Section BDirections: There are 2 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by som

Section B

Directions: There are 2 passages in this section. Each passage is followed by some questions or unfinished statements. For each of them there are four choices marked A, B, C and D. You should decide on the best choice.

Many now have been breathing hot flames at our industry and so I thought it would be time to say my piece this week, after all, we in the business cannot deny that it has been a rough spring for newspaper editors and reporters. Ethical scandals great and small have soiled news- rooms from coast to coast. Everyone knows about the profound deceits of Jayson Blair at The New York Times, and the "Writergate" controversy involving Rick Bragg, which led to the departure of the two top editors at the paper. Other misdeeds have ranged from two reporters at The Salt Lake Tribune selling information to The National Enquirer, to a food writer for The Hartford Courant fired for plagiarizing recipes. Are newspaper standards going to pot？

Some say ethics are worse than ever—or are they？ The past is filled with people running photos of wrestlers in the sports section in exchange for money. In fact, ethical breaches may be less of a problem than 20 years ago. A lot of newspapers are cutting corners, but the standards in the business have improved. There were things going on in the past such as reporters writing speeches for politicians they covered and taking bribes from lobbyists but people back then were quietly moved out or they left on their own. There was no public display.

The industry as a whole is in trouble because, due to media concentration, people at the top are taking out too much money and driving the profits up. The perception is that the real customers are not those who read the paper but those who buy the stock, which damages the profession. Some of this is about resource pressure. Copydesks are overloaded and there is not enough time and more reporters are having to report by phone. The larger the size of news- papers, the less communication between divisions there tends to be. Reporters don't climb the Stairs anymore, they are highly trained people who sit in their offices and write term papers and won't sully themselves going to a greasy housing project or stand out in the rain for a few hours. The economics of journalism along with technological changes has created an atmosphere of trying to get enormous amounts of information as rapidly as possible. The important thing is to make sure the ownership understands the value of a news organization with integrity and every paper needs to slow down and remind ourselves that we have nothing to sell if the readers don't believe us.

The main idea of the first paragraph is that ______.

A．newsrooms are suffering from a decline in standards

B．there a. re too many ethical scandals going on in newspapers

C．there is a perception that newspapers should do more to correct mistakes

D．this has been a rough time for newspapers and many are wondering what is wrong