This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Media

  • Media’s trouble

    This morning in the Wall Street Journal, the editorial board repeats the outcome of a recent poll, the results of which no one reading this blog will find surprising;

     The presidential primaries are finally over. We know how the candidates fared with voters but what did voters think of the news media that covered the race? If objectivity and balance are the goals, not well at all. A new Rasmussen Reports survey finds that 68% of Americans “believe most reporters try to help the candidate that they want to win.” Not surprisingly, a majority of voters also thought that Barack Obama received the most favorable coverage during the primary season.

    The belief that news reporters are often news twisters isn’t confined to cranky ideologues. It cuts across all racial, gender and income groups. A full 82% of Republicans, 56% of Democrats and 69% of independents believe reporters try to give an assist to the candidate they prefer. Only 17% of all voters believe most reporters actually attempt to deliver unbiased coverage.

    Barack Obama is likely to be the beneficiary of this favoritism come the fall campaign. During the primaries 54% of those surveyed by Rasmussen thought he received the most favorable coverage vs. 22% for John McCain and only 14% for Hillary Clinton.

    This fall, a full 44% of voters think the media will try to make Senator Obama look good while only 13% think most reporters will tilt in Senator McCain’s direction.

    Now, I grew up during a time when Americans depended upon the media to tell them what was happening in their worlds, to inform us on events without “spin” – a term we never used, or suspected from our media. There was a time I wanted to be a journalist, but my time working in an Army Public Affairs Office in Panama during Jimmy Carter’s administration during the treaty negotiations disabused me of that notion. Many of the media types only wanted certain pictures, certain stories…they weren’t interested in telling the unvarnished story.

    The Washington Post’s stock has fallen over 30 percent in the last four years, the New York Times’ stock has fallen nearly 50% in the last year and is it any wonder? If Americans wanted fiction, they’d go to the book store. Newsroom editors have decided what they should tell Americans about politicians for years and it hasn’t worked for them – you’d think they’d have learned by now. Instead of trying to clean up their newsrooms, they’ve decided instead to set up “citizen journalists” to tear down our cottage industry of truth telling. Webloggin‘s Terry Trippany writes that Associated Press has taken action against a Leftist website for the same thing we do everyday – cutting, pasting and linking. Little Green Footballs reported last night that the New York Times fingered the Right’s bloggers for spreading the story about Michelle Obama’s “Whiteys” lie (even though it was clearly a Leftist blog that was propagating that lie.

    I guess going after everyone else is easier than cleaning up the way they do business.

  • Tim Russert passes

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    I’m shocked. My homeboy is gone. (WSJ link);

    Tim Russert, host of NBC’s “Meet the Press” and its Washington bureau chief, collapsed and died at work Friday after suffering an apparent heart attack. He was 58 years old.

    Tim Russert signed off after an interview with John McCain during a taping of “Meet the Press” in January.

    Mr. Russert, of Buffalo, N.Y., took the helm of the Sunday news show in December 1991 and turned it into the most widely watched program of its type in the nation. His signature trait there was an unrelenting style of questioning.

    Washingtonian magazine once dubbed Mr. Russert the best journalist in town, and described “Meet the Press” as “the most interesting and important hour on television.

    My condolences to his family.

    Apparently, he touched Thus Spake Ortner‘s life.

  • Iraqis unsure about US’ future role

    The Washington Post writes this morning, under the headline “Iraqis Condemn American Demands” in regards to negotiations with the Iraq government for our security plans in Iraq. Since the Washington Post has a habit of changing their headlines after I write about them, I took a screen cap;

    untitled0011.bmp

    The article doesn’t really support the headline (which I learned in my journalism class the first day is one of three places a journalist tells the story). The headline implies that all Iraqis are of that mind. In fact, the article only names a few;

    “The Americans are making demands that would lead to the colonization of Iraq,” said Sami al-Askari, a senior Shiite politician on parliament’s foreign relations committee who is close to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. “If we can’t reach a fair agreement, many people think we should say, ‘Goodbye, U.S. troops. We don’t need you here anymore.’ “

    Most Iraqis realize that we don’t want a colony – most of the world knows that our history doesn’t support that contention, but that doesn’t stop the Post from injecting a single quote from a single Iraqi.

    The use of the term “American Demands” doesn’t fit either;

    President Bush has spoken directly to Maliki about the issue in recent days and instructed his negotiating team to show greater flexibility, Iraqi politicians said. U.S. officials circulated a draft of the status of forces agreement over the weekend without many of the most controversial demands, buoying hopes that a deal could be reached, according to Iraq lawmakers.

    “Greater flexibility” doesn’t sound like the US is making “demands” on the Iraqis at all. Further along in the article is this quote:

    “Now the American position is much more positive and more flexible than before,” said Mohammed Hamoud, an Iraqi deputy foreign minister who is a lead negotiator in the talks.

    Yeah, why wasn’t that in the headline? I’m pretty sure I’ll get to hear or read some nit-witted Leftist screaming that the Iraqis don’t want us there anymore. All they seem to read are the headlines. Like this commenter at the WaPo story;

    irae wrote:
    “Let Freedom reign!” Unless, of course, it leads the Iraqis to assert independent control of their “sovereign” nation. This fiasco will appear on the historic list of our national embarassments, like the Native American genocide and the internment of U.S. citizens during WW II. Thanks, Republicants!

    Or this bubblehead at Counterpunch;

    A secret deal being negotiated in Baghdad would perpetuate the American military occupation of Iraq indefinitely, regardless of the outcome of the U.S. presidential election in November.

    The terms of the impending deal, details of which have been leaked to this reporter, are likely to have an explosive political effect in Iraq.

    If you want to talk about demands, maybe the Post was thinking about this paragraph;

    In Washington, the White House hastily organized a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill on Tuesday after Sens. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) and John W. Warner (R-Va.), the chairman and ranking minority member of the Armed Services Committee, respectively, demanded Monday that the administration “be more transparent with Congress, with greater consultation, about the progress and content of these deliberations.”

    Yes, the Democrats who’ve sabotaged every move the administration has made in Iraq wonder why no one will let them take part in the discussion. Maybe we can have Leaky Leahy make daily reports through the WaPo of the closed door meetings – that should make the Iraqis more trustful of the process.

    If the Iraqis truly want us leave, I’d be the first to say we should go, but this article focuses on the same Shi’ites who’ve been calling us an occupying force since al Sadr formed the Mahdi Army to drive us out. They’ve been beat politically and militarily, so they turn to their only ally – the American media.

    I’d like to see fewer troops in Iraq, but I already predicted we’d be back in Iraq at the end of the Gulf War when Iraqi bullets were still ricocheting off of my Bradley turret when the ceasefire took effect and ending our presence there again might force a future generation back – depending on who we elect in the interim. And the Iraqis should take that into consideration, too. The next President might abandon them like we abandoned the South Vietnamese when they needed us most in 1975.

    UPDATE: Gateway Pundit reports that President Bush says we don’t permanent bases in Iraq. Quoting the President;

    And as I said clearly in past speeches, this will not involve permanent bases, nor will it bind any future President to troop levels. You know, as to — look, Eggen, you can find any voice you want in the Iraqi political scene and quote them, which is interesting, isn’t it, because in the past you could only find one voice, and now you can find a myriad of voices.

  • Spit it out, Barry (Updated)

    If George Bush did this, it’d be on every news channel running in a loop;

    [youtube 8znPAEaI9KA nolink]

    But he didn’t. What’s missing from the video is what he said right after this sputtering “I’ve been up for 48 hours”, so the poor baby who wants to lead the entire free world needs a nap and he can’t stay on message.

     Update: Still tired, I suppose, Barack tries to explain his dilemma being a leader who doesn’t want to get his hands dirty (video from Liberty Pundit)

    [youtube N_WY29woBxg nolink]

    Jammie Wearing Fool has the transcript;

     “Well, look,” Obama said, “the, the, I mean – first of all I am not vetting my VP search committee for their mortgages, so you’re gong to have to direct — ”

    “But shouldn’t you?” asked Miller.

    “Well, no,” Obama said. “It becomes sort of a, um, I mean, this is a game that can be played – everybody, you know, who is tangentially related to our campaign, I think, is going to have a whole host of relationships — I would have to hire the vetter to vet the vetters. I mean, at some point, you know, we just asked people to do their assignments.

    Yeah, he’s a regular silver-tongued, smooth-talkin’ messiah. McCain will eat him alive.

  • Our Congress-managed economy

    Earlier today I wrote how Congress can’t even manage their own dining system on Capitol Hill. Now I find this at Liberty Pundit (who, by the way, named us his “Blog of the Day“);

    He has a point:

    Ask yourself a few questions: Why did unemployment surge at a time when unemployment compensation claims are historically low? More to the point, how could unemployment spike this much without a coinciding spike in corporate lay-offs?

    The answer to all of these questions is same: because very few people lost jobs last month. This huge jump in the size of the unemployed comes from new entrants to the economy – hundreds of thousands of them. In short, well over 600,000 people who were not job seekers in April became job seekers in May. And who starts looking for work at the end of Spring? That’s right – students. Hundreds of thousands of students are looking for work right now, and they’re not finding it.

    Congress is to blame. Last year Congressional Democrats (along with some Stockholm-Syndromed Republicans) passed the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, which started a phased hike of the minimum wage from $5.15 an hour to $7.25. Free market economists warned them that this would increase unemployment – that rapid increases in unemployment compensation hit teens and minorities the hardest. But the class-warriors are running the people’s house now, and they would hear none of that, so they took to the floor, let loose the dogs of demagoguery, and saddled America’s pizza parlors, municipal swimming pools, house painting businesses and lawn mowing services with a huge cost increase.

    We were pooh-poohed when we suggested this might happen. In fact, nearly a year ago, I wrote about the demographics of minimum wage earners and predicted the same outcome;

    So who are those 1.7 million low-income workers scheduled to be rolling in dough in a few weeks? Well, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2006, the number is actually 1.692 million out of the total workforce of 76.517 million workers – 2.2% of the workforce earn minimum wage or less. 1.2 million of that 1.6 number (3/4) earn less than minimum wage now – so how’s a minimum wage increase going to help them?

    866,000 of them (over half) are between 16 and 24 years old – high school and college kids. 1.24 million of the total work in service related industries, the largest occupational group of minimum wage workers, out of that number, 880,000 are in food service and preparation (um, MacDonald’s), 24,000 are security guards, 52,000 are janitors. Only 340,000 work 40+ hours every week (less than 1 in 5 minimum wage earners) at the job for which they’re paid minimum wage.

    477,000 have less than a high school diploma, 127,000 have college degrees (how many of those are grad students I wonder). 8,000 have master’s degrees, but there are no Phds making minimum wage – some kind of correlation there?

    Oh, yeah, you want to blame Bush for gas prices, too? British Petroleum’s Tony Hayward says (what we’ve been saying here for years) that the reason prices of gasoline has soared is because there’s been no investment in production capacity is what drives the price up (Times of London link);

    “Producers are being hampered by 25 years of low investments, because of low prices,” Mr Hayward told the Asia Oil and Gas Conference in Kuala Lumpur today. “The result is a supply chain being stretched to breaking point.”

    And why has there been no investment in production capacity in the US? because Congress and environmentalists have blocked expanding refinery capacity and exploration – claiming that “alternate sources” are right around the corner. Of course the only reason there hasn’t been a clean alternate source of fuel is because we haven’t thrown more money at the problem, yet.

    Why isn’t the media holding the Democrat Congress responsible for their missteps in this election year?

  • This is a free media?

    This is a congressman? Here’s a video I picked up from Little Green Footballs on Democrat Congressman Keith Ellison speaking to the National Conference for Media Reform.

    [youtube dpdafLcxL0Y nolink]

    Charles sums up the 17 minute video;

    Ellison talks about how Ronald Reagan made him sick—but not as sick as George W. Bush makes him. (Applause.)

    He calls America an “imperial power.” Then he suggests that the country should get rid of “hate radio” and Fox News.

    But that’s not all. He claims that journalists and lawyers are the only people who defend the Constitution because they’re the only occupations mentioned in Bill of Rights. I don’t remember lawyers being mentioned in the Bill of Rights. He singles out a free media’s most dangerous enemy – Rupert Murdoch. The only people who are afraid of Rupert Murdoch are people who are afraid to have their malfeasance exposed.

    He complains that media conglomerates control the news. Bill Moyers who spoke the following day did, as well;

    …the newspaper industry is in the middle of the most momentous change in its three hundred year history – a change that is diminishing the amount of real news available to the consumer. A generation of relentless corporatization is now culminating in a furious, unprecedented blitz of buying, selling and consolidating of newspapers, from the mightiest dailies to the humblest weeklies. It is a world where “small hometown dailies in particular are being bought and sold like hog futures. Where chains, once content to grow one property at a time, now devour other chains whole. Where they are effectively ceding whole regions of the country to one another, further minimizing competition. Where money is pouring into the business from interests with little knowledge and even less concern about the special obligations newspapers have to democracy.” They go on to describe the toll that the never-ending drive for profits is taking on the news.

    It’s people like Bill Moyers who doomed the media. They took over the media, as Ellison points out in 1964 and Conservatives couldn’t get a word in edgewise. For years, all we had was PBS’ Firing Line, The National Review and Commentary magazines. Folks got tired of the spin (before we knew that spin was the word) which gave rise to talk radio, more weeklies and finally, Fox News (who, despite the Leftist scripts, is more balanced than Right which makes them seem Right by comparison). What the Left can’t wrap their tiny brains around is that if Americans rejected the new media sources, they’d go out of business. Well, except The Washington Times which hemorrhages cash.

    Honestly, I don’t see how Ellison, a congressman, can find the nerve to say that he supports a free media in one breath, and then in the next condemn a news organization by name in the next. And then this organization applauds Ellison like they’re insane. From their own About page;

    Free Press is a national, nonpartisan organization working to reform the media. Through education, organizing and advocacy, we promote diverse and independent media ownership, strong public media, and universal access to communications.

    Nonpartisan enough to cheer on Ellison who would shut down legal news organizations because they oppose him ideologically. I ought to mention his childish behavior in the beginning of the video, but the words that follow are so much more childish.

  • Army torments soldiers, Part II

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    This Washington Post story is really sticking in my craw. If you’ll kindly look at the photo above, you’ll see a picture from Yahoo Maps. The crosshairs are on Martin Army Hospital. North of the hospital is Columbus, GA. The buildings to the east (your right) across the highway are the PX and Commissary. The buildings southeast and southwest are family housing (where I lived) to the west is the horse stables. Now where is the firing range “across the street…200 yards away”?

    I’ve emailed Ann Scott Tyson, the author of the Post article earlier this morning. I passed out from holding my breath awaiting a reply, so I stopped doing that. Instead I called the Fort Benning Public Affairs Office and spoke to Monica Manganaro. She tells me that the Warrior Transition Battalion is not located near the hospital, as Tyson claimed. It’s on Reagan Court near Building 4 (Infantry Hall for all you grunts),

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    Infantry Hall is that long building in the center top of the photo . The barracks of the WTB are in the lower left corner. Yes, there are firing ranges, but Ms. Manganaro tells me they are only M16 and M4 ranges and are not used often at night – The ranges are generally used 8 am – 2pm (although there is occasional night firing).

    The nearest machinegun range is 2km away and the nearest mortar range is over 3km away. She also explained that the quarters are only temporary. Fort Benning is in the process of building a new $42 million complex for the Warrior Transition Battalion (WTB) near the Officers’ Club.

    She also told me that some soldiers have complained in the past about the noise from the nearby range, and they’ve been moved to another set of barracks away from the noise. She mentioned a case where a soldier complained but declined to be moved. There are monthly “townhall” style meetings where soldiers are allowed to air their complaints about the facilities and there are two civilian ombudsmen who report directly to the Department of Defense for soldiers to talk to if they’re wary about complaining to their chain of command.

    Ms. Manganaro told me that she told Ms. Tyson all of this but she said it seemed Tyson already knew how she was going to write the story.

    Now, what made me do Part II of the story is the comments on the Washington Post article. Comments like these;

    ridagana wrote:
    I’ve seen too many soldiers in both Iraq and Afghanistan. Their IQ is about 80, they love to brag, show their weapons, even in the office sitting at the computer they carry their guns, bulletproof vests and helmets, etc. while other folks like me sitting right next to them just have regular cloths and no guns. They can not communicate at random or discuss a variety of issues and perspectives. They either take orders or they give them. This goes all the way from a 19 year old soldier to a 4 star General. Certainly they get mentally sick when shot – quite frankly they already were mentally shaky the day they were born. The problem is integrating them with regular society both while at war but most certainly when back with society.
    6/3/2008 11:40:21 AM
    Recommend (2)

    wgriff3245 wrote:
    As a Vietnam Era vet, I shudder everytime someone says “The best and the Brightest”. You go into the army to either avoid jail and working at Mc Donalds. This also applies to the upper eshelon. This is just another example of the mentality of the leaders of this country. They are all idiots.
    6/3/2008 10:36:58 AM
    Recommend (2)

    hotezzy wrote:
    If this isn’t the stupidest thing I have ever heard — you place wounded soldiers trying to recover from PTSD (usually resulting for bomb blasts and the sights and sounds of war and death) in a facility about 200 yards from the Army firing ranges so they can hear that each and every day. Is this what their doctors recommended as an appropriate treatment plan for these soldiers??? If so, then they definitely need to be stripped of their medical licenses. No medical, rehabilitative, or recovery facility should be anywhere near a firing range and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand that fact. But once again the soldiers who go to war and get wounded are pretty much tossed aside once they get wounded physically and/or mentally in regard to their care and treatment upon their return to this country as we can see with the care that went into this decision. But I am sure it was some general’s dumb decision resulting in building this facility in the worst possible location on this planet, but rank doesn’t ususally result from great intelligence just butt kissing of the highest order.
    6/3/2008 10:20:36 AM
    Recommend (2)

    loewsing wrote:
    That’s what you get when you have these chickenhawk, armchair, spend my all tax dollars republicans in power. The country is broke and they want to bring down veterans. It’s amusing to see republicans with their support the troop banner on the back of the luxury automobile. What a bunch of cowards.
    6/3/2008 9:59:41 AM
    Recommend (4)

    mhoust wrote:
    Let me tell you something about PTSD and the military hierarchy. Even today, most of the people in the chain of command are, at best, clueless about PTSD; and most of the rest are outright derisive of it or deny it exists. The only fortunate thing for them is that most sufferers of PTSD are not malevolently violent; otherwise there would be a heck of a lot of dead officers, and maybe a few politicians.

    These men, and women, are hurt. They are crippled. But because their wounds are not visible and in your face, denial of the problem is rampant.
    6/3/2008 8:12:02 AM
    Recommend (6)

    OldProgessivefromWisconsin wrote:
    Just one more example of the crass disregard the U.S. Military has for those who have served to the last inch of their lives. Holding them in a continuing nightmare of gun fire while they attempt to recuperate is something only Satan could think up. Well, I guess they say war is Hell. Will these poor souls never be released?
    6/3/2008 7:02:51 AM
    Recommend (4)

    Deadline wrote:
    PTSD soldiers shouldn’t be even allowed to handle weapons. I know it was just a movie but Full Metal Jacket is very plausible I think. Wouldn’t surprise me if someone with severe PTSD snaps one day while handling weapon. It’s already happended in Iraq but could almost as easily happen here at home.
    6/3/2008 4:18:21 AM
    Recommend (5)

    And after I left my comment criticizing the commenters for swallowing the WaPo story without questions, the response was;

    DEFJAX wrote:
    99% of the idiots complaining about this article have never been anywhere near combat and are nothing more than tough talking cowards.

    ..
    6/3/2008 1:50:54 PM
    Recommend (2)

    shipfreakbo214 wrote:
    defjax comment
    I applaud your comment, these back room soldiers making comments they know nothing about. When I was in the Army we called them draft dodgers, they love there country but wont fight for it.

    Their only combat experience is from playing video games and their understanding of soldiers comes from watching Hollywood’s versions and they don’t listen to anyone who gives them reasons to think differently. Well, that’s Washington Post’s audience.

  • Army torments soldiers with gunfire

    The Washington Post, obviously uninformed about the nature of the business of the Army, accuses the Army of tormenting soldiers with the sound of gunfire inside a military base;

    Army Sgt. Jonathan Strickland sits in his room at noon with the blinds drawn, seeking the sleep that has eluded him since he was knocked out by the blast of a Baghdad car bomb.

    Like many of the wounded soldiers living in the newly built “warrior transition” barracks here, the soft-spoken 25-year-old suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder. But even as Strickland and his comrades struggle with nightmares, anxiety and flashbacks from their wartime experiences, the sounds of gunfire have followed them here, just outside their windows.

    Across the street from their assigned housing, about 200 yards away, are some of the Army infantry’s main firing ranges, and day and night, several days each week, barrages from rifles and machine guns echo around Strickland’s building. The noise makes the wounded cringe, startle in their formations, and stay awake and on edge, according to several soldiers interviewed at the barracks last month. The gunfire recently sent one soldier to the emergency room with an anxiety attack, they said.

    I’ve lived at Fort Benning and there are ranges every where – because it’s mainly a training facility for infantrymen. Infantryman shoot guns day and night. And, funny thing, none of the soldiers have been complaining about it;

    “Fort Benning is a training unit, so there is gunfire around us all the time,” said Elaine Kelley, a behavioral health supervisor at the base hospital. If a soldier had a severe problem, it would have been identified, she said.

    Lt. Col. Sean Mulcahey, who recently took command of the Warrior Transition Battalion, where wounded soldiers are assigned, said: “No soldier has talked with me about the ranges.” If it is an issue, “we will address it,” he said, stressing that the battalion’s mission is “getting those soldiers to heal.”

    So if no one complained to the commander of the unit, how did the Washington Post find out about it?

    Soldiers interviewed said complaints to medical personnel at Fort Benning’s Martin Army Community Hospital and officers in their chain of command have brought no relief, prompting one soldier’s father to contact The Washington Post.

    Emphasis is mine. I’m sure the father thinks he’s helping, but the Washington Post isn’t very helpful.

    Under Army rules, commanders of warrior transition units are supposed to enforce “quiet hours.” Officials said the location of the barracks for wounded soldiers, along with a $1.2 million Soldier and Family Assistance Center, was chosen for its proximity to central facilities such as the hospital.

    The hospital isn’t near any ranges – how stupid would that be to build a hospital near ranges. However, there are big booms emanating from the impact area that can be heard all the way into Columbus, Ga. You can hear rifle fire all night from miles away all over the post. I remember hearing the gunfire from the ranges while I stumbled from bar to bar on Victory Drive. My quarters were a few hundred yards from the hospital and the sound of gunfire never bothered me or my family.

    I’m not completely unsympathetic to people who suffer from PTSD from the war, but, I have to ask them what would be their solution to this problem? What would the Washington Post like the Army to do about it? Develop silent weapons? Stop training for night combat operations (our greatest advantage over every army on earth)? Or put these troops in sound-proofed cells?

    I’m sure the Washington Post has proof it’ll release later that that Dick Cheney has the sound from the ranges piped directly into soldiers’ rooms.