Media cutting corners

As in the food industry, if a media organization cuts the time between raw ingredients (the information fed to it) and the final product (the story written or broadcast), they'll decrease labor and increase profit. They'll also make a tasteless product with little nutrition.

Flagrancy to Reason:
As for an explanation why all this scrutiny had so little affect on the national discussion that everybody who was wrong can now chirp away about how everybody else was wrong, too, USA Today offered the following (2/25/2003):

"Of 414 stories on the Iraqi question that aired on NBC, ABC and CBS from Sept. 14 to Feb. 7, Tyndall says that the vast majority originated from the White House, Pentagon and State Department. Only 34 stories originated from elsewhere in the country, [news analyst Andrew Tyndall] says.

Similarly, a check of major newspapers around the country from September to February found only 268 stories devoted to peace initiatives or to opposition to the war, a small fraction of the total number."

U.S. Operatives Killed Detainees During Interrogations in Afghanistan and Iraq

American Civil Liberties Union:
The American Civil Liberties Union today made public an analysis of new and previously released autopsy and death reports of detainees held in U.S. facilities in Iraq and Afghanistan, many of whom died while being interrogated. The documents show that detainees were hooded, gagged, strangled, beaten with blunt objects, subjected to sleep deprivation and to hot and cold environmental conditions.

“There is no question that U.S. interrogations have resulted in deaths,” said Anthony D. Romero, Executive Director of the ACLU. “High-ranking officials who knew about the torture and sat on their hands and those who created and endorsed these policies must be held accountable. America must stop putting its head in the sand and deal with the torture scandal that has rocked our military.”

Simple explanations of Fitzgerald, Valerie Plame

This discussion between onegoodmove: Bill Maher / Arianna Huffington about Valerie Plame and the Fitzgerald investigation is a reflection of my feelings about the investigation.

Think Progress � Fox News Pushing “Criminalization of Politics” Talking Point

Think Progress � Fox News Pushing “Criminalization of Politics” Talking Point:
Conservative defenders of Karl Rove and Scooter Libby have settled on their No. 1 talking point: the grand jury investigation into the CIA leak scandal represents the “criminalization of politics.”

In other words, they say, the outing of a covert CIA agent in a time of war to punish a whistleblower is just everyday “politics” — nothing out of the ordinary, certainly nothing criminal. In fact, according to conservatives (as articulated by the National Review), the “criminalizing of politics” is actually “the most dangerous fire of this ordeal.”

To spread this talking point across the nation, the right has received a major assist from Fox News. According to a database search, every single television reference to the CIA leak scandal as the “criminalization of politics” in the last 30 days has been on Fox. Even more stunning: on every occassion, the phrase was introduced into the segment by a Fox News anchor or correspondent, never by a guest.

via Mark

A Tiny Revolution

When I read this, it was like someone had put my thoughts onto paper about the basic reality of for-profit media. I love Schwarz' entry here... click through and read the whole thing.

A Tiny Revolution: One thing I tend to repeat is that the mainstream media does a FANTASTIC job. Day in and day out, they turn in an extraordinary performance at what they exist to do. And that is to make as much money as possible.
...
Again, a huge corporation like the New York Times pretends—even to itself—it wants someone smart, hard-hitting, etc. to cover national security issues. But in reality, it selects for vapidity. Judith Miller rose to the top of the New York Times not IN SPITE OF being unbearably vapid, but BECAUSE she's unbearably vapid.
...
'Few newspapers, magazines or networks are willing to pay for high-priced low-volume journalism. It’s so much easier--so much more cost effective--to take mass-produced information off the shelf and embellish it with a few opinions, or just to receive wisdom from the folks in power. Many critics are complaining about all the money that Judy’s case has cost the Times. But maybe they’re missing the point. Think of all the money she saved the Times by getting headlines day after day from top-level sources instead of working on a project year after year just to shoot those sources down.'

So, I believe progressives need to let go of the hope that the mainstream media is ever going to be much different from what it is today. We can't change much about reality if we keep hoping Santa Claus will bring us presents, because there is no Santa Claus.

Maryam Namazie

The Observer | Comment | One woman's war:
After years of hearing this postmodern twaddle, Namazie flipped. Why was it, she asked, that supposed liberals always give 'precedence to cultural and religious norms, however reactionary, over the human being and her rights'? Why was it that they always pretended that other cultures were sealed boxes without conflicts of their own and took 'the most reactionary segment of that community' as representative of the belief and culture of the whole.

In a ringing passage, which should be pinned to the noticeboards of every cultural studies faculty and Whitehall ministry, she declared that the problem with cultural relativism was that it endorsed the racism of low expectations.

'It promotes tolerance and respect for so-called minority opinions and beliefs, rather than respect for human beings. Human beings are worthy of the highest respect, but not all opinions and beliefs are worthy of respect and tolerance. There are some who believe in fascism, white supremacy, the inferiority of women. Must they be respected?'
...
Maryam Namazie's obscurity remains baffling. She ought to be a liberal poster girl. Her life has been that of a feminist militant who fights the oppression of women wherever she finds it. She was born in Tehran, but had to flee with her family when the Iranian revolution brought the mullahs to power. After graduating in America, she went to work with the poor in the Sudan. When the Islamists seized control, she established an underground human rights network. Her cover was blown and she had to run once again. She's been a full-time campaigner for the rights of the Iranian diaspora, helping refugees across the world and banging on to anyone who will listen about the vileness of its treatment of women.
...
Right-thinking, left-leaning people have backed away from Maryam Namazie because she is just as willing to tackle their tolerance of oppression as the oppressors themselves.

Electronic circuits mass-printed onto paper

Gear Factor:
Another breakthrough in electronic printing now allows for mass-printing of electronic circuits in paper and cardboard. While this is akin to the flexible display technology we've been following for some time, it's entirely new in an important way: Electronic printing in mass-produced paper products will mean that just about any box, carton, or brochure you come across in the future may be chock full of circuits and stuff. This is a huge milestone in the push to integrate RFID into just about every object on earth. It also means we may soon see everything from electronic playing cards to blinking, talking, animated road maps that will still be impossible to fold.

Using veto to approve torture

Here's something worthy to write your congresspeople about, making sure they override any veto on this.

End the Abuse:
The amendment gives President Bush a chance at least to amend the record of abuse that will blot his legacy. Yet Mr. Bush is not inclined to accept this chance. Despite the mounting reaction from the Senate, the military establishment, the courts and courageous serving officers such as Capt. Ian Fishback, the president stubbornly digs his dishonorable hole deeper. The White House is leaning on Republican House members to kill or water down the McCain amendment; the president's spokesman even threatened a veto.

Let's be clear: Mr. Bush is proposing to use the first veto of his presidency on a defense bill needed to fund military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan so that he can preserve the prerogative to subject detainees to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. In effect, he threatens to declare to the world his administration's moral bankruptcy.

Google hires first lobbyist

Washington Post: Technology Briefing:
Google outlined the Internet policy issues its new Washington office will focus on, led by recently hired lobbyist Alan Davidson, former associate director of the Center for Democracy and Technology.

The Silicon Valley-based company said it would oppose legislation that restricted how people access the Internet, oppose any expansion of liability based on search results and take an active stance on copyright issues. Google also said it would focus on issues of privacy, spyware, trademark dilution, patent law reform and phone calls over the Internet

Buffalo News - Rumors of rescue copters under fire unfounded

This blaming of the government for being racist in its response to Hurricane Katrina is less important to me than the racism involved in the rumors spread at forest-fire speeds by the media... and which will be little explored by the media which spread them.

No evidence backs up reports of rescue helicopters being fired upon:
Among the rumors that spread as quickly as floodwaters after Hurricane Katrina, reports that gunmen were taking potshots at rescue helicopters stood out for their senselessness.

On Sept. 1, as patients sweltered in hospitals without power and thousands of people remained stranded on rooftops and in attics, crucial rescue efforts were delayed as word of such attacks spread.

But more than a month later, representatives from the Air Force, Coast Guard, Department of Homeland Security and Louisiana Air National Guard say they have yet to confirm a single incident of gunfire at helicopters.

Likewise, members of several rescue crews who were told to halt operations say there is no evidence they were under fire.

Police say there is no epidemic of crime at any of the relief centers

The Deadly Bigotry of Low Expectations?

Frothy, Not Factual


Yet it is very easy to find stories still running in local newspapers which propagate the rumors:
"People began robbing the stores for food, water and televisions. They were shooting at the rescue helicopters to keep them from landing so the people who wanted to get out couldn't," Burris said. Her only way to safety was to get to the ferry bridge. She made contact with a couple who had hot-wired a minivan. Burris, her two children, the couple and their mother loaded up in the van and drove to the Algiers ferry where the Army was rescuing families.