalism schools were created to mask inherent biases rather than eliminate them.

A new listener promotes "The Occupants," a podcast dedicated to field reports from the Occupy movement. The hosts also perform a "sexy voice" birthday shoutout for a primary school teacher in South Australia at the request of her fiancé. A warning is issued regarding a phone number mentioned earlier that may be linked to multi-level marketing spam.

Modern news reporting has shifted toward headlines and opinion due to the lack of cost-effectiveness in deep investigative journalism. Journalism schools are criticized for producing generalists rather than beat reporters with specialized knowledge, leading to poor technical coverage in Silicon Valley. This lack of expertise results in the promotion of "vaporware" and speculative tech stories that lack substance or immediate availability.