The events of 9/11 changed a lot of things about America. The practice of journalism is one of them. Five years later, the news business is still feeling the effects of that rare, transformative story that defined many careers and set permanent shifts into motion.
The media treated 9/11 not simply as a story, but as a call to arms. World wars covering vast swaths of several continents had happened before, but this was different. A vaguely defined "enemy" and a ...