Reader Feedback Day!

I started to respond to a comment in the comments section, but somewhere around paragraph five, I realized that that section wasn't big enough for me and my soap box.  Still, I can see both sides of this argument, so please feel free to weigh in, and tell me how wrong I am.

The initial comment was:

"I would also buy the tomatoes. That being said, I'm a little disappointed that you consider the WSJ a trusted source. Regardless of politics, have you not heard anything about the massive scandal currently unfolding?
"But what initially began with allegations that Murdoch's British News of the World had illegally hacked scores of Brits' phone messages has widened from a sordid tabloid tale involving a murdered British teen to a burgeoning scandal with broad political, criminal, ethical and business ramifications for Murdoch's far-flung News Corp."http://www.usatoday.com/money/media/2011-07-11-Rupert-Murdoch-News-Corp-phone-hacking_n.htm "

The user name is suspiciously spam-like, but as this is first person to comment here, I am going to give him/her the benefit of the doubt.

First, I want to point out the humor in citing USA Today in an effort to undermine the credibility of the Wall Street Journal.  I'm not making an argument there, it's just funny.

Moreover, I have indeed heard about this scandal, and read a lot about it.  However, I have yet to see, in the article that is linked to or any other, a single connection to the WSJ, aside from the fact that Rupert Murdoch owns it.

The very brand respect that they have earned over the years, and the standards of journalistic integrity that (I believe) they have maintained, prevent me from assuming guilt by association.  Is the commenter suggesting that the WSJ editorial staff was involved in the scandal?  Or the writers?

I am not prepared to tear down a long-standing edifice based on rumor and innuendo.  If new evidence comes to light of wrongdoing taking place at the Journal, my opinion can change, but for right now, I don't see how the scandal mentioned affects this brand in particular.  News Corp perhaps, but not every single one of its components, not yet.

Additionally, let's not lose sight of the fact that this scandal is about the means they used to gather information for stories.  Means which I do not defend and solidly condemn as abhorrent, in light of the subject matter and the newsworthiness of the data in the first place.  Nonetheless, the accusation is that they published information that was illegally/immorally acquired, not that they fabricated it.  Decency is in question, but they aren't making things up to print at least.

I'm not even going to get into the part that we the public play in this, and how our hunger for lurid details encourages papers to go to great lengths to invade the privacy of anyone who we will pay to read about.  Still, on the face of it this is a simple question:

Does the Murdoch scandal inherently taint the contributions of every part of his empire?  Does the value tied to a brand give it the benefit of the doubt?  Let me know.