Get Religion is a national and global journalism site focusing on how the mainstream press covers religion news in politics, entertainment, business and sports.
I have read a lot of Michael Lewis over the years — at least five of his books that I can remember, not to mention countless articles. His real gift as journalist is a knack for pure, unadulterated readability. The fact he’s able to write about esoteric subjects such as baseball statistics and credit default swaps and make them both understandable and wildly popular is no mean feat. Believe me, I’m envious.
Time for a dip into my GetReligion folder of guilt, that file into which I put stories that I really want to write about when I finally get a few minutes, somehow, to read them carefully and then write a post.
We live in the age in which print and video forms of journalism are merging into something new and, at this point, uncertain.
One of the hardest things to explain to people who have never worked in a real newsroom is why some events are news at one moment in time and in one location, but a similar story is not news at some other time in some other location.
Trust me, I know that covering religion news is complicated, especially when you are dealing with ancient religious groups in which it seems that everything is encrusted with centuries worth of doctrine, tradition, rubrics and symbolism. However, facts and facts and words matter.
It’s amazing how much information can be packed into a 950-word newspaper story — and how much can be assumed and left unsaid.
The blogosphere and the wider world of digital social media is such a strange, strange place. It has its own unique joys and sorrows.
I started to put this post up this morning but decided that it was not worth the risk. I did not want people spewing their coffee onto their keyboards.
When I was still living in the Chicago suburbs, every time Rod Blagojevich’s name was mentioned, eyes were rolled. Who could believe that the great people of Illinois voted him into the highest position in the state not once but twice?
