Excerpts from an Ethics Week column in The Mountain Mail, of Salida, Colo., by our own Clint Brewer:

Studies detailing media distrust by the American public – and of journalists – are too numerous to count. But instead of heeding the warning, many traditional news entities bend to pressing market forces.

With each passing year, they blend in more and more with the noisy din of partisan talk shows, celebrity infotainment and, more recently, the Wild West of the blogosphere.

…

Ethical journalism is not dead. It just requires one to know where to look – whether it’s on the Internet, the newsstand or the airwaves. A map to help media consumers find that place of trust would also be helpful.

As the Society of Professional Journalists celebrates Ethics Week this week, we offer that map to help consumers find the news they can trust. And, as always, we offer this code of ethics to help journalists guide their actions.

Here’s an interesting and very public ethics quarrel between two well-known journalists.

A little background: Todd Gitlin writes a column for the Columbia Journalism Review that critiques Tim Russert’s interviews. A recent critique was of Russert’s interview with Barack Obama.

From the top:

Dan Kennedy: Shouldn’t CJR have chosen someone other than Todd Gitlin to write about Tim Russert? Gitlin’s debut isn’t bad. But look at this: Gitlin publicly announced his support for Barack Obama back in February.

Todd Gitlin: I’m not writing a column on Obama. I’m writing a column on Tim Russert. I’ve been writing about Russert for a decade or so. I was writing about him—critically, in the main—when I’d never heard of Barack Obama. I’ll write straight about Russert whatever his subject. If Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee, or if Obama is, I’ll still treat him straight. If you think I get Russert wrong, criticize me for that.

Dan Kennedy comes back on his blog: “You and I have heard of Obama, and you’ve publicly endorsed him. Thus you’ve forfeited the right to evaluate Russert’s coverage of the presidential campaign without disclosing that fact. And if you do disclose it, fewer people will take you seriously. This is basic journalism ethics. Do you not get it?”

I’m curious about whether they discussed these issues privately before taking to the page.

Will there be a next punch?

The Ethics Committee comes across far more ethics-related publications than we can absorb and comment on in a thoughtful way, but it’s often a waste to not at least mention them.

Today, for example, Chairman Andy Schotz sent the committee a couple of interesting articles I thought you might like:

A Fight for Journalism Values in Santa Barbara
John Diaz at the San Francisco Chronicle: “Citizen McCaw” delivers chapter and verse of how News-Press owner Wendy McCaw poisoned a climate of ethics and professionalism.

Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon’s Hidden Hand
A Pentagon information apparatus has used television-news analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance. | Responses

I usually track journalism-ethics-related news on my feed reader, using Google Alerts. Here are a few more recent pieces from around the Web:

Chinese Academy Asks U.S. Journalists to Review ‘Creed’
A Chinese higher-education academy has responded to CNN and other Western media that delivered “distorted reports and offensive comments on China.”

Canadian Journalism Ethicist Heads to U.S.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison has selected Stephen J.A. Ward to be the first James E. Burgess Chair and Professor in Journalism Ethics and the director of a new Center for Journalism Ethics beginning in August 2008.

Redefining Journalism Ethics to Include Social Media
Liz Pope at SpinSucks.com and DenverPost.com: A code of journalism ethics needs to be redefined to include bloggers.

Do you like these news snippets? Let us know.

My thanks to Amy Gahran at Poynter Online for helping inspire this post with her “Mini-Tidbits” on journalism and technology.