Wolfpack Journalism and Twitter Tidbits

A lone wolf howls in the wilderness.

   Clever politicians know that media mutts can be easily distracted by throwing a bone and watching them scramble to gnaw at what little meat there may be.
   Clever reporters are more like lone wolves. They prowl the edges, lurking while the pack worries the easy target, then pouncing when the larger, more important prey wanders from the herd.
   So it is with journalism. Scoops are not doled out in carefully staged "news events," as PR agents like to call them. Rather, the good stories are dug out and captured by reporters watching the edges.
   As veteran reporter Scoop Callahan might put it, watch the little things. One event may not be significant in itself, but two or three other "little things" can reveal a pattern, and thus a news story.
   One is an accident, two is a coincidence, and three makes a pattern.

  We have seen examples of wolfpack journalism often during this election cycle, as the major candidate tossed out tidbits via Twitter, knowing that the hungry wolves in the journalism pack would pounce and squabble over these while the candidate went about other political business.
   To the chagrin of news observers, the strategy worked, and Donald Trump won the election.
   Now he is continuing the same strategy, enticing the journalistic wolfpack with Twitter tidbits, juicy enough to make many news hounds salivate with anticipation for some bigger morsel of news that never comes.
   Wise up, reporters. You're being used.

   The good news, however, is that some media outlets are aware of this distraction strategy and are moving to outfox the clever candidate.
   The strategy may have been clever enough to win the election, but now the future of American democracy may well be at stake.
   Therefore, the nation needs a vigilant press corps more than ever. What may have been wonderfully entertaining for the past year is no longer funny.
   Show biz and responsible government are not equal. Uttering pronouncements and expecting the world to follow such arbitrary instructions or face the dictum, "You're fired," is no way to run a government.
   Or as the Monty Python character said to King Arthur, "just because some moistened bint launched a scimitar in your general direction is no basis for a system of government. Supreme executive power derives from a mandate from the masses, not some farcical aquatic ceremony."
   Trump may have won the election, but he's not a king, and acting like one will not change that.