gemini33

A lot of my fellow New Jerseyans think you're going to be Wall Street's man in Washington. Do you favor tougher regulation of Wall Street and breaking up the Too Big To Fail banks?

Hi Paul. Thanks for doing this AMA. a. How do you feel about objectivity in journalism? Is it okay to have a clear bias on a subject or the region you cover and still provide good journalism?

b. On scale of 1-10, 1 being completely objective and 10 being completely biased, how would you rate your journalism on the coverage of the Ukraine crisis? (I'll provide my rating later)

If Crimea's parliament elected a new PM in the same way that Ukraine's parliament elected a new PM, why are the things that Crimea's parliament and PM seen as illegitimate while the actions of Ukraine's parliament and PM are somehow legitimate.

Ukraine's govt. is being given billions and apparently will be allowed to make fundamental, profound changes to the country, like joining the EU, taking on IMF loans, etc. Crimea's govt. made similar, profound changes and want their voters to decide, via referendum, whether to remain in the Ukraine or to return to Russia (where they were, historically, for much longer than with Ukraine).

Crimea wants the voters to decide. Ukraine gives their voters no chance to decide whether to take on billions in IMF loans or drastically change their country into an EU country.

So why is one set of actions seen as legitimate, and one not? Why does Ukraine demand the right to self-determination but will not allow Crimea self-determination? And why does the world not call this out?

I'm familiar with that Keller/Greenwald debate. They clearly felt (or at least Greenwald did) that journalists were aware of their own level of bias/objectivity. So I think it's odd to cite that debate as your answer and then say that rating objectivity is not even possible. Or am I misunderstanding your answer?

Great answer. Much to think about as a result of that analysis.