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Since there is no such thing as ideological truth, it follows that to the extent a reporter is a liberal reporter or a conservative reporter, or a Democratic or Communist or Republican reporter, he is no reporter at all.

— H. L. Mencken

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Journalism

More quotes by H. L. Mencken

It is the dull man who is always sure, and the sure man who is always dull.

The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos.

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.

Smart Set (1910)

Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable.

Prejudices, Third Series (1922)

The fact is that the average man's love of liberty is nine-tenths imaginary, exactly like his love of sense, justice and truth.

All H. L. Mencken quotes →

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Journalists who make mistakes get sued for libel; historians who make mistakes get to publish a revised edition.

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In a world where everyone is a publisher, no one is an editor and that is the danger we face today.

Scott Pelley

Every newspaper editor owes tribute to the devil.

Jean de La Fontaine Lettre à Simon de Troyes (1686)

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: H. L. Mencken (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.