How “Objective” Journalism Misses the Point

Staff
January 21, 2026

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TL;DR

The Miami Herald objectivity failure wasn’t about bad facts—it was about bad framing. By treating power as just another perspective, the paper missed the real story.

The Miami Herald didn’t get the facts wrong.
It did something worse.

It treated power like just another opinion.

Allow me to digress.

In its coverage of Deerfield Beach’s split from BSO, the Herald practiced a familiar ritual: quote both sides, step back, call it balance. That’s fine when two neighbors argue over a fence. It fails when one side controls armed services and the other is exercising a contract right.

The article faithfully reports that an independent study found the city could save “more than $500 million over the next 20 years.” That’s math. It then places that math next to a sheriff calling the study “an advocacy memorandum.”

Bullshit.

Those two things are not equal.
One is an audit. The other is a rebuttal from a threatened vendor.

And from a vendor who “fired missiles.”
Hello? Is anyone home?

Yet the paper presents them as parallel perspectives.

No wonder the Herald hired Brittany Wallman.

The Herald also quotes warnings about “emotional decisions,” risks to public safety, and the possibility of harm if the city walks away.
Fear is printed.
Fear is not evaluated.
Fear is allowed to sit there, untreated, as if it were data.

That’s the failure.

When Sheriff Gregory Tony Frank Drebin offers to extend the contract and pay for a new study, the article reports the offer but does not interrogate it. No question is asked about conflicts of interest. No context is given about procurement norms. Readers are left to assume this is just another reasonable proposal.

It isn’t.

Mayor Todd Drosky’s response — that the city bears full financial risk while controlling little under the BSO model — is accurate, boring, and devastating. It is also treated as just another quote, not the structural argument it actually is.

This is the Hunter S. Thompson problem in real time. “Objectivity” becomes a refusal to weigh evidence. Authority is laundered through quotation marks. Leverage is mistaken for perspective.

The result is journalism that feels neutral while quietly favoring power.

The BSO dispute isn’t the story.
The story is how easily fear, status, and institutional gravity still pass for balance — and how often “objective” reporting helps them do it.

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