Chiquita, again
I read this and thought wow, neither the Enquirer nor anybody else within Gannett would have the guts to publish anything like this today. I had thought that 10 years later, the Chiquita mess really hadn't had a long-term impact on the Enquirer. It wasn't a hard-nosed paper before, and it wasn't afterward, so what was the effect?
Cincinnati Magazine set out to answer that question, but came back with something different. No readers were interviewed, none of the powers that be in the region were interviewed. The editor and the publisher were interviewed. What would Tom Callinan know about the effect of the Chiquita mess? First, he wasn't here at the time. Second, the journalistic tone he's set for the Enquirer shows he doesn't know much about journalism. You get President's Rings for pushing paper, not for putting people in jail.
After reading Cameron McWhirter's look back, it occurred to me that the Enquirer would never, ever write about itself in such terms. A hard-hitting series, the disavowal that didn't say the reporting was in error, the $10 million payment to the richest man in town, the felony conviction, the naming of previously unnamed sources -- the Chiquita affair was a major event in this town, of historical proportions. The Enquirer celebrates the anniversaries of lesser events with front-page treatment. Why not Chiquita? The Enquirer, sadly, can't be honest its present, about its circulation numbers and its business practices. Why would it be honest about its own past?
Cincinnati Magazine set out to answer that question, but came back with something different. No readers were interviewed, none of the powers that be in the region were interviewed. The editor and the publisher were interviewed. What would Tom Callinan know about the effect of the Chiquita mess? First, he wasn't here at the time. Second, the journalistic tone he's set for the Enquirer shows he doesn't know much about journalism. You get President's Rings for pushing paper, not for putting people in jail.
After reading Cameron McWhirter's look back, it occurred to me that the Enquirer would never, ever write about itself in such terms. A hard-hitting series, the disavowal that didn't say the reporting was in error, the $10 million payment to the richest man in town, the felony conviction, the naming of previously unnamed sources -- the Chiquita affair was a major event in this town, of historical proportions. The Enquirer celebrates the anniversaries of lesser events with front-page treatment. Why not Chiquita? The Enquirer, sadly, can't be honest its present, about its circulation numbers and its business practices. Why would it be honest about its own past?
posted by Newsache at 2:57 PM
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