To hear Robert Peston’s account of the financial crisis you might wonder where he gets his information. He is a terrific reporter and seeker-out-of-scoops. But at what point does a journalist with really cut-glass sources stop being a journalist and start being — well — a cypher? Continue reading
These are some of the things that have caught my attention lately. It’s a more eclectic mix than just the news business, but then so’s life: Continue reading
The ‘credit crunch’ as viewed by the just-nationalised Bradford & Bingley’s buy-to-let mortgage company, Mortgage Express (just closed for business) in May, 2008: Continue reading
This is some of what’s caught my attention lately: Continue reading
In case British readers were wondering what journalistic resources they could rely on to keep abreast of the current situation in the financial markets, here’s my advice. You don’t need to! There really is no point in following events you have no possibility of debating, influencing or changing (see Downs’ An Economic Theory of Democracy).
However, if you do feel the need to waste your time in profitless contemplation then you might enjoy FiNTAG.
Want an impartial account of the McCain-Obama debate? The BBC offers this analysis.
[McCain on Putin] I would say in America it plays much better as a tough-guy sound-bite, suggestive of a president who knows how to stand up to Moscow.
Mr Obama’s answer on Russia rambled quite a bit and veered off into a dissertation on the need to develop alternative energy sources — not his first of the night…
But it felt a little bookish and laboured — you could sense which reply would play better in American living rooms.
This isn’t analysis, it’s web-filler — with a little stereotyping thrown in. A case of something you could write, rather than should. Not exactly value-added reporting, unless you want to gauge a British reporter’s prejudices about what ‘plays’ in America’s living rooms.