Let My Newspapers Go

“American newspapers are passing through an era… in which a corporate ownership model seems increasingly unworkable.”
Tim Rutten

The Tribune Company is emblematic of the pitfalls of corporate ownership of media. It’s portfolio includes 11 daily newspapers, 25 television stations, and cable superstation WGN, as well as WGN-AM radio, the Chicago Cubs, and news, information and entertainment websites.

One of its newspapers, the Los Angeles Times, is at the cornerstone of a conflict that encompasses disgruntled shareholders, rebellious executives and underserved customers. Through all of this turmoil, some insight and inspiration has come from Tim Rutten, the paper’s Associate Editor of Features. Rutten has taken a hard line position on the question of corporate ownership. How often do you see a reporter give his employer an ultimatum like this:

“American newspapers are passing through an era not only of technological change but also one in which a corporate ownership model seems increasingly unworkable. If the Tribune Co. does not feel able or willing to resist its investors’ unreasonable demands on behalf of the public’s interest, then it should put The Times into the hands of somebody who will.”

And a couple of weeks later:

“No one can argue that Tribune or anyone who owns The Times is obliged to lose money. On the other hand, no one should argue that a newspaper’s proprietor has no obligation except to make as much money as it can. Somewhere between those two extremes is a fulcrum called responsibility on which a balance must be struck. Doing so requires the recognition that, although stockholders certainly are stakeholders in this process, so – and just as surely – are a paper’s readers.

What this moment in the life of the Los Angeles Times requires is recognition that the paper’s social, intellectual and political value to readers needs to be unlocked and not just its monetary value to investors.”

While these comments were directed specifically to the affairs at The Times, they could apply generally to almost any media conglomerate. The notion that a newspaper’s responsibility to its readers is at least equivalent to its fiduciary obligation to shareholders is one that should gain more acceptance in the journalism world. The more local the control, the more likely that outcome can be achieved. The Times deserves some credit for publishing Rutten’s provocative views. And Rutten deserves even more for having and expressing them.

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Blame The Internet – The Predators Feeding Ground

In the wake of the resignation of Rep. Mark Foley (FL-Perv), the Internet’s culture of free speech and access could be swept under along with a few deviant and corrupt Republicans.

The fact that the offending behavior of Foley was acted out on the net could become impetus for his desperate colleagues to renew their pursuit of restrictive and censorious legislation such as the Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA). This bill would ban social networks (and much more) from any computer in a school, library, or publicly funded facility.

Foley himself was a sponsor of the Internet Stopping Adults Facilitating the Exploitation of Today’s Youth (Internet SAFETY) Act, a bill that the Center for Democracy and Technology says…

“would have a profoundly damaging chilling effect, deterring bloggers, artists and even health advocates from posting legitimate information that could expose them to jail time.”

Foley’s own comments in support of the measure have an eerie drone to them now:

“Sex offenders are not petty criminals. They prey on our children like animals and will continue to do it unless stopped.”

In honor of Internet Safety Day (July, 28, 2004) Foley warned that the Internet…

“provides a new medium for pedophiles to reach out to our most vulnerable citizens-America’s children.”

Hopefully one of them was stopped this weekend. But we must not allow a pack of super-righteous hypocrites to dictate the future of access to the Internet. We need to be on our guard, because they will attempt to exploit this scandal to provoke fear and confusion about the Internet. They will characterize it as dangerous and unsupervised. Indeed, Michael Fitzpatrick (R-PA), the author of DOPA, has already declared that…

“…this new technology has become a feeding ground for child predators that use these sites as just another way to do our children harm.”

Make no mistake about it. They will come after the Internet. They will seek to explain away their political difficulties by shifting blame to other matters. They will exploit a scandal to further the establishment of their extremist theocracy. By covering up the abhorrent behavior of their colleague, they have demonstrated that they care more about partisan advantage than about children. So what would make anyone think they care about free speech or the Internet?


Eat At Cheney’s

Now at Cheney’s,

It’s The Grand Scam Warfest Breakfast
A celebration of culinary barbarism.

At Cheney’s, abuse is on the menu 24 hours a day. So tie up the wife, bind and gag the kids and come on down to Cheney’s.

Don’t Torture Yourself!

With the passage of the Freedom to Torture Act of 2006, all Americans can learn to appreciate the joys of Waterboarding and Sleep Depravation. In fact, we should be able to partake of it in our own communities in the comfortable surroundings of establishments we commonly patronize. Torture is no longer an elitist pastime reserved for the priveliged few. Thanks to the United States Congress, discrimation is once again cast out of American society. Aren’t you proud?

The Flash movie linked above is my entry in the Huffington Post Contagious Festival. I would appreciate it if you’d take a look and, if you like it, send it to everyone you know. And I do mean everyone. I’ll be checking so don’t try any funny stuff.


General Motors’ Great American Idiot

In a stunning display of marketing ineptidude, General Motors has tagged Sean Hannity as its spokesman for a campaign/contest to give away 5 new cars. The “You’re A Great American Car Give-Away”, was conceived as a means to promote GM’s American-made vehicles. But the “great” American they chose as the public face of the promotion is a controversial and contentious figure who routinely disparages the patriotism of other Americans. He is a divisive and hostile partisan that recently declared that control of the Congress in the next election is a life and death struggle:

“there are things in life worth fighting and dying for and one of ‘em is making sure Nancy Pelosi doesn’t become the speaker.”

GM, like other automakers, has fallen on hard times. So has Hannity, whose program’s ratings have declined 21% year-over-year. So the selection of Hannity as their spokesman may just be a case of two withering dinosaurs huddling together waiting for extinction.


Newsweek Covers Cover-Up News

The segregation of Americans from the rest of the world is graphically illustrated with this week’s issue of Newsweek. International readers of the magazine will see a cover that features a menacing jihadi and the headline: Losing Afghanistan. But U.S. readers will get a far more comforting cover featuring celebrity photographer Annie Liebowitz and her, “Life In Pictures.” (Liebowitz cover is at the top left at the link above. Scroll down for the International cover).

Since we know that magazine covers have a profound impact on sales, the message delivered by Newsweek’s editorial staff reveals their rather disturbing preconceptions about their readers.

  • International readers are compelled by substantive news that challenges and informs them with honest and relevant reporting.
  • U.S. readers prefer gossipy tabloid material that shelters them from woe and preserves a blissful ignorance.

Whether or not the Newsweek editors are correct, they are irresponsible. Their job is to publish news, not pacify the perceived tender sensitivities of their customers. The American people deserve better than the insulting insinuation that they are too fragile to be exposed to the messy reality of truthful reporting.

But coddling like this has even more serious consequences. The gap between how the world perceives international affairs and how Americans do, is an ever-widening chasm. Americans are frequently surprised by the actions and opinions of other nations and fail to grasp why they so often disagree with us. Maybe it’s because our media does us the disservice of sanitizing our news. Like children at the dinner table, they slice it up and feed it to us in digestible bits. The result is that we don’t get the full story.

As a democracy, our foreign policy is executed by representatives that we elect. If our choices are made on the basis of incomplete, and even inaccurate, information, then our policies will reflect that deficiency. That’s why so many Americans initially supported the Iraq invasion while most of the world opposed it. That’s why universal healthcare is provided by most economically stable nations but not here. That’s why over 160 countries have signed the Kyoto environmental accords, but not the U.S. That’s why the death penalty is outlawed in every western industrialized nation except for ours.

The impression that America is out of touch with the rest of the world is inescapable and the blame lies with Newsweek and it’s peers in the American media. This cover controversy is not an isolated example. It is merely a graphically expository one. And if we do not demand more from our media, we will continue to be shortchanged and misinformed. And we will continue to misunderstand the world and they will misunderstand us. That is a dangerous brew that foreshadows escalating differences and risks for Americans and all the world’s people.

(Hat tip to Truthout and Eat The Press)


Propaganda Is Its Own Reward

Last year, a PR firm called the Lincoln Group, was hired by the Pentagon to bribe Iraqi newspapers to carry pre-packaged stories that put the U.S. and the war effort in a positive light. But two unrelated articles published today demonstrate that their effort was less than successful, and for that they are being rewarded with a new $12 million dollar contract.

The Washington Post is reporting that, “Most Iraqis Favor Immediate U.S. Pullout, Polls Show.”

“A strong majority of Iraqis want U.S.-led military forces to immediately withdraw from the country, saying their swift departure would make Iraq more secure and decrease sectarian violence, according to new polls by the State Department and independent researchers.”

It has become commonplace for Iraqis to theorize that the U.S. is intentionally fomenting chaos. Typical is the view of this unemployed Iraqi construction worker:

“Do you really think it’s possible that America — the greatest country in the world — cannot manage a small country like this? No! They have not made any mistakes. They brought people here to destroy Iraq, not to build Iraq.”

If this is a demonstration of the success we can expect from the Lincoln Group, it makes one wonder how they got a new contract to monitor the media in Iraq and the U.S.

“The idea is to use the information to ‘build support’ in Iraqi, Arabic, international and U.S. audiences for what the military describes as its goals in Iraq, such as destroying the insurgency and helping Iraqis build a democracy…The list of media outlets to be watched includes the New York Times, Fox Television and the satellite channel, Al-Arabiya.”

I’m not sure which is more disturbing – The fact that this unethical and incompetent firm is getting a new federal contract, or that this new contract was offered to anyone. Do the American people really need a government-run media watchdog pouring over what the press is publishing? What do they intend to do with the data they compile? The potential for the punitive use of this kind of information is obvious, and this administration has proven that it is capable of such extra-Constitutional behavior.

Our only hope for unfettered press freedom is that the combined ineptitude of the Lincoln Group and BushCo will lead to the failure of their devious plots.

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Stalking Points Memo – Bush Haters

Bush Haters

In this Memo, Bill tackles a subject of which he is exceedingly knowledgable: Hurting America. The only problem is that, as usual, he gets all the facts wrong and arrives at the wrong conclusions. At least he’s consistent.


(Click the pic here to go to Stalking Points Memo page, then click the pic there to start the Flash movie)


Fox Pulls Clinton Video From YouTube

This weekend’s big interview was the Chris Wallace ambush of Bill Clinton. After promising to divide the time between Clinton’s Global Initiative and everything else, Wallace sandbags Clinton by asking why he didn’t do more to get bin Laden. Clinton wouldn’t take the bait, but did lay into the Fox correspondent, calling it a “conservative hit.”

Ever since, the piece has been replayed and talked about throughout the TV, radio and Internet universe. So, predictably, it ended up on YouTube where its various submissions received more than a million views.

That was until Fox got jealous and insisted that it be removed. This is a perfect demonstration of a corporate media megalith misunderstanding the new media playing field. And it also underscores the necessity of keeping Internet media independent. Just imagine the kind of censorship that would prevail if Fox owned YouTube (or if Viacom, who is currently sniffing around it, did).


T-Warrior In The House

Bill O’Reilly’s new book, Culture Warrior, comes out today. OK, just sit your butt back down. There’s plenty of copies for everyone.

I tried desperately to get a pre-release copy, but they had the distribution pretty locked-up. That didn’t stop Media Matters, who did get a copy and have published a comprehensive debunking. Here’s some appetizers:

“My goal is to expose and defeat people who have the power to do you great harm. My weapons will be facts and superior analysis based on those facts”

If his weapons are facts and superior analysis, he is entering the battlefield unarmed.

“If you are on the traditionalist side, the S-Ps [Secular-Progressives] will reject you and perhaps try to inflict pain upon your person.”

“…inflict pain upon your person?” Who talks like that? No wonder Bill feels rejected. He even told Newsweek that he doesn’t get invited to parties and that, “Nobody Wants Me.”

“I don’t have to be a culture warrior. I could make millions doing straight anchor work or just writing books. But I’m on a mission.”

He’s on a mission to make millions of dollars as a mercenary in his invented war on culture.

The Media Matters article goes into great depth citing the falsehoods, mischaracterizations, slanders, and delusions in this book. They have carefully documented every assertion they put forth while pointing out that O’Reilly seems to have an aversion to doing so. For those of you who don’t have the stomach to read the book itself, Media Matters is providing a valuable public service.


Ted Turner’s Smackdown

The former CNN founder and reformed media mogul, Ted Turner, made some interesting remarks in a recent interview:

“[The decision to invade Iraq] will go down in history — it already is going down in history — as one of the dumbest moves that was ever made by anybody,” Turner said, citing the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor and the German invasion of Russia during the Second World War as other “dumb” moves.

“We lost so much,” he said of the U.S. invasion. “It literally broke my heart, it was so dumb. … If you started wars with everyone you don’t like, well good God, we would all be at war with everybody.”

That kind of honesty is all too rare from Turner’s social set. And as welcome as it is to hear, I like even better his statement that he has no interest in being at war with anyone — even Rupert Murdoch:

“I’d fight [Murdoch] in the ring, with gloves on, but I wouldn’t bomb News Corp.”

Well I guess that’s one less imaginary threat Bill O’Reilly has to worry about. The funny thing is, if Turner and Murdoch met in the ring, Murdoch’s network would probably snap up the broadcast license for the match. Turner would kick Murdoch’s ass, and then Fox would go back to celebrating the war that Turner so insightfully dubbed as stupid. Turner has also said that ceding control of CNN was one of the stupidest things that he’s ever done. On that I’m going to have to agree with him again.

This seems like a good time to remind everyone to read Turner’s inspired essay, “My Beef With Big Media.” If you’ve never read it, then drop everything and read it now. If you have read it, you’d be surprised how stimulating it is to read again. I make a point to read it at least annually.