Maybe some of today’s papers have too many ‘feel-good’ features, but there is a lot of good news out there.
BEN BRADLEEIf an investigative reporter finds out that someone has been robbing the store, that may be ‘gotcha’ journalism, but it’s also good journalism.
More Ben Bradlee Quotes
-
-
The champagne was flowing like the Potomac in flood.
BEN BRADLEE -
The biggest difference between Kennedy and Nixon, as far as the press is concerned, is simply this: Jack Kennedy really liked newspaper people and he really enjoyed sparring with journalists.
BEN BRADLEE -
There will always be leaks; in Washington, everywhere.
BEN BRADLEE -
The Nixon administration really put a lot of pressure on CBS not to run the second broadcast.
BEN BRADLEE -
More likely to mean the security or the personal happiness of the guy who is telling you something.
BEN BRADLEE -
Generals who can write always make me nervous.
BEN BRADLEE -
It changes your life, the pursuit of truth, if you know that you have tried to find the truth and gone past the first apparent truth towards the real truth. It’s very, it’s very exciting.
BEN BRADLEE -
Our best today; better tomorrow.
BEN BRADLEE -
As a child, one looks for compliments. As an adult, one looks for evidence of effectiveness.
BEN BRADLEE -
Nothing’s riding on this, except the First Amendment to the Constitution, freedom of the press and maybe the future of the country. Not that any of that matters, but if you guys f-k up again, I’m gonna get mad.
BEN BRADLEE -
If an investigative reporter finds out that someone has been robbing the store, that may be ‘gotcha’ journalism, but it’s also good journalism.
BEN BRADLEE -
I do worry about how newspapers respond to falling circulation figures. I’m not sure that the answer is for newspapers to try to cater to whatever seems to be the fad of the day.
BEN BRADLEE -
To hell with news! I’m no longer interested in news. I’m interested in causes. We don’t print the truth. We don’t pretend to print the truth. We print what people tell us. It’s up to the public to decide what’s true.
BEN BRADLEE -
It’s very hard to stand up to the government which is saying that publication will threaten national security. People don’t seem to realize that reporters and editors know something about national security and care deeply about it.
BEN BRADLEE -
The history of American politics is littered with bodies of people who took so pure a position that they had no clout at all.
BEN BRADLEE