MediaBloodhound

Story of the Day: Brian Williams' "Truthiness" in Advertising

(updated below)

For some time now, MSNBC has been running commercials touting their election coverage team's commitment to providing information that better enables Americans to make informed choices at the voting booth. But in context of the unfolding Pentagon TV war analysts scandal, one of these promos (which I believe is new) stood out for its particular hypocrisy.

To a melodramatic background score that's one part patriotic sentimentality (scene in Mel Gibson movie after character's army triumphs), one part childhood wonder (kids riding bikes in the sky to silhouette of the moon in E.T.), and one part lovers reuniting after a long separation (archetypal open-armed sprint across verdant meadow), this is the TV promo's content:

TEXT GRAPHIC: Decision 2008

TEXT GRAPHIC: Why Do People Care About Politics?

IMAGE: "VOTE HERE" sign with people standing in line behind it.

BRIAN WILLIAMS VOICEOVER: This is a participatory democracy.

TEXT GRAPHIC: Know

IMAGE: Black and white shot of people voting in the foreground; full-color American flag hanging prominently in the background.

BRIAN WILLIAMS VOICEOVER: I think you owe it to your democracy to know as much as you can about what's going on.

IMAGE: Old man (again in black and white), holding an American flag (again in full color) and seated on a bench, is gazing out toward the New York harbor.

TEXT GRAPHIC: That's Why You Care

TEXT GRAPHIC: That's Why We Cover It

IMAGE: Brian Williams' face, then the major faces of MSNBC election coverage.

TEXT GRAPHIC: MSNBC Decision 2008

TEXT GRAPHIC: MSNBC The Place for Politics

To this day, however, Brian Williams and MSNBC, along with CNN, Fox News, ABC, CBS and NBC, have failed to respond to a PBS NewsHour request for an interview about The New York Times exposé, which revealed ex-generals-turned-TV war analysts, shilling directly for the Pentagon, appeared regularly on their programs. (Yesterday, Media Matters published a study that found "since January 1, 2002, the analysts named in the Times article -- many identified as having ties to the defense industry -- collectively appeared or were quoted as experts more than 4,500 times on ABC, ABC News Now, CBS, CBS Radio Network, NBC, CNN, CNN Headline News, Fox News, MSNBC, CNBC, and NPR.")

Williams, who in that MSNBC promo says, "This is a participatory democracy" in which "you owe it to your democracy to know as much as you can about what's going on," has, along with his network colleagues, prevented millions of people from knowing what's gone on in the run-up to the war in Iraq and over the course of the occupation. Williams champions our participatory democracy in MSNBC's ad yet fails to share with his viewers any information about what President Eisenhower, in his farewell address, presciently predicted would be the single greatest threat to our democracy - the "military-industrial complex."

On January 17, 1961, Eisenhower - a Republican president, former lifetime military man and war hero - explicitly cautioned: "In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals so that security and liberty may prosper together."

Yet here's Williams only acknowledgment of his network's involvement with these Pentagon-shilling TV war generals - not from behind his anchor desk but on his NBC Nightly News blog The Daily Nightly (April 29, 2008):

Story of the Day: Leading Newspapers Perpetuated Obama-Muslim Mython Day of IN Primary

(updated below)

Media Matters posted a piece this afternoon about how the right-wing Washington Times today "quoted  [an] Indiana man saying Obama is 'a Muslim' without noting the assertion is false."

A fine catch.

Media Matters also smartly showed how a responsible journalist reports such incidents:

By contrast, after quoting the same man in its own article, the Chicago Sun-Times wrote that "Obama has never been a Muslim, but bogus e-mails accuse him of being a Muslim who put his hand on a copy of the Quran to be sworn into the U.S. Senate and refusing to say the Pledge of Allegiance."

An additional search, however, reveals the decidedly more credible Los Angeles Times, Washington Post and Baltimore Sun also reported the same scene without pointing out the man's claim was false. Except they published their reports yesterday, on the day of the Indiana and North Carolina primaries. Specifically, the failure of these newspapers - two of which, along with The New York Times, are considered our nation's papers of record - to clarify the man's misstatement was potentially directly damaging to Obama's chances in Indiana. Whereas today's Washington Times piece, published in a disreputable rag the day after the Indiana primary, might impact voters' opinions for the general election and, possibly, still undecided superdelegates.

Here's the breakdown:

Los Angeles Times (5/6/08), as reported by Peter Nicholas:

One of his first encounters went poorly. He approached a man sitting alone at a table and was waved away. The man told me afterward he had no interest in meeting Obama.

"I can't stand him," he said. "He's a Muslim. He's not even pro-American as far as I'm concerned."

Obama seemed unfazed. He had better luck at a round table where several men were eating.

At no point, prior to or following this anecdote, did Nicholas clarify that Obama is a Christian and has never been a Muslim.

Washington Post (5/6/08), as reported online by Shailagh Murray:

Obama arrived at the Greenwood restaurant about 7:40 a.m. and received a mixed response. One man waved the senator away from his table, later telling the pool reporter on the scene that "I can't stand him. He's a Muslim. He's not even pro-American as far as I'm concerned."
      
At another table, a group of regulars dubbed the "Johnson County Roundtable" greeted Obama warmly.

Murray failed as well as to cite Obama's actual religion.

Baltimore Sun (5/6/08), as reported online by John McCormick: 

One of his first table stops did not go well. As he approached a man sitting alone at a table, Obama was waved away. The man later told a Los Angeles Times reporter that he was not interested in meeting Obama.

"I can't stand him,'' he said. "He's a Muslim. He's not even pro-American as far as I'm concerned."

McCormick and the Baltimore Sun even did WaPo and the LA Times one better, not only excluding clarification of Obama's religion but also creating an original claim of their own in the very next sentence:

Obama got another surprise at another table. While talking to a trio of men eating breakfast, one handed him the bill. "This will seal the thing,'' the man said. The somewhat tightwad senator accepted the check and later took it to the cashier and paid it.

"The somewhat tightwad senator"? Nice of McCormick to back up this assertion with somewhat zero factual information. What's more, as McCormick reports himself, Obama paid for the three men's breakfasts. And, notably, without hesitation. So is Obama a "somewhat tightwad senator" because he didn't pick up every diners' breakfast during that stop or the breakfast of every diner he's met along the campaign trail?

To paraphrase Joe Pesci's character in Goodfellas: What exactly does McCormick mean, Obama's a somewhat tightwad senator? You tell us! Somewhat a tightwad how? How is Obama a partial tightwad? What are his miserly attributes? Tell us, tell us! What about him makes him such a tightwad?! (Of course, Pesci's character soon revealed he was joking around with the other character; McCormick, on the other hand, to be a credible journalist, must supply supporting facts when making such claims.)

In a more nuanced offense - exemplifying why words do indeed matter - McCormick and the Sun provide this gem later in the piece: 

Obama prowled the building's parking lot looking for people on their way in to cast ballots.

Yes, not searched or canvassed or even scoured. Is McCormick oblivious to the inarguably pejorative meaning of the word prowl, the primary definition of which on Dictionary.com (an aggregate of the most authoritative dictionaries) is "to rove or go about stealthily, as in search of prey, something to steal, etc." 

Let us pray this coverage improves.

UPDATE: Mike Tronnes over at Cursor alerted me to this new twist by the Financial Times:

"I heard that Obama is a Muslim and his wife's an atheist," said Mr Simpson, drawing on a cigarette outside the fire station in Williamson, a coalmining town of 3,400 people surrounded by lush wooded hillsides.

You haven't heard that Michelle Obama is an atheist? That might be because she isn't. Nevertheless, while this article does correct this man's false assertion that Obama is a Muslim, it fails to clarify that his wife isn't an atheist.

Is this really so difficult?

Story of the Day: Bob Schieffer, Company Man

Bob Schieffer's coverage during the George W. Bush years, weighed against his hushed compromising relationship with the president, belies the CBS newsman's projected image as an unimpeachably principled journalist and typifies the way our media class operates.

In a Sunday post on Crooks and Liars, under the headline "Schieffer Wakes Up to Life in the Bush Administration," Nicole Belle wrote: "I don’t know where Bob Schieffer’s been these last seven years, but he thinks that the White House might have an credibility problem." She was reacting to Schieffer's Face the Nation commentary on the Lurita Doan scandal:

SCHIEFFER: I saw a story in the Washington Post the other day, where a reporter granted a government official anonymity in order as the newspaper put it, ‘for the government official to speak more candidly.’ Well, that made me wonder. Do we no longer expect government officials to tell the whole story if they must take responsibility for what they say? Even worse, do we believe that is acceptable?

For sure, the White House won no prize for candor last week; it gave the outgoing head of the General Services Administration, Lurita Doan, a big send off by thanking her for making government buildings more energy-efficient or some such, when in truth, she was forced out. She was the object of multiple investigations, suspicious dealings on government contracts, and asking government employees what they could do to help political candidates, which is, of course, against the law. Even the government’s watchdog agency recommended she be disciplined to the fullest extent. Yet the White House spokesman declined to say if her resignation had anything to do with any of that. From the White House came only thanks and confirmation she was gone. The government saw no obligation to say why, which leads me to this: have decades of secrecy, spin and stonewalling conditioned us to accept less than the whole story from the government? Is telling the whole truth no longer a given? Frankly, I’m not sure. What I do know is more and more people seem skeptical of everything the government says and does. What we saw last week may be one reason why.

Belle then pointed out the underlying absurdity:

The Lurita Doan scandal is such a minor one relative to all the other lies, spin, incompetence and outright negligence of the Bush administration that it’s tragically laughable that this is the one that Schieffer thinks exemplifies why the American people are skeptical to what comes out of the White House.

This also epitomizes Schieffer's reporting on the administration, which has treaded between muted criticism and outright fawning. It's no wonder after Dan Rather's departure from CBS Evening News, President Bush gladly granted Schieffer an exclusive interview. Something he never afforded Rather.

In a March 2003 interview, Schieffer was asked "if the Pentagon's decision to allow reporters to embed with troops" will "make it difficult for journalists to remain objective?" His answer was telling:

BOB SCHIEFFER: No, I don't think so at all. I think it was a very good decision. I must tell you on this one, I'm sort of like Ronald Reagan who used to say of the Soviet Union, "Trust but verify." I take them at their word at the Pentagon, if they're going to let these reporters go along and give us a view of this war if it does come. But I'm going to wait until the shooting starts until I give a final opinion. So far, they are saying all the right things. I give them the benefit of the doubt. I think they're going to try to do the right thing. But we'll see once the shooting starts if they follow up. If they do what they say they're going to do, it would be a very good thing. I also think it's not just good for the American people to have independent observers along, I think it's also good for the military. Had there been a reporter along with Lieutenant Calley when he massacred those people in Vietnam, I think that probably wouldn't have happened.

The truth is, however, in covering the Bush administration, Schieffer has been overly willing to trust and, whenever discrepancies between administration claims and the facts are verified, ever reluctant to hold anyone accountable. The ideal company man. Affable and avuncular yet trusted and above the fray. Walter Cronkite without that pesky willingness to speak truth to power. In the end, Schieffer might as well replace "trust but verify" with "ask but don't follow up."

Throughout his January 2006 interview with Bush, Schieffer responded "Um-hmm" and "Okay" and jarringly changed topics when the president's absurd answers demanded further inquiry. His misplaced deference lent credence to Bush's specious, unconstitutional explanations on everything from wiretaps, speaking with our enemies, the state of Iraq, Katrina, healthcare and energy independence. Moreover, Schieffer's final three questions were embarrassing softballs: "Has the presidency changed you, Mr. President?"; "What has been the worst part?"; and "What has been the impact on your family?"

Story of the Day: Miley Cyrus Trumps Voter ID Ruling on NBC Nightly News; On Same Day, NBC Anchor Slammed NYT's Fluff

Last night, NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams allotted eighty seconds to yesterday's momentous Supreme Court ruling that there's nothing unconstitutional with Indiana's law requiring a photo ID to vote. Meanwhile, during the same broadcast, it spent over two minutes on the concern caused by photos of teen star Miley Cyrus in Vanity Fair.

That would be embarrassing enough for a news organization purporting to be credible.

But earlier in the day on the Nightly News blog The Daily Nightly, anchor and managing editor Brian Williams (in a post titled "What Times Is It?") actually took The New York Times to task for publishing puff pieces. Now, Williams won't get an argument from me on The Times' penchant for such reporting in between serious news items, which can bump a crucial story to the back pages (that's why "NYT Front|Back" is an ongoing series here). But Williams is either in bunker-mentality denial or gallingly disingenuous to suggest he and his newscast - not to mention his network news colleagues and the mainstream media at large - don't regularly focus attention on the same kind of tripe at the expense of substantive news.

Talk about your glass houses.

How big has Williams' bubble grown? Did it not cross his mind that people might read his post, then watch his newscast and call him out on his hypocritical, cognitive dissonant analysis? Does he realize that even though he might wish to remain in his Big Media bubble, that it's precisely this kind of intellectual dishonesty and brain-dead hackery that drove, and continues to drive, millions of formerly trusting viewers to seek their news elsewhere?

What's more, Williams and NBC poorly handled those eighty whole seconds they allocated to the Supreme Court ruling on voter IDs. They not only failed to present one dissenting viewpoint - whether from a Supreme Court Justice, legal scholar, civil rights lawyer or voters in Indiana - but also to point out how this ruling will impact the upcoming primary in Indiana, where, as the Associated Press reported yesterday, "more than 20 percent of black voters do not have access to a valid photo ID."

Instead, ignoring substantive context, dissenting views and serious implications on the constitutional right to vote, Brian Williams framed the issue for NBC justice correspondent Pete Williams (former longtime aide to Dick Cheney) through a Fox News-like lens:

BRIAN WILLIAMS: Pete, let's come at this a little differently. In a nation where in the post-9/11 era, we need a photo ID to fly, why was it a big story today, this court ruling that we need it to vote?

Yeah, what's all the fuss about, Pete? I mean, sure, we're only spending eighty seconds on this story, but let's take it from the angle of questioning why we should cover it at all.

Of course, Brian turned to the right correspondent to take a complex issue involving civil liberties and the Constitution and, for all intents and purposes, reduce it down to corporate media stenography and Bush administration talking points. A skilled piece of journalistic hackery in short form:

PETE WILLIAMS: Well, showing a photo ID at the airport has been upheld because of the need for security. Now the Supreme Court said that states can require voter ID at the polls to prevent voter fraud. Georgia, Florida and Michigan have laws like Indiana's and seventeen other states were waiting for today's decision before considering laws of their own to make voting another part of American life requiring a photo ID, just like flying. Today's vote was six-to-three, with one of the most liberal justices, John Paul Stevens, in the majority. He said most people do already have a photo ID and that for those who don't, who are poor, elderly or handicapped, this may add to their burden. But he said it was not enough to overcome the state's interest in discouraging fraud, Brian.

Our curious anchor's follow-up?

BRIAN WILLIAMS: All right. Pete Williams in Washington for us. Pete, thanks.

Adding insult to injury, this clip is not currently available on its own on MSNBC's Nightly News website (it's only accessible through watching a video of the full broadcast). But fear not, Brian's two-minute-plus Miley Cyrus (aka, Hannah Montana) report, covered by NBC correspondent Rehema Ellis, is there in all its gratuitously vapid glory.

Never mind how the Supreme Court's decision will directly affect the Indiana Democratic primary, the presidential election in November, and, potentially, voting rights of US citizens for years to come. NBC Nightly News and Brian Williams provided their viewers with a much more valuable piece of information: the "ruckus" over teen sensation Miley Cyrus' photo spread in Vanity Fair and an answer to the question that's keeping most Americans awake at night:

REHEMA ELLIS, NBC CORRESPONDENT: How could this affect the pop star's career?

Editor's Note: Appreciate this post? Subscribe to receive MediaBloodhound email alerts so you don't miss the next one. MBH doesn't post daily, so it's a great way to keep up with the latest. And it's easy to subscribe: 1) Enter your email address above the "Subscribe" button in top right-hand column of this site and click button; 2) Check your inbox for auto email from "confirmations@emailenfuego.com" (if you don't see it, check your spam folder); 3) Open email, click confirm link and you're done. Thanks for your readership. - Brad Jacobson

Story of the Day: Disturbing Security Lapse at Dallas Obama Rally

With the John McCain-New York Times story dominating the news cycle, the most underreported political news of the day is the startling breach of security, evidently ordered by U.S. Secret Service, at Barack Obama's Wednesday rally in Dallas.

Yes, you read that correctly.

From the Fort Worth Star-Telegram (via Raw Story), which broke this news (a Google News search reveals that United Press International is thus far the only other mainstream media outlet to either pick up or report on this story):

Security details at Barack Obama's rally Wednesday stopped screening people for weapons at the front gates more than an hour before the Democratic presidential candidate took the stage at Reunion Arena.

The order to put down the metal detectors and stop checking purses and laptop bags came as a surprise to several Dallas police officers who said they believed it was a lapse in security.

Dallas Deputy Police Chief T.W. Lawrence, head of the Police Department's homeland security and special operations divisions, said the order -- apparently made by the U.S. Secret Service -- was meant to speed up the long lines outside and fill the arena's vacant seats before Obama came on.

"Sure," said Lawrence, when asked if he was concerned by the great number of people who had gotten into the building without being checked. But, he added, the turnout of more than 17,000 people seemed to be a "friendly crowd."

The Secret Service did not return a call from the Star-Telegram seeking comment.

[...]

Several Dallas police officers said it worried them that the arena was packed with people who got in without even a cursory inspection.

They spoke on condition of anonymity because, they said, the order was made by federal officials who were in charge of security at the event.

"How can you not be concerned in this day and age," said one policeman.

The police officer makes a good point. Though I'd add that President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas nearly a half century ago, his brother five years later in Los Angeles on the way to almost certainly winning the Democratic presidential nomination.   

No one wants to think about such a horrific potentiality. But we damn well better pay attention to it in order to avoid similar inexplicable breakdowns in security for any national candidate, especially a wildly popular black presidential candidate - often compared to JFK, RFK and MLK - who's promising to end a war that Republicans and their friends in the defense and oil industry want to prolong indefinitely.

Story of the Day: WaPo Joins NYT, Calls Telecom Amnesty "Victory" for WH; Nightly Newscasts Ignore Vote Altogether

Yesterday, I wrote about the Senate's despicable vote to grant retroactive immunity to our illegally, unconstitutionally spying telecom companies (link includes full Roll Call Vote, showing where each of our senators stood). Among other things, I noted Glenn Greenwald's comment about The New York Times' framing of this vote:

Here is the first paragraph from Eric Lichtblau's NYT article this afternoon:

After more than a year of heated political wrangling, the Senate handed the White House a major victory Tuesday by voting to broaden the government's spy powers and to give legal protection to phone companies that cooperated in President Bush's warrantless eavesdropping program.

To conserve resources, newspapers should just create a macro of that phrase -- "the Senate handed the White House a major victory today" -- and then just program it to be automatically inserted into every article reporting on anything done by the Senate. That system would be foolproof.

Well, now our other paper of record has delivered on this one-two "victory" punch. Here's the lede of today's Washington Post article by Paul Kane:

The Senate yesterday approved a sweeping measure that would expand the government's clandestine surveillance powers, delivering a key victory to the White House by approving immunity from lawsuits for telecommunications companies that cooperated with intelligence agencies in domestic spying after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

And how did our three major broadcast networks - ABC, CBS and NBC - treat this story on their nightly news programs?

They didn't. If you are unfortunate enough to still get your daily news wrap-up from these woefully inadequate sources, you wouldn't know that yesterday America took a big jackbooted step closer to a full-on police state.

Now, we're right in the middle of an historic campaign season, so these networks can't be faulted for allocating hefty chunks of time to that. But here are just a few of the non-campaign-related stories they deemed more newsworthy than one of the most important pieces of legislation of our time:

ABC World News with Charles Gibson

"Rent-a-Pet" - Description from website:  "If you don't want to commit long-term to a pet, you can rent a dog for a day."

Think that's embarrassing? Here's how Gibson introduced the story: "This is a big night for dogs. A beagle by the name of Uno has a chance to make history by being the first of its breed to ever win best in show at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, always a very popular event. But for those who don't own or necessarily want a champion, there's a company that's come up with the idea of renting dogs, one day at a time. One more concession these days to people who can't commit. Is this a good idea? Who would rent a pup? Is it fair to the dog?" Has Charles Gibson lost his mind? Am I watching the last story of a local newscast? Is this The Daily Show? (Please note: this wasn't even the final story of the night.)

"Swimming with Walruses" - Description from website: "Ice swimmers in the Russian Winter." Gibson begins, "A follow-up to a story we did a couple of months ago, when we ran some pictures of men jumping into the Moscow River. At the time, we didn't know a lot about them. Only that they chose to swim in sub-zero temperatures. And we chose to watch them from afar. But we remained intrigued, and so we sent our Moscow correspondent Clarissa Ward out in the cold to investigate." OK, so let's get this straight: in addition to this story trumping the historic telecom amnesty vote, it's a follow-up to a non-story World News had already presented two months ago. And so important did Gibson and team ABC deem it, they dispatched their Moscow correspondent; at a time when foreign news desks are being slashed every day, it's heartening to know that ABC is putting their resources to good use. I guess this Russian story was too fluffy for their Moscow office.

"HGH Goes Mainstream" - Description from website: "The use of growth hormones is a problem in America, and not just among athletes." Obviously this is only "news" because of the current Roger Clemens case. Out of more than 300 million Americans, this report cites that roughly 30,000 of them are currently using HGH by prescription. It's not approved for prescription for cosmetic purposes. But it's unclear from the report how many of those 30,000 Americans are taking HGH for specific medical conditions, for which it is approved through prescription, as the report also notes. It's the kind of sensational story that could've been aired any day this week, or even next week, or possibly next month.

CBS Evening News with Katie Couric

"The Fed Who Infiltrated the Mob" - Description from website: "In an exclusive interview with CBS News, Armen Keteyian speaks with undercover FBI agent Jack Garcia, who infiltrated New York's notorious Gambino crime family, taking down its bosses in 2005." A terribly pressing story, indeed.

NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams

"A Guide to Genetic Tests" (second installment of the three-part series "Who We Are: The Truth About DNA, where chief medical correspondent Robert Bazell explores the role DNA plays in history, health, and the legal system") - Description from website for last night's report: "Tests that examine your risk of developing a disease are widely marketed, but doctors often don't know what to tell patients after they receive their results — and many doctors disapprove of the tests altogether." No argument here on the general worthiness of this report, but rather on the timing. There's nothing urgent about it. Had NBC aired this segment of the series on the following night, it wouldn't have mattered. Most people wouldn't have noticed. And if NBC feared they would, Williams could've easily slipped in a programming note that the segment was bumped one night in order to bring viewers news of the day's major breaking story.

Of course, the clear winner of the evening is ABC World News and Charlie Gibson, with their impressive hat trick of worthless stories.

Never mind our burgeoning police state. I'm worried about how Uno performed last night.

Story of the Day: Media Buries U.S. Complicity in Suharto's Bloody Rule

(updates I and II below - the nightly news Suharto blackout and Amy Goodman's powerhouse Suharto coverage; update III: John Pilger focuses on Britain's key role in supporting Suharto; update IV: mainstream media's Suharto whitewash continues in original NY Times and WaPo articles.)

Suharto, former Indonesian president and brutal dictator, is laid to rest today, the U.S. mainstream media has chosen to bury or ignore outright our government's role in his murderous reign.

Consider the Associated Press 1,441-word article on Suharto's burial, the main story on the subject currently running on the websites of The New York Times, Washington Post, MSNBC and CNN, in which one sentence - just 31 words, 30 paragraphs into the report - is allocated to this relationship:

During the Cold War, Suharto was considered a reliable friend of Washington, which did not oppose his violent occupation of Papua in 1969 and the bloody 1974 invasion of East Timor.

ABC News' website is currently running a 736-word Reuters dispatch on the burial, in which no mention exists whatsoever of U.S. complicity in Suharto's bloody rule.

Spoon-fed such revisionist history, in which our government's murderous alliances are ignored or glossed over with clipped and blunted allusions, it's no wonder so many otherwise well-meaning American citizens are unaware of past and present implications of U.S. foreign policy.

Meanwhile, here are some fun facts on the U.S.-Suharto relationship from the East Timor Action Network (via Common Dreams):

Story of the Day: AP Deserves Credit for Covering MLK Complexity

In honor of Martin Luther King Day last year, I wrote about the mainstream media's reluctance to reflect on anything other than the iconic orator of the "I Have A Dream" speech. Along with many others in alternative media, I pointed to Dr. King's speech "Beyond Vietnam" as an example of the forgotten, inconvenient King: the anti-war humanist who called for a "revolution of values" and excoriated the United States for being "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today"; the moral leader who better than anyone connected the dots in America between food and bullets, poverty and power, reality and propaganda.

So it was pleasantly surprising to see Sunday's Associated Press article "Popular View of King Ignores Complexity." It's one thing for this to pop up in an alternative media outlet, but quite another for it to land on our nation's #1 newswire. (Is this the result of alternative media's efforts, propelled by its growing clout and popularity? Whatever the case, let's just say easy access to all those online articles, posts, videos and transcripts - the democracy of the Internet that Big Telecom seeks to curtail - didn't hurt.)

With the exception of "some say," AP journalist Deepti Hajela frames his piece by expressing, in part, the longtime alternative media view on King's treatment:

But nearly 40 years after his assassination in April 1968, after the deaths of his wife and of others who knew both the man and what he stood for, some say King is facing the same fate that has befallen many a historical figure — being frozen in a moment in time that ignores the full complexity of the man and his message.

Hajela soon delves into the reality usually absent in mainstream media coverage of MLK Day.

At the time of his death, King was working on anti-poverty and anti-war issues. He had spoken out against the Vietnam War in 1967, and was in Memphis in April 1968 in support of striking sanitation workers.

King had come a long way from the crowds who cheered him at the 1963 March on Washington, when he was introduced as "the moral leader of our nation" — and when he pronounced "I have a dream" on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

By taking on issues outside segregation, he had lost the support of many newspapers and magazines, and his relationship with the White House had suffered, said Harvard Sitkoff, a professor of history at the University of New Hampshire who has written a recently published book on King.

"He was considered by many to be a pariah," Sitkoff said.

But he took on issues of poverty and militarism because he considered them vital "to make equality something real and not just racial brotherhood but equality in fact," Sitkoff said.

The most salient passage in the article describes one reason (though there are many of course) why it's so crucial for the mainstream media, along with politicians and teachers, to discuss and examine the other sides of King and his message.

That does a disservice to both King and society, said Melissa Harris-Lacewell, professor of politics and African-American studies at Princeton University.

By freezing him at that point, by putting him on a pedestal of perfection that doesn't acknowledge his complex views, "it makes it impossible both for us to find to new leaders and for us to aspire to leadership," Harris-Lacewell said.

She believes it's important for Americans in 2008 to remember how disliked King was in 1968.

"If we forget that, then it seems like the only people we can get behind must be popular," Harris-Lacewell said. "Following King meant following the unpopular road, not the popular one." [Emphasis mine.]

King himself echoed this in "Beyond Vietnam," unwittingly foreshadowing his sanitized image:

Even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government's policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one's own bosom and in the surrounding world.

Today, with our mainstream news fully commodified and distilled through a handful of corporations, with our "citizens" long ago having been supplanted by "consumers," our country has moved with ever greater "difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought."

Thus, it should come as no surprise why this Dr. King was boarded up and abandoned: almost 40 years later, this King still threatens the establishment. Meanwhile, members of the same establishment shamelessly continue to co-opt and manipulate his legacy while discarding his uncomfortable truths.

King has "slipped into the realm of symbol that people use and manipulate for their own purposes," [Glenn] McNair [associate professor of history at Kenyon College] said.

Harris-Lacewell said that is something people need to push back against.

"It's not OK to slip into flat memory of who Dr. King was, it does no justice to us and makes him to easy to appropriate," she said. "Every time he gets appropriated, we have to come out and say that's not OK. We do have the ability to speak back."

This article certainly has its flaws. Why not, for example, show us how "by taking on issues outside segregation, he [King] had lost the support of many newspapers and magazines"? This passing detail fails to impart the impact of Time magazine having called his "Beyond Vietnam" speech "demagogic slander that sounded like a script for Radio Hanoi" or of the Washington Post having proclaimed "King had diminished his usefulness to his cause, his country, his people."

Another glaring omission is the article's failure to mention by name "Beyond Vietnam" or any of King's other more progressive addresses or writings, or to provide links to their transcripts or videos. How can a news story on Martin Luther King - specifically one purporting to spotlight his forgotten legacy - report that "He had spoken out against the Vietnam War in 1967..." but not cite even one major speech in which this occurred?

Yet considering the mainstream media's negligent track record in reporting on Dr. King's legacy, journalist Deepti Hajela and the AP deserve some credit for presenting this story at all, despite its shortcomings. Though the words and deeds of the latter day King should also be reported widely each year, the fact is it's not. So if this is a step in the right direction, I applaud the AP for "following the unpopular road."

Story of the Day: Distinguished Journalist Slams NBC's Censorship

(updated below)

Kudos to veteran journalist and erstwhile Dateline reporter John Hockenberry:

A former "Dateline NBC" correspondent claims that in the aftermath of September 11, the network diverted him from reporting on al Qaeda and instead wanted him to ride along with the country's "forgotten heroes," firefighters.

John Hockenberry, who was laid off from "Dateline" in early 2005, wrote in this month's Technology Review that on the Sunday after the September 2001 attacks he was pitching stories on the origins of al Qaeda and Islamic fundamentalism. He claimed that then-NBC programming chief Jeff Zucker, who came into a meeting Hockenberry was having with "Dateline" executive producer David Corvo, said "Dateline" should instead focus on the firefighters and perhaps ride along with them a la "Cops," the Fox reality series.

According to Hockenberry, Zucker said "that he had no time for any subtitled interviews with jihadists raging about Palestine."

NBC's defensive, nasty response to Hockenberry's accusations is somewhat surprising. Usually an effortless "no comment" suffices, with the implicit assurance that such claims will disappear down the memory hole. Moreover, keep in mind that Mr. Hockenberry is no journeyman hack, but rather a highly decorated veteran journalist - a recipient of four Emmy awards, three Peabody Awards and an Edward R. Murrow award, among other accolades, and is currently a distinguished fellow at the MIT Media Lab.

Nevertheless, NBC speaks of its former award-winning reporter as if he's suddenly a card-carrying member of the tinfoil hat crowd:

"It's unfortunate that John Hockenberry seems to be so far out of touch with reality," an NBC spokesperson said. "The comments are so utterly absurd, we will have no further comment." Another NBC executive said it didn't sound like Zucker, who was promoted out of the news division and was at one time "Today" executive producer.

Yes, after decades of mainstream respectability, John Hockenberry, having called out one of our big media outlets for some of the reprehensible censorship and jingoism of the last seven years, is now loony as a tune. Please.

Here are further "out of touch" assertions by Hockenberry:

Another bombshell is Hockenberry's claims that General Electric, NBC's parent company, discouraged him from talking to the Bin Laden family about their estranged family member. Hockenberry asked GE, which does business with the Bin Laden family company, to help him get in contact with them. Instead, a PR executive called Hockenberry's hotel room in Saudi Arabia and read a statement about how GE didn't see its "valuable business relationship" with the Bin Laden Group as having anything to do with "Dateline."

In another instance, Hockenberry claimed a story he did about a Weather Underground member wouldn't appear on the Sunday edition of "Dateline" unless its lead-out, the 1960s family drama "American Dreams," did a show about "protesters or something." And for another story on the abuse of mentally ill inmates, Hockenberry was told by a producer that video of a fatal attack on a prisoner by guards wasn't enough.

The only thing unbelievable about these claims is that more mainstream journalists - those who genuinely respect their profession and its central role in any healthy democracy, who are disgusted by big media's complicity in the Bush White House's unprecedented executive branch criminality - have not stepped forward like Mr. Hockenberry.

Each time big media outlets respond to warranted criticism with such glib condescension, as though the reporting of news still operates in a pre-Internet vacuum, they accelerate their hemorrhaging audience shares and further degrade their already tattered reputations.

Finally, putting aside the reporting of news, per se, for just a moment, aren't corporations supposed to at least excel at PR? Who does that anonymous NBC spokesperson think he or she is benefiting with such a belligerent response (aside from, of course, the growing forces in alternative media)?

Note to NBC news executives: it's 2008, not 1998. It's time to act accordingly.

Cross-posted at Larisa Alexandrovna's at-Largely.

UPDATE: Hockenberry's piece in Technology Review (excerpts of which served as the basis for the Reuters report cited above) is a keenly observed insider's view of the entrenched, myopic, self-defeating stupidity in network news. You have to wonder if that anonymous NBC spokesperson took the time to read Hockenberry's article before making his or her embarrassing statement. My guess is no. Regardless, Hockenberry's skills as a journalist of substance and integrity - not to mention unimpeachable credibility - are in full display. In contrast, NBC's petty, baseless response only further supports Hockenberry's analysis.

I implore you to read in full Hockenberry's "You Don't Understand Our Audience: What I Learned About Network Television at Dateline NBC."

Here's the unforgettable anecdote from which that title derives:

To get airtime, not only did serious news have to audition against the travails of Diana or a new book by Dr. Phil, but it also had to satisfy bizarre conditions. In 2003, one of our producers obtained from a trial lawyer in Connecticut video footage of guards subduing a mentally ill prisoner. Guards themselves took the footage as part of a safety program to ensure that deadly force was avoided and abuses were documented for official review. We saw guards haul the prisoner down a greenish corridor, then heard hysterical screaming as the guard shooting the video dispassionately announced, "The prisoner is resisting." For 90 seconds several guards pressed the inmate into a bunk. All that could be seen of him was his feet. By the end of the video the inmate was motionless. Asphyxiation would be the official cause of death.

This kind of gruesome video was rare. We also had footage of raw and moving interviews with this and another victim's relatives. The story had the added relevance that one of the state prison officials had been hired as a consultant to the prison authority in Iraq as the Abu Ghraib debacle was unfolding. There didn't seem to be much doubt about either the newsworthiness or the topicality of the story. Yet at the conclusion of the screening, the senior producer shook his head as though the story had missed the mark widely. "These inmates aren't necessarily sympathetic to our audience," he said. The fact that they had been diagnosed with schizophrenia was unimportant. Worse, he said that as he watched the video of the dying inmate, it didn't seem as if anything was wrong.

"Except that the inmate died," I offered.

"But that's not what it looks like. All you can see is his feet."

"With all those guards on top of him."

"Sure, but he just looks like he's being restrained."

"But," I pleaded, "the man died. That's just a fact. The prison guards shot this footage, and I don't think their idea was to get it on Dateline."

"Look," the producer said sharply, "in an era when most of our audience has seen the Rodney King video, where you can clearly see someone being beaten, this just doesn't hold up."

"Rodney King wasn't a prisoner," I appealed. "He didn't die, and this mentally ill inmate is not auditioning to be the next Rodney King. These are the actual pictures of his death."

"You don't understand our audience."

"I'm not trying to understand our audience," I said. I was getting pretty heated at this point--always a bad idea. "I'm doing a story on the abuse of mentally ill inmates in Connecticut."

"You don't get it," he said, shaking his head.

The story aired many months later, at less than its original length, between stories that apparently reflected a better understanding of the audience. During my time at Dateline, I did plenty of stories that led the broadcast and many full hours that were heavily promoted on the network. But few if any of my stories were more tragic, or more significant in news value, than this investigation into the Connecticut prison system.

Story of the Day: NY Times Buries Dodd's Filibuster Threat Victory

(updated below)

It's nothing new for our country's Paper of Record to stick a crucial story in its back pages (often while providing front-page real estate to a particularly banal article).

But one of the most egregious examples of such editorial decisions is today's move by The New York Times to bury news of presidential candidate Senator Christopher Dodd's victorious filibuster threat against the proposed telecom immunity bill.

So what page did The Times slip in this account of Dodd's courageous and historic stand? What page did it cover this patriotic push-back to a bill that, if passed, would effectively reward telecom companies for complicity in the Bush administration's illegal wiretapping of millions of innocent American citizens and set a frightening precedent of similar retroactive immunity in such cases where various parties (CIA, Blackwater mercenaries, etc.) took part in torture, extraordinary renditions or other criminal activities in George Bush's "war on terror"? What page did the paper that sat on the illegal wiretapping story for a year - before "scooping" it - deem this fit to print?

A29. Yes, A29.

(The online version has no page numbers, but this news is buried there as well; no mention of it even makes the home page - where over 90 stories currently reside.)

Now ask yourself how? Who at The Times authorized this inane editorial decision? And what excuse can possibly explain it away?

Senator Dodd's threat to filibuster yesterday and his triumph in having the patently unconstitutional bill withdrawn from a vote last night is precisely the kind of story that should be big news in a democracy, especially one such as ours, which has been gasping under the boot of an overtly criminal White House for seven long years.

What's the sound of one U.S. senator taking a successful stand against a rogue White House administration and its spineless collaborators in Congress?

If you're The Times, it's something akin to a whisper.

(Editor's Note: If you tried to comment today and received a message about triggering the spam filter - some people got this, some didn't - I apologize for your troubles. Typepad, which hosts this site, has installed a new, overly aggressive spam filter. Rest assured I can now access this filter and publish anyone's comment that incorrectly winds up there. So post comments as you normally would. If you don't see yours right away, you will shortly. Thanks for your patience and for contributing to the conversation.)

UPDATE: Commenter EastFallowfield left this earlier today:

A29 in the Times doesn't mean it's buried. It's not front page, but the first x amount of pages after page 1 are International News.

The National news starts in the middle somewhere, and this time of year there are a ton of fullpage or other large ads filling up many pages of the A section. It was right in the middle of all the pages on politics and such.

The Times is no "Thinkprogress" or Kos, but if it's not on the front page then it was pretty much where it was supposed to be in their world.

I responded to it in the comments section and thought the points made helped to further clarify the irresponsibility of The Times' editorial decision, so I'm reposting my response here, too:

EastFallowField, thanks for your comment. But I think you're giving The Times far too much credit here. First, there's no valid reason why this story didn't make the front page. That said, here's a deeper examination of its specific placement:

When the Times thinks a story is important but is short on space, it sometimes puts a photo of the story on the cover that calls out the page number inside (as it did for the large Darfur peace rally in Central Park a year and a half ago).

Or the Times will highlight a story on the front page's "Inside" section. What were some of the stories on the "Inside" section that beat out the Dodd news yesterday? #2: "NBC Late Shows to Resume"; #4: "Why the Long Face?" (about a new book that helps you diagnose what's ailing your pet dog, cat, ferret, etc.); #7: "A Winning Influence" (a successful all-Indian high school basketball team in Oklahoma).

In addition to the "Inside" section (located on the cover), there is also the "News Summary" area located on the following page (A2). This section also serves to highlight important articles inside the paper, from International, National, New York/Region, Business, Science, Health & Fitness, and Editorial. This section calls out five National stories. The Dodd news wasn't there either. What's one of the stories that was? #3: "Churches Battle Witchcraft." I wish I were making that up. Unfortunately, this was yet another story The Times deemed more critical than Dodd's victory.

Finally, the first page of the National section on that day was A24; the Dodd news, as mentioned, was located on A29. That's six pages into the National news section. While it should've been on the cover, that it didn't make the first page of the National section and didn't appear until six pages deep into it, only further underscores the absurdity of The Times' editorial decision and confirms the story was indeed buried.

Moreover, please note two of the three National stories trumping Dodd's victory on the first page of the section - the aforementioned witchcraft article: "A Midnight Service Helps African Immigrants Combat Demons" and this more pressing national news item: "San Francisco's Mayor Proposes Fee on Sales of Sugary Soft Drinks."