Fortunately, the media, typically tasked with inflaming tense situations as much as possible, has agreed to shift the focus in the other direction for a while. Fresh on the heels of very serious and very determined corrections to avoid the wrath of Andrew Cuomo’s financial thought police, the New York Times covers the emergent phenomenon, which, like most stories in the media about the media, gives the media high marks for restraint and Newspeakness.
“We’re very careful not to throw words around like ‘meltdown’ and ‘free fall,’ ” said Ali Velshi, senior business correspondent at CNN. “If someone wants to say the markets are in free fall, we’ll discuss it first,” he said, and the outcome is most likely to be a change in wording.
CNN isn’t the only sterling provider of quality financial news that is thumbing the scale a little bit in favor of totally panicked and totally-on-the-brink-of-collapse firms.*
” ‘Crash,’ ‘panic,’ ‘pandemonium,’ ‘apocalypse,’ those are the words we’re staying away from,” said Robert H. Christie, a spokesman for The Wall Street Journal, now part of the News Corporation.
Even the sleeveless one gets kudos.
“I want to caution everybody,” said the on-air editor, Charles Gasparino. He said several times that the tip came from “Wall Street sources,” not the government, adding, “We have yet to get a confirmation from the Treasury Department.”
Uh, no comment.
Of course, this wouldn’t be an article from the New York Times, if it didn’t discuss the New York Times.
Early this month, a New York Times article described Lehman as “ailing” and “precarious,” but did not explicitly mention the possibility of failure or bankruptcy.
I smell a Pulitzer.
Amid Market Turmoil, Some Journalists Try to Tone Down Emotion [New York Times]
* Not that we are suggesting any firms at all are experiencing any dip or drop or depression or temporary slowdown or anything whatsoever that might bring them the slightest bit closer to anything resembling failure or the like. Kay. Thanks.
In Soviet Russia, Media crashes You!
Pravda.
Anal_yst mentioned the whole “responsible journalism” thing (whatever that is) the other day
http://1-2knockout.typepad.com/12_knockout/2008/09/dont-be-so-quic.html
Sounds about right.
Any other 370+ point dive in the Dow would normally send that harpie fartaromo into convulsions.
In a related announcement Cuomo has appointed Baghdad bob as a consultant for all financial media effective fucking yesterday. Cuomo cited bobs ability to calmly guide the Iraqi dumbass public through a quickly and poorly managed us govm’t takeover of sovereign assets to bumble around with for years while running it into the ground as a perfect intership for the needs of todays financial reporters.
The new DB hot line is 212-526-7000. Make sure DB gets the word first before it hits the tape.
SPODE
@spode– wrong. the db tips line is 312-353-5431.
Well, watch the official language from the White House. The media mimics it.
Housing bubble burst = Housing correction
Recession = rough patch
Recession = slow down
Slow down = psychological problem of whiners
Rising unemployment = Slower job growth
War = Peace
Love = Hate (unless you are an ObGyn)
…and so on and so on.
Thanks fundamental -
made me laugh because its true.
Equity
I’m worried about your regular job. We need LBO volumes up. Buyout some companies.
Hecka of a job brownie = you fuckied up so big that today is (or should be) your last day…
Hecka of a job COX!!
Perhaps there is a sane person or two around: Take a look at Dodd’s plan
http://www.politico.com/static/PPM41_ayo08b28.html
It is a sttriking 44 pages long and even starts to make sense.
Why hasn’t the media raised the question of a potential terrorism attack on the financial system?
Are there hackers in the system, and if so, where are they originating? What I-bank(s) have they infiltrated?
The WTC collapses in 2001 at the start of a new US Administration … now the entire US financial system is on the verge of collapse, poised to shift market dominance to the Mid-East…why hasn’t the press pursued this lead yet?
@13
It’s not financial terrorism.
It’s over-leverage. By banks.
Actually, a lot of things I read say that the banks began hoarding cash and that regular people began hoarding cash. They also say that people went onto their PC’s on Wednesday and Thursday trying to sell their stocks. They pointed out on that bastion of financial reporting, CNBC, that the government and foreign governments put a lot of cash into the system and it disappeared and that is what let them know they had a serious problem.
Does anyone anywhere in any of these institutions know what is going on?
#13 with the tinfoil hat on
Ever heard of Occam’s razor?
I’m sure the yahoo boards are discussing your conspiracy theory right now.
Hey, it’s #13 — It’s more than Yahoo
http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2008/09/terror-attack-o.html
@13 & 17 – MSM,including cramer gave this some media play. Ususally BR is smarter than to post something like this but last week was an unusual week (to say the least)
It ia a ridiclous notion much like WMD. It was an attempt to justify the governments ban on short selling of the financial institutions. Much like WMD was used to justify the war on Iraq.
The only flaw in the theory is shorting of financial institutions is actually off about 20% since July 15, 2008. As of last Thursday, both MS and GS had less than 4% of their float represented as short positions.
Granted WM has something like 26% short interest but they are circling the drain as evidenced by the rachet clause in th,eir last death sprial financing. As for all the interest in buying WM – i bet that all those “interests” are looking at which branches they are going to bid the FDIC for.
Financial Terroism is BULL SHIT. Do NOT let the governemnt make you believe (for even a second) in WMD redux.
@17
If that is where you got this bullshit from then you should have read the comments over there. They took care of dismissing it pretty well, at least the vast majority of them did. Why continue spreading the bullshit, can you reason?