When being right doesn't mean much

Former BusinessWeek investigative reporter Gary Weiss rants Tuesday about those who believe in the omnipotent power of the press to change society, noting that he wrote an article for the magazine in 1998 that railed against the excessive use of leverage — and accomplished nothing.

Weiss writes, “Journalism is not as powerful as some poeple think. Even if this had been a cover story, even if it had been a page one story in the Wall Street Journal or New York Times, even if everyone had gotten on the leverage bandwagon, in all likelihood the outcome would have been….. nothing.

“Why? Because leverage was a potential problem at the time. It was a danger, and so it was until the bubble burst.

“It was the responsibility of government to head off such impending disasters. Sure, we in the media can point the way, but, as Chris Byron once said, we’re just ‘seeing eye dogs’ for the blind regulators. If they choose to fall off a cliff, because that is what Wall Street wants and they are too captured to do anything about it, there is nothing the media can do to stop it.”

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