When do security journalists stop being journalists?

I’d love to see the dif­fer­ence between a US Defence Dept Video News Release and the piece Frank Gard­ner presen­ted tonight on the BBC 10. Go view it.

The pay-off to his online copy notes:

…until ter­ror­ists actu­ally det­on­ate a dirty bomb, the fund­ing for cop­ing for one [sic] is thin on the ground.

Some equip­ment is now being dis­trib­uted, in both the US and Bri­tain, but privately sci­ent­ists ques­tion whether it will really be enough to cope with a full-scale radi­olo­gical disaster.

Stop me and buy one!

Gardner’s no dupe. Let’s hope he real­ises the dam­age that feeble fare like this does to his cred­ib­il­ity as a reporter.

2 thoughts on “When do security journalists stop being journalists?

  1. Bit harsh on Frank, who after all had a num­ber of exclus­ive lines in his report, ie that ambu­lance crews were now car­ry­ing dosi­met­ers. I’ve not heard or seen that any­where else.

  2. I just re-read the online piece and failed to pick up any traces of skep­ti­cism. What if this had been a piece about a new vac­cine from a big pharma company…

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