Latest / The Schmidt Show PDX / Certified Organic Journalism

Transcript

Certified Organic Journalism · The Schmidt Show PDX

0:12
SPEAKER_00: Welcome back.
0:13
I'm Mike Schmidt,
0:14
former district attorney of Multnomah County term podcast host.
0:17
And I'll be honest with you,
0:18
today's episode is one I've been wanting to do for a long time.
0:22
SPEAKER_00: We talk a lot on this show about institutions,
0:24
SPEAKER_00: who runs them,
0:25
SPEAKER_00: who funds them,
0:25
SPEAKER_00: who they actually serve versus who they say they serve.
0:29
And there's one institution I've been circling for a while now
0:32
that I haven't fully gone after.
0:34
SPEAKER_00: Partly because you need them.
0:35
SPEAKER_00: Partly because some of them are friends.
0:36
SPEAKER_00: And partly because when you criticize the press,
0:39
SPEAKER_00: you start to sound a little bit like Donald Trump.
0:41
SPEAKER_00: And quite frankly, I'd rather chew glass.
0:44
SPEAKER_00: But here's the thing.
0:45
SPEAKER_00: I'm not Donald Trump and my critique is not his critique.
0:47
SPEAKER_00: His critique is, oh, if the media says things I don't like, it's lies.
0:52
SPEAKER_00: But there is an actual critique to be had.
0:54
SPEAKER_00: That the media used to be a check on power,
0:57
and in too many places it has become an instrument of it if it
1:01
exists at all.
1:03
SPEAKER_00: I watched this up close as district attorney.
1:05
SPEAKER_00: I had a front row seat to how local journalism covered criminal justice,
1:08
SPEAKER_00: which is to say how it covered me.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes it was great.
1:11
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes reporters asked hard questions I needed to answer.
1:14
SPEAKER_00: That's the job.
1:15
SPEAKER_00: I respect that.
1:16
SPEAKER_00: But sometimes it was something else.
1:18
A gotcha headline written while the mundane story hides behind
1:21
the firewall.
1:22
A reporter shopping a narrative telling sources what conclusion
1:26
he needed for them to reach.
1:28
SPEAKER_00: Dangling a cover story as the prize.
1:30
SPEAKER_00: And I'd come home thinking,
1:32
SPEAKER_00: if this is what they're doing to me,
1:33
SPEAKER_00: and I know what was happening,
1:35
SPEAKER_00: what are they doing to stories where nobody knows?
1:38
SPEAKER_00: I'm not the only one who's gotten there.
1:40
SPEAKER_00: My guest today got there too, from the inside.
1:43
SPEAKER_00: Ryan Haas spent years at Oregon Public Broadcasting.
1:46
SPEAKER_00: He's good at his job.
1:47
SPEAKER_00: He believed in public media,
1:48
SPEAKER_00: the mission,
1:49
SPEAKER_00: the firewall between editorial and the money side,
1:52
SPEAKER_00: all of it.
1:53
SPEAKER_00: And then he watched as those lines became blurred.
1:55
SPEAKER_00: So he left.
1:56
SPEAKER_00: He and his partner, Leah Sotilli, built something new.
1:59
SPEAKER_00: The Western Edge.
2:00
SPEAKER_00: Investigative journalism.
2:02
SPEAKER_00: Reader supported.
2:03
SPEAKER_00: Answerable to nobody but the story.
2:06
They've been at it only a few months and they've already broken
2:08
news about worker
2:09
SPEAKER_00: deaths at Amazon's Troutdale facility that nobody else was touching.
2:14
SPEAKER_00: Today we're going to talk about what they're building.
2:16
We're going to talk about what we lost when local journalism
2:19
got hollowed out.
2:20
And we're going to wrestle with a question I don't think gets
2:22
asked enough.
2:24
SPEAKER_00: If Americans have a right to clean air and clean water,
2:27
rights we had to fight like hell to establish and still have to
2:30
fight to protect,
2:31
SPEAKER_00: shouldn't we have a right to clean information?
2:34
SPEAKER_00: But if so, how?
2:35
SPEAKER_00: Who enforces it?
2:37
And if the government can't because the government is exactly
2:39
who journalism is
2:40
SPEAKER_00: supposed to hold accountable,
2:42
SPEAKER_00: well then what?
2:43
SPEAKER_00: I don't have those answers,
2:44
but I have a feeling Ryan Hass has been thinking about it
2:46
longer than most.
2:48
SPEAKER_00: Let's get into it.
2:59
SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the show, Ryan Hass.
3:00
SPEAKER_00: Hey, thanks for having me, Mike.
3:02
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
3:02
SPEAKER_00: Well, Ryan, I'm so excited to talk to you.
3:05
Local journalism is something I care a lot about,
3:08
and you are a local journalism professional.
3:11
SPEAKER_00: Thanks.
3:12
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
3:13
SPEAKER_01: Yes, I am.
3:14
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
3:14
SPEAKER_00: you know,
3:15
unlike us podcast amateurs who like grab a microphone and have
3:18
opinions like you're
3:19
SPEAKER_00: a person who's actually,
3:21
SPEAKER_00: you know,
3:21
SPEAKER_00: trained,
3:21
SPEAKER_00: you've done the work,
3:22
SPEAKER_00: you've been in the industry,
3:24
SPEAKER_00: and now you're doing some really exciting stuff on your own.
3:27
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
3:28
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I think it's always awkward.
3:31
SPEAKER_01: I think as you sort of get older,
3:33
SPEAKER_01: you've been in a professional a long time,
3:35
SPEAKER_01: it's hard to make that transition and say like,
3:37
SPEAKER_01: yeah,
3:37
SPEAKER_01: I actually am.
3:38
SPEAKER_01: I actually am.
3:38
SPEAKER_01: I know what I'm doing.
3:41
SPEAKER_00: I know.
3:41
SPEAKER_00: I totally know what you mean.
3:42
SPEAKER_00: Well, let's just start out.
3:44
SPEAKER_00: Tell folks a little bit about yourself.
3:46
SPEAKER_00: Sure.
3:47
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so I've been in journalism for more than 20 years.
3:51
SPEAKER_01: I grew up in Illinois,
3:53
SPEAKER_01: actually,
3:54
and kind of did journalism in different parts of the country
3:57
before ending up in
3:58
SPEAKER_01: Oregon and
3:59
SPEAKER_01: 2011 or so.
4:00
SPEAKER_01: I was down in Southern Oregon in Coos Bay.
4:03
SPEAKER_01: I was running the newspaper there.
4:05
SPEAKER_01: Oh, wow.
4:06
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so I've kind of been in different parts of the state.
4:08
SPEAKER_00: Do they still have a newspaper there?
4:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think so.
4:12
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
4:12
it's pretty hollowed out and I think we'll get into talking
4:15
about the status of
4:16
SPEAKER_01: newspapers in these non-urban communities because that's really...
4:21
Part of the reason driving the project that my co-founder Leah
4:25
Satili and I are
4:26
doing now but and then I came to Portland in I don't know I
4:31
guess 2013 or so 2014
4:33
somewhere in there my partner got a job up in this area and I
4:37
moved here and
4:38
started working for Oregon Public Broadcasting and I was with
4:41
them for more than 12
4:43
SPEAKER_01: years before
4:45
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
4:59
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, it's really shocking, I think.
5:04
I think it's really hard for people in the Portland metro area
5:07
to understand this
5:07
SPEAKER_01: because there is still a media ecosystem here.
5:11
SPEAKER_01: But if you go out to some of these communities,
5:13
SPEAKER_01: even ones that are not very far from here,
5:16
SPEAKER_01: there's nothing.
5:17
SPEAKER_01: There's no real media.
5:18
SPEAKER_01: I mean, no institutional media anyway.
5:21
SPEAKER_01: There are people who are trying to kind of revive that now.
5:23
SPEAKER_01: But it's just...
5:26
SPEAKER_01: Mike Schmidtshowp
5:41
SPEAKER_01: I agree,
5:42
SPEAKER_01: and people try to share information,
5:44
SPEAKER_01: but the people doing that are not necessarily trained journalists.
5:50
It's easy in today's media era where everyone can have access
5:55
to these platforms,
5:56
SPEAKER_01: which is great,
5:57
SPEAKER_01: I think.
5:57
SPEAKER_01: I think there are a lot of benefits of that.
5:59
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
6:26
SPEAKER_00: Well, so as you mentioned, you worked at OPB.
6:28
SPEAKER_00: I think that's where I first heard your name and saw you on some bylines.
6:34
SPEAKER_00: You left that.
6:35
SPEAKER_01: I did.
6:36
Yeah,
6:36
I was the managing editor of news,
6:39
which is a fancy way of saying it.
6:42
I worked with a lot of reporters and editors there and were
6:46
basically helping run
6:47
the newsroom for a long time and yeah I decided to leave last
6:51
year there were some
6:54
changes in leadership there and some changes in priorities from
6:58
my perspective I
6:59
can only speak from my perspective I'm sure there's people that
7:02
would agree or
7:02
SPEAKER_01: disagree with me but I saw a lot of what I see in
7:09
SPEAKER_01: Media writ large,
7:10
SPEAKER_01: which is kind of pulling away from hard hitting stuff sometimes or,
7:16
SPEAKER_01: you know,
7:16
SPEAKER_01: being a little more hesitant to invest in investigative reporting,
7:20
SPEAKER_01: for example,
7:20
SPEAKER_01: which is kind of a passion of mine.
7:22
SPEAKER_01: It's where my interest is.
7:24
It's it's the stuff that I think can be a big investment,
7:28
but also gets big results.
7:30
SPEAKER_01: And and
7:32
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
7:32
And so I just sort of disagreed with some of the decisions that
7:35
were being made and
7:36
SPEAKER_01: decided to start my own organization.
7:39
SPEAKER_01: I think,
7:40
SPEAKER_01: you know,
7:41
kind of the flip of what I was saying before is like there is
7:44
it is easier to go
7:45
solo now and take those tools that you've built through
7:50
institutional media and
7:51
SPEAKER_01: apply them in new ways.
7:52
SPEAKER_01: And that was exciting to me.
7:54
SPEAKER_01: I've also been in a career.
7:55
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you probably know as you know, when
7:59
SPEAKER_01: In law, it's like you do something for a long time.
8:02
SPEAKER_01: And it's like, man, you know, you kind of know how it works.
8:04
And you can just come in every day and just sort of autopilot
8:07
through it a little bit.
8:08
SPEAKER_01: And,
8:09
and it's nice to challenge yourself and put yourself in perhaps
8:12
a new circumstance
8:13
SPEAKER_01: and see how that works out.
8:14
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
8:15
SPEAKER_00: Well,
8:16
I appreciate that you have that internal experience and a lot
8:20
of the things that
8:21
you're reacting to are pressures that I think are writ large in
8:26
the journalism or
8:27
SPEAKER_00: media landscape that a lot of outlets are wrestling with.
8:32
But you decided to leave and start out on your own and you
8:34
started something called
8:35
SPEAKER_00: the Western Edge.
8:36
SPEAKER_00: That's right.
8:36
SPEAKER_00: That's right.
8:37
SPEAKER_00: The Western Edge.
8:38
SPEAKER_00: I love that.
8:39
SPEAKER_01: We debated for a long time.
8:40
SPEAKER_01: We're like, we got to get a cool name here.
8:42
SPEAKER_01: That's the first hardest decision.
8:44
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
8:45
SPEAKER_00: So what is the idea?
8:47
SPEAKER_00: Your tagline is journalism that cuts through.
8:51
The Western Edge was born out of a project that we were doing
8:54
at Oregon Public
8:55
SPEAKER_01: Broadcasting called Hush.
8:56
SPEAKER_01: And our ethos in that project was,
8:59
let's go do deep dive investigative journalism in communities
9:03
that are smaller or
9:04
SPEAKER_01: more rural or that don't have this.
9:07
SPEAKER_01: You know, it's easy to focus on Portland.
9:09
SPEAKER_01: There's so much happening here all the time.
9:12
SPEAKER_01: And there's a lot of power brokers.
9:14
SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of tantalizing stories you could do.
9:17
SPEAKER_01: But we sort of felt like, can we take
9:21
These principles of strong investigative and narrative
9:23
journalism and apply them
9:25
SPEAKER_01: outside the Portland area.
9:27
SPEAKER_01: And anytime we've gone to these places and we do that,
9:30
SPEAKER_01: people are like,
9:32
SPEAKER_01: Oh,
9:32
SPEAKER_01: my gosh,
9:32
SPEAKER_01: thank you for like covering this place.
9:34
SPEAKER_01: And so that's
9:35
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
9:58
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
9:58
SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you,
9:59
SPEAKER_00: my experience as the district attorney in Portland,
10:01
SPEAKER_00: I,
10:03
SPEAKER_00: of course,
10:03
SPEAKER_00: being in the industry,
10:04
SPEAKER_00: being amongst the prosecutors,
10:06
SPEAKER_00: you hear about things,
10:07
SPEAKER_00: you see court cases.
10:08
SPEAKER_00: So it's like you hear what's going on in other counties and some of
10:13
SPEAKER_00: Mike Schmidtsch
10:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
10:50
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
10:51
SPEAKER_01: we can talk about this later,
10:52
SPEAKER_01: but I'm sure there are many stories that happen where you're like,
10:54
SPEAKER_01: really,
10:55
SPEAKER_01: that's a story?
10:56
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
10:56
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yes.
10:57
SPEAKER_01: Because reporters are always kind of looking.
11:01
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
11:01
some types of reporters are always looking for like the little
11:05
tidbit that they can
11:06
SPEAKER_01: get a scoop or whatever.
11:07
SPEAKER_01: It's not really my deal.
11:08
But if you're under that type of microscope,
11:11
you're not going to do the big scandal.
11:13
SPEAKER_01: And what I see is exactly what you're talking about is like these smaller
11:17
SPEAKER_01: communities where that's not happening.
11:18
SPEAKER_01: It's like.
11:19
SPEAKER_01: Crazy, crazy things, things and like corruption that's happening.
11:24
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
11:25
SPEAKER_01: And to me,
11:25
SPEAKER_01: it's like,
11:26
SPEAKER_01: OK,
11:26
SPEAKER_01: can we show up in these communities and say like,
11:28
SPEAKER_01: hey,
11:28
SPEAKER_01: we're watching like we're watching.
11:30
SPEAKER_01: Don't do it.
11:31
SPEAKER_01: You know,
11:32
SPEAKER_00: well,
11:32
I want to take a little bit of a deep dive just to to
11:35
illustrate what you're
11:36
SPEAKER_00: talking about.
11:37
I read your story on the deaths,
11:40
the worker deaths at the Troutdale Amazon warehouse facility.
11:44
SPEAKER_00: Mm hmm.
11:45
SPEAKER_00: Fantastic work.
11:46
SPEAKER_00: Thanks.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: And I remember I did see,
11:51
SPEAKER_00: I think at the time it happened,
11:53
SPEAKER_00: some headline that was like,
11:55
SPEAKER_00: worker dies,
11:55
SPEAKER_00: people just keep working around them.
11:57
SPEAKER_00: And it's like, you know, I don't know, 12 lines or something.
12:00
SPEAKER_00: And that was the whole story.
12:01
SPEAKER_00: That was it.
12:02
SPEAKER_00: And then it was like moving on next.
12:04
SPEAKER_00: And I
12:07
You know,
12:07
I was just like,
12:08
wow,
12:09
I can't believe there's not more to say about that.
12:11
SPEAKER_00: But I guess there's not.
12:14
But you saw probably that same headline said,
12:17
there's a bigger story here.
12:19
SPEAKER_01: Well, yes.
12:22
SPEAKER_01: I mean, what I will say is I broke that story.
12:24
The headline you were probably reading was someone actually
12:26
stealing my work.
12:27
SPEAKER_01: Someone probably stealing your work.
12:28
SPEAKER_01: There you go.
12:30
SPEAKER_01: Which I have a funny anecdote.
12:32
SPEAKER_01: Well, I mean, it happens.
12:33
SPEAKER_01: It's fine.
12:34
SPEAKER_01: But, you know, what that story came out of was...
12:37
SPEAKER_01: I saw people talking about it online.
12:40
SPEAKER_01: I saw these workers talking about it online and nobody had said anything.
12:45
SPEAKER_01: I was like, that's crazy.
12:46
SPEAKER_01: Amazon is a big company.
12:47
SPEAKER_01: Somebody dies at work.
12:51
I'm like I'm surprised I didn't see anything and that was what
12:55
prompted me to just
12:56
start asking people questions so I just started reaching out to
12:58
people who I saw
13:00
worked at Amazon I was like hey can I just talk to you about
13:02
what happened here and
13:03
SPEAKER_01: yeah I mean the story that I was told was shocking it's so indicative of
13:13
SPEAKER_01: The challenges that a lot of people in Amazon feel.
13:16
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
13:17
Amazon's been reported on for years and years about the working
13:19
conditions in their
13:20
SPEAKER_01: facilities.
13:21
SPEAKER_01: And what I can say is when that story came out,
13:25
I had dozens of workers in this building in my inbox texting me
13:31
on Signal saying
13:32
SPEAKER_01: like,
13:33
SPEAKER_01: Mike Schmidtshowp
14:03
SPEAKER_00: I can't say and what I can say is probably like.
14:23
SPEAKER_01: Mike Schmidtshowpdx
14:43
Beyond that,
14:43
you're just like,
14:44
okay,
14:45
if you want to file a frivolous lawsuit,
14:48
that's on you.
14:49
I don't know what the deal was with that,
14:54
but I will say I've talked to the family of the man
14:57
who died and they have the same like what the hell all these TV
15:01
stations that flood
15:02
around every little like you know whatever bit of crime that
15:06
happens why are they
15:07
not covering this story and scrutinizing a giant corporation
15:11
you know I don't I
15:12
can't say why they're not doing that but from my perspective
15:17
it's a failure of the
15:19
SPEAKER_00: profession to not do that
15:21
SPEAKER_00: One of the things that I so appreciated about your story,
15:24
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
15:24
SPEAKER_00: because you in that one,
15:26
SPEAKER_00: and there are others that I read,
15:27
SPEAKER_00: I just I'm talking only about that story.
15:30
SPEAKER_00: But you've only been around for a couple months.
15:31
SPEAKER_00: So that's correct.
15:32
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
15:33
But it's so exciting to see the long form journalism that
15:36
you're doing with the,
15:38
SPEAKER_00: you know,
15:38
SPEAKER_00: actually talking to people.
15:39
One of the things that kind of surprised me is it sounded like
15:42
you at least heard
15:43
SPEAKER_00: from some workers that were like,
15:46
Yeah,
15:46
it happens,
15:46
but honestly,
15:47
you know,
15:48
I don't want to lose money on my shift.
15:50
Like,
15:50
I'm kind of glad I could continue working and not have to clock
15:54
out for the day.
15:55
SPEAKER_00: That's right.
15:55
You know,
15:56
which was also like,
15:58
I mean,
15:58
such an important part of the story,
16:00
right?
16:01
SPEAKER_00: Because in that sentiment captures so much.
16:05
SPEAKER_00: I think so.
16:05
SPEAKER_00: People that can't afford to lose an hour on a shift.
16:10
SPEAKER_00: And because of that pressure that they're under, the humanity of...
16:15
pausing a beat to recognize dignity in life is subservient to
16:22
the I need to survive
16:23
SPEAKER_00: and pay my electric bill this month.
16:25
SPEAKER_01: Right, exactly.
16:25
And I think that is what's interesting to me about that Amazon
16:29
dynamic is,
16:30
SPEAKER_01: yes,
16:31
SPEAKER_01: you're going to have a big diversity of opinion.
16:33
SPEAKER_01: And I think to what you're saying,
16:36
SPEAKER_01: I did hear from some people who were like,
16:38
SPEAKER_01: why are you writing about this?
16:39
SPEAKER_01: Don't like this.
16:41
SPEAKER_01: It's no big deal.
16:42
SPEAKER_01: Somebody died.
16:42
SPEAKER_01: Who cares?
16:43
SPEAKER_01: Like, and I do think like,
16:46
There's an element of that from my perspective where you have
16:50
this big company
16:51
SPEAKER_01: that's like,
16:52
SPEAKER_01: go,
16:52
SPEAKER_01: go,
16:52
SPEAKER_01: go,
16:52
SPEAKER_01: measure everything.
16:54
SPEAKER_01: You're being watched the whole time.
16:55
SPEAKER_01: And it's sort of, there is a removal of your humanity from that.
16:59
And so I sort of wonder how much is the work environment
17:04
transferring into how
17:05
SPEAKER_01: someone perceives or thinks about a coworker.
17:07
SPEAKER_01: They're like, look, I didn't know this person.
17:10
SPEAKER_01: There's 3,000 people here.
17:11
SPEAKER_01: I don't know this person.
17:12
SPEAKER_01: Why do I care?
17:13
SPEAKER_01: I mean, to me, that's a little...
17:16
SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
17:17
it just says like what is this moment we're living in where
17:20
everything's so
17:20
SPEAKER_01: commoditized and how you're supposed to feel about your work.
17:23
SPEAKER_01: On the flip side,
17:24
SPEAKER_01: I've had a lot of people reach out who are like,
17:27
SPEAKER_01: yeah,
17:27
SPEAKER_01: we've had people who died from cancer here.
17:31
SPEAKER_01: And the company doesn't even say anything.
17:32
SPEAKER_01: They don't say like, hey, we lost Susie.
17:35
SPEAKER_01: She passed away like.
17:37
SPEAKER_01: And they sort of feel like, yeah, I'm just a number here.
17:39
SPEAKER_01: You don't even care.
17:40
I mean,
17:40
it's not anything that the company did,
17:42
but just an acknowledgement.
17:44
SPEAKER_01: I think if anybody was working in a workplace and somebody died,
17:47
SPEAKER_01: you'd expect the bosses to say like,
17:49
SPEAKER_01: hey,
17:50
SPEAKER_01: like.
17:51
SPEAKER_00: Any place I've ever worked,
17:53
SPEAKER_00: I think that certainly would have been the expectation,
17:56
SPEAKER_00: which I think was another kind of undercurrent of the story.
17:59
SPEAKER_00: Just by you telling the story,
18:01
one of the things that jumped out to me was the privilege that
18:04
some of us have in
18:06
SPEAKER_00: our jobs and everything else.
18:08
That would have never,
18:09
ever,
18:09
ever happened in any place that I've worked in the legal field.
18:13
If a lawyer would drop dead when I was in the DA's office or
18:17
any other place I've been,
18:18
SPEAKER_00: Mike Schmidtshowpdx
18:37
SPEAKER_00: Well,
18:37
that's a privileged difference between my profession and the
18:42
profession of law and
18:43
where I was working and the folks who are working in this
18:46
Amazon warehouse
18:48
SPEAKER_00: situation.
18:49
SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
18:49
and I think that is something that is really important to me
18:54
when I'm doing
18:55
SPEAKER_01: journalism is to try to bring the humanity out of it because-
19:00
SPEAKER_01: The working conditions at Amazon have been written about many,
19:02
SPEAKER_01: many times,
19:03
but you have to really talk to people and find those elements
19:09
of the story that can
19:10
SPEAKER_01: bring out that like,
19:11
SPEAKER_01: hey,
19:11
SPEAKER_01: you should feel something.
19:12
That's a guiding principle I always have with my journalism is
19:15
you should feel
19:16
SPEAKER_01: Hopefully feel something when you're reading this,
19:18
SPEAKER_01: not just,
19:19
SPEAKER_01: oh,
19:19
SPEAKER_01: I'm consuming information,
19:20
SPEAKER_01: which is fine.
19:21
SPEAKER_01: There's you know, there's a place in journalism for that.
19:23
But I think if you really as a journalist want to have an
19:27
effect on things,
19:28
SPEAKER_01: you have to find that emotional part of the story and help people.
19:33
SPEAKER_01: Reflect on that and say, like, how do I feel about that?
19:35
SPEAKER_00: You know, how do I feel about what happened here?
19:38
And that's what I appreciated because you didn't tell me to
19:40
feel those things in your writing.
19:42
SPEAKER_00: You reported on, you know, the conversations you had had with workers.
19:46
SPEAKER_00: But through that, I was led to those reflections.
19:50
SPEAKER_00: Right.
19:50
SPEAKER_00: So fantastic work.
19:53
SPEAKER_00: Well, so that's not my experience.
19:57
SPEAKER_00: I want to talk a little bit about the state of local journalism.
20:04
SPEAKER_00: I got to say,
20:05
SPEAKER_00: I had folks that I thought were very professional that covered me,
20:10
SPEAKER_00: did a good job,
20:11
even ones who asked very hard questions and held me accountable
20:15
for challenging
20:17
SPEAKER_00: topics.
20:20
I also experienced a lot of incredibly salacious headlines
20:24
where then the story,
20:26
SPEAKER_00: which is almost benign,
20:27
SPEAKER_00: is hidden behind a paywall.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: That was very frustrating to me as an elected official.
20:35
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I wondered if the journalist actually understood what set of...
20:48
SPEAKER_00: I'll give you an example.
20:50
While I was a district attorney,
20:52
I implemented the first ever staff survey about equity.
20:57
SPEAKER_00: You might imagine an office that never cared about equity ever.
21:01
SPEAKER_00: The results weren't great.
21:04
SPEAKER_00: That was what the reporting reflected was how terrible the results were.
21:09
SPEAKER_00: I thought to myself, I knew who I was and I knew that
21:13
SPEAKER_00: Mike Schmidtshowpdx
21:28
SPEAKER_00: Sure.
21:29
SPEAKER_00: And then try to burn you with it.
21:30
SPEAKER_00: Sure.
21:43
SPEAKER_00: So that type of coverage,
21:44
SPEAKER_00: that type of gotcha,
21:44
SPEAKER_00: salacious coverage,
21:45
SPEAKER_00: I think actually leads to bad outcomes.
21:58
SPEAKER_00: Wow
22:14
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's terrible in both of those sources who he said it to.
22:18
SPEAKER_00: I don't know how many more people he said it to called me right away.
22:21
Professionals in the courthouse said,
22:24
Mike,
22:24
you got to know this is what this reporter said.
22:26
SPEAKER_00: Like, watch out.
22:27
SPEAKER_00: They're trying to get you right.
22:30
They're writing the story that they want to write and then
22:33
looking for the quotes
22:34
SPEAKER_00: or looking for somebody to give them the quote that they want.
22:37
SPEAKER_00: It all left me.
22:39
SPEAKER_00: with not a great feeling about local journalism.
22:42
SPEAKER_00: Of course, I didn't like it.
22:43
SPEAKER_00: I didn't like being the person under attack, of course.
22:46
But it also made me think what I think a lot of other people
22:49
have experienced is if
22:52
I see them doing that in this situation where I know I can see
22:56
what they're doing,
22:57
SPEAKER_00: how many of these other stories are lacking integrity?
23:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
23:02
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, that's a very common thing, and I think I see that.
23:06
I see that when I see coverage of things that I know well,
23:11
and I'm like,
23:12
oh...
23:13
SPEAKER_01: Like you left out XYZ thing and I mean what I will say is I think that's
23:20
irresponsible like what you're describing I mean obviously I
23:23
wasn't there I don't
23:23
know the circumstances but you know someone saying like this is
23:28
the story I'm doing
23:29
I'm going to cherry pick facts to or quotes to do that story
23:34
like that's a terrible
23:35
way to practice journalism frankly like the way you practice
23:39
journalism is like
23:41
You may have a hypothesis or a theory or you may have heard a
23:44
rumor and then you
23:47
SPEAKER_01: fact check that.
23:48
SPEAKER_01: You're asking questions, you're trying to understand and...
23:54
You have to be willing to let go of your preconceptions when
24:00
you're doing a story.
24:01
If you're doing a story well,
24:03
you have to let go of what I think this story is.
24:07
SPEAKER_01: I'll give you an example.
24:08
SPEAKER_01: When Lee and I were doing the first season of Hush,
24:11
which was about this man named Jesse Lee Johnson who was on
24:14
death row in Oregon for
24:16
17 years and incarcerated for 25 in total for a crime that he
24:21
said he didn't
24:22
SPEAKER_01: commit.
24:23
SPEAKER_01: Lee and I came into that story.
24:24
SPEAKER_01: We had read a ton of the documents.
24:26
SPEAKER_01: We had read the trial transcript.
24:29
SPEAKER_01: We were like,
24:30
this looks pretty suspicious that he probably didn't do this or
24:33
that's what I can
24:34
SPEAKER_01: understand why people are saying that,
24:36
SPEAKER_01: why his lawyers are saying that.
24:38
SPEAKER_01: Even then, we were still throughout the process saying like, yeah, but
24:43
SPEAKER_01: Is it true?
24:44
SPEAKER_01: Is it true?
24:44
SPEAKER_01: What are the facts like?
24:46
SPEAKER_01: What are the facts that are leading us here?
24:47
SPEAKER_01: And ultimately,
24:48
SPEAKER_01: like I will say at the end of that reporting process,
24:50
SPEAKER_01: I was like,
24:51
SPEAKER_01: I don't think you did this.
24:52
SPEAKER_01: I looked at every single possible detail of this.
24:56
SPEAKER_01: And yes, that is where I started.
24:58
SPEAKER_01: But there were moments where I'm like, well, what about this thing?
25:00
SPEAKER_01: Like what?
25:01
SPEAKER_01: Right.
25:01
SPEAKER_01: We have to run this down because this doesn't look great.
25:05
And unless you're willing to be open to changing your mind in
25:10
the process of reporting,
25:12
SPEAKER_01: You are not practicing journalism at the highest possible level.
25:17
SPEAKER_01: I think journalists should not be invested in the outcomes of,
25:22
SPEAKER_01: you know,
25:23
what's going to happen to this person or how do I burn this
25:26
person so I look good
25:27
SPEAKER_01: or I get a scoop like that is a recipe for journalism.
25:32
SPEAKER_01: Mike Schmidtshowp
25:50
SPEAKER_00: Since then, that concept has been around.
25:52
And I certainly don't subscribe to what his critiques are
25:56
because it seems like his
25:57
SPEAKER_00: fake news is news that's critical of me is fake.
26:00
SPEAKER_00: News that's positive about me is true.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: So I don't subscribe to that.
26:06
SPEAKER_00: But this is so true of so many things about Trump, right?
26:10
SPEAKER_00: He did identify something that resonated with a lot of people, right?
26:15
SPEAKER_00: Which was that people have been losing trust in media, right?
26:20
And we started this conversation referencing a small paper in
26:23
Coos County I think
26:24
SPEAKER_00: there have just been a lot of different forces Economic forces,
26:30
SPEAKER_00: technological forces Things that have come to bear that have
26:34
made it probably more challenging than ever to sustain and
26:39
maintain the old style
26:41
SPEAKER_00: that I think a lot of reporters used to do.
26:44
SPEAKER_00: I mean,
26:45
SPEAKER_00: I worked in the state capitol for a year,
26:50
SPEAKER_00: and there was a whole,
26:52
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure you know this,
26:52
SPEAKER_00: you've been down there,
26:53
SPEAKER_00: no doubt,
26:54
SPEAKER_00: in the basement of the state capitol,
26:56
SPEAKER_00: it was all these rooms for reporters.
26:58
SPEAKER_00: And when I was there in 2013,
27:00
SPEAKER_00: there were never any reporters in those rooms,
27:03
SPEAKER_00: even when they were in session.
27:04
SPEAKER_00: And it's because,
27:05
SPEAKER_00: yeah,
27:05
SPEAKER_00: not to say that there was zero coverage of the Capitol,
27:09
but I imagined the days of people smoking cigarettes and
27:13
typewriters and the rooms
27:14
SPEAKER_00: were full and busy and bustling.
27:16
SPEAKER_00: And they built that into our legislature.
27:20
And by the time I got there in 2013,
27:22
it was a catacombs of empty journalists,
27:26
you know,
27:27
offices.
27:28
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, this is a long story of what happened to journalism.
27:33
SPEAKER_01: I mean, the newspaper industry collapsed for a number of reasons.
27:36
SPEAKER_01: One is advertising goes away.
27:40
SPEAKER_01: Classified ads were a big part of it.
27:42
SPEAKER_01: Craigslist comes along, guts classified ads out of a newspaper.
27:45
SPEAKER_01: That's a big revenue source.
27:48
And so these institutions have really shrunken,
27:52
and then the incentives get...
27:54
even worse when when you shrink when you start to pull away
27:58
from doing ambitious
27:59
things people are like you know this kind of sucks like I'm
28:02
look I worked at a
28:03
community newspaper it was like well we just we're so short
28:08
staffed we just have to
28:09
turn around stuff to fill the paper and so you're writing
28:12
really poorly reported
28:15
SPEAKER_01: stories people pay a dollar for their paper and they're like well this is
28:19
SPEAKER_01: This is terrible.
28:21
SPEAKER_01: I'm not learning anything.
28:23
SPEAKER_01: This isn't that insightful.
28:24
SPEAKER_01: You're kind of printing press releases.
28:28
SPEAKER_01: And then you also have the internet on top of that where all these news
28:31
SPEAKER_01: organizations are like,
28:32
SPEAKER_01: oh,
28:32
SPEAKER_01: okay,
28:33
SPEAKER_01: online advertising.
28:34
SPEAKER_01: We have to get clicks.
28:34
SPEAKER_01: We have to do things that are salacious to get clicks.
28:37
SPEAKER_01: You have BuzzFeed come along.
28:39
SPEAKER_01: They popularize this.
28:40
And so there's all these bad incentives that are happening that
28:43
are producing...
28:45
Journalism that's of lower and lower quality all the time and
28:49
so of course people
28:49
are like yeah this is sucks like why I don't want to support
28:53
this I'm not getting
28:54
anything useful out of this why would I pay money for this and
28:58
look they have a
28:59
point they have a point the end result though is kind of where
29:04
we are today where
29:05
SPEAKER_01: now there aren't
29:08
SPEAKER_01: That's so sad.
29:29
SPEAKER_01: I mean...
29:58
You know,
29:58
I think that's a compelling vision and I really hope it does
30:03
work.
30:03
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, who knows?
30:05
SPEAKER_00: Because the alternative seems to be just complete AI slop,
30:08
SPEAKER_00: like endlessly feeding on itself and regurgitating.
30:13
SPEAKER_00: I know, right?
30:13
SPEAKER_00: That's the newest asteroid heading to this journalistic planet is AI.
30:20
SPEAKER_00: But AI will never...
30:24
in my imagination do what you're doing right no it won't I mean
30:28
look I'm not scared
30:29
about AI taking my job because AI cannot go and meet people in
30:35
person and say like
30:37
tell me what you think about this like tell me your deepest
30:41
thoughts about this and
30:42
and tell me the nuance tell me why I'm wrong why what I think
30:45
about this is wrong
30:46
SPEAKER_01: like
30:48
AI is not going to do that AI is not going to request you know
30:51
public records every
30:52
SPEAKER_01: week and dig this up I have a very funny story about Amazon and AI um
30:58
SPEAKER_01: So yesterday I learned that Peter Thiel has funded this whole thing.
31:02
Peter Thiel,
31:03
who famously took down Gawker by funding a lawsuit from Hulk
31:08
Hogan against it.
31:10
SPEAKER_01: He's created this new thing called Objection AI,
31:13
SPEAKER_01: where people can use AI to challenge the validity or trustworthiness of
31:20
SPEAKER_01: journalists.
31:23
SPEAKER_01: A very funny thing,
31:24
SPEAKER_01: so someone reblogged my Amazon story,
31:28
SPEAKER_01: and somehow it ends up on this objection,
31:30
SPEAKER_01: not my story,
31:31
but the reblogging of my story ends up on this objection AI
31:35
where an anonymous
31:37
SPEAKER_01: investigator,
31:38
SPEAKER_01: a quote-unquote independent investigator,
31:40
SPEAKER_01: is trying to verify it.
31:42
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, one, my sources are my sources.
31:48
SPEAKER_01: You're not going to know them, and I'm not going to tell you.
31:51
SPEAKER_01: Right.
31:52
Two,
31:52
you're rewriting or you're judging someone who rewrote my story
31:56
somewhat incorrectly.
31:59
And three,
31:59
like the things that they're using to like challenge it are
32:03
things like Reddit posts.
32:05
SPEAKER_01: And they're like, well, this Reddit post says like that didn't happen.
32:08
SPEAKER_01: And so therefore that's evidence against the story.
32:10
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like...
32:12
SPEAKER_01: Is this the world we want to live in?
32:14
Like where billionaires are funding these AI tools to take down
32:19
actual journalism?
32:20
SPEAKER_01: To take down actual journalism.
32:21
SPEAKER_01: Right, right.
32:22
SPEAKER_01: And so I think,
32:23
SPEAKER_01: you know,
32:24
the hard thing is that it's really up to media consumers to
32:28
some degree to figure
32:30
SPEAKER_01: out what do you trust?
32:31
SPEAKER_01: What do you not trust?
32:32
SPEAKER_01: Right.
32:33
SPEAKER_01: So, it feels like
32:54
SPEAKER_00: Mike Schmidtshow
33:09
SPEAKER_00: Mike Schmidtshow
33:25
SPEAKER_00: Mike Schmidt – Yeah.
33:47
SPEAKER_00: Because of that lack of foundational understanding of our civics,
33:51
it's even easier to manipulate people with bad stories and
33:57
alternate realities.
33:59
SPEAKER_00: Your facts are not my facts.
34:03
My thinking on this is that information,
34:07
real,
34:08
good,
34:09
clean,
34:09
I'll call it information,
34:11
is
34:12
SPEAKER_00: is necessary for a functioning democracy.
34:15
I think that's what a lot of us are experiencing is that
34:20
without honest and people
34:22
SPEAKER_00: always say,
34:23
SPEAKER_00: right,
34:24
SPEAKER_00: we used to get our news from Walter Cronkite and we all got
34:26
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
34:42
SPEAKER_00: You know, and so that's the way it used to be.
34:45
SPEAKER_00: We are far, far from that.
34:47
SPEAKER_00: And it feels like that is threatening our democracy.
34:51
SPEAKER_00: It feels like our foreign adversaries are intentionally,
34:54
SPEAKER_00: it doesn't feel like they are intentionally manipulating that.
35:01
SPEAKER_00: What do we do?
35:03
SPEAKER_00: Ryan, give us the answer, Ryan.
35:04
Yeah,
35:05
well,
35:05
I mean,
35:06
I think first and foremost,
35:07
it's important to let go of the idea that
35:12
SPEAKER_01: That we're all going to get our information from the same place,
35:15
SPEAKER_01: that the world doesn't exist anymore.
35:16
SPEAKER_01: Walter Cronkite is not coming back to save us.
35:19
SPEAKER_01: Exactly, exactly.
35:20
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
35:20
SPEAKER_01: there's a million ways to get media these days,
35:24
SPEAKER_01: and I think it's incumbent upon all of us to...
35:29
SPEAKER_01: Mike Schmidtshowp
35:55
SPEAKER_01: How trustworthy are all of these?
35:58
SPEAKER_01: How rigorous is the reporting that's happening in all of these?
36:03
SPEAKER_01: It's complicated because I don't think,
36:05
SPEAKER_01: you know,
36:05
SPEAKER_01: it's hard for me to expect,
36:07
SPEAKER_01: you know,
36:07
SPEAKER_01: the average person who works all day and comes home and to be like,
36:12
SPEAKER_01: oh,
36:12
that article I read was actually like some Chinese adjutant
36:16
prop that I didn't
36:17
SPEAKER_00: like.
36:18
SPEAKER_00: I read that from a different perspective,
36:19
from a different outlet to make sure that my thinking on this
36:21
is not biased.
36:22
SPEAKER_01: So it's really hard.
36:23
SPEAKER_01: It's really hard.
36:24
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
36:24
there are a lot of both media outlets and journalism support
36:31
organizations that are
36:32
SPEAKER_01: trying to address this problem.
36:33
SPEAKER_01: But I think you're right.
36:34
I think there are core things like civics education that are
36:37
outside the realm of
36:38
SPEAKER_01: journalism a little bit of like,
36:40
SPEAKER_01: yeah,
36:41
understanding what police do versus what DAs versus what
36:44
defense attorneys do.
36:45
SPEAKER_01: Those are all, I mean, those are
36:47
SPEAKER_01: Mike Schmidt
37:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, true.
37:31
My ability to form this many opinions about this many things is
37:35
not good.
37:36
SPEAKER_01: I don't have the brain space to do it.
37:39
SPEAKER_00: Also,
37:40
SPEAKER_00: just playing to the way human brains work,
37:42
SPEAKER_00: and there's been plenty of research on this,
37:44
SPEAKER_00: that there's recency bias,
37:46
SPEAKER_00: and there's also repetitive bias,
37:49
SPEAKER_00: that the more you hear something,
37:50
SPEAKER_00: especially if you hear it coming from different angles,
37:53
SPEAKER_00: the more likely you are to say,
37:54
SPEAKER_00: oh,
37:54
SPEAKER_00: okay,
37:55
SPEAKER_00: this must be true,
37:56
SPEAKER_00: because I heard it from them,
37:57
SPEAKER_00: and I heard it from them,
37:57
SPEAKER_00: and I heard it from them.
37:58
SPEAKER_00: But
37:59
The people trying to give you that information understand that
38:01
research well,
38:03
SPEAKER_00: and they know that that is what is going to work.
38:05
SPEAKER_00: So it's not just passive that this environment exists.
38:09
SPEAKER_00: The environment is being built in order to lead people to conclusions.
38:14
SPEAKER_00: So we have to be equally not just passive,
38:17
but active in trying to figure out how to divine something
38:22
that's accurate.
38:23
SPEAKER_01: Well, and it's hard too.
38:24
SPEAKER_01: I think you're raising a really good point, and I'll use...
38:28
Yourself as an example is is in a media and this is like a very
38:32
complex thing to
38:34
SPEAKER_01: understand within a media ecosystem.
38:36
SPEAKER_01: But if paper a writes a story about Mike Schmidt, that's critical.
38:41
SPEAKER_01: Paper B sees that and says like, Well, we have to like have our thing.
38:45
SPEAKER_01: We have to follow up on that.
38:46
SPEAKER_01: We have to come with that same angle.
39:09
one thing I always tried to do at OPB when I was running that
39:11
newsroom is like
39:12
trying to challenge people to like think of be more creative in
39:16
the stories you're
39:17
telling tell me something original don't copy somebody somebody
39:19
did that story you
39:20
don't need to do it you know what I mean and so for me
39:26
personally just like my
39:27
background is if someone does a story I don't personally want
39:31
to do it I'm like
39:32
great that's their story they can report on that I'm going to
39:34
find something else
39:35
SPEAKER_01: that I think is more interesting I'm going to
39:38
Take the contra position or talk to people from a different
39:40
side of that story and
39:42
SPEAKER_01: add something new to the conversation.
39:43
SPEAKER_01: I think that's when journalism is best is when people are trying to.
39:49
SPEAKER_01: You know, challenge what's happening.
39:51
SPEAKER_01: I mean, Portland used to have this right like.
39:54
It's very interesting to me because the Oregonian and
39:57
Willamette Week kind of
39:59
SPEAKER_01: mirror each other a little bit these days.
40:01
SPEAKER_01: They do.
40:01
SPEAKER_01: They used to be at loggerheads.
40:03
SPEAKER_01: If you go back to what Portland media used to be,
40:06
SPEAKER_01: Willamette Week would always take a cutting jab at the Oregonian,
40:09
SPEAKER_01: take a different angle on the story.
40:11
SPEAKER_01: And people like that.
40:12
SPEAKER_01: They're like, oh, I learned something.
40:14
SPEAKER_01: I'm understanding something from a different perspective.
40:17
SPEAKER_01: I think it can be...
40:20
a disservice to readers when media outlets are all writing the
40:24
same thing because
40:25
SPEAKER_01: it is exactly what you're saying.
40:26
SPEAKER_01: Everybody's like, oh, that has to be the truth.
40:29
SPEAKER_01: The truth is often very,
40:30
very nuanced and it's very difficult to represent it well in a
40:34
story unless you're
40:35
spending a year on it and you're really digging in and you're
40:38
thinking about it
40:39
SPEAKER_01: critically.
40:40
It can be hard to represent a story that has all the subtleties
40:46
like what you're
40:46
SPEAKER_01: saying about the survey,
40:47
SPEAKER_01: like
40:48
you know saying saying openly like hey this hadn't been done
40:51
before and and maybe
40:53
people had a lot of pent-up feelings about what was happening
40:55
in this office i
40:56
don't know but you know that could be a subtlety of that story
41:00
that was not
41:00
represented because everybody was so eager to chase like the
41:03
scandalous part of it
41:05
SPEAKER_00: yeah exactly
41:07
SPEAKER_00: All right, well, I have an idea.
41:08
SPEAKER_00: I want to pitch something to you.
41:09
SPEAKER_00: All right, here's my solution.
41:11
SPEAKER_00: Here's how we're going to fix this.
41:12
SPEAKER_00: All right.
41:13
This might be a completely terrible idea,
41:14
and you're feel free to say it's a terrible idea.
41:16
SPEAKER_01: Well, I hope it's subscribed to the Western Edge.
41:19
SPEAKER_00: So step one is subscribe to the Western Edge.
41:22
That is true,
41:22
and I will put it in the show notes,
41:25
and I think everybody should.
41:25
SPEAKER_00: I've been so impressed,
41:26
and I'm glad I can help support in my little tiny way the work
41:31
you're doing.
41:31
SPEAKER_00: All right, here's step two.
41:35
SPEAKER_00: This might be dumb.
41:38
SPEAKER_00: It's okay.
41:39
I've got this theory that clean information is crucial to our
41:45
democracy,
41:46
right?
41:46
SPEAKER_00: Just like clean water is crucial to a good,
41:49
SPEAKER_00: healthy populace,
41:52
SPEAKER_00: clean air,
41:52
SPEAKER_00: we have the EPA,
41:54
SPEAKER_00: well,
41:55
SPEAKER_00: used to have the EPA that would regulate those things.
41:59
SPEAKER_00: Mike Schmidtshowpdx
42:29
SPEAKER_00: Here's my idea.
42:31
SPEAKER_00: What if we do an organic certification approach,
42:36
like that there is an empowered industry standard that does
42:40
things like says,
42:42
SPEAKER_00: yes,
42:43
SPEAKER_00: I have gone in,
42:44
SPEAKER_00: I've looked at the Western Edge,
42:46
SPEAKER_00: our team has reviewed their
42:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, potentially, I think, you know,
43:15
I think anything like that would probably be subject to the
43:20
whims of our cultural
43:21
disagreements probably it comes in and you know I think that
43:26
would be the question
43:27
is how do you how do you get everybody on board to say like yes
43:31
we we trust the
43:33
journalism organic certification to be balanced and be fair and
43:40
follow these things
43:41
SPEAKER_01: I mean
43:43
SPEAKER_01: Because what I see is like even organizations,
43:46
SPEAKER_01: and I'll use Donald Trump as an example,
43:48
SPEAKER_01: like I believe it was over the Gulf of Mexico stuff.
43:54
SPEAKER_00: The Gulf of America.
43:55
SPEAKER_00: And the Associated Press,
43:57
SPEAKER_01: which is probably one of the most like,
44:00
SPEAKER_01: you know,
44:00
down the middle news organizations because they are essentially
44:04
a wire service,
44:05
SPEAKER_01: said we're not going to do that.
44:06
SPEAKER_01: We're just like, that's ridiculous.
44:08
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
44:09
SPEAKER_01: We're not going to change the name of this.
44:11
SPEAKER_01: And he says, Oh, these woke left liberals.
44:13
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, I don't know.
44:14
SPEAKER_01: AP is pretty down the middle.
44:16
So I think that would be the challenge is how do you get people
44:19
to not politicize
44:21
SPEAKER_01: something like that?
44:23
SPEAKER_01: But I love it.
44:23
SPEAKER_01: I think that that could work.
44:26
SPEAKER_00: I think,
44:27
SPEAKER_00: and again,
44:28
SPEAKER_00: it might not be the idea that does it,
44:31
SPEAKER_00: but you said this,
44:32
SPEAKER_00: and it's absolutely correct.
44:33
I've talked to Andrew DeVigal from the Agora Center of
44:39
Journalism over at the U of
44:40
SPEAKER_00: O,
44:40
SPEAKER_00: and I know he's working on
44:42
SPEAKER_00: and others are working on how do we restore trust to journalism?
44:45
Because when people don't have trust,
44:48
now I'm going to get my facts from wherever.
44:51
SPEAKER_00: And so we need to figure out something.
44:53
SPEAKER_00: So maybe certified organic is one way.
44:56
SPEAKER_01: Look, I think now is a good moment to do it.
44:58
SPEAKER_01: I think people,
44:58
SPEAKER_01: I think many,
44:59
many people are starting to realize what's happening when
45:02
journalism disappears.
45:03
SPEAKER_01: I think for a long time, for the past decade, it's been easy to be
45:08
SPEAKER_01: I'm an attorney, right?
45:26
SPEAKER_00: Mike Schmidtshowpdx
45:42
SPEAKER_00: But,
45:43
SPEAKER_00: you know,
45:43
I get held to a professional code of conduct and standard and
45:47
there are rules that
45:47
SPEAKER_00: are specific and if I violate those,
45:51
SPEAKER_00: I can lose my license to practice.
45:53
SPEAKER_00: And there are other penalties that you can suffer up to that,
45:56
SPEAKER_00: but that can be the ultimate penalty.
45:59
SPEAKER_00: And so what about something like that for journalists?
46:04
SPEAKER_01: Yeah,
46:04
SPEAKER_01: I mean,
46:04
SPEAKER_01: I'm always a little hesitant on stuff like this because I don't,
46:07
SPEAKER_01: you know,
46:08
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to say...
46:11
Someone going out to a protest with their cell phone and
46:14
calling themselves a journalist.
46:15
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to say that person's not a journalist.
46:17
SPEAKER_01: They are documenting something.
46:19
SPEAKER_01: They're not doing the type of journalism I do.
46:21
SPEAKER_01: So that's my only hesitation is someone being like, well, we only trust
46:25
SPEAKER_01: I agree with you I think
46:46
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
47:01
SPEAKER_00: You want to take my case for me?
47:02
SPEAKER_01: You don't have a law degree.
47:03
SPEAKER_01: I want somebody with a law degree to do this for me.
47:07
SPEAKER_01: So there are different aspects.
47:11
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to completely shut off that.
47:14
SPEAKER_01: I'll tell you my crazy idea to save journalism.
47:16
SPEAKER_00: Okay, good.
47:17
SPEAKER_00: That's where my next question was going to be.
47:18
SPEAKER_00: My crazy idea to save journalism,
47:21
SPEAKER_01: and I think this is the first time I've said this in a public forum,
47:25
SPEAKER_01: is that I...
47:28
Wish there was something like AmeriCorps for journalism where
47:34
you would go out and
47:36
SPEAKER_01: do two years of service doing journalism,
47:40
SPEAKER_01: doing local journalism.
47:41
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you wouldn't have to leave your community necessarily.
47:44
SPEAKER_01: Mike Schmidtshowpdx
48:02
SPEAKER_01: To me,
48:03
SPEAKER_01: it's going to add information into the system that's clean,
48:08
SPEAKER_01: which is kind of what you're looking for.
48:11
It's going to teach people how these systems work and how to
48:13
understand what good
48:14
SPEAKER_01: media or bad media is.
48:16
SPEAKER_01: From my perspective, I don't care.
48:19
SPEAKER_01: Mike Schmidt
48:46
SPEAKER_01: $10,000 towards your college education or something.
48:49
I think a program like that could change how people think about
48:54
journalism because
48:55
SPEAKER_01: if there are more people who do it,
48:57
it's suddenly less of a boogeyman and people understand it a
49:01
little better.
49:01
SPEAKER_01: So that's sort of my perspective.
49:04
SPEAKER_01: I think there are a lot of other fixes to this.
49:06
SPEAKER_01: I think Oregon has tried something that would essentially...
49:13
Force these big tech companies that have profited off a lot of
49:16
local journalism to
49:17
SPEAKER_01: pay something to flow some of that money back to funding journalism.
49:22
SPEAKER_01: Andrew's really- That's how I met Andrew.
49:24
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
49:24
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I-
49:26
you know had a lot of conversations around those bills and I
49:29
think those would be
49:31
very helpful um agreed I you know another idea that I've heard
49:35
out of uh Katie
49:37
Wilson in Seattle which I don't think she's actually followed
49:39
up on this so someone
49:40
can ask her about that but is uh creating essentially media
49:45
vouchers or something
49:46
SPEAKER_01: basically give everybody
49:48
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
50:11
SPEAKER_00: I hadn't heard that one.
50:13
SPEAKER_00: I love the AmeriCorps idea.
50:15
SPEAKER_00: I did Teach for America out of college,
50:18
SPEAKER_00: which is a program that people can have mixed feelings on,
50:21
but it gave me two years of experience in public schools in the
50:24
city of New
50:25
SPEAKER_00: Orleans.
50:26
SPEAKER_00: That experience has certainly stayed with me throughout my career.
50:31
SPEAKER_00: I didn't stay in education,
50:33
but it really introduced me to a lot of the challenges that the
50:37
educational system
50:38
SPEAKER_00: faces.
50:39
And that has been instrumental,
50:40
even as I went on to be a district attorney.
50:43
SPEAKER_00: I mean, obviously crime in youth, juveniles and understanding education.
50:47
The rates at which kids are expelled and then the difference
50:50
between black kids
50:51
being expelled at what rate versus white kids and literacy
50:55
rates and how literacy
50:56
SPEAKER_00: rates almost become predictive of crime rates.
51:01
I love that AmeriCorps idea because I do think that that
51:05
translates to a person who
51:08
SPEAKER_00: is more in tune with some of the things going in society.
51:11
SPEAKER_00: Of course, that would pump government money into the industry and labor.
51:16
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
51:17
SPEAKER_00: Into the industry and exposure.
51:19
SPEAKER_00: And,
51:19
SPEAKER_00: you know,
51:19
SPEAKER_00: one of the things that I do appreciate about professional journalists,
51:23
SPEAKER_00: and I dealt mainly with professional journalists,
51:25
SPEAKER_00: but I dealt with some not actual,
51:28
SPEAKER_00: they might call themselves journalists.
51:29
SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't, but I dealt with people.
51:31
SPEAKER_00: At least there is a code that people, you know, generally they respect.
51:36
SPEAKER_00: And I never...
51:38
Came across somebody that I think violated the whole on the
51:41
record,
51:41
off the record.
51:42
SPEAKER_00: There are basics, right?
51:43
SPEAKER_00: And at least we could have those conversations.
51:46
And so I do appreciate that there are standards that people
51:50
typically abide by.
51:52
SPEAKER_00: They should.
51:53
SPEAKER_00: They should.
51:55
SPEAKER_00: Well, Ryan, I really appreciate you taking the time.
51:58
SPEAKER_00: I hope people go on to the Western Edge media.
52:01
SPEAKER_00: What do you got coming up?
52:02
What's something that you're working on or you're excited about
52:04
that you can tease for people?
52:07
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's always a tricky question.
52:08
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I know.
52:08
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to give away anything.
52:10
Well,
52:10
I mean,
52:10
what I will say is I'm not done reporting on Amazon,
52:15
so I have that.
52:17
And outside of that,
52:19
there are several stories that both Leah and I have coming that
52:24
I think –
52:26
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
52:27
SPEAKER_01: This is tricky.
52:29
SPEAKER_00: I can't give up resources.
52:30
SPEAKER_00: People are just going to have to sign up.
52:32
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thanks.
52:32
SPEAKER_01: No, I mean, I hope people go.
52:35
SPEAKER_01: Do sign up.
52:35
SPEAKER_01: There are many, many stories there that you can already read.
52:39
SPEAKER_01: There's a wide variety of stuff.
52:41
SPEAKER_01: I think it was before we went on there.
52:43
SPEAKER_01: You know,
52:44
one of the first stories we did was about a man named Kyle
52:47
Headquist down in Salem
52:48
who had served a long sentence in prison and became center of
52:53
this big controversy
52:55
SPEAKER_01: in that community.
52:56
SPEAKER_01: And I think those types of stories we like to do.
53:00
SPEAKER_01: We like to go in after the fact, you know.
53:03
That story had been covered by the local media and it was a
53:06
huge controversy of how
53:07
can this guy who was incarcerated for murder be serving on this
53:11
police oversight
53:11
SPEAKER_01: board.
53:12
It's way more complicated than that when you actually take the
53:15
time to look at it.
53:16
SPEAKER_01: And those are the types of stories that we like to do is to go into these
53:20
communities and dig out these complicated stories and take the
53:25
time to tell them
53:26
SPEAKER_01: well.
53:26
SPEAKER_01: So
53:28
Like I said earlier in this conversation,
53:30
you don't have to come to the Western Edge every day.
53:32
SPEAKER_01: You can find a piece,
53:34
SPEAKER_01: read it on Sunday or whenever you have some time,
53:37
SPEAKER_01: enjoy it,
53:38
SPEAKER_01: savor it and be like,
53:39
SPEAKER_01: wow,
53:39
SPEAKER_01: that's a good story.
53:40
SPEAKER_01: I care about that.
53:41
SPEAKER_01: That's the kind of work we're trying to do.
53:43
SPEAKER_00: I appreciate it.
53:45
SPEAKER_00: The way you say savor it, it really does feel more like steak.
53:49
It's more fulfilling than a lot of the stuff that I come across
53:53
as I'm scrolling endlessly.
53:55
SPEAKER_01: Scroll less, savor more.
53:57
SPEAKER_01: Ryan Hess, thank you so much.
53:59
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
54:09
SPEAKER_00: Ryan Hess, everybody.
54:11
SPEAKER_00: Go find The Western Edge at thewesternedge.media Subscribe.
54:15
SPEAKER_00: Pay for it if you can.
54:16
SPEAKER_00: That's how this works.
54:17
SPEAKER_00: Investigative journalism doesn't run on good intentions.
54:20
SPEAKER_00: It runs on people deciding the work is worth supporting.
54:24
SPEAKER_00: Here's what I keep coming back to after that conversation.
54:27
We don't accept polluted water just because clean water is hard
54:30
to produce.
54:31
SPEAKER_00: We built systems imperfect,
54:33
SPEAKER_00: fought over,
54:34
SPEAKER_00: constantly under attack,
54:35
SPEAKER_00: but to protect our water source.
54:38
And the argument that information deserves the same protection
54:41
isn't radical.
54:41
SPEAKER_00: It's just honest about what's at stake.
54:44
SPEAKER_00: Democracy doesn't work if people can't agree on basic facts.
54:47
SPEAKER_00: And people can't agree on basic facts if the institutions responsible for
54:51
SPEAKER_00: establishing them have been hollowed out,
54:53
SPEAKER_00: captured,
54:54
SPEAKER_00: or reduced to chasing the algorithmic drip of clicks and outrage.
54:58
SPEAKER_00: That's not a left problem or a right problem.
55:01
SPEAKER_00: That's everybody's problem.
55:02
SPEAKER_00: Ryan and Leah are trying to do something about it.
55:05
SPEAKER_00: Two journalists,
55:06
SPEAKER_00: a substack,
55:06
and a willingness to pick up the phone and ask the questions
55:09
nobody else is asking.
55:10
SPEAKER_00: That shouldn't be remarkable in 2026, but it is.
55:15
SPEAKER_00: Support their work.
55:16
SPEAKER_00: Share this episode.
55:17
And if you've got a story that needs telling something
55:19
happening in your community
55:20
SPEAKER_00: that nobody's covering,
55:22
SPEAKER_00: reach out to them,
55:23
SPEAKER_00: to us.
55:24
SPEAKER_00: That's what this is all about.
55:25
SPEAKER_00: I'm Mike Schmidt.
55:26
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for being here.
55:27
SPEAKER_00: We'll see you next time.