A day in the life of an American newspaper (yes, political)

Poststructural Pub
1

For the past month or so in the many exchanges about politics, Gilder has asserted that our domestic press is not doing the job of covering the war and mentioning salient facts that would help us view Bush and the Iraq war in some kind of truthful light. He has also inferred that foreign press does a better job perhaps and cited sources as varying at the Tehran Times and other reports.

It would be impossible to really know, without being on the ground and with them, what kind of quality of reporting is being done and how accurate and diligent the reporters are. The editors, at home, make decisions about how they are going to project a story, based on placement, headlines etc.

While I am not disputing the entirety of Gilder’s assertion, I believe that in some part, his assertions reflect Noam Chomsky’s “propaganda model” which would have papers not wanting to deliver news thats unpleasant or at-odds with some kind of status quo and corporate control. I am sure that’s an oversimplification but it reminds me of the kinds of things that have been said. My issue with Gilder on this topic and in this post is more about how editors and writers go about the job and the overall dynamic of presenting information in newspaper form and whether they are inordinately influenced by the Bush White House to suppress information.

Anyway, I woke up Sunday morning and looked at my paper. Its a Knight-Ridder, so is very similar to many papers across the country that you may see daily. The news section is divided into three parts, Front page, National-World, and Local.

On the front page is the headline with story: “Insurgents bunkers well-stocked” with subhead about how it illustrates “rebels audacity.” The lead paragraph asserts that the rebels are doing well enough to operate within a short distance of a Marine Base. It’s a big story and jumps to a back page within the section. The rest of the front section deals with California and the West so there is no more Iraq.

In the National/World section you get, on the front page: "Battle proves Taliban alive, kicking, with a subhead of how the Taliban is "supplied with money, men and weapons. The lead paragraph talks about how rebels are being spotted everywhere and the story continues about how replacements come in quickly from Pakistan to continue the Taliban cause. Even the cutline below the photo mentions “replenishing.” Its another big story and jumps to about the sixth page of that section.

And on that page are the following heads/stories; “Army troops inssuficient for mission” and describes specifically how many troops are deployed on the northwestern Iraq/Syria border and that they are not enough.
Below is a related story of how US intelligence leaders are rethinking the idea that Syria is as big a player in Zarqawis insurgency and how he probably has stayed in and been supported by native Iraqis.

On the opposite page, is the top story with the head: “Bush’ optimist clashes with pessimism in Iraq.” That story continues, as you would expect, expressing the frustration with Iraqis with the US effort. On the following page is a story that might be interpreted as supportive of the military because it mentions the Anaconda base as a model for others in the area. Still, it is full of specific info about troop numbers etc.

THe Sunday paper also has a round-up of opinions in a section called “Perspective.” The front page is a large story written by a local Democratic congresswoman with the head:
War tells its own truth." and subhead" US failure in Iraq is obvious to nearly all." She goes on to demand the ever-popular timetable for US withdrawal.

Frankly, the effect of that paper was inescapable: Bush and the US are LOSING in every way.

Now as for the quality of the info in these stories, I cannot really know. All were written by field reporters with datelines from Afghanistan, and Iraq.

What does this tell me, and how do I square it with Gilder’s assertions?

I think its entirely possible that early on, reporters and editors were gung-ho and accepting of the Pentagon view and that they no longer are.
This would support Gilder’s assertions about that time period to me. And I think that with time and the slow light of truth dawning about the WMDs, the credibility with Gitmo etc, the reporters do not want to be “fooled again.”

But I think that its clear that these reporters are looking for and finding hard data to back up their stories, even if they and their editors are choosing a slant, which happens to be, at the moment, pretty anti-Bush and full of pessimism, in opposition to the Pentagon spokesmen, etc, which come off as cardboard to many.

Overall, I think I may agree with GIlder about insufficient coverage but I am not as negative about the domestic press and I don’t think a hand of government propaganda is definable in this. Except to say, that the newspapers feel a sense of what is acceptable in the public eye to say.

It is now OKAY to knock the lame-duck President and that the reading public AND advertisers don’t think the newspaper it out of line with anti-Bush stories, even though there are many who have personnel abroad there who are in danger and feel dissapointed that their morale may be affected. Especially with the Congressional elections coming up, I think the media is onboard with a power change at the top. Call if self-correcting if you want.

I work for a newspaper and I have to tell you, most people don’t really understand how it works. The editorial policy of any paper has three components: one is making sure the advertisers are happy by not putting their ads in a publication that is somehow at a cognitive dissonance with what they think society is thinking. Another factor is the readers, who once again, will not accept something that is too outrageous in ANY polemic direction, politically [yet will settle for trash as long as it contains obits, sports scores, cartoons and bleeding leads]. The third is the corporate or private owners of the paper and whatever policy they have. The editor, who is hired by the third, essentially plays a juggling job and depending on how strong-willed they are, can supply some dynamic influence. The effect is some kind of watered-down middle of the road picture, but I don’t know if that is avoidable, frankly.

And there is a balance to be had. If the owners of the press get too agenda-oriented and ignore the readers and advertisers, they lose their business. I believe this is what is happening with network TV news right now, with the CBS fiascoes fresh in mind.

So, yes there is a flow of propaganda but it seems based on popular sentiment RATHER than government fact-controlling (try as they might from their Press secretarys, fax machines et al). But what is the alternative? Government run? Can anyone honestly think that a government paper would be any less agenda-driven than this private melange of interests?

I just don’t think that the blanket statement that somehow foreign press is going to get it more right, because frankly, they have ALL of the same pressures on their editorial process, whether from private business or governments. If you live in a country that basically hates Bush, do you expect an article about schools re-opening in Bagdad and more water or electricity, even if its true? Do those readers want that? Do their advertisers or government want that?

So, this is letter of faint support for American newspeople or at least a refutation that others are doing a much better job at bringing the truth about Iraq and Bush to light. The biggest failures are at the top with corporate thinking and I would direct people to a recent book by retired CBS reporter Tom Fenton, who bemoans the fact that major TV networks have very few reporters on the ground. At least the newspapers do in fact have coverage and they seem pretty persistent at getting something to report, flawed as it may be. And I wish to say that corporate control of media outlets is problematic but I still am not as sure as Gilder that this results in the kind of information suppression that I have read about in his posts.

Just like everything else human, the answer is diffuse and permeable, rather than Draconian and defineable. Sure, manipulators abound, but they are on all sides of the political spectrum and operate all over the world.

While I expect the full deconstruction treatment, I offer these comments not as polemic but as alternative reality from what I have read here.

Also, I would ask: what is the veracity of the polar opposite of this watered-down reality? Very smart people who feel they have the premium on truth? Do they really, or are they trapped in their own pretensions?

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weeks - thanks for the thoughtful (thoughtout?) writings.

I think the following is most important:
“…one is making sure the advertisers are happy by not putting their ads in a publication that is somehow at a cognitive dissonance with what they think society is thinking. THe second are the readers, who once again, will not accept something that is too outrageous in ANY polemic direction, politically. The third is the corporate or private owners of the paper and whatever policy they have. You might say a peripheral fourth is the editor him or herself and their particular whims.”

And of that - the first listed reason is the most impactful. This isn’t just effecting news in print, but also that on TV and radio (and to a lesser extent, that found on internet sites such as CNN).
The dollar (or it’s equivalent) is the driving force in all this. “News” is not “news” anymore, it’s entertainment bites of 30 seconds. And, for whatever reason, people don’t want to hear “good” news - it’s the horrific and gross that sells.

This is the main reason I tend to get news off the internet. I do look at the local paper - and I’ll look at national sites such as CNN. But I can quickly do a search to see if the reported story is plausible, or if it seems to be spun a certain way (headlines seem to be notorious, lately, for putting a spin on stories that aren’t substantiated in the body).

There’s a local comedy show that talks about putting hidden microphones in high level meetings, etc - and their “motto” is “Your right to know supercedes your right to exist”. While it’s funny, it’s also sad but true.

We had another shooting yesterday - I think we’re up to 32 for the year now. This time it was a 16 year old, and it’s supposedly some type of “turf war” incident. What was the lead story on the radio and TV yesterday? Michael Jackson. How sick is that?


Missy

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What I said was that the foreign press has gotten it right when the US press has not in certain cases. You instantaneously dismissed the article I posted from the Tehran Times without even considering it. You dismissed it solely because of the country of origin without any real substantiation other than your prejudice. You went on to discredit what you referred to as the “Islamic press.”

The corporate media executives are attending briefings at the White House. There have also been “news stories” about the war and the military that were produced by the Pentagon and aired on corporate media to look as though they were produced by the local broadcasters. Also, the press is provided with a list of questions that can’t be asked. I even heard the head on CNN tell their journalists at a major conference about “questions that the American people don’t want to ask and don’t want an answer to.” If you are a White House reporter and you ask one of these questions – you will be cut off.

There were many voices that were saying that the evidence of WMDs was insufficient based on things like Kamel’s testimony as well as what Scott Ritter and Hans Blix were saying. The pro-war voices out numbered the anti-war voice by something like 60 to 1 and featured mostly military and ex-military “experts.” But it turns out that the anti-war voices were right, and the pro-war voices were wrong. But despite that the ratio of commentators hasn’t changed at all. The reports I see on US mainstream TV about the Iraq war are a far cry from what the reality is based on non-US and independent news outlets, and the credibility gap keeps widening.

This only true in some cases, but the International press as a whole is a much better alternative to US corporate media. Independent media in the US has been far more accurate in most cases as well. The art of propaganda in the US is very subtle – but it’s very deliberate.

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I think one of the foremost reasons for looking to outside media for perspective is that they are not biased by the “US must be held in the holiest light” stance that many, especially in the last several years, have taken.

Of course, there is the pendulum swing of ‘we’ve been fooled, so we have to counter attack’… so more negative now coming to the fore.

I do not think the US is especially ‘evil’, but I do not fully trust what is being fed to me through the standard news sources, and there have been many, many examples to support that lack of trust.

Oh… must exit as a storm is arriving … will edit later if needed.

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On the front page is the headline with story: “Insurgents bunkers well-stocked” with subhead about how it illustrates “rebels audacity.” The lead paragraph asserts that the rebels are doing well enough to operate within a short distance of a Marine Base. It’s a big story and jumps to a back page within the section. …
I think its entirely possible that early on, reporters and editors were gung-ho and accepting of the Pentagon view and that they no longer are.

From outside of the US, I can tell you that while the coverage may be somewhat less accepting of the white house’s spin, much still remains intact, starting with the terminology.

The white house calls the enemy “rebels” explicitly attributing treason to their enemies and legitimacy to the US army.

This is not the case; you are, after all, an army of occupation. Absent the white house’s preferred spin, those you fight would are seen as the resistance, not as traitors.

Which is the way you’ll find the same events covered outside the US.

So if the thesis of this argument is that the domestic US press has turned on the white house and against the war; that isn’t true. The press may be far more sceptical, but they’re largely programmed to emit the white house line.

And their scepticism is warranted. In the run up to the war and in the early stages, the white house released–and the US press uncritically printed–a great deal of highly dubuois information.

The papers got burned for their trust; the more serious papers had to print embarrassing retractions for their uncritical cheerleading.

Once burned, twice shy. Ari Fleisher, Scott McClelland and the pentagon’s briefers out and out lied to the press and betrayed their trust. No wonder they’re somewhat more sceptical now.

6

Jayson Blair.

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Here’s what the Spokane Spokesman-Review had on the front page for Sunday, June 5, 2005:

Jordan leaves a new EWU (about the president of Eastern Washington University. This is the top story on the front page.)

Recalls easy to threaten but difficult to exucute (about the city council trying to force a recall of Mayor Jim West since the SR did a sting and exposed him as a homosexual who supposedly was trying to pick up boys under age 18.)

Troops expose rebels’ hideout (oh goodness - an actual NEWS story?)

Seniors to commence debate (should local high school seniors attend their graduation or go to a national speech and debate tournament?)

Must be nice to have a local paper that actually has NEWS instead of trying to be the next National Enquirer!

8

Weapons of Mass Destruction.

9

Aw, c’mon, the NY Times is “special.” Their editorial agenda is pretty clear and I think they have lost tremendous respect. The Blair thing showed what happens when they micromanaged some social engineering right into their hiring policy. But just some people are “good Democrats” and “loyal Republicans,” the Times has what I think is an undeservedly loyal following. Alternatively, they continue to offer very wide-ranging coverage on many fronts, making it an interesting paper to read even if you think Pinchy Sulzberger and his coterie are out of control. I can learn a lot from the Times but their bloodlust after Abu Ghraib was so transparent as to be laughable.

I dispute what Simon says about the insurgents being resistance fighters because its not that simple. I think that some Iraqis continue to welcome the US because it upended the Sunni-Baath-Saddam hegemony and it continues to serve their purpose and fuel their hopes for a different future. Others desperately hope to regain power by outlasting the Americans and count on domestic pressure to pull out. I think the press has conveyed that situation pretty well and it sounds reasonable, all things considered, that you would have the spread of opinion.

Another message from the press that has been clear from Day One is how impossible the task was of restoring trust of the US after the Shiite and Kurd massacres post Gulf War I, not to mention even earlier support for Saddam against Iran. I often wonder if the choice of having Britain in the southern areas was part of that, as the Marsh Arabs and others took the brunt of Saddam’s post-war fury after coalition tanks left. I can definitely say that the US press very much underreported the British role down South. It was okay at first, during the invasion, then really dropped off.

To deny that foreign fighters are coming in is to ignore reality; the seized documents, the cash, the weapons and evidence trails to other countries. How can a foreign fighter be a resistance fighter for Iraq? They are not natives, and Iraqis turn them in almost everyday, no matter how bad you think its going for the U.S. If you think the human cannon fodder for Islamo-fascists coming over to Iraq are on the level with notable patriots of various countries in history, then we have an irreconciliable difference of opinion.

And that’s another thing about the various press agencies. You can ALWAYS find an Iraqi that will say something like “we were better off with Saddam” just as you can always find one that sees hope for the future.
The devil in it is that you always wonder just what the individual reporter is thinking when he/she gathers info for the story. If they are lazy, they just collect quotes to push a point and ignore conflicting ones.

It would be interesting to hear some conversations between field reporters and their editors as they are given their assignments.

10

The Iraqi insurgents are a legal resistance recognized by International law. Having outside forces assistance is nothing new either; the US was exactly that during WWII helping various countries resists occupation by Germany. Just like Hitler did in Poland, the US initiated a preemptive war in Iraq concocted from deliberate lies. Iraq has as much right to resist the US occupation, as Poland had to resist German occupation.

==========================

Iraq’s Right to Resistance and Self-Determination

Click on title for full article

By Ghali Hassan
Information Clearing House
Feb 25, 2005, 19:57

According to UN Charter and numerous UN resolutions, international law guarantees people’s right to resist an illegal occupation by “all necessary means at their disposal” to end the occupation of their nation. Resistant groups “are entitled to seek and receive support”. Armed resistant have been used against the English in the US, against the Nazis in France, Yugoslavia and Norway. The historic judgement by the Italian judge Clementina Forleo, Judge for the Preliminary Hearing in Milan on 24 January 2005 adds another legitimacy to the Iraqi struggle against US Occupation. Judge Forleo ruled that the accused (five North Africans) “cannot be classified as terrorists”, but resistance fighters. She said, ”that resistance [to] US occupation forces in Iraq by sending fighters does not amount to terror”. The judgement was supported by an overwhelming majority of the Italian Legal Community.

The US Occupation of Iraq has failed. Basic improvements to the lives of ordinary Iraqis, which started to appear before the war, have now disappeared. More Iraqis now than ever face increasing hardship and misery. The health system is deteriorated and Iraq’s infrastructure is collapsing. Insecurity and unemployment are rising to dangerous levels. Iraq’s future today is being determined not by the Iraqi people, but by the corrupt and incompetent US administration. The US-installed puppet government of expatriates and quislings are fighting among themselves for the position of who will serve the Occupation better and provide the US with new façade to role the Middle East.

The new US strategy coupled with illegitimate elections is to change the face of the Occupation and internationalise it. With this, the Bush Administration hopes it has a platform to manoeuvre and pursue new war. The US is training more Kurd militias and requesting more troops from the dwindling “coalition of the willing”. This cosmetic change is a farce PR. The Occupation remains a violent US-British military Occupation against the wishes of the Iraqi people. Occupation is not “freedom” and “liberty”; occupation is a tyranny with all the characteristics of oppression and fear.

In the mean time, the heroic Iraqi Resistance stands in stark contrast to the cowardly self-styled and US-installed Arab rulers and the bankruptcy of Arab intellectuals. The Iraqi people are unlikely to remain under US Occupation and artificially divided.

With or without the “solidarity” of those who demonstrated against the war in Western capitals, the Iraqi popular Resistance movement will continue against the US-led Occupation until the US is forced to leave Iraq. Only a US withdrawal will bring the possibility of real democracy and freedom to Iraq.

Self-determination independent of foreign power is the Iraqi people right to self-rule. Once this is achieved, the Iraqi people will have the chance to build their society and their country free from foreign domination. Lets hope that Iraqi Resistance will thwart US imperialism in the Middle East and elsewhere.

11

Yes, very well written. I don’t necessarily agree, but it was fun to read. :slight_smile:

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[u]Print is either dead or dying[/u] The only fun most of us really have with papers is laughing about what they don’t know. And they probably know it. So, they’ve become very careful with their editorials now. They realize they better say something good, even about what they dissagree with, if they want to keep their jobs. That’s why I prefer direct source material, and making up my own mind, rather than some editors colorful and persuasive rendition of the truth that is likely being used for a dual purpose.

So, in that light, I feel good reading any newspaper or editorial. I don’t necessarily believe any of it, or swallow it without a good chew first. Sometimes I just use the information for comparison when readiing other news accounts. When I see two editors from two different papers arguing two different positions on national TV about the same incident…well, who could know more than they do? And why should I believe either one without reading around a lot first?

I’ve been in local gov’t business long enough to know what the paper reports about an issue is not the complete picture; it’s only what they were told. If they go out and actually do some independent investigation, they usually check with the city or county first to sort things out. There’s nothing more embarrassing for a paper to endorse a particular issue of candidate…and then see the voters go the other way.

Duh, how could the average reader be that smart? (face-saving followup editorial: “We knew public opinion was overwhelming, but we still maintain the passage of the Initiative will not be in the public’s long term best interest”) :laughing:

So, I think editorials, and most news reports, are mostly slanted to please subscribers, or a particular known partisanship of a community. Like one editor said: when we realized it was a matter of readers falling one way or other, we changed the slant on our approach. :laughing:

13

I have heard that this, more than anything else, controls what gets said, or how its said, regarding reporting on any level of government, but especially the feds, ever since Watergate. If a reporter/editor/news provider really ticks the administration off, they are excluded from all further news events, and left to try to get info third hand. I’m sure that this level of control always existed to some extent, but it seems that this type of policy is more aggresively pursued now more than ever before. Possibly this has to do with the all-pervasive nature of modern media and acknowledgement by politicos of the need to keep reigns of some kind on what gets said.

djm

14

To deny that foreign fighters are coming in is to ignore reality.

Dude, your troops ARE “foreign fighters”, and there are at least a few hundred of them to every non-Iraqi you’re fighting.

The vast majority of the resistance you’re meeting consists of Sunni Muslims from Iraq.

There are at least 38 factions (according to recent news) fighting in Iraq, and only one–the al Zargawi faction–is thought to have significant foreign membership.

15

Al-Zarqawi is Jordanian.

A good number of the terrorists (call them insurgents, rebels, whatever, what they are is terrorists) are from Syria.

16

Poor Heather Coyne… she’s surely not going to get a job with the NYTimes, LATimes or Newsweek now…




Far from media focus: steady democratic progress in Iraq
By A. Heather Coyne

BAGHDAD – Recent international reporting on Iraq has focused on the wave of violence and the spike in insurgent activity. Yet only a few weeks ago, press reports were trumpeting a lull in attacks as the end of the insurgency.

The political process in Iraq - as covered by the few reports that do not focus exclusively on the number of bombs and shootings - appears similarly erratic: elation over the elections rapidly deteriorated into cynicism and despair over parliamentary wrangling. The press has painted a picture of political chaos in which inflexible politicians are squandering the momentum created by brave Iraqi voters.

These wild swings in the security and political environment that are depicted on front pages around the globe are not as evident here on the ground in Baghdad.

In fact, having spent the past two years in Iraq, first as an Army officer and now as the head of the Iraq office of the Washington-based US Institute of Peace, I am struck by the determination and steadiness of Iraqis as they struggle to build a stable, democratic country, and by the continuing, firm commitment of Iraqis to participate in - and manage - that process.

In spite of a constant threat from the various insurgencies over the past year, Iraqi government agencies, political parties, and civil society organizations have gradually expanded their capabilities and activities. They will tell you how much more they could have done had they not been constrained by security threats or - almost as important - the lack of reliable infrastructure, but what they have accomplished already is admirable, as is their unflagging determination in the face of these threats and constraints.

There is a phrase I hear in almost every conversation with Iraqis that captures the mood of this process: hutwa bi hutwa, or “step by step.”

I hear it from National Assembly members talking about writing the new constitution, from anticorruption watchdogs trying to monitor the government, and from women’s groups planning a campaign to reduce violence in schools.

The lead-up is the same: The conversation turns to the magnitude of a task at hand, and the seemingly insurmountable challenges involved. There is a shrug of the shoulders, a resigned smile, and the words hutwa bi hutwa. “Step by step” is the way Iraqis reconcile their great hopes for the future with recognition of the slow, painful march it will take to get there.

Take the security situation, for example. The threat has not decreased, nor have the insurgents lost their will or capability to inflict damage. But behind the headlines of the recent spate of attacks, the step-by-step approach is gaining momentum. Iraq is producing new police and military forces that are gradually winning the confidence of the people they serve - so much so that the public is providing more and more valuable information on insurgent activity. That enables the weapons cache seizures and high profile arrests that then increase public respect for the forces, which helps with recruiting and decreases support for the insurgents.

While the media continue their longstanding tendency to focus on the most dramatic and destructive events - the capture of a terrorist, a deadly attack - the real story changes too gradually to make headlines: the steady stream of volunteers at recruiting stations that bit by bit brings force numbers up to significant levels, the increasing numbers of tips to the police, the growing sense of public ownership of the newly trained forces.

The same applies to the political process. Most Americans hear only about the milestones: the elections, the failure to form a government, the selection of a partial cabinet. But these headlines do not reflect the constant level of effort Iraqis are putting into the process of rebuilding political and governmental institutions.

The long delay in announcing the government was certainly frustrating to Iraqis, who want to see concrete signs that their participation in the elections was meaningful; that they really do have a say in their government. But the process, while painfully slow, is moving through necessary stages to reach the next step.

In meetings I had this month with many of the leaders of the new National Assembly, none of the members seemed surprised or distressed by the long delay. They all recognized the tough decisions that the party leaders were struggling with, the trade-offs involved in constructing a government that would not immediately collapse on itself.

This was the first time such discussions were taking place between ethnic and political groups that have a longer history of mutual suspicion and conflict than they have of negotiation, compromise, and consensus building.

With the government formation behind them, Iraqi officials and the public are shifting focus to the next step: the constitution. Without a doubt they will treat this next monumental task with the same serious dedication and undiminished enthusiasm that they have shown at each step so far.

Those who wait for the headline “Iraq completes constitution” or “Iraq misses constitution deadline” will have missed all the intervening steps that really mattered, as political parties and civil society organizations mobilize the Iraqi people to participate in a national dialogue on the constitution.

The real danger is that Iraq’s new leadership and the public might also focus on those headlines, and skip this most important step in the entire process.

• A. Heather Coyne is the chief of party of US Institute of Peace activities in Iraq. The views expressed are her own.

17

Aw, c’mon Irtrad, you know she must be a stooge or lackey of the US Crusaders, subjugating the “heroic resistance fighters” …

18

She’s just looking out a different window. That’s why there’s a variety of views.

19

Yeah, she’s only in Iraq for a coupla years, not in the US or Britain where we see things much clearer. There is this annoying commonality with many returning soldiers (no, not all) and contractors (like my nephew) that does dare to shine some positive light when WE all know better. What is up with that?

20

On-the-site reporting offers no real final conclusion as to how things really are in all of Iraq. Reporters can still shape the truth as they see it. I admire reporters who are brave enough to go there, and news organization who consider news worthy enough to send out reporters, but Salinger couldn’t resist the temptation to shape the truth as he saw it…through the little window he’d framed. I’d bet there’s several different truths about Iraq, both good and bad. We choose our favorite sources…and that’s what wrong about this whole process of learning.

There’s no longer any honest use of such monolithic terms as “Iraq” as if the picture painted applies to the whole country.