Jeremy Paxman is a journalism god

27 June 2012 Rob Buckley UK TV 2 Comments

This week, we’ve been talking a bit about The Newsroom, Aaron Sorkin’s new show calling for a return to decent journalism on US TV. In it, there are well intentioned journalists who are supposed to be good at interrogating people to get the truth out of them.

Let it be stated for the record that although Jeff Daniels and co may seem hard-hitting to Aaron Sorkin, he clearly hasn’t seen the god-like Jeremy Paxman on the BBC’s Newsnight. Last night, he demolished Chloe Smith, one of the Treasury’s ministers, over a recent u-turn in policy over fuel tax duty. If you ever want to see what a proper firebrand journalist can do, this is a must-see:

Of course, Paxo has form. Possibly one of the greatest journalistic interviews in British TV history involved Jeremy Paxman interrogating the then-Home Secretary Michael Howard over certain decisions he’d made regarding prisons. It’s amazing the power of one single question and certainly Michael Howard’s reputation was never the same afterwards:

And if that’s whet your appetite, here’s a collection of great Paxman moments.

Author

  • Rob Buckley

    I’m Rob Buckley, a journalist who writes for UK media magazines that most people have never heard of although you might have heard me on the podcast Lockdown Land or Radio 5 Live’s Saturday Edition or Afternoon Edition. I’ve edited Dreamwatch, Sprocket and Cambridge Film Festival Daily; been technical editor for TV producers magazine Televisual; reviewed films for the short-lived newspaper Cambridge Insider; written features for the even shorter-lived newspaper Soho Independent; and was regularly sarcastic about television on the blink-and-you-missed-it “web site for urban hedonists” The Tribe. Since going freelance, I've contributed to the likes of Broadcast, Total Content + Media, Action TV, Off The Telly, Action Network, TV Scoop and The Custard TV.

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