Journalism still has power.
Journalism still has power. But not the way you'd hope. by Sam Thie lman Tow editor at the Columbia Journalism Review. PETE HEGSETH, THE FOX NEWS PERSONALITY, Iraq War veteran, and a one-time guard at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp, often receives compliments for his commentary on Fox & Friends, the popular morning show Hegseth frequently guest-hosts, from President Trump. Hegseth was briefly considered by Trump to head the Department of Veterans Affairs. Instead, he has used his platform on the president’s favourite show—and access to the man himself—to run the kind of journalistic campaign that used, more usually, to be pointed at water contamination in Flint, Michigan or public corruption in Bell, California. It has centered on the cases of three men accused or convicted of murder while deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan: Eddie Gallagher, Clint Lorance, and Matt Golsteyn. Hegseth’s attitude was that the men accused had done nothing less noble than falter sligh...