Steve Howell

Quick story about govt. shutdowns and the theatrics behind them. One year when I was reporting at CBS News during a govt. shutdown, I think 2013, we were sincerely searching for real life impact. When we couldn't find any, *that* should have been part of the story. Instead, we kept trying to create the appearance of an impact. It wasn't really trying to be dishonest. It was, in my retrospective view, because the general editorial idea for the story was to show how bad the "Republican" shutdown was for ordinary Americans, and the answer simply couldn't be that it wasn't. I've written quite a bit about this but we, as journalists, too often "decide" the story in advance and shape the facts to fit our narrative, rather than gathering information and letting that tell the story, whatever it may be. Anyway, the Ds were blaming Rs for the shutdown, so we were calling Ds and the Obama administration for ideas to report what was the real impact. Taking our cue, these officials fabricated impact that we could report. For example, they cordoned off outdoor public monuments in Washington DC. We knew and even discussed in the newsroom that this made no sense. These monuments weren't "manned" to begin with. The only reason to cordon them off from the public was so that visiting tourists would see the "impact" of the shutdowns and the news media would have something to take pictures of and interview people about. There are other examples but this is the one I remember the most.