Feinstein & Duke

[Lauderdevil]

Who said anything about rights? Feinstein is a journalist, or at least he holds himself out as one. That means he has an obligation to his readers to provide them with information, opinions and insights based on his professional analysis, not his personal grudges. Bashing Duke based on the actions of officials that have been gone from the university for the better part of a decade is an act of pettiness unworthy of an adult, let alone an ostensible professional.

“I’ve always been fast. I was fast when I was at The Chronicle," he told the paper a few years back. "And I think in writing like I talk, I tend to be opinionated when I talk, so my writing is opinionated. When I was writing straight news in the news section, I had to back off from that. But in sports obviously even when you’re not a columnist, you have more liberty to voice your opinion.”

Feinstein's right here. The suggestion that he must be objective because he's a journalist is kind of off the point. He's a sports journalist, which, let's face it, is different from covering the Fed or U.S. relations with China. We tolerate -- no, we expect -- opinions. "Brady had the best performance of a quarterback this year," "Jeter can't buy a hit the last few games," "the Red Sox are just godawful." Would we really read the sports page if it was all in the form of: "then, Ibanez grounded a ball between short and third, and the winning run scored"? We want writers to say what they think. We might object to Feinstein's opinions, but I think it's nonsense to say it's based on some principle that he shouldn't be voicing them in the newspaper. I'd rather read a guy who's pro-Duke than anti-Duke, but above that I'd rather read a guy (or woman, of course) who has opinions than someone who just reports the facts.