Big Crandon Story: News Media

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Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen (R) has asked the residents of Crandon to ignore reporters inquiring about the mass shootings. That didn't sit too well with the news media.

WSJ Excerpt:
"No one has the authority to suggest that an entire community remain silent, " an editorial in Friday 's Wausau Daily Herald read.

Anyone has the right to suggest anything they want providing it's not for financial or personal gain, suggestions are…suggestions, nothing more. Now if he ordered the community to remain silent, that’s different.

Interestingly enough, Monday’s Janesville Gazette editorial gave J.B. Van Hollen a big "thumbs up” for his office holding seminars on the state public meeting laws and open records, of all things.

But news media has clearly run amuck, censoring whatever they please, shaping stories to fit an agenda and invading privacy for the sake of news. Van Hollen merely gave them some of their own medicine, and they cry foul.

Average citizens are overwhelmed by the tactics employed by trained reporters and usually submit embarrassing or sensitive information without knowing the real consequences and power of newsprint. I’ve mentioned this here before, that municipalities, school boards, unions, civic organizations and private citizens need to formulate a “rules of the wrode” handbook on dealing with the unruly and profit driven press.

For starters, perhaps they should be viewed and labeled as “solicitors.”

Read related: Sympathy for Crandon shooter prevails.