The TV Networks Owe Us An Apology

Scott McClellan has done his first good deed to the people of the United States in the last 8 years. He has pointed out in his new book that the Bush White House manipulated the media to get a war that they knew was unnecessary, and that the television media in the U.S. was completely complicit in this deception.

We know that the White House lied to get us into the war. There is no reasonable point of debate on this issue any longer. We know that Congress allowed the White House to dominate this issue, and gave them the war they wanted without any significant debate. Even under the Democratic Leadership, Congress has been unwilling to reign in the White House’s excesses. We are painfully aware of how the Supreme Court has largely allowed the White House to do what it will, with only token disagreement by allowing Civil instead of Military trials of U.S. Citizens captured within the U.S. as terrorists.

Now, with McClellan’s and other voices being heard, there is no longer any doubt that the television media in the United States at best allowed the White House to completely have its say, and at worst actively suppressed dissent of a war that would kill thousands of Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis.

Before the war former weapons inspector Scott Ritter came to the college I was attending to give a talk about his experiences. He made it absolutely clear that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq because he and his team found and destroyed them. He also told us, as a former Marine, that he believed that invading Iraq would be a huge mistake. He believed that invading Iraq and taking Saddam out would mean that we would be mired in the country for decades. He said that he believed that Iraq would break out in civil war. He said all of this before we set one foot over the Iraqi border. Perhaps the President had bad information about how the Iraq war would go, but that means I had better information available to me. The sad thing is the media had the same access to this information I did, and ignored it.

Before we went into Iraq, CNN news chief, Eason Jordan, went so far as to say of Mr. Ritter, “Well, Scott Ritter's chameleon-like behaviour has really bewildered a lot of people…U.S. officials no longer give Scott Ritter much credibility..." Perhaps U.S. Officials didn’t, but CNN should have. Not long after, Paula Zahn said on her show that Scott Ritter had “drunk Saddam Hussein’s Kool-Aid.”

In the final weeks of the run up to the war, MSNBC fired Phil Donahue from his highly rated show because he was willing to book guests that were speaking out against the war. A memo from MSNBC stating this explicitly surfaced at allyourtv.com soon after the firing that confirmed the reasons.

Perhaps it’s this mind set that explains why, as reported by The New York Times, these news bureaus didn’t carefully check the connections that their military experts had with the Pentagon. The vast majority of the military experts seated in all of the networks were working directly for the Pentagon or for military contractors. If the analysts said anything the Pentagon didn’t like, then they were denied access to the Pentagon and threatened with being fired. This means that all military analysis that was seen on U.S. television was approved by the Pentagon. Considering that the White House fired any dissenters in the Pentagon prior to the war, for all intents and purposes all military analysis of the war shown on TV was approved by the White House. We got no differing views. The reporting was anything but fair and balanced. And this was happening at all of the networks.

There is no other way to say this: The “Fourth Branch of Government”, the one given its existence in the First Amendment, failed us completely and spectacularly, at least as badly as the three traditional branches of government.

The framers of our Constitution knew that Democracy requires a well informed citizenry. That is the reason why they created an independent press in the First Amendment. For at least the last decade, television news has completely fallen down on their responsibility to keep us well informed by making sure we know and understand all points of view.

Newspapers, the main source of news when the Constitution and the First Amendment were written, are no longer the main source of news in this country. Television surpassed newspapers decades ago. Those who work for television news have done everything they could to become the most important news source for us, without realizing that there is an enormous responsibility that comes with it. The use of the limited public airwaves, whether directly to the home, via satellite link, or over the internet, obliges them to help with the nurturing of our democracy. Becoming the primary source of news to the average citizen clinches that responsibility. This is a responsibility that cannot be disregarded. Doing so will guarantee that democracy in this country will fall into despotism, and even the television news organizations will not be immune to that.

In order for us to regain our trust in television news, it is necessary for the news organizations to apologize to us, directly and publicly. This is not optional, and the failure to do so compromises the integrity of those news organizations. The longer it takes to get that apology, the more serious the breach of trust.

All of us need to demand this of our news organizations, including all of the ones mentioned in this essay, as well as all of the others in this country. There has been a major breach of trust, and it needs to be fixed. An apology is the least that they can do, and it should be done now.

Sources:

CNN’s attack on Scott Ritter:

CNN's Hatchet Job on Scott Ritter, by Antonia Zerbisias, originally in The Toronto Star, archived at: http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0912-02.htm

MSNBC Fires Phil Donahue over liberal, anti-war bias:

Commentary: The Surrender Of MSNBC, by Rick Ellis, Wednesday, February 25th, 2003, http://www.allyourtv.com/0203season/news/02252003donahue.html

Some Critical Media Voices Face Censorship, FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting), 4/3/03, http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1825

Pentagon’s Control of TV Military Analysts:

Behind TV Analysts, Pentagon’s Hidden Hand, By DAVID BARSTOW, Published: April 20, 2008 in The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/washington/20generals.html?ex=1366689600&en=eefc8e0bdd6ffc91&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

The Political Anchors Dragging Down John McCain

By Ed Smallwood

Senator John McCain has problems. He has been trying to distance himself from an unpopular President in G.W. Bush. He has been trying to convince you that because he is a former POW from the Vietnam War that he is a military supporter. He also wants you to believe that the economy is going well. Each of these issues is weighing him down like anchors around his neck.

It came out recently that former Senator Phil Gramm, who was a lobbyist for UBS, and who lobbied hard for deregulation of the mortgage industry, is a leading economic advisor to Senator John McCain. That’s right; the architect of the current “Mortgage Meltdown” is a senior advisor for Mr. McCain’s economic policy. We’ve already seen what happens when the President’s closest advisors are former industry big-wigs—you get $4 per gallon oil, manipulation of the electricity market in California, implosion of Enron, and the destruction of the home owning dream in America. Do we want to continue down this road with John McCain.

Right now the Senate and the House of Representatives are in conference to put the finishing touches on a new G.I. Bill that the President has vowed to veto. It would allow veterans to go to college after their service is completed. Many of our Military Servicemen and Servicewomen went into their branches of the service with the understanding that they would get monetary assistance in college as a result of their service to our country. All of the major veteran’s groups have come out in favor of this bill.

John McCain has publicly come out against the new G.I. Bill, in opposition to many of his peers in the Republican Party. He says it will cost too much. I’m not joking. Mr. McCain has said in no uncertain terms that he is not willing to give an education to people who are willing to give their lives for him and us. The cost of the lives of those over 4,000 dead in all of the branches of the military including the National Guard is not enough to make sure the rest get an education. Over 30,000 have been wounded, and that is not payment enough, according to John McCain and G.W. Bush, to make sure they and their compatriots get an education. Mr. McCain says he is afraid that one of the main recruiting tools that the military has, the offer of a free education in exchange for military service, will encourage current military personnel to leave the military instead of spurring more enlistment, and that could make a difference in his 100-year-war. Is that supporting our military?

Relying on industry to give input on how it should be regulated. Giving military support lip service. Allowing the economy to fall into disrepair from neglect. Don’t these all sound like the methodology of G.W. Bush? Can McCain really distance himself from Bush while using these tactics?

More importantly, can we vote for McCain while knowing all of this? For myself, I know that the answer is an emphatic “No!”

Sources:

Military Casualties:

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

McCain’s Veteran’s Problems:

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1808161,00.html?xid=rss-topstories

http://washingtonindependent.com/view/mccains-gi-bill

Sen. Phil Gramm’s lobbying:

http://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/stories/2008/05/26/daily15.html

Memorial Day 2008

By Edward Smallwood

Memorial Day Weekend is upon us. As we madly go to our movies, barbeques, and sales, we should all take a moment to remember what Memorial Day is really all about.

Memorial Day was started in May of 1868 to commemorate the sacrifices of those who died in the Civil War. At that time it was referred to as Decoration Day, a day meant to decorate the graves of those who died in service to the country in that rebellion. Observance of the day to celebrate those who died in all wars did not start until after World War I.

This Memorial Day I will be remembering my step-grandfather, who served in Italy in World War II. It traumatized him so much that he didn’t begin to talk about it until just a couple of years before he died. I do miss him, and I regret that I know so little of what he went through in that conflict.

I will also be remembering George Swenson, the father of my brother-in-law, Mike Swenson. About a week-and-a-half ago George, a former Marine, Contractor, and REALTOR, suffered a cerebral hemorrhage in his sleep. The next day when he did not get up for his doctor’s appointment, his wife, Shirley, called the ambulance. He had three operations to stop the bleeding in the next 24 hours, but has not awakened. This morning they made the decision to remove his breathing tube, which will happen in about 30 minutes from the time I write this. He is not expected to survive much past that time.

Please, remember those who have left us, but also take the time this weekend to let those still with us know how much you appreciate them.

Jack Cafferty Understands

By Ed Smallwood

Jack Cafferty absolutely went off on the current President of the United States live on CNN today. This was surprisingly candid, and unexpected. I know many people will do everything they can to convince us that the media is liberal, but just how often in the past eight years has the media criticized the President? Instead, they put his people in positions as “unbiased” military analysts.

Why did Jack do this? Today is the 60^th anniversary of the founding of Israel. To mark the occasion, GW gave a speech in front of the Knesset, and called those who wanted to talk to Iran appeasers, and by extension, he was calling Barak Obama an appeaser. On the Wolf Blitzer program, The Situation Room, with several other commentators, Wolf Blitzer asked Jack Cafferty the following question:

Wolf Blitzer: “Is this going to scare Americans about Barak Obama, what the President said, Jack?”

Jack Cafferty: “No. This is like ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.’ One—George Bush is an embarrassment. I mean, the other day he opens his mouth and says his act of solidarity with the families of the kids that he had killed in Iraq—his war—was to give up playing Golf. I mean, every time he opens his mouth you want to get under the desk. The good news is he’s irrelevant. In five months or six months we close the door on this national nightmare and he goes away. But his idea is to invade a sovereign country in the middle east—Iraq—which posed no threat to us, on phony intelligence, sell it to the American public as a lie in effect. 4,000 troops plus, hundreds of billions of dollars, and his buddy, John McCain goes around singing ‘bomb-bomb-bomb Iran.’ There has been no diplomacy, there is no foreign policy except to roll some tanks up to the border and fly some airplanes over. Is it going to scare anybody? No. 80% of this country is fed up with George Bush’s policies—read the polls. 70% have given him the highest disapproval rating of any President in modern American history. He is beyond irrelevant and he is not going to scare anybody. He just babbles away like Elliot Spitzer talking about matrimonial fidelity. It’s a joke.”

It’s nice to see at least one person in the media actually gets it.

A Mother’s Day Loss

By Edward Smallwood

I don’t think I have ever been motivated to write two blog entries in one day. This has been an unusual day. For many of you who may be reading this, Mother’s Day may indeed be over. Here on the “Left Coast” we still have about two-and-a-half hours to go. With a few minutes of spare time, and a ready laptop, I feel as ready to write this entry as I ever will.

This is a difficult entry to write. My closest friend at my work, specifically the movie theater mentioned in my bio, is my boss. About two weeks ago her mother had to go into the hospital to have a heart valve replaced. This put a lot of pressure on my boss, and it really showed. In-between shifts, at the theater, she’s been taking care of her mother, her two sons living at home (one is autistic), and her husband. Her oldest son just got back from a tour in Iraq a few months ago. She’s been sick from allergies but she still backs me up like nobody I’ve worked with.

Today, on mother’s day, her mother died from a stroke. This was a totally undeserved blow to my boss. I really do not know how to express my sorrow at her loss.

It’s been quite an eye-opening experience for myself and many of my younger co-workers. Several seemed to be dreading going out to dinner with their own mothers, but when the news broke here, that attitude evaporated. This is probably the best that can come from a tragedy of this nature.

It is my hope that all who read this and still have a mother they can communicate with now take the time to call her up and let her know just how they appreciate her.