objectivity or neutrality came to mean not a strict commitment to unvarnished facts, which is what it kind of sounds like. And i think that's what people think it means, but it came to mean a kind of political and ideological middle ground that the target audience was comfortable with. So here in our time, among other problems, this means that if a high ranking public official does something patently stupid or outrageous, a reporter can't just say that, because then you'll be accused of being biased. You'r taking sides. What i think that actually does is prop up tively inferior information to create the impression of balance, right? But it's a false ballance