Comment Re:Two sides to every argument (Score 2) 50
These questions seem to reflect fundamental misunderstandings about free speech and the first amendment.
"Should a journalist be able to walk into a church during service and interrupt the proceedings, and not be held accountable because he's a journalist? "
Interrupting proceedings in this nature would potentially be trespassing, and could be sanctioned as such. That isn't a free speech issue. What WOULD be a free speech issue is if the government tells a journalist they can't report what they've seen or their opinion of what they've seen.
" Should a major news outlet be able to report something without at least a cursory check to see if it's accurate?"
Absolutely, at least as far as the GOVERNMENT is concerned. It's not the government's job to decide if a media outlet was good enough with its fact checking. However, slander/libel law may be allow a private party to sanction a media outlet reporting falsehoods (though the bar is quite high if concerning a public figure).
"Should an interview answer be swapped with the answer from a different question?"
Is that ethical journalism? No. But again, it's not the GOVERNMENT'S job to enforce journalistic standards. Because once you make that the government's job, then low journalistic standards become those of any outlet saying something the government doesn't like.