October 24

Salon - Something very unusual happened on The Washington Post Editorial Page today.

They deigned to address a response from one of their readers, who "challenged [them] to explain what he sees as a contradiction in [their] editorial positions": namely, the Post demands that Obama's health care plan not be paid for with borrowed money, yet the very same Post Editors vocally support escalation in Afghanistan without specifying how it should be paid for.

"Why is it okay to finance wars with debt, asks our reader, but not to pay for health care that way?"

Last night I had the great misfortune of watching ABC's Nightly News. On it the anchor discussed this news of a recent poll on the public option. From the Post:

A new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows that support for a government-run health-care plan to compete with private insurers has rebounded from its summertime lows and wins clear majority support from the public.

He then asked George Stephanapolous what he thought the poll meant. He answered something to this effect:

"It makes the country even more divided on the issue of healthcare."

I try not to make a habit of screaming at the TV, but I did.

This, folks, is why I don't watch TV anymore.

A Censored Headline and why it Matters:

German High Court Outlaws Electronic Voting

Justices of the German Federal Constitutional Court. Image

(DailyCensored.Com) The justices above are clearly the most rational group of high level functionaries in the industrialized world. They did what no other court would do in Europe or the United States. They effectively outlawed electronic voting. On March 3, 2009, the German Federal Constitutional Court declared that the electronic voting machines used in the 2005 Bundestag elections for the German national parliament were outside of the bounds of the German Constitution.

They reasoned that electronic voting is not verifiable because citizen votes are counted in secret. It obscured a technology inaccessible to all but a very few initiates. Most importantly, the German high court noted, electronic voting machines don't allow citizens to "reliably examine, when the vote is cast, whether the vote has been recorded in an unadulterated manner" Mar. 3, 2009.

The written opinion effectively bars electronic voting in future elections based on the complexity of voting machines and the inability of voters to watch their vote being counted. This raises the bar of acceptability well above the meaningless solutions offered by "paper trails" for touch screen voting or the so-called "paper ballots" for computerized optical scan voting machines, the most popular form of voting in the United States.

Germany's 2009 Bundestag elections were conducted with hand counted paper ballots.

Have you heard that one of the world's leading economic powers, the fourth largest economy in the world, banned electronic voting; said it was undemocratic? Given the multitude of problems encountered in the U.S. and the number of questionable election results, wouldn't it make sense that when Germany banned electronic voting and replaced it with paper ballots, there would be at least a days worth of national coverage in the United States?

Nothing like that occurred. The Associated Press (Times of India) story on the verdict danced around the periphery of the world media market with coverage in Turkey, India, Australia, and Ireland. But there were no major media takers for the AP story in the United States.

There was every reason to carry the story. In a 2006 Zogby poll, 92% of the 1028 registered voters surveyed said they agreed with this statement:

Citizens have the right to view and obtain information about how election officials count votes - 92% agree. New Zogby Poll On Electronic Voting Attitudes Aug. 21, 2006

Arran Frood | Oct 6

BBC - Conspiracy theorists have used the internet to co-ordinate increasingly slick attacks on the accepted versions of events, but now a group of scientists and sceptics has decided it's time to organise and fight back.

Conspiracy theories are pervasive and popular.

A poll for the Scripps Howard media organisation in 2006 suggested 36% of Americans suspected government involvement or deliberate inaction in the 9/11 attacks, and belief in a Kennedy conspiracy ran at 40% in the same poll.

A decade after Princess Diana's death, one survey found a fifth of Britons believed she was murdered. And to millions across the world, 2009's Apollo Moon landing 40th anniversary was a hollow sham because we have never been there.

Conspiracy theories predate the internet but the web has provided a fast, accessible platform for groups to unite, gather research and disseminate information without even meeting or leaving their houses.

While many people find them harmless fun, others believe there is a darker truth - that conspiracy theories are rewriting history, warping the present and altering the future. Enough is enough they say - it's time to fight back.

Washington | Sept 14

AFP - Public trust in the US media is eroding and increasing numbers of Americans believe news coverage is inaccurate and biased, according to a study released on Monday.

Just 29 percent of the 1,506 adults surveyed by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press between July 22-26 said news organizations generally get the facts straight.

Sixty-three percent said news stories are often inaccurate, up from 34 percent in a 1985 study, Pew said.

Sixty percent of those polled said the press is biased, up from 45 percent in 1985. Just 26 percent in the latest survey said that news organizations are careful their reporting is not politically biased.

Seventy-four percent said news organizations tend to favor one side in dealing with political and social issues. Eighteen percent said they deal fairly with all sides.

Pew Research: Press Accuracy Rating Hits Two Decade Low

Holy hell. I know news programs are pretty bad and tend to cover inane subjects--or, if covering something important, descend into inanity pretty quickly. That being said, I was just watching Rick Sanchez on CNN Newsroom while eating lunch when I saw the following.

Sanchez wrapped up a news segment on a teenage fight club somewhere in the state of TN, then some images of a flood-devastated area in Istanbul, Turkey appeared on screen. He mentions that dozens have died and many more have lost everything, while pictures of survivors picking through mud-caked ruins are played on the screen. He then says that watching flood waters come on so suddenly and strongly is amazing, like nothing you'd expect, etc. Sanchez must have then looked up at the screen for the first time since starting the flood story and said (paraphrased) "sorry folks, I thought we had better footage... this isn't that interesting."

He made one more trite, half-hearted statement and then asked his producers to cut back to him (before the segment was supposed to end), whereupon he stated that they'd be going to commercials and, after the break, be discussing what some person or another said about President Obama. Stay tuned!

Well, let's see here--what's the bigger story? Dozens die in floods deemed "disaster of the century" by the Turkish prime minister? Or discuss the latest gossip about something someone said about President Obama? Well, clearly the first one is just boring, so Sanchez decided that gossip was better. Actually, I bet he has a better feel for his audience than I do. Covering foreign disasters without spectacular footage of explosions or destruction probably loses viewers.

In 1989, newly elected president, Bush 1 pardoned Secretary of the Army Caspar Weinberger and other Iran/contra defendants ending the investigation of Iran/contra crimes. Stonewalling, perjury, obstructing justice, shredding evidence, retaliating against truth tellers had proved to be effective.

The Kerry subcommittee reported: "the saga of Panama's General Manuel Antonio Noriega represents one of the most serious foreign policy failures for the United States...It is clear that each US government agency which had a relationship with Noriega turned a blind eye to his corruption and drug dealing, even as he was emerging as a key player on behalf of the Medellin Cartel. Manuel Noriega was allowed to establish "the hemisphere's first ‘narcokleptocracy.’”

The rot is deep. As Greenwald notes.

Ian Burrell | August 3

The Independent - Guardian Media Group (GMG) is considering closing the world's oldest Sunday newspaper, The Observer, after the group's disastrous performance in the past year when it recorded losses of close to £90m.

The Observer, which was founded in 1791 and was a platform for the early writing of George Orwell, was bought in 1993 by the publishers of The Guardian, who promised to safeguard its future.

GMG is thinking of replacing the Sunday paper with a Thursday magazine, which may be branded as The Observer in a nod to tradition. Journalists at the paper are deeply unhappy that a dummy edition of such a magazine is being prepared and some are lobbying to ensure it never reaches the news-stands.

There is only one take-away from this Times front pager: Fox won.

For years I have criticized the corporate media for having too much power and having it's ultimate interests aligned towards the corporate parent, as opposed to news and newsgathering. This goes to the heart of it.

Here's what happened. Olbermann attacks Bill O'Reilly's media practices. He does this for years and gets under his skin. O'Reilly isn't stupid--whatever else me may be--and attacks the business side of the corporate parent GE. Some of the attacks are clearly below the belt. But this is all part and parcel of Fox's way of reporting the news. Fox doesn't have a corporate parent to answer to like GE. It's a full-blown, vertically integrated news organization and can weather anything Olbermann brings.

Finally, Immelt cries uncle. That's the only conclusion I can come to, although the way the article is written, in that soi disant news-style which presents both sides as being equal and both as valid, makes it out to have been a two way war. But it wasn't. Olbermann attacked O'Reilly's politics and news persona. O'Reilly attack the parent. And when the parent had enough Olbermann was muzzled. It would be like two boxers in the ring, one trying to make head shots (Olbermann) and the other (O'Reilly) hitting below the belt and in the kidneys. The refs just look the other way. Or wring their hands at how violent boxing is, while enjoying the spectacle.

Our media is fucked. And it will not change until the news organizations are ripped away from their corporate parents in an anti-trust action.

David Carr at the NYT opines on the cancellationof the Washington Post salon fiasco. He comments that the upstart beltway Politico has caught

the paper on a fundamental lapse in the wall between church and state.

As if there was really any question that our mainstream media wasn't composed entirely of whores--although a whore might be insulted by the comparison, let there be no remaining doubts:

The Washington Post has offered lobbyists and association executives off-the-record, nonconfrontational access to "those powerful few": Obama administration officials, members of Congress, and — at first — even the paper’s own reporters and editors.

The astonishing offer was detailed in a flier circulated Wednesday to a health care lobbyist, who provided it to a reporter because the lobbyist said he felt it was a conflict for the paper to charge for access to, as the flier says, its “health care reporting and editorial staff."

With the newsroom in an uproar after POLITICO reported the solicitation, Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli said this morning that he was "appalled" by the plan and said the newsroom will not participate.

"It suggests that access to Washington Post journalists was available for purchase," Brauchli told The Post’s media reporter, Howard Kurtz. The proposal "promises we would suspend our usual skeptical questioning because it appears to offer, in exchange for sponsorships, the good name of The Washington Post."

I'm speechless.

I must bring your attention to the profound musings of one Glenn Beck.

I think this is the problem. First they came for the banks. I wasn't a banker, I didn't really care. I didn't stand up and say anything. Then they came for the AIG executives. Then they came for the car companies. Until it gets down to you. Most people don't see -- they are coming for you at some point! You're on the list! Everybody's on the list. You may not be rich -- as currently defined.

Beck, Cavuto promote militia-movement 'constitutionalist' theories on Fox

News publishers easily could block Google's spiders with a simple text file. But then their stories would not appear on Google News or in its search engine. You don't hear news publishers talk about this because that's the last thing they want.

Circulation is falling -- more than 10% between 2004 and 2008 alone

1910, there were 2,600 daily newspapers in the United States, the vast majority independently owned and operated. By 1990, there were 1,600 papers nationwide, largely under corporate control and overseen by 15 chief executive officers.

For years, papers cleared 40% margins

Charles Blow, New York Times:

Lately I’ve been consuming as much conservative media as possible (interspersed with shots of Pepto-Bismol) to get a better sense of the mind and mood of the right. My read: They’re apocalyptic. They feel isolated, angry, betrayed and besieged. And some of their “leaders” seem to be trying to mold them into militias.

At first, it was entertaining — just harmless, hotheaded expostulation. Of course, there were the garbled facts, twisted logic and veiled hate speech. But what did I expect, fair and balanced? It was like walking through an ideological house of mirrors. The distortions can be mildly amusing at first, but if I stay too long it makes me sick.

Seattle | March 17

AP - The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, which has chronicled the news of the city since logs slid down its steep streets to the harbor and miners caroused in its bars before heading north to Alaska's gold fields, will print its final edition Tuesday.

Seattle becomes the second major city to lose a newspaper this year, following Denver, as many U.S. dailies face uncertain futures, battered by quickly declining ad revenue in the age of the Internet and a teetering economy.

"Round and round this goes, with the people committed to saving newspapers demanding to know 'If the old model is broken, what will work in its place?' To which the answer is: Nothing. Nothing will work. There is no general model for newspapers to replace the one the internet just broke."

Clay Shirky offers a provocative analysis of the end of newspapers in
"Newspapers and Thinking About the Unthinkable"

Hat tip to Clif Figallo for this one.

It turns out that there may be more to the story then originally met the eye, according to (yes, really) Playboy magazine.

Excerpt:

“How did a minor-league TV figure, whose contract with CNBC is due this summer, get so quickly launched into a nationwide rightwing blog sensation? Why were there so many sites and organizations online and live within minutes or hours after his rant, leading to a nationwide protest just a week after his rant?

"What hasn’t been reported until now is evidence linking Santelli’s “tea party” rant with some very familiar names in the Republican rightwing machine, from PR operatives who specialize in imitation-grassroots PR campaigns (called “astroturfing”) to bigwig politicians and notorious billionaire funders. As veteran Russia reporters, both of us spent years watching the Kremlin use fake grassroots movements to influence and control the political landscape. To us, the uncanny speed and direction the movement took and the players involved in promoting it had a strangely forced quality to it. If it seemed scripted, that’s because it was.

Reuters

- TV executives in Europe and the United States are following a bizarre kind of logic: the more inter-connected the world becomes, the less foreign coverage we have beamed into our sitting rooms.

The Tyndall Report, which monitors nightly newscasts of the three American broadcast television networks ABC, CBS and NBC, says their 2008 news coverage of foreign stories was the lowest in 21 years - and that takes into account their sports coverage from the Beijing Olympics, which got by far the most airtime.

Last week's dramatic survival story of the US Airways flight that crash landed on the Hudson River was the third most covered story of the past 18 months on US television - aside from presidential election coverage - according to Tyndall.

It got a lot more coverage than Gaza, where Israeli shells hit a U.N. compound that same day, setting light to a warehouse storing vital food and medicines.

You could argue that for just one day a national "good news" story in which 155 people's lives were saved by the heroic pilot's skill will make it ahead of an ongoing humanitarian disaster in Gaza.

But the total coverage of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in 2008 was just 41 minutes, plus 8 minutes on U.S. government policy on the issue.

Here we go with the Times again. Seriously, where in the world does this assertion come from:

To Christopher Cox, the Republican chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the need for action was obvious in the spring of 2006.

I mean, come on! Cox is one of the worst offenders in this whole deal and now the Times is writing that as early as 2006 he saw it coming? Cox, or his surrogates, might be saying it, but that doesn't make it true. And what's worse is the Times doesn't even give a quote for this, nothing to support it at all. It's just a bald assertion, another repetition of the party line.

Good grief.

Richard Pérez-Peña | San Diego | November 17

NYT - Over the last two years, some of this city’s darkest secrets have been dragged into the light — city officials with conflicts of interest and hidden pay raises, affordable housing that was not affordable, misleading crime statistics.

Investigations ensued. The chiefs of two redevelopment agencies were forced out. One of them faces criminal charges. Yet the main revelations came not from any of San Diego’s television and radio stations or its dominant newspaper, The San Diego Union-Tribune, but from a handful of young journalists at a nonprofit Web site run out of a converted military base far from downtown’s glass towers — a site that did not exist four years ago.

As America’s newspapers shrink and shed staff, and broadcast news outlets sink in the ratings, a new kind of Web-based news operation has arisen in several cities, forcing the papers to follow the stories they uncover.

Ed Howker | Nov 6

The Independent - Why are we asking this now?

Communities Minister Hazel Blears made a speech to the Hansard Society yesterday in which she criticised political bloggers in the UK. "Political blogs are written by people with disdain for the political system and politicians, who see their function as unearthing scandals, conspiracies and perceived hypocrisy," she said. Conservative grandee Lord Baker has described the comments as "extraordinary". He said: "She needs to tune into the modern world. People have a right to say what they think and if she doesn't like it she can blog back". However, Blears maintains that: "Until political blogging adds value to our political culture, by allowing new voices, ideas and legitimate protest and challenge, and until the mainstream media reports politics in a calmer, more responsible manner, it will continue to fuel a culture of cynicism and despair."

interesting points are raised, that also apply to US bloggers and press

Other than this one bullshit sentence: "Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit does this for the right-of-center; Duncan Black at Eschaton does it for the left," I pretty much liked this article on blogging by Andrew Sullivan. He was, after all, one of the original bloggers. It's interesting, in post-modern, lit-crit kind of way.

Today's LA Times is running a story on the revolution in Iran. Here's the headline:

U.S. policies may have contributed to Iran revolution, study says

I realize for most Americans the headline may come as a shock, but for those of us here who know a little something about Iran, it's got to be the most obtuse headline ever. My first reaction upon reading it was, "ya think?" Still, credit to the LA Times for running a story counter to the CW. Those don't come around so often.

It is a measure of the catastrophe unfolding right now that the pretty-people on CNBC are having really heated and serious discussions. Tempers were actually flaring a few moments ago as I watched. There's actually serious debate as to what in the world the Federal government is doing and how it got us into this mess. For example, words like lax enforcement of regulations on the books; the understaffing, actually the gutting of the SEC; the greed and corruption of the 'shadow banking system'. I could go on. I'm just pleased that finally the talking heads are sitting up and actually taking notice that they have a role to play. Maybe, for once in the last twenty years they might actually rise to the occasion. Optimistic, I know. But what else do we have to cling to?

Update: Interesting discussions still ongoing. And surprise of surprises, someone actually chimed in and raised my question about Paulson and Goldman and shorts and conflict of interest! I guess CNBC is now reading The Agonist.