- The writer whose Rolling Stone article brought down Gen. Stanley McChrystal said he never thought his reporting would bring about the effective end of McChrystal’s career, as well as a crisis for the Obama administration...
But, Hastings told Lauer, he did receive pressure from the general’s staff to change some of his intended reporting.
“They tried to pressure me not to write about some things that were on the record. I told them I can’t really play that game,” Hastings said.
A generation ago, Rolling Stone gave America the “gonzo” reporting of Hunter S. Thompson. That tradition has continued today with the unfettered reportage of a new generation of writers who do not operate by the conventions of the mainstream media, including Matt Taibbi and Hastings.
“One of the things that happens in journalism, especially with powerful figures, is that they give journalists access in exchange for favorable coverage and future access,” Hastings said. “That dynamic didn’t apply to me and the story I was writing, or just my general style of journalism.”
And do not expect to be invited to any Beach party's:
From the Right or from the Left, sucking up to The Powers That Be is equal opportunity B*LL SH*T.
Update - 25 June 2010
As always, the master Political Satirist John Stewart nails the Beltway Presstitutes to the wall:
Mr. Stewart, the American News Media started to "kind a suck" 15 years ago at the start of the Hunting of the President, on to the War on Gore and fininally mutating into the Lapdog press. The problem is NOBODY but you and Colbert had the guts to call them out.
