sydney schanberg on bushworld - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

roachboy · 05-25-2005, 07:30 AM

the following article perhaps explains some elements that came up in the "fascism is already a reality in america" thread before it was derailed into conspiracy theory. schanberg's perspective is simply one that has not submitted to the re-enframing of journalism in the context of bushworld--one result of this re-enframing is that perspectives such as this are marginal in national discourse. which is a shame: i do not see schanberg saying very much that is even contreversial in this. i suspect that reactions may prove me wrong on this.

what do you make of schanberg's take on the present sad state of affairs, vis-a-vis journalism (do you think he is correct in his assessment? he is not without his own motives...he writes from a particular viewpoint, shaped by a particular personal history) and the effects of the bush administration's keystone kops actions over the past 4 years or so?

source:
http://villagevoice.com/news/0521,sc...g,64250,6.html

Quote:

Show of Farce
The press digs itself into holes; the government covers up its own errors?the system at work

by Sydney H. Schanberg
May 24th, 2005 10:43 AM

This would seem to be one of those moments in American history when satire becomes obsolete. It's because our national dialogue has itself become a full-blown, round-the-clock farce. The White House and the press are major players. Exhibit A: Newsweek made a telling error recently by publishing a story that lacked proper confirmation?about American military jailers desecrating the Koran to break down their Muslim prisoners. A week or so later, Islamic protest riots partly related to the story left at least 15 people dead in Afghanistan.

The Bush White House, suffering a yawning credibility gap from the Iraq war plus a global wave of anti-American sentiment, leaped on the press mistake and, even after a Newsweek apology and retraction, said the magazine should go further and "repair the damage" by "speaking out" about American values to the Muslim world. "The values that the United States stands for . . . the values we hold so dearly," as Bush spokesman Scott McClellan put it.

Reasonable citizens could not be blamed for rolling their eyes at such an exhortation. Indeed, what values has the Bush administration stood for and paraded before the world? For one, it can no longer be sanely disputed that this president led the nation into the Iraq war on a platform of false information. No stockpiles of "weapons of mass destruction" were found in Iraq. There was no imminent threat. Bush hailed our soldiers as heroes, but he sent them into battle without proper body armor or armored vehicles and without a large enough force or any real plan for restoring order after Saddam Hussein was ousted. Avoidable casualties have been the result. And the continuing scandal about the torture of Muslim prisoners needn't have happened at all if the White House had sent properly trained and disciplined units to run the detention centers.

Just what values does the loyal Mr. McClellan think all these policies and practices and behavior add up to? Does he really think we should present this list to the world as the sum of what America stands for?

Newsweek erred and has been deeply embarrassed and shaken. Unlike the president and his band, the press does make mistakes and, at least in the present era, it owns up to them.

But this story is much larger than a Newsweek article that may have contributed to unforeseen yet nasty mayhem. Our whole country is in an embarrassed and embarrassing state. We are deeply divided?fractured may be a truer word. People are uncertain and nervous about the future, yet the White House and its Republican-controlled Congress regularly paper over the war and serious domestic problems with little more than advertising slogans. And now the voters, from their separated clans and interest groups and political fraternities, scream epithets at each other?it's as if we have nothing in common as Americans.

The press is very much a part of this national dissonance. Over the past few decades, it gradually depreciated itself and dug its own hole. Even as the digital revolution enhanced reporters' fact-finding abilities and produced better investigative, serious journalism, the profession in other ways allowed itself to grow softer and looser. Gossip and celebrity chitchat crept into the news sections. We began covering the sex lives of public figures even when we could not demonstrate that their private indiscretions had any effect on their public performance or public policy. Remember the Miami Herald stakeout in 1987 at Gary Hart's townhouse that revealed his marital infidelity and ousted him from the presidential race? That was a landmark in the press's slippery slide. News became more like a game. It was entertainment. Later, of course, we gave the world the Monica saga of sex in the White House. Michael Isikoff, co-author of the Newsweek article currently in dispute, was a major unearther of the lubricious details back then. In devoting such investigative energy and resources to a love-nest story, the press took resources away from matters that actually have a tangible effect on American lives.

The press's proprietors and editors (some of the latter, to their credit, winced as they participated) told us that this was the necessary path to the future if we were to survive financially. They said we had to enliven newspapers and news on television so we could capture those 18- to 49-year-olds and thus draw the big advertisers who yearned to sell them things. "Get jiggy with it!" they told the newsroom doubters.

Almost without noticing, the press began losing its memory about its crucial adversary role. At America's beginning, the founding fathers, in establishing the fundamentals of this democracy, said a free press was necessary as one of the country's checks and balances. That explains John Peter Zenger and Thomas Paine and the First Amendment.

As amnesia about our history spread, the major news companies began making deals with the government. In 1991, you may recall, they agreed to accept the Pentagon's ground rules for covering the first Gulf war. The rules decreed that reporters had to be accompanied at all times by military babysitters who would not only select the story sites but pre-interview soldiers at those sites to avoid any lapses into truth telling. And that was how America, on television and in print, was handed its first major sanitized war. Another landmark. (The father of the current president was in the Oval Office then. Dick Cheney was the Pentagon chief.)

Journalists used to come largely from the "outsider" precincts of our culture. They were children of immigrants and working people, raised simply, not prone to cozying up to power or accommodating power. That's because the press was supposed to be a watchdog on power on behalf of the public. That has changed?not completely, but it has changed. At times now, too many reporters seem to be channeling Dickens's Oliver Twist, with their bowls outstretched toward their government minders, asking: "Please, sir, may I have some more gruel?"

Finally, into the era of press compliance stepped a presidency that had imperial ambitions and imperious ways. One of those ways is lockstep secrecy. The Bush White House's golden rule goes something like this: Jolly the press, but tell them nothing but boilerplate; hide from them anything embarrassing and anything that might give them evidence of our mistakes and fallibility. It's a little bit like a monarchy, which America thought it had shed two centuries ago. Like the first one (the reign of King George III), this one too is non-benevolent.

Facing this extreme choke hold, the Washington press corps has begun to resist, finally. The rest of us in the press should back them solidly and stand up as professionals to bring about strong change, not lip service. We are in a fight for old established principles. The nation as a whole is in the same fight, though it does not fully realize it yet.

Some people say the national cacophony is merely a season of bitter partisan jousting between Democrats and Republicans. In rebuttal, I believe the evidence is strong that the Bush government has perverted important American traditions. I believe the press, too, fell into a perversion. We welcomed the anointing of journalists as celebrities and over time sowed other bad seeds as well. The harvest was Jayson Blair, Jack Kelley, Stephen Glass, and a laundry list of other fabricators and corner-cutters who flourished under loosened standards. Some of the country's top newspaper editors gave this explanation: The Internet had created a 24-hour news cycle that inflamed the news business's competitive fever and left the editorial gatekeepers little time to winnow out the chaff and the misreporting. There's some truth in their words about the arrival of an unending news cycle. But the rest of the rationale won't wash. The devil didn't make us do it.

The river of press scandals has brought about change. Ombudspersons have multiplied at newspapers. The screening of copy has tightened up. The use of "anonymous sources" has been reduced. (Newsweek, in "A Letter to Our Readers" in its latest issue, lays out its stricter newsroom standards.) But the press remains under siege, under a microscope, trying to rebuild the people's confidence in what they read in the paper and what they're told on television.

The struggle with the Bush White House and its acolytes will also be a hard slog. They cling to an ideological view and concede nothing to those who have different beliefs. Nonetheless, the press, if it doesn't want to become the national piñata, will have to clean up its house and vigorously fight for its traditional role in this democracy.

To get an idea of how the Bush government deals with the press and public, let's take a look at how it handled the original Newsweek article, which was 354 words long and ran in the Periscope section in the May 9 issue. The reference to desecration of Islam's holy book said: "Among the previously unreported cases [of abuse at the Guantánamo Bay detention center], sources tell Newsweek: Interrogators, in an attempt to rattle suspects, flushed a Qur'an down a toilet . . . " The article went on to say this incident and other findings were "expected in an upcoming report by the U.S. Southern Command in Miami . . . "

Newsweek's editor, Mark Whitaker, says that before deciding to publish the item, "we approached two separate Defense Department officials for comment. One declined to give us a response; the other challenged another aspect of the story but did not dispute the Qur'an charge." The other "aspect," Newsweek says, was corrected before publication.

More than a week passed before the Pentagon complained about the Koran reference. In a news story in its May 18 edition, The New York Times wrote that the Pentagon spokesman, Lawrence Di Rita, "said that the military was still reviewing whether there had been any incidents of Koran abuse at the [Guantánamo] prison." Di Rita was quoted as saying: "We've not previously included [the issue of Koran desecration] in any kind of previous investigations into detainee operations, because there haven't been credible allegations to that effect." He added that "there have been instances, and we'll have more to say about it as we learn more, but where a Koran may have fallen to the floor in the course of searching a cell."

When Newsweek went back to its original source (there was only one, contrary to the citation of "sources" in the original item), the person, described as a senior government official who had been reliable in the past, said he could no longer be certain he saw that Koran reference in the Southern Command report. He said he might have read it elsewhere.

Other articles alleging Koran desecration by American interrogators have appeared in the press here and abroad. The March issue of Harper's, for example, carried an account given by a former Afghan detainee to a Daniel Rothenberg, identified as a human rights researcher. The former prisoner recounted many abuses including the following:

" . . . Then they would throw the Holy Koran on the ground or drop it in the latrine. This made us very upset."

In summary, similar allegations, based on prisoner accounts, have been aired by the International Committee of the Red Cross and others. The Pentagon's position is that its rules against mishandling the Koran are stringent and that these prisoners are lying to foment trouble.

The Pentagon has so far declined to make public the Southern Command report. The White House has still never apologized for, or retracted, its false claims about weapons of mass destruction and imminent threat.

Those are the sounds of secrecy. They are not quiet things. They are the wild, unloosed sounds of the inmates in full control of the asylum.

Charlatan · 05-25-2005, 07:47 AM

If you can find it, you should also read the acticle by Robert Kennedy Jr. in a recent Vanity Fair... He describes a strong effort by the right-wings in media to control political discourse in America... If even a part of it is true (and I believe it is) then America is in big trouble.

Ustwo · 05-25-2005, 08:08 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Charlatan

If you can find it, you should also read the acticle by Robert Kennedy Jr. in a recent Vanity Fair... He describes a strong effort by the right-wings in media to control political discourse in America... If even a part of it is true (and I believe it is) then America is in big trouble.

The left wing has controled the news media for 30 years.

Now we have some strong right wing voices in the press and the left wing media and politicians don't know what to do.

Never mind the media and journalist are still predominately left wing. Heaven forbid someone in the news media might *gasp* support a Republican.

What the left is calling a right wing take over is more a horrified reaction to, for the first time in decades (if ever), a true balance.

Perhaps Liberal America is in trouble, they are loosing their media monopoly, but America will do just fine.

Charlatan · 05-25-2005, 08:13 AM

I see nothing fair or balanced in the reporting that is happening in America today.

Ustwo · 05-25-2005, 08:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Charlatan

I see nothing fair or balanced in the reporting that is happening in America today.

If by fair and balanced you mean the left wing biased press getting to fabricate stories and spin the news in their direction without being challenged you would be correct.

Now they have to use things like facts and take accountability for what they say. My heart really bleeds for them.

Mind you, most of the media IS still biased to the left, but what is amazing is when they are challenged now, they fold like the proverbial house of cards. We won't take their lies and innuendo without challenging it, and if it doesn't hold up to scrutiny, why did they report it in the first place?

raveneye · 05-25-2005, 08:37 AM

I see nothing to disagree with there. Schanberg knows what he's talking about more than probably 99% of people who have written on the subject recently, and he's not even saying anything controversial; in fact it all seems obvious to me.

What is interesting is how this particular viewpoint came to be marginal; one could argue that increased calls for secrecy and concealment are naturally to be expected during war time, and things will return to "normal" when the country returns to peace. But I think that's too rosy a view; there are more fundamental problems, and as he points out these problems (eg press "compliance") had a genesis long before 9/11.

Charlatan · 05-25-2005, 09:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

If by fair and balanced you mean the left wing biased press getting to fabricate stories and spin the news in their direction without being challenged you would be correct.

Now they have to use things like facts and take accountability for what they say. My heart really bleeds for them.

Mind you, most of the media IS still biased to the left, but what is amazing is when they are challenged now, they fold like the proverbial house of cards. We won't take their lies and innuendo without challenging it, and if it doesn't hold up to scrutiny, why did they report it in the first place?

I am not sure what world you are living in but the discourse is increasingly (if not entirely) controlled by the right. The journalists on this end of the spectrum have made an art of getting their spin to be THE spin...

The biggest one of all is that the media has a Liberal bias.

I am all for challenging what the media has to say but all I see is right wing spin doctoring rather than journalistic integrity (i.e. questioning those in power rather than just being cheerleaders).

roachboy · 05-25-2005, 09:15 AM

i dont know, ustwo:

when i see responses like yours, i wonder if the idea behind them is that information--or "news"--should serve a therapeutic function for conservatives rather than provoke debate, ask questions, function as a check on the exercize of state power.

it is only in that kind of context that it makes any sense to me when you simultaneously acknowledge that you are being fed disinformation--but from a viewpoint you generally agree with--and then claim that "america will be just fine" in the absence of a broader spectrum of information.

inside of this, there is a truly dismal understanding of democracy, such as it is: for the right, democracy is a problem to be countered with opinon management. the idea seems to be that "opinion" got out of control during the vietnam period--the specious notion of the "vietnam syndrome" floated by the reaganites seems apropos here. so the problem with vietnam was not the manifold illegalities of that war, its brutality, its specious underpinnings--but it was the press coverage of the war, the primary fault of which was to prevent conservatives from feeling good about themselves----because the coverage at times exposed the contradictions that seperate the reality of american policies from their ideological justifications. since then--and manifestly since the reagan period--the right has worked to eliminate this problem not by adjusting policy, not by rethinking anything based on the fiasco that was vietnam (not to mention more recent fiascos) but by working to eliminate dissonant information about these same contradictions.

all this is almost funny, given the conservative cliches about their fantasy double on "the Left"--which here as elsewhere i assume refers to anyone and everyone more moderate that paul weyrich--the cliches usually center on the liberal penchant for "feel good" policy and information...maybe its easier to slide into a kind of smug know-nothing position if you attribute the functions of the press you agree with to elements of the press that you do not agree with.

it is also funny in that it seems geared toward disabling critique in periods of crisis. it seems pretty clear that the right is worried not about crisis but about the problems of disunity provoked by crisis. so the obvious solution is tightening the mechanisms and extending the reach of opinon management.

shanberg is simply rehearsing the outlines of this situation from a viewpoint not beholden to the contemporary right. this should give you a good idea of what seperates the right from the rest of us: what you endorse as a type of information looks more or less as schanberg outlines it to folk who do not share your politics.

Ustwo · 05-25-2005, 09:27 AM

Ok, sorry for the tangent and back to the OP.

I agree with much of what Mr.Schanberg is saying, but I think he is wrong about the press loosing its way and becoming the farce it is today. The press has always been a farce, home of slander, biased reporting, loose facts, and sensationalism. “Yellow” journalism and muck raking has been around a long time, and if you read some of the press from the founding fathers on, it makes what we are currently experiencing seem quite tame. There have been good journalists and journalism in the past, and in the present but there was no golden age they need to recapture, it has always been crap.

The difference between now and then, is back then the only public outlet was word of mouth or another paper. Now we have blogs, and websites, and message boards like this one to dissect each news article. We have people who have nothing better to do then check facts or note that the font used was MS default font. Information which once would never be known can now go world wide in only minutes. As such the flaws in the press are now glaring, obvious and while some may state they are new and due to the whatever reason, I claim they have always been there and only now have people woken up.

powerclown · 05-25-2005, 09:43 AM

I believe that the Media (print, radio, tv) acts soley on Editorial agendas of the various and sundry respective media outlets. In this thread example, you have the historically left-leaning Village Voice sounding off in a predictable fashion. I submit the content you see below as examples one might gather from sources opposite the Village Voice et al. The conclusions are yours to construct. Amidst a fiercely biased political landscape, one can easily find media agendas ranging the entire political spectrum, if one wishes. Google, etc., makes the information available to anyone able to type or dictate.

Quote:

Extreme Conservatives vs. Unlabeled Liberals

In the six months since November’s elections, network reporters have zeroed in on “conservatives” — especially “religious conservatives” — as an energized and unwelcome force in American politics. As TV told it, George W. Bush won re-election because of strong support from “social conservatives” and would pack the courts with “conservative” judges. It was “conservatives” who pushed Terri Schiavo’s right-to-life case, and “conservatives” like Tom DeLay and John Bolton were embroiled in controversy.

It’s true conservatives have been making a lot of headlines, but even as the networks painted the right side of the spectrum as ideological, and even a tad fanatical, reporters rarely used ideological terms to define liberals. Since Election Day, network reporters branded politicians or groups as “conservative” 395 times, compared to 59 “liberal” labels, a greater than six-to-one disparity. Our last review in 2002 (using the same methodology, but looking only at evening shows) found a four-to-one skew.

As before, MRC analysts used the Nexis database to examine each use of “liberal” and “conservative” on ABC, CBS and NBC morning and evening news programs from November 3 through May 2. We rejected labels that weren’t political (a “conservative investment”) or outside the U.S. context (all those labels of Pope Benedict XVI, for example). We also excluded labels applied by a news source rather than the network reporter.

CBS provided the fewest labels (95) but the worst bias: just seven liberal tags, compared to 88 conservative ones, more than a twelve-to-one skew. NBC, whose three-hour Today spends more time on politics than other morning shows, had the most labels (193), but only 26 liberal modifiers. ABC had the most “balanced” approach — 140 conservative tags vs. 26 liberal labels, a five-to-one disparity. A few examples:

An Imbalanced Approach: On the April 26 Today, Katie Couric introduced a debate segment by branding just one side: “Dee Dee Myers was President Clinton’s first White House press secretary, and Tucker Carlson is a conservative commentator and host for MSNBC.” Were we supposed to believe Myers is non-ideological?

On the March 2 NBC Nightly News, David Gregory talked about “the conservative group USA Next” and the “senior lobbying group AARP,” ideological opposites in the Social Security debate. On all four occasions the networks mentioned USA Next by name, they correctly called it “conservative,” but not once during the six-month study period did a network reporter describe the AARP as “liberal.”

Angry Extremists: On the April 25 Early Show, CBS’s Joie Chen portrayed conservatives as an angry mob: “Thousands of Christian conservatives gathered in Kentucky, seething over what they call the ‘filibuster against faith,' and spoiling for a political fight.” Shortly after the election, on the November 8 Good Morning America, reporter Manuel Medrano trotted out an extreme label: “Arch-conservatives worry that [new Attorney General Alberto] Gonzales may not be conservative enough on hot-button issues.” On the November 4 World News Tonight, ABC’s Linda Douglass warned viewers that “the Senate has gotten much more conservative. One new Senator wants the death penalty for people who perform abortions.”

It’s not that network reporters misuse the “conservative” label. Rather, journalists systematically fail to identify those who seek a secular society and a strong, government-controlled, social welfare system as ideologues of the Left. The media’s labeling scheme presents “conservatives” as less mainstream than their ideological adversaries, even as election returns show that it’s liberals who need to start swimming back to the center.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

A Faked Hug?
U.S. Coerced Iraqi Voters?
MSNBC’s Chris Matthews Pushes Crackpot Conspiracies

Unlike Dan Rather, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews at least doesn’t deny that he brings his liberal opinions with him when he anchors the third-place cable news networks live coverage of political events. But in recent days he’s been using his perch to suggest wacky conspiracy theories that might make even Howard Dean blush.

During last night’s State of the Union coverage, Matthews suggested that the emotional highlight of the evening — the embrace of a mother whose Marine son was killed in Fallujah and an Iraqi human rights activist who braved insurgent threats to vote on Sunday — was cynically engineered by President Bush “to push his numbers on Social Security reform, just to get his general appeal up a bit, a couple of points.” Only left-wing MSNBC host Ron Reagan agreed with Matthews premise. Newsweek’s Jon Meacham called it “absurd.”

Matthews persisted. “The only question is whether that Iraqi woman was prompted to go up and hug Janet Norwood [the mother of the Marine] by some staffer,” he told his mostly skeptical panel. If a rebuttal is even necessary, Mrs. Norwood appeared on ABC’s Good Morning America on Thursday, and explained that she and her husband “had no idea who was going to be there. We met just as we went in the door.”

Matthews was also out in far left field a few hours after eight million Iraqis voted in Sunday’s free elections, wondering if our troops had bullied them into making the trip to the polls: “Was there no pushing by American soldiers or coalition forces to make people vote or discourage them from not voting? Was it a clean turnout, in other words?” he asked NBC’s Brian Williams. Williams rejected Matthews’ theory.

A couple of hours after Matthews signed off last night, the left-wing Air America radio host Janeane Garofalo showed up as a guest on MSNBC. She sneered that it was “disgusting” for House members to salute the bravery of Iraqi voters by holding up similarly ink-stained fingers, and mockingly held up her hand in a Nazi salute. Next to her, Chris Matthews looks downright mainstream.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

NOTABLE QUOTABLES

A bi-weekly compilation of the latest outrageous, sometimes humorous,
quotes in the liberal media.

May 20, 2005
(Vol. Eighteen; No. 11)

Conspiracy to Embarrass Media

Anchor Keith Olbermann: “Why does a book in a toilet start riots, but a war doesn’t?...Newsweek first apologizing for the report over the weekend, and then late this afternoon, formally retracting the story....Something smells funny to me about this Newsweek apology, then retraction. Do you sense the same thing, and what the heck are we smelling?”
MSNBC Analyst Craig Crawford: “...This is a pattern we’ve seen before, Keith. We saw it in the CBS case, as bad as the supposedly fake memorandum that Dan Rather used in the 60 Minutes report on Bush’s National Guard service, as bad as that was, they did show it to the administration ahead of time. It does make you wonder if sometimes they set up the news media.”
— MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann, May 16.

“The way Craig Crawford reconstructed it, this one went similarly to the way the Killian [60 Minutes] memos story evolved at the White House. The news organization turns to the administration for a denial. The administration says nothing. The news organization runs the story. The administration jumps on the necks of the news organization with both feet — or has its proxies do it for them. That’s beyond shameful. It’s treasonous.”
— Keith Olbermann in a posting to his MSNBC.com “Bloggerman” Web log at 9:45pm EDT May 16, about 90 minutes after his exchange with Crawford.

Of Course, Army Is Still Guilty

“‘What we know,’ he [Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman] said, ‘is that the Newsweek story about a Koran destruction is demonstrably false.’ Demonstrably false? At Guantanamo Bay, almost nothing is demonstrable, especially to the Muslim world. It’s a secret prison, for good reason, perhaps. But secret. What really goes on at Guantanamo Bay, no one really knows.”
— ABC reporter John Donvan on the May 16 Nightline.

“Do you think the volume of the protests [from Bush administration officials] is, perhaps, a bit calculated to deflect some attention away from the policies at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo?...Given the other abuses, I guess what I’m getting at here is, does Newsweek deserve all the blame assuming that its story was incorrect?”
— Anchor Chris Bury to Akbar Ahmed, Chairman of Islamic studies and professor of international relations at American University, on ABC’s Nightline, May 16.

Mag Caved to Bush’s “Pressure”

“Under pressure from the White House, Newsweek today retracted a story that led to deadly rioting in Afghanistan.... Over the weekend, Newsweek said its source could no longer confirm the report, and the magazine’s editor apologized. Then late today, under pressure from the White House, Newsweek retracted the entire story.”
— Bob Schieffer introducing the May 16 CBS Evening News.

“Did you get pressure from the White House, Dan?”
“The administration’s criticism of Newsweek has intensified over the last 24 hours following the so-called apology on Sunday. Do you think there is a bit of piling on here from the administration?”
— Co-host Matt Lauer to Newsweek Washington bureau chief Dan Klaidman on NBC’s Today, May 17. Klaidman denied there was any pressure exerted on Newsweek.

Simply Beyond Help

ABC White House correspondent Terry Moran: “Scott, you said that the retraction by Newsweek magazine of its story is a good first step. What else does the President want this American magazine to do?”
Press Secretary Scott McClellan: “...We would encourage Newsweek to do all that they can to help repair the damage that has been done, particularly in the region. And I think Newsweek can do that by talking about the way they got this wrong, and pointing out what the policies and practices of the United States military are when it comes to the handling of the Holy Koran. The military put in place policies and procedures to make sure that the Koran...is handled with the utmost care and respect....”
Moran: “With respect, who made you the editor of Newsweek? Do you think it’s appropriate for you, at that podium, speaking with the authority of the President...to tell an American magazine what they should print?”
— Exchange at the May 17 White House news briefing.

Anchor Bob Schieffer: “I must say I can never recall a White House telling a news organization to go report X, Y or Z. Can you ever remember anything like that?”
Reporter Wyatt Andrews: “I’ve thought about that, Bob. I cannot remember any circumstance like this from the White House podium, especially in this context, as if Newsweek is now obligated to repair the damage that America has suffered to its reputation overseas. Never seen it.”
— CBS Evening News, May 17.

Twisting Ken Starr’s Words

CBS’s Gloria Borger: “Just who gets to sit on the Supreme Court? And should we appoint Justices who want to rule on everything from abortion to gay marriage to civil rights? That’s why many conservatives consider the fight over judges their political Armageddon. But conservative icon and former federal Judge Ken Starr says it’s gotten out of control.”
Ken Starr, to Borger: “This is a radical, radical departure from our history and from our traditions, and it amounts to an assault on the judicial branch of government.”
Borger: “Starr, who investigated the Monica Lewinsky case against President Clinton, tells CBS News that the Republican plan to end the filibuster may be unwise.”
Starr: “It may prove to have the kind of long-term boomerang effect, damage on the institution of the Senate that thoughtful Senators may come to regret.”
— CBS Evening News, May 9.

“Kenneth Starr — an appeals court judge on the D.C. circuit from 1983-1989 — came out against the Republican plan to ban judicial filibusters on Monday. He told CBS Evening News that it is a ‘radical, radical departure from our history and our traditions, and it amounts to an assault on the judicial branch of government.’”
— May 10 Associated Press dispatch by Jesse Holland.

vs.

“The ‘radical departure’ snippet was specifically addressed — although this is not evidenced whatever from the clip — to the practice of invoking judicial philosophy as a grounds for voting against a qualified nominee of integrity and experience....Our friends are way off base in assuming that the CBS snippets, as used, represent (a) my views, or (b) what I in fact said.”
— Ken Starr in an e-mail he sent to National Review writer Ramesh Ponnuru and posted May 12 on National Review’s “The Corner” Web log.

“Very Conservative” John Warner

“It’s interesting to me that the person who may actually be the deciding vote could be John Warner, the very conservative Senator from Virginia, who may — I’m saying may; there’s been no public announcement — could vote with the Democrats to defeat this.”
— CBS’s Bob Schieffer discussing a proposal to end the Senate Democrats’ filibuster of judicial nominees, on Face the Nation, May 15. According to the American Conservative Union’s 2004 scorecard, Warner was tied with John McCain as the fifth least conservative of 51 Republican Senators, behind only Mike DeWine, Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, and Lincoln Chafee.

“Disgusted” If Filibuster Fails?

“If the ‘nuclear option’ is played out, don’t you think voters are going to be disgusted with all politicians and say come on, get out of the sandbox?”
— NBC’s Katie Couric to Republican Senator Arlen Specter on the May 13 Today.

Informed Putin vs. Ignorant Bush

Anchor Bob Schieffer: “Let me ask you this other question, though, Mike. Do you find him [Russian President Vladimir Putin] informed on what’s going on in the West?”
Mike Wallace: “You know something? He’s a foreign intelligence expert, that’s where he came from. And unlike President Bush who, I understand, says, ‘Look, I get the news, I don’t read newspapers, I get the news from my aides,’ he [Putin] said, ‘Not me, I read newspapers all day long. I don’t want to hear the biases of my aides. I don’t want to hear what they believe is the news. I want to find out for myself. And that’s why I read papers.’”
— Exchange on the May 9 CBS Evening News, where Wallace was showing additional clips from his interview with Putin for 60 Minutes.

vs.

Mike Wallace: “Mr. Putin apparently believed that Dan’s resignation as anchor of the CBS Evening News meant he had been fired from CBS.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin: “On our TV screens, we saw him resigning. We understood that he was forced to resign by his bosses at CBS. This is a problem of your democracy, not ours.”
Wallace to Putin: “He still works for CBS News. He continues to work, as a matter of fact, on 60 Minutes.”
— CBS’s 60 Minutes, May 8.

Mean Assault on Beloved Liberal

“It’s like he [President Bush] stuck a broomstick in his [FDR’s] wheelchair wheels.”
— Newsweek’s Jon Meacham on MSNBC’s Imus in the Morning May 9, discussing Bush’s criticism of Roosevelt’s Yalta deal with Stalin on control of post-war Europe.

CBS Ethics Guide, “Never Used!”

“My yard sale consisted mostly of things I found lying around the office, like a box of macaroni and cheese from the ’96 Republican convention, and some boring personnel manuals. ‘CBS News Standards.’ This is the standards we work by. That book’s never been used.”
— CBS’s Steve Hartman showcasing some of the items he tried to sell while working on a story on yard sales for 60 Minutes Wednesday, April 27. Hartman marked the spiral-bound guide, “Never used!” and priced it at 50 cents.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Will They Dismiss a Real Vote, When They Fell for a Fraud?

While the network news gurus have spent weeks questioning whether Sunday’s elections in Iraq would (A) occur on time or (B) be accepted as legitimate, it’s important to remember that when Saddam Hussein called a vote in October 2002 as coalition troops moved into place, ABC, CNN, and NBC accepted the dictator’s “100 percent” vote as a credible plebiscite, not a joke. To his credit CBS’s Tom Fenton explained why everyone voted aye: “You would be foolish not to — a U.N. human rights report said 500 people were jailed in the last referendum after casting a negative ballot.” But other networks, desperate for access into Saddam’s Iraq, played dumb and parroted the dictator’s script:

? “Iraqi citizens are preparing to go to the polls to decide whether Hussein stays in office.” — Preview of an October 14, 2002 segment on CNN’s American Morning with Paula Zahn posted on CNN’s Web site.

? “Seven years ago, when the last referendum took place, Saddam Hussein won 99.96 percent of the vote. Of course, it is impossible to say whether that’s a true measure of the Iraqi people’s feelings.” — ABC reporter David Wright, World News Tonight, October 15, 2002.

? “All 11,440,638 eligible voters went to the polls with one thought: Yes to Saddam Hussein! The government proclaimed it a victory of light over darkness, good over evil. It seemed more like a political miracle.“ — NBC reporter Keith Miller on Today, October 16, 2002.

? Diane Sawyer: “I read this morning that he’s [Saddam Hussein] also said the love that the Iraqis have for him is so much greater than anything Americans feel for their President because he’s been loved for 35 years, he says, the whole 35 years.”
Dan Harris in Baghdad: “He is one to point out quite frequently that he is part of a historical trend in this country of restoring Iraq to its greatness, its historical greatness. He points out frequently that he was elected with a 100 percent margin recently.” — ABC’s Good Morning America, March 7, 2003.

link

roachboy · 05-25-2005, 12:29 PM

the above material--the last segment at least, comes from the pen of the right honorable l. brent bozell, the right's pet "media watchdog" whose methods are questionable at best.

read the mission statement of bazell's organization here:

http://www.mediaresearch.org/about/aboutwelcome.asp

the political character of this particular source is evident--the group bozell fronts (or is) set out to "demonstrate" the conservative canard about "liberal biais" in the press...he assumed the existence of this biais up front and made it the center for the construction of largely anecdotal articles that "prove" his point.

bozell is a beautiful example of the type of guy who functions to provide an echo for the general mechanism of projection that has been central to right ideology for at least a decade: if you are doing something questionable, blame the other side for exactly the same thing.

i do not think you could say the same about sydney schanberg--had the article at the start of the thread been bit from an editorial in the village voice, i could perhaps see the point of the above--but it is simply published there by someone with a long and very well-known track record as a journalist--for the most part associated with the new york times, a pulitzer prize winner, etc.

if i have time later, i'll locate data about the extent to which in 2005 television has become the dominant medium for the gathering of infotainment by many americans. with all its obvious problems--inability to contextualize information, inability to accomidate complexity--on and on--much of the bush's "war on terror" is as it is, in my view, because it is fitted to television--quick images of arbitrary violence, no thought about cause, no context--ridiculous interpretations floated on the basis of fragmented information. a significant element in what schanberg is saying is driven by the gradual shift away from print media and toward television in this regard.

the contemporary right media apparatus is organized on very different grounds than has been the american press before it: it is a tightly co-ordinated space---consider the roger ailes chaired fox news, whose working practices are fairly well documented--but if you want to see a nice quick and painful demonstration of them, simply watch "outfoxed"--the way fox news works internally is not like how other networks have operated--there is a daily set of talking points, which are purely political in motivation, that is circulated throughout the faux news set-up every day that dictates from the top which stories will be covered, which lines willbe emphasized, which stories ignored, etc. this is not a news organization: it is a purely political operation that uses video footage as a kind of footnote system to conceal the political nature of what the network is doing. you will not find parallel types of "news" gathering and dissemination outside right media.

there is abundant documentation about the history, nature, and limits of this conservative instrument for what amounts to cultural warfare. i find it baffling that the existence of it is still up for debate. i can see maybe why conservatives themselves would at points prefer to pretend that there no particular difference in kind between the information sources they prefer and others--but i think this has no empirical correlate, is simply a kind of wish that is expressed.

that this apparatus is not coincident with the entirety of the press in the states is obvious--i am not sure what the point is of saying it--that the dominant frame of reference within which most of the american press operates is conservative is also obvious--think about the extent to which all media outlets in the states understand capitalism as an unqualified good, and move from there. very little space for serious critique of the existing order, either at the economic level (globalizing capitalism) or at the political level. that the right media relies on perpetuating the illusion that it is marginal, under attack from its evil fantasy double--you know, this fiction they enjoy called "the Left" in america (which again seems to lump together everyone to the left of paul weyrich)--is another form of projection. nothing else.

that the net provides easy acces to an international press, and thereby to the possibility of gathering and processing information from viewpoints not either directly dominated by the american right or working from a frame of reference significantly shaped by the right, is a fine thing--but at the same time, it reflects the sad state of affairs that obtains domestically that one would have to search out other papers from other countries just to get anything like an idea of what is happening in the world outside the narrow, self-defeating view of the bush administration and its buddies in the conservative press.

maybe the situation would not be so bad if the conservative press provided anything like an accurate picture of what is going on in the world--but it doesnt--think about the iraq war for example. personally, i think conservatives in general are afraid of the world, afraid of dissonance, afraid of information, afraid to think that maybe reality is complex and easy judgements are absurd.

but what keeps despair at bay is that often individual conservatives, when i talk to them or exchange quips on messageboards with them disguised as debate, are not as limited in their thinking and views as the media they draw information from is or would have them be. what this means is there is some reason for hope for the rest of us: over time this version of the right will fall in and its constituency scatter. you cant lie systematically to intelligent people for long before those people start to withdraw consent.

but this changes nothing about the state of affairs.

Elphaba · 05-25-2005, 05:53 PM

I tend to agree that the "liberal media" has become an urban myth. My local paper juxtaposes one conservative leaning journalist with one liberal leaning each day. Reading George Will and Molly Ivans on the same day, on the same topic is a catalyst to becoming more informed - at least in my experience as a centrist.

powerclown · 05-25-2005, 08:24 PM

Urban myth indeed, Elphaba.

Of course, it might be a problem when looking to discredit a single link in opposition to the thesis of a vast right wing media conspiracy when there are dozens upon dozens upon dozens of such links available. One need only cast their net and trawl about for a link that will inevitably harmonize with their political sensibilities. In regards to Mr. Shanberg, one can see a distinguished and ideologically vocal media creature whose critical writing was devoted to the the poor and the oppressed, at times taking on big business and industry, and opposing - with his pen - movers and shakers and decision-makers of big industry (job creators?). The original article in this thread comes as no surprise from one whose life was shaped chronicling (and, opposing) the Cambodian War of 1970-75, which ultimately resulted in Hollywood taking an interest in his work, the result being a movie with a rather bleak and hostile outlook on the American role in the conflict, entitled The Killing Fields.

A subject of interest is the encouraging phenomena of the role that the Internet is playing in the political realities of America, and - one hopes - the rest of the world as well. Where once upon a time people were relegated to the role of passive recipients of information relayed to them by strange and anonymous sources, there are now empowered and ordinary citizens who can read, disseminate, circulate and even broadcast their own viewpoints before an entire world audience. The democratization of information that the internet brings allows citizens to be informed to an extent impossible even 15 years ago. While television is still the dominant media appliance in the household, things are changing in favor of interconnectivity and user customization of the media experience. As it applies to the political nature of this thread, the internet has provided citizens with the ability to balance the left leaning politcal agendas of content providers such as cnn (tv), slate (web) or neil rogers (radio), as well as their ideological counterparts. Modern-thinking individuals understand that competition for power and desire to set the agenda can characterize high-profile, ratings driven media outlets. It is important to remind oneself that first and foremost, content providers are in business to make a profit like any other business. If people aren't watching or listening or reading a particular media source - for whatever reason - it's bad for business. Next time the circus comes to your town, remind yourself that the hawker hollering for your attention to play his games for a farthing is exactly similar to the orchestrated seduction of any competent and successful news program, liberal or otherwise

There is talk in this thread of a conservative bias in today's media as it relates to American politics. Perhaps a natural response to recent political activities in America, as regards the unexpected popularity of President Bush? What might not be as obvious at first glance is the anger and resentment some individuals harbor when they feel deceived or betrayed by an authority figure. One need realize that what makes up the mainstream media who commentate on the American political scene are highly educated, successful and talented people from the top schools and universities in America. These schools have been around for centuries, they have tradition, and they operate on standards of conduct they themselves created in years past. They have become authorities in their field, similar to any such profession that has developed an expertise over time and through experience - be it farmers, salesmen, miners, doctors, designers, florists. Within a media organization or any other business-driven organization are trained individuals of varying beliefs and political values going about their work, one faction competing against the other for a larger slice of viewership.

As far as the viewer-reader-listener is concerned, what is most important is freedom of choice, and media companies know this. In a free society, expression is the currency of the realm, mandated in law by the Consitution. In America, this means that information consumers have a wider political spectrum from which to get their information than ever before. Into this scene comes the addition of personal internet blogs that have matured into outlets of expression which now compete with the established media players for the viewership of an audience. Conservative blogs keep the liberal media honest, liberal blogs commentate on those currently in seats of power and more. It is simply a matter of picking and choosing whatever media outlet one desires to keep them informed. In this day and age, to say that one source of information is more prevalent than the other is erroneous and can be proven so simply by changing the tv channel, tuning the radio dial, visiting a magazine stand, or typing a given url on the net. To insinuate otherwise would be to insult the intelligence of even the typically-informed consumer. The proof is in the pudding, goes the saying.

Elphaba · 05-25-2005, 09:39 PM

You have made several good points PowerClown (I hate these fake names). Let me bring the argument in another direction.

The deregulation of media ownership has caused most media outlets to be owned by a few major corporations. Do you honestly belief that General Electric is a part of the "liberal media?"

Ustwo · 05-26-2005, 05:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elphaba

You have made several good points PowerClown (I hate these fake names). Let me bring the argument in another direction.

The deregulation of media ownership has caused most media outlets to be owned by a few major corporations. Do you honestly belief that General Electric is a part of the "liberal media?"

Ownership is only relevant if the owners are pushing their personal agenda on the network (such as CNN). Most corporate ownership is about profit, and as long as they are making a profit they stop worrying there. It is the producer/editor/big name reporters that tend to decide what is covered and how it is covered. CBS isn't getting a shake up because of its obvious liberal bias, its getting a shake up because its ratings are in the toilet. If CBS had the #1 news show instead of being beat even by cable, you would see no changes.

Elphaba · 05-26-2005, 04:10 PM

Ustwo, I believe both of our points are made in this article:

Hidden Angle: Fortifying the Firewall
By Susan Q. Stranahan
CJR Daily (Columbia Journalism Review)

Tuesday 24 May 2005

BP, the giant oil company, has adopted a "zero tolerance" policy for bad news. Ad Age reports today that BP has informed print publications that its ads must be removed from any edition containing "objectionable editorial coverage."

According to Ad Age, BP wants advance notification "of any news text or visuals…that directly mention the company, a competitor or the oil-and-energy industry."

BP's action comes on the heels of a similar decision last week by Morgan Stanley, which also has said it will pull ads if negative stories about the beleaguered financial services provider are set to appear.

Last month, General Motors went a step further and pulled all its corporate ads from the Los Angeles Times to protest an April 6 column by the Times' Pulitzer Prize winning auto writer Dan Neil in which Neil blamed GM's troubles on its management and called for them to be fired. GM was reportedly spending $10 million a year to promote its cars in the Times. One would think the troubled automaker would have more to worry about than Dan Neil's column, but apparently not. So far the Times has not caved, and it seems safe to say that it won't as long as the current editors are in the saddle.

But in a way, the decisions of BP and Morgan Stanley are more brazen than GM's. After all, GM acted after the objectionable column was published -- as it has every right to. BP and Morgan Stanley, however, are using the threat of withdrawn ads (and withdrawn ad revenue) as thinly-veiled efforts to dictate editorial content -- in advance.

In response to Morgan Stanley's decision, Wall Street Journal publisher Karen Elliott House told Ad Age's Jon Fine that the pre-emptive threats won't work. "It would not be a practical condition at The Wall Street Journal," said House. "The ad department has no knowledge of what stories are running in the next morning's newspaper."

It's reassuring to know that the firewall that separates the business and news operations at the Journal is inviolate, and that reporters don't have ad salesmen looking over their shoulders. But that may not be the case at other publications, especially those in more dire financial straits who find themselves threatened with the carrot-and-stick of ad revenue offered and ad revenue withdrawn.

BP's policy harkens back to a 1997 demand by Chrysler Group that magazine sales staffs warn the automaker of potential "offensive" or "provocative" articles. The policy was abandoned after several months, Ad Age reports, when the Magazine Publishers of America and the American Society of Magazine Editors took "the unusual step of issuing a joint policy on the topic of editorial integrity that bars magazines from giving advertisers a sneak peek at stories, photos or tables of contents for upcoming issues."

Maybe it's time for those two organizations -- plus editors and publishers of newspapers as well -- to step to the plate and explain once again to advertisers (and to their readers) why it's important to keep church separate from state.

Locobot · 05-27-2005, 05:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

Ownership is only relevant if the owners are pushing their personal agenda on the network (such as CNN). Most corporate ownership is about profit, and as long as they are making a profit they stop worrying there. It is the producer/editor/big name reporters that tend to decide what is covered and how it is covered. CBS isn't getting a shake up because of its obvious liberal bias, its getting a shake up because its ratings are in the toilet. If CBS had the #1 news show instead of being beat even by cable, you would see no changes.

I see owner influence over content to be inevitable, it's up to us to judge the extent of that influence. Most American newspapers have mechanisms in place through their editorial board to limit the reach of the owners. TV is different. There is a very clear pattern of Rupert Murdoch and G.E. controlling the content and scope of coverage on their respective news providers - Fox news, NBC, MSNBC. CNN's coverage has become subltly more generic since Ted Turner lost complete control. They even hired Mr. Gee-whiz Anderson Cooper.

CBS has 60 Minutes which is still pretty much the best rated "news" program on TV. Some of the best (and worst) reporting is still coming out of CBS news, their reporters tend to be old enough to remember an older journalistic tradition (or old enough to not give a shit anymore).

Any television news can be taken only at face value.

Mantus · 05-27-2005, 06:35 PM

Over the last decade news media figured out that the US consumer doesn't want to make their own judgements concerning the news. The consumer wants to be sold both news and it's meaning.

CNN was the first to capitalize on this. Fox News was the first one to actually provide a full package by creating news specifically for the Republican viewer. This was a brilian move by Muchdoch allowing Fox to tap into an enourmous audience.

The problem is that instead of being smart and drawing on the other major segment of the populous: the Democrat viewers; all the other news medial outlets just tried to make themselves a clone of Fox.

The democrat autdience still doesnt have it's own propoganda machine. Despite what some people may think. There is a differnece between bias reporting and the full blown subordinate relationship Fox shares with the current administration.

Yet I am not here to state that lefties need their own media outlet. We need real news back. New that reports and allows the viewer to make up their own minds. Unfortunately the only way this change will happen is if the consumer body wants it to happen. Which isn't very likelly.

Thats my take on it.

05-25-2005, 07:47 AM	#2 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	If you can find it, you should also read the acticle by Robert Kennedy Jr. in a recent Vanity Fair... He describes a strong effort by the right-wings in media to control political discourse in America... If even a part of it is true (and I believe it is) then America is in big trouble. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

05-25-2005, 08:13 AM	#4 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	I see nothing fair or balanced in the reporting that is happening in America today. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

05-25-2005, 09:15 AM	#8 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	i dont know, ustwo: when i see responses like yours, i wonder if the idea behind them is that information--or "news"--should serve a therapeutic function for conservatives rather than provoke debate, ask questions, function as a check on the exercize of state power. it is only in that kind of context that it makes any sense to me when you simultaneously acknowledge that you are being fed disinformation--but from a viewpoint you generally agree with--and then claim that "america will be just fine" in the absence of a broader spectrum of information. inside of this, there is a truly dismal understanding of democracy, such as it is: for the right, democracy is a problem to be countered with opinon management. the idea seems to be that "opinion" got out of control during the vietnam period--the specious notion of the "vietnam syndrome" floated by the reaganites seems apropos here. so the problem with vietnam was not the manifold illegalities of that war, its brutality, its specious underpinnings--but it was the press coverage of the war, the primary fault of which was to prevent conservatives from feeling good about themselves----because the coverage at times exposed the contradictions that seperate the reality of american policies from their ideological justifications. since then--and manifestly since the reagan period--the right has worked to eliminate this problem not by adjusting policy, not by rethinking anything based on the fiasco that was vietnam (not to mention more recent fiascos) but by working to eliminate dissonant information about these same contradictions. all this is almost funny, given the conservative cliches about their fantasy double on "the Left"--which here as elsewhere i assume refers to anyone and everyone more moderate that paul weyrich--the cliches usually center on the liberal penchant for "feel good" policy and information...maybe its easier to slide into a kind of smug know-nothing position if you attribute the functions of the press you agree with to elements of the press that you do not agree with. it is also funny in that it seems geared toward disabling critique in periods of crisis. it seems pretty clear that the right is worried not about crisis but about the problems of disunity provoked by crisis. so the obvious solution is tightening the mechanisms and extending the reach of opinon management. shanberg is simply rehearsing the outlines of this situation from a viewpoint not beholden to the contemporary right. this should give you a good idea of what seperates the right from the rest of us: what you endorse as a type of information looks more or less as schanberg outlines it to folk who do not share your politics. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

05-25-2005, 09:27 AM	#9 (permalink)
Ustwo Pissing in the cornflakes	Ok, sorry for the tangent and back to the OP. I agree with much of what Mr.Schanberg is saying, but I think he is wrong about the press loosing its way and becoming the farce it is today. The press has always been a farce, home of slander, biased reporting, loose facts, and sensationalism. “Yellow” journalism and muck raking has been around a long time, and if you read some of the press from the founding fathers on, it makes what we are currently experiencing seem quite tame. There have been good journalists and journalism in the past, and in the present but there was no golden age they need to recapture, it has always been crap. The difference between now and then, is back then the only public outlet was word of mouth or another paper. Now we have blogs, and websites, and message boards like this one to dissect each news article. We have people who have nothing better to do then check facts or note that the font used was MS default font. Information which once would never be known can now go world wide in only minutes. As such the flaws in the press are now glaring, obvious and while some may state they are new and due to the whatever reason, I claim they have always been there and only now have people woken up. __________________ Agents of the enemies who hold office in our own government, who attempt to eliminate our "freedoms" and our "right to know" are posting among us, I fear.....on this very forum. - host Obama - Know a Man by the friends he keeps. Last edited by Ustwo; 05-25-2005 at 09:29 AM..

05-25-2005, 12:29 PM	#11 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	the above material--the last segment at least, comes from the pen of the right honorable l. brent bozell, the right's pet "media watchdog" whose methods are questionable at best. read the mission statement of bazell's organization here: http://www.mediaresearch.org/about/aboutwelcome.asp the political character of this particular source is evident--the group bozell fronts (or is) set out to "demonstrate" the conservative canard about "liberal biais" in the press...he assumed the existence of this biais up front and made it the center for the construction of largely anecdotal articles that "prove" his point. bozell is a beautiful example of the type of guy who functions to provide an echo for the general mechanism of projection that has been central to right ideology for at least a decade: if you are doing something questionable, blame the other side for exactly the same thing. i do not think you could say the same about sydney schanberg--had the article at the start of the thread been bit from an editorial in the village voice, i could perhaps see the point of the above--but it is simply published there by someone with a long and very well-known track record as a journalist--for the most part associated with the new york times, a pulitzer prize winner, etc. if i have time later, i'll locate data about the extent to which in 2005 television has become the dominant medium for the gathering of infotainment by many americans. with all its obvious problems--inability to contextualize information, inability to accomidate complexity--on and on--much of the bush's "war on terror" is as it is, in my view, because it is fitted to television--quick images of arbitrary violence, no thought about cause, no context--ridiculous interpretations floated on the basis of fragmented information. a significant element in what schanberg is saying is driven by the gradual shift away from print media and toward television in this regard. the contemporary right media apparatus is organized on very different grounds than has been the american press before it: it is a tightly co-ordinated space---consider the roger ailes chaired fox news, whose working practices are fairly well documented--but if you want to see a nice quick and painful demonstration of them, simply watch "outfoxed"--the way fox news works internally is not like how other networks have operated--there is a daily set of talking points, which are purely political in motivation, that is circulated throughout the faux news set-up every day that dictates from the top which stories will be covered, which lines willbe emphasized, which stories ignored, etc. this is not a news organization: it is a purely political operation that uses video footage as a kind of footnote system to conceal the political nature of what the network is doing. you will not find parallel types of "news" gathering and dissemination outside right media. there is abundant documentation about the history, nature, and limits of this conservative instrument for what amounts to cultural warfare. i find it baffling that the existence of it is still up for debate. i can see maybe why conservatives themselves would at points prefer to pretend that there no particular difference in kind between the information sources they prefer and others--but i think this has no empirical correlate, is simply a kind of wish that is expressed. that this apparatus is not coincident with the entirety of the press in the states is obvious--i am not sure what the point is of saying it--that the dominant frame of reference within which most of the american press operates is conservative is also obvious--think about the extent to which all media outlets in the states understand capitalism as an unqualified good, and move from there. very little space for serious critique of the existing order, either at the economic level (globalizing capitalism) or at the political level. that the right media relies on perpetuating the illusion that it is marginal, under attack from its evil fantasy double--you know, this fiction they enjoy called "the Left" in america (which again seems to lump together everyone to the left of paul weyrich)--is another form of projection. nothing else. that the net provides easy acces to an international press, and thereby to the possibility of gathering and processing information from viewpoints not either directly dominated by the american right or working from a frame of reference significantly shaped by the right, is a fine thing--but at the same time, it reflects the sad state of affairs that obtains domestically that one would have to search out other papers from other countries just to get anything like an idea of what is happening in the world outside the narrow, self-defeating view of the bush administration and its buddies in the conservative press. maybe the situation would not be so bad if the conservative press provided anything like an accurate picture of what is going on in the world--but it doesnt--think about the iraq war for example. personally, i think conservatives in general are afraid of the world, afraid of dissonance, afraid of information, afraid to think that maybe reality is complex and easy judgements are absurd. but what keeps despair at bay is that often individual conservatives, when i talk to them or exchange quips on messageboards with them disguised as debate, are not as limited in their thinking and views as the media they draw information from is or would have them be. what this means is there is some reason for hope for the rest of us: over time this version of the right will fall in and its constituency scatter. you cant lie systematically to intelligent people for long before those people start to withdraw consent. but this changes nothing about the state of affairs. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 05-25-2005 at 12:35 PM..

05-25-2005, 08:37 AM	#6 (permalink)
raveneye Born Against	I see nothing to disagree with there. Schanberg knows what he's talking about more than probably 99% of people who have written on the subject recently, and he's not even saying anything controversial; in fact it all seems obvious to me. What is interesting is how this particular viewpoint came to be marginal; one could argue that increased calls for secrecy and concealment are naturally to be expected during war time, and things will return to "normal" when the country returns to peace. But I think that's too rosy a view; there are more fundamental problems, and as he points out these problems (eg press "compliance") had a genesis long before 9/11.

05-25-2005, 05:53 PM	#12 (permalink)
Elphaba Deja Moo Location: Olympic Peninsula, WA	I tend to agree that the "liberal media" has become an urban myth. My local paper juxtaposes one conservative leaning journalist with one liberal leaning each day. Reading George Will and Molly Ivans on the same day, on the same topic is a catalyst to becoming more informed - at least in my experience as a centrist.

05-25-2005, 08:24 PM	#13 (permalink)
powerclown Junkie Location: Detroit, MI	Urban myth indeed, Elphaba. Of course, it might be a problem when looking to discredit a single link in opposition to the thesis of a vast right wing media conspiracy when there are dozens upon dozens upon dozens of such links available. One need only cast their net and trawl about for a link that will inevitably harmonize with their political sensibilities. In regards to Mr. Shanberg, one can see a distinguished and ideologically vocal media creature whose critical writing was devoted to the the poor and the oppressed, at times taking on big business and industry, and opposing - with his pen - movers and shakers and decision-makers of big industry (job creators?). The original article in this thread comes as no surprise from one whose life was shaped chronicling (and, opposing) the Cambodian War of 1970-75, which ultimately resulted in Hollywood taking an interest in his work, the result being a movie with a rather bleak and hostile outlook on the American role in the conflict, entitled The Killing Fields. A subject of interest is the encouraging phenomena of the role that the Internet is playing in the political realities of America, and - one hopes - the rest of the world as well. Where once upon a time people were relegated to the role of passive recipients of information relayed to them by strange and anonymous sources, there are now empowered and ordinary citizens who can read, disseminate, circulate and even broadcast their own viewpoints before an entire world audience. The democratization of information that the internet brings allows citizens to be informed to an extent impossible even 15 years ago. While television is still the dominant media appliance in the household, things are changing in favor of interconnectivity and user customization of the media experience. As it applies to the political nature of this thread, the internet has provided citizens with the ability to balance the left leaning politcal agendas of content providers such as cnn (tv), slate (web) or neil rogers (radio), as well as their ideological counterparts. Modern-thinking individuals understand that competition for power and desire to set the agenda can characterize high-profile, ratings driven media outlets. It is important to remind oneself that first and foremost, content providers are in business to make a profit like any other business. If people aren't watching or listening or reading a particular media source - for whatever reason - it's bad for business. Next time the circus comes to your town, remind yourself that the hawker hollering for your attention to play his games for a farthing is exactly similar to the orchestrated seduction of any competent and successful news program, liberal or otherwise There is talk in this thread of a conservative bias in today's media as it relates to American politics. Perhaps a natural response to recent political activities in America, as regards the unexpected popularity of President Bush? What might not be as obvious at first glance is the anger and resentment some individuals harbor when they feel deceived or betrayed by an authority figure. One need realize that what makes up the mainstream media who commentate on the American political scene are highly educated, successful and talented people from the top schools and universities in America. These schools have been around for centuries, they have tradition, and they operate on standards of conduct they themselves created in years past. They have become authorities in their field, similar to any such profession that has developed an expertise over time and through experience - be it farmers, salesmen, miners, doctors, designers, florists. Within a media organization or any other business-driven organization are trained individuals of varying beliefs and political values going about their work, one faction competing against the other for a larger slice of viewership. As far as the viewer-reader-listener is concerned, what is most important is freedom of choice, and media companies know this. In a free society, expression is the currency of the realm, mandated in law by the Consitution. In America, this means that information consumers have a wider political spectrum from which to get their information than ever before. Into this scene comes the addition of personal internet blogs that have matured into outlets of expression which now compete with the established media players for the viewership of an audience. Conservative blogs keep the liberal media honest, liberal blogs commentate on those currently in seats of power and more. It is simply a matter of picking and choosing whatever media outlet one desires to keep them informed. In this day and age, to say that one source of information is more prevalent than the other is erroneous and can be proven so simply by changing the tv channel, tuning the radio dial, visiting a magazine stand, or typing a given url on the net. To insinuate otherwise would be to insult the intelligence of even the typically-informed consumer. The proof is in the pudding, goes the saying.

05-25-2005, 09:39 PM	#14 (permalink)
Elphaba Deja Moo Location: Olympic Peninsula, WA	You have made several good points PowerClown (I hate these fake names). Let me bring the argument in another direction. The deregulation of media ownership has caused most media outlets to be owned by a few major corporations. Do you honestly belief that General Electric is a part of the "liberal media?"

05-26-2005, 04:10 PM	#16 (permalink)
Elphaba Deja Moo Location: Olympic Peninsula, WA	Ustwo, I believe both of our points are made in this article: Hidden Angle: Fortifying the Firewall By Susan Q. Stranahan CJR Daily (Columbia Journalism Review) Tuesday 24 May 2005 BP, the giant oil company, has adopted a "zero tolerance" policy for bad news. Ad Age reports today that BP has informed print publications that its ads must be removed from any edition containing "objectionable editorial coverage." According to Ad Age, BP wants advance notification "of any news text or visuals…that directly mention the company, a competitor or the oil-and-energy industry." BP's action comes on the heels of a similar decision last week by Morgan Stanley, which also has said it will pull ads if negative stories about the beleaguered financial services provider are set to appear. Last month, General Motors went a step further and pulled all its corporate ads from the Los Angeles Times to protest an April 6 column by the Times' Pulitzer Prize winning auto writer Dan Neil in which Neil blamed GM's troubles on its management and called for them to be fired. GM was reportedly spending $10 million a year to promote its cars in the Times. One would think the troubled automaker would have more to worry about than Dan Neil's column, but apparently not. So far the Times has not caved, and it seems safe to say that it won't as long as the current editors are in the saddle. But in a way, the decisions of BP and Morgan Stanley are more brazen than GM's. After all, GM acted after the objectionable column was published -- as it has every right to. BP and Morgan Stanley, however, are using the threat of withdrawn ads (and withdrawn ad revenue) as thinly-veiled efforts to dictate editorial content -- in advance. In response to Morgan Stanley's decision, Wall Street Journal publisher Karen Elliott House told Ad Age's Jon Fine that the pre-emptive threats won't work. "It would not be a practical condition at The Wall Street Journal," said House. "The ad department has no knowledge of what stories are running in the next morning's newspaper." It's reassuring to know that the firewall that separates the business and news operations at the Journal is inviolate, and that reporters don't have ad salesmen looking over their shoulders. But that may not be the case at other publications, especially those in more dire financial straits who find themselves threatened with the carrot-and-stick of ad revenue offered and ad revenue withdrawn. BP's policy harkens back to a 1997 demand by Chrysler Group that magazine sales staffs warn the automaker of potential "offensive" or "provocative" articles. The policy was abandoned after several months, Ad Age reports, when the Magazine Publishers of America and the American Society of Magazine Editors took "the unusual step of issuing a joint policy on the topic of editorial integrity that bars magazines from giving advertisers a sneak peek at stories, photos or tables of contents for upcoming issues." Maybe it's time for those two organizations -- plus editors and publishers of newspapers as well -- to step to the plate and explain once again to advertisers (and to their readers) why it's important to keep church separate from state.

05-27-2005, 06:35 PM	#18 (permalink)
Mantus lascivious	Over the last decade news media figured out that the US consumer doesn't want to make their own judgements concerning the news. The consumer wants to be sold both news and it's meaning. CNN was the first to capitalize on this. Fox News was the first one to actually provide a full package by creating news specifically for the Republican viewer. This was a brilian move by Muchdoch allowing Fox to tap into an enourmous audience. The problem is that instead of being smart and drawing on the other major segment of the populous: the Democrat viewers; all the other news medial outlets just tried to make themselves a clone of Fox. The democrat autdience still doesnt have it's own propoganda machine. Despite what some people may think. There is a differnece between bias reporting and the full blown subordinate relationship Fox shares with the current administration. Yet I am not here to state that lefties need their own media outlet. We need real news back. New that reports and allows the viewer to make up their own minds. Unfortunately the only way this change will happen is if the consumer body wants it to happen. Which isn't very likelly. Thats my take on it.