Observations from D.C.

First, one addition to yesterday's post: This piece by the Washington Post's Dana Milbank shows just how sour relations between Newt and the press corps have gotten.

Now for some observations from my last couple of days in two of the nation's leading news rooms:

1. There is no doubt that Twitter is the new circulatory system of the 4th estate. What's interesting is how varied the individual uses of it are--beyond using it as an 'early warning system' for breaking news, which literally everyone I talked with does. While a few are quite comfortable tweeting almost everything they see and hear, many reporters and editors are ambivalent about Twitter's role in political news. I'm hoping there's a journal article in there somewhere for me.

2. There is little doubt that the news cycle has sped up to the point that many in the business are concerned about being able to rise above the tide of info-bits to report the bigger picture. They use a variety of phrases to describe this phenomenon; I like the way Karen Tumulty of the Post characterized it in our conversation today: "nano news."

The micro-focus encouraged by Twitter, on which 'news' is continually breaking, seems to be making it harder for reporters to connect the dots--as Tumulty did when Gingrich told a Florida audience a few days ago that college students should work while going to school (something a younger Newt refused to do himself).

This speeding up of the news cycle probably isn't news to a lot of you. But the implications are pretty interesting.

For example, what if nano news makes it harder for the press to call out candidates who are not real candidates? I think we've had at least two of those this cycle: People for whom running for office is a business model, a way of spreading their personal brand to sell more books, charge higher speaking fees, and amass big campaign accounts that they are allowed to keep (See Exhibit A here). Is a press corps with their noses buried in their Blackberries and iPhones less able to resist the instant news appeal of those pseudo-candidates? To be fair, several smart reporters I've spoken with insist that Twitter and other innovations are improving the collective ability of the press to call out candidate b.s. Another question begging for a good research paper!

Finally, I'd just like to say that many people in the newsroom are way nicer than you might expect. Banal, I know, but we get so accustomed to the egomaniacs on TV that it's good to be reminded that many of those in the news business are just trying to do a good job in challenging circumstances.