In writing the rebuttal, I used the criteria of the AJC’s PolitiFact column which rates public statements from pants-on-fire lies to fully true. PolitiFact says when a “statement is accurate but leaves out important details. That’s our definition of Half True.”

Half truth, that’s also my definition of this six-figure university salary investigative piece. It is accurate but leaves out important details.

I believe my rebuttal, using numbers, provides more context in helping understand who actually is getting those six-figures and why. Greater context would have enhanced the level of debate among those who think state-financed faculty, administrators and staff are overpaid and those who think they are underpaid. Instead judging from the comments of the politician in the AJC story and one of the students paying tuition, the impression was these six-figures salary are an outrage that needs to be fixed.

Half-truth journalism, because of its lack of depth, sounds much more sensational and quickly gets on the radar of grandstanding policy makers and politicians, which results in bad policy and bad lawmaking that stays in place long after those headlines disappear.

It really pains me to write this critique because Georgia is a state dominated by one party and it has a history of inequalities and many varieties of malfeasance and incompetency. Strong investigative journalism is needed. Indeed, it is essential for the long-term health of our local, state, regional and national democracies.

Many of the AJC’s investigations are spot-on and much needed. However, in its zeal to become known as an investigative, muckraking paper, some of its investigations resemble 6 o’clock TV, inch-deep investigative news rather than investigative reporting worthy of the state’s largest news organization. I am writing this in a hope that the leadership, reporters, editors and investigative units at the AJC take some time for reflection, and, perhaps, have some folks they respect review and critique everything that is pegged as investigative journalism.

I am afraid the crooked, unethical and incompetent folks who have been legitimately investigated will use my words to tar all the AJC investigations. This piece is not aimed at defending their actions nor at defending the bureaucratic systems that fail to serve us well. All of them need to be investigated, but that comes with a responsibility that requires in-depth reporting that goes deep beyond the veneer.

As readers and members of the public, we must demand it.

Leonard Witt is the executive director of the Center for Sustainable Journalism at Kennesaw State University. Its mission is to find ways to ensure that high quality, ethically journalism has an enduring place in our democracy.

He healed our sick hospitals and anemic health care system and all but rose the lame, struck down by diabetes, from their wheelchairs  — and he did it with narratives, stories, examples and explanations that had just enough common sense logic to make them seem doable.

And for all of that, he deserved page three on the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Metro page, with the headline that reads:

Former president skips Obama jabs in speeches 

Ah, if only he had taken even a tiny jab, certainly that would have pushed him to the front page of the Metro section and a nice round-house swing would have elevated him to 1A status. But no, he offered nothing more than a rousing speech for which hundreds of people, the Marietta Daily Journal said thousands, stood in line for more than an hour to hear. The wimp, the palooka. Thus not even a photo.

Okay, I get it, the hardcopy part of the newspaper only has so much room, the website will reflect the feeling of celebration. After all, this is Cobb County, Georgia, home of Newt Gingrich and Bob Barr, certainly one must ask: Where the hell did all these Democrats come from? I know that was a question people were asking in the line itself. 

The Marietta Daily Journal, the real hometown newspaper, did, in fact, run the story with big photos on Page 1A, and with a massive headline that reflected the mood of the crowd, and not the disappointment of the AJC reporter, with a line from Clinton’s speech:

Rebuild the Dream

The difference is that the AJC plays for a mass audience and apparently does not have a clue how to connect in new ways with small fragmented communities. Hence, they wait for the punch in the face or at least the hope of a head butt. A former President — for whom people waited not just an hour, but really for years to see in person — connecting with his tribe was a thing of beauty, which the AJC with its old ways of covering the news, basically ignored. But that ignoring, built out of ignorance of social media, is done at its own peril.  

Rather than wasting everyone’s time by burying a story on page three that no one will read, why not direct that energy to engage the hundreds of people who came to this event. Let them share photos, stories, which you play up for anyone who is interested. Do the same with the other candidates, with rock concerts, with demonstrations, but don’t just write about who is on the stage; instead be the indispensable catalyst for community building, bring your tribes back home just as Bill Clinton did last night at Kennesaw State University. Give yourself a punch in the face, wake up; find yourself the 100-mile-a-gallon news operation, raise up from your wheelchair, rebuilt your anemic ways…and tomorrow you will feel good about yourself just as Bill Clinton’s crowd feels good about themselves this fine Saturday.