One of the problems with modern political journalism is that journos & editors distrust our ability to digest objective information and develop our own feelings or conclusions. Increasingly, the reported fact now comes with strong suggestions about what our response *should* be.

Often the editorializing is so unobjectionable and the sentiment shared by all right-minded people that it seems almost churlish to object, as is the case with this recent comment about Jeremy Corbyn by @SkyNews’ @lewis_goodall https://twitter.com/lewis_goodall/status/1199406124581216256

But as soon as personal opinions or moral statements are offered by “objective” journos, an important line is crossed. If “objective” journalists start condemning or praising uncontroversial things, inevitably this practice will bleed into greyer areas of greater controversy

If it seems like I’m suggesting that mainstream journalists should forego emoting and “brand-building” on social media - and that political journalism should become a lot more “boring” - perhaps I am. Perhaps that’s the price journos & we all must pay to restore trust in media.

For a long time the complaint was that political journalism was too dry, inaccessible, elitist. And so we dumbed down in order to widen access. BBC Westminster became The Daily Politics, with all its stunts and gimmicks. Political journalism as a whole became infotainment.

At this point, the question “have these changes improved matters or made them worse?” hardly requires answering.