Editorial: Nattering Nabobs of Negativism - by Chris Bradley

In the 1970s, US politician Spiro Agnew said the press baying for President Nixon's blood over the Watergate affair were "nattering nabobs of negativism", such was his loyalty to a criminal. So, now you know where the name of this website comes from. But Agnew's vocal disdain for journalists doing their jobs properly - holding the powerful to account; informing the public responsibly - has been hijacked in recent years by politicians growing ever more media savvy.

Barack Obama began his campaign for President of the United States in 2007 with sweeping speeches about change and peace. Since George W Bush's campaign of terror to fight the War on Terror, America had been left disillusioned with its purpose in the world: for once they were mighty, freedom fighters, in the non-offensive kind of way, nobly liberating oppressed countries who could not fend for themselves. At least, that was the nub.

Obama became the first black president of the United States of America helped along by a gushing media who saw the handsome, eloquent Chicago boy as a celebrity rather than a politician hoping to become the most powerful man on the planet. Senator John McCain, his Republican adversary, was a Vietnam veteran and 70 years-old: if ever their was a case for the news media becoming tabloidized, this was it.

The Nobel Peace Prize soon followed for Obama, promises of Guantanamo Bay's and other clandestine prisons around the globe to be closed were made. Their would be no more war. Iraq had been a nightmare; Afghanistan un-winnable. But then came the recession and support for Obama slumped.

Obama could not live up to the hype he saturated the media with to get votes and the media became a cog in an unstoppable machine. Obama was going to become President and journalists were blinded by flash bulbs and glamour to look at the real issues. That is why the Tea Party rose; its why the media turned on Obama; its why Libya is dangerous political territory because it threatens a re-crafted image of a country and its leaders. Libya needs careful scrutiny; journalists should not be blinkered by flash bulbs or toe the official line.

Nabobs rescue the news from the media.