{"id":12293,"date":"2016-09-11T14:00:32","date_gmt":"2016-09-11T19:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.robertfeder.com\/?p=12293"},"modified":"2016-09-11T14:24:45","modified_gmt":"2016-09-11T19:24:45","slug":"feder-flashback-carol-marin-lessons-911","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/robertfeder.dailyherald.com\/2016\/09\/11\/feder-flashback-carol-marin-lessons-911\/","title":{"rendered":"Feder flashback: Carol Marin on the lessons of 9\/11"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Carol<\/a>

<\/a> Carol Marin (September 11, 2001)<\/p><\/div>\n

The following is excerpted from my blog post of September 8, 2011 on TimeOutChicago.com:<\/em><\/p>\n

September 11, 2001, profoundly affected broadcast journalists who covered the terrorist attacks that day. But 10 years later, Carol Marin looks back with regret that television news so quickly lost the sense of life-or-death seriousness it conveyed to a shocked and grieving nation.<\/p>\n

\u201cI thought we distinguished ourselves in those days following 9\/11,\u201d Marin said in an interview this week. \u201cWe had been given a sobering lesson in what our real purpose and mission is. This is what news was built for \u2014 to be the link between people hungry to know what was happening and why.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marin was a 52-year-old correspondent for CBS News working on a piece for \"60 Minutes\" in New York when she saw the World Trade Center attack on television. Almost instinctively, she rushed to the scene and found herself just blocks away when the first tower began falling. As she turned to run, a firefighter scooped her up and shielded her from the deadly cloud of smoke and debris rushing toward them.<\/p>\n

Miraculously, Marin made her way back to the CBS Broadcast Center, her navy blue suit covered in soot, and told her harrowing story to Dan Rather and the world. Marin didn\u2019t get back to her hotel that day until after midnight.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m troubled talking about it because I was the one who was saved,\u201d she reflected. \u201cI didn\u2019t save anybody, and I didn\u2019t get the name of the firefighter who saved me. But at the same time, if it happened all over again, I\u2019d do the same thing. It\u2019s what we do. We report.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marin, now a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times, political editor of NBC Chicago and a contributing anchor for WTTW\u2019s Chicago Tonight, saw the economics of the media business quickly overtake the ethos of the moment.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve seen steady shrinkage of the very delivery system that was so distinguished on 9\/11,\u201d she said. \u201cNot so long after that, there were further cutbacks, further foreign bureaus closed up. The fact is that news budgets continue to decline. Cable segmentation brought about many more competitors. The Internet blew up into a giant mushroom of new ways for people to get information. So there were lots of prevailing winds that blew away that sober, highly intentioned news coverage of 9\/11.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday there are fewer crews on the street, and more media handouts taking the place of reporting. Nationally a lot of newscasts look just the same as every other newscast.\u201d<\/p>\n