The Tragedy of a Complicit Media http://www.antiwar.com/orig/frey.php?articleid=7326 September 20, 2005 by William Frey Standing before a German cameraman in Biloxi, Miss., Christine Adelhardt, spoke to her countrymen: "Two minutes ago, the president drove past in his convoy. But what has happened in Biloxi all day long is truly unbelievable. Suddenly recovery units appeared, suddenly bulldozers were there, those hadn't been seen here all the days before, and this in an area, in which it really wouldn't be necessary to do a big clean-up, because far and wide nobody lives here anymore, the people are more inland in the city. The president travels with a press baggage [big crew]. This press baggage got very beautiful pictures, which are supposed to say that the president was here and help is on the way, too. The extent of the natural disaster shocked me, but the extent of the staging is shocking me at least the same way. With that, back to Hamburg." But this German report contrasts sharply with press coverage in America, where a complicit media routinely assesses such image manipulation to be less than newsworthy. It is, as Yogi Berra would say, "déjà vu all over again." Flashback to April 9, 2003: Saddam's statue topples in Fardus Square, Baghdad. Hours of American television time are devoted to showing purportedly spontaneous celebrations by masses of jubilant and enthusiastic Iraqis. Donald Rumsfeld pronounces the scene "breathtaking." The press agrees. CNN labels a highly cropped photograph, "Crowds cheer as statue of Saddam Hussein falls." What is not shown by mainstream media is the uncropped photograph of Fardus Square, which reveals the notably dissimilar scene of a stage-managed media event. It remains for alternative media both to release the photo and to report that the staged event features, instead of indigenous Baghdad residents (as the mainstream media reports), members of Ahmed Chalabi's Free Iraqi Forces Militia who have been flown into Iraq by the Pentagon. (Chalabi was the scandal-plagued London banker favored by Washington to head the new Iraqi government until he was discredited as both a major source of false WMD "intelligence" and a spy for Iran.) Day in and day out, as in both of these staged photo-ops, members of the allegedly liberal media establishment in America dutifully dispense manipulated and misleading images to a believing public. At Fardus Square, this occurred despite the fact that most American journalists were staying in the Palestine Hotel, directly across the square from Saddam's statue, with a clear view of the proceedings. If the average American is to see these exploited events for what they are, he must rely on information sources other than the mainstream American media. Notwithstanding incessant protestations of "liberal media bias" by Bush supporters, the American media has been an indispensable ally in disseminating the administration's public relations narrative. The reality of the (much maligned) New York Times and Washington Post faithfully propagating administration prewar claims of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, and the detested "liberal media" dutifully beating the drums of war and mocking valiant congressional efforts to expose the "fixing" of prewar "intelligence" have yet to register with the Bush faithful. The remarkable aspect of the misleading photo-ops described above is not, in fact, the administration's duplicity. Rather, it is the casual, business-as-usual state of acquiescence and indisputable collaboration with the powers that be to which the "liberal media" has descended. It is no coincidence that we only know of the events in Biloxi because of the serendipitous presence of an incredulous German TV crew. Of what consequence is such an unquestioning and complicit American media? One could, of course, complain of the diversion of scarce resources to public relations purposes during a time of crisis, but the damage to our republic is much more fundamental than the inefficient utilization of a few bulldozers in Mississippi. Media complicity is a necessary daily component of the Karl Rove/Frank Luntz spin machine. This most effective of modern political hegemonies does not control the framing of public discourse only through the efforts of unabashed administration partisans in talk radio, Fox News, and the endless stream of commentators and wannabe empire-builders hatched at incestuous neoconservative think tanks. Control of the framing of the issues of public discourse is only possible if aided by the silence and the active complicity of an intimidated and fearful media. In Iraq, misrepresentation by the media of the staged celebrations at the toppling of Saddam's statue reinforced the unrealistic prewar "they'll welcome us with flowers" mindset. This in turn reinforced a misinformed American bullishness that was oblivious to the extent of Iraqi ambivalence about a foreign military presence. Unquestionably, most Iraqis were delighted to be rid of Saddam. But this gratitude was, in fact, tempered by the fear that America coveted her resources, desired a controlling presence in the Middle East, and that American forces would be in Iraq permanently. With America thus disconnected from Iraqi sentiments, the opportunity for the Bush administration to allay Iraqi fears was squandered in subsequent months. By not moving quickly to transfer power to Iraqis, and by not disclaiming the intent for a permanent military presence in Iraq, administration actions unfortunately confirmed rather than calmed Iraqi fears. Iraqi public opinion polls give clear confirmation of this squandered opportunity. Gallup reports that while 43 percent of Iraqis said they had viewed Americans as "liberators" at the time of the invasion, one year later this number had declined to 19 percent. Polls commissioned by the U.S.-backed Coalition Provisional Authority were even more grim: by May 2004, only 2 percent of Iraqis identified Americans as "liberators." Forty-one percent favored immediate withdrawal, 45 percent wanted withdrawal after the election of a permanent government, and 6 percent favored our staying as long as coalition forces thought necessary for stability. Despite the president's repeated promises of "no occupation," "no territorial ambitions," "no desire to dominate," statements that "the occupation will end," and beguiling talk of "bringing home our troops," the undeniable reality of the unabated construction of untold millions of dollars worth of permanent bases is the proverbial "elephant in the living room." With the overwhelming majority of both Sunnis and Shi'ites opposed to a permanent American military presence, and with the fear of an unending occupation fueling an intractable insurgency, W. Andrew Terrill, professor at the Army War College's strategic studies institute – and the top Iraq expert there – summarizes our plight: "I don't think that you can kill the insurgency. … We have a growing, maturing insurgency group. … We see larger and more coordinated military attacks. They are getting better and they can self-regenerate. The idea there are x number of insurgents, and that when they're all dead we can get out is wrong. The insurgency has shown an ability to regenerate itself because there are people willing to fill the ranks of those who are killed. The political culture is more hostile to the U.S. presence. The longer we stay, the more they are confirmed in that view." In the face of the dissonance between the president's "no occupation" rhetoric and the reality of continued construction of permanent bases, burdened with an intractable insurgency with no discernible end, we must progress with the additional encumbrance of an intimidated and compliant press that will not challenge these presidential contradictions. A press that collaborates in routine image manipulation and disingenuous photo-ops is not a press that will demand answers to grave discrepancies between rhetoric and actions. Our second president, John Adams, warned, "Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people." And our fourth, James Madison, advised, "Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives." An American public detached from reality is not a public that will compel a necessary correction of our national course. And an American public detached from reality is the most damaging consequence of our servile and complicit media.
Is the media perfect? No but neither do I believe it to be fatally flawed. The problem with this article and those bashing the "liberal" media is that they are both viewing the media through their own relative political lenses. To a supporter of the Admin. the media is never supportive enough, especially in an age where people buy into the argument of a simplistic unquestioning patriotism and demand that the US media should be outrightly supporting the Admin.. For those who strongly oppose the media it is never critical enough. Complicating the situation is that under our system the major media can never be truly independent. They are for profit companies, or in the case of NPR and PBS, quasi governmental entities. They have shareholders and political oversight committees looking over their shoulders. Further in the case of a war reporters are relying on the very soldiers they report on to not just get them information but also to protect them. Under all of these constraints I don't think the major news media is doing that bad of a job. Ultimately though there is no such thing as a perfect news source. The most we can do as individuals is to get our news from many various sources to make sure we are getting a diversity of viewpoints in the hope that inherent biases cancel each other out.
Are you saying we should be OK with media reporting staged events? Heck, I thought it could only happen in PRC.
Sishir, The media should ALWAYS be critical, that IS its job. I don't want to hear from CNN or Faux News what Bill Clinton and George Bush said, I would want them to critically evaluate (with evidence and educated opinions) what our politicians don't say and the validity of what they said. They should always seek out the truth and attempt to present differing arguments and opinions from educated individuals. IMO, that is the media's primary job, and as far as the mainstream American media is concerned, they have miserably failed at it. Why do you think more people are turning to 'independent' news sources/blogs/forums to report/read/discuss the news? The Internet is the worst thing that ever happened to mass media, because now people from every part of the world can log on and read op-eds from a news source half a world away. In that sense, the Internet is very empowering. The real tragedy though, to borrow wnes' thread title, is the fact that the majority of Americans continue to view our media as either 'liberal' or 'conservative'; the correct answer is 'neither', they are merely part of the elite establishment, and will do whatever they can to safeguard their interests.
No I'm saying that the fact that conservatives don't think the news is conservative enough and liberals don't think it is liberal enough tells me that they're both viewing it through their political lenses. Further I'm saying you should get your news from a variety of sources.
The problem with that is that being critical isn't the same as being objective and I would think that one would prize objectivity in reporting. The argument you are making seems to apply to news analysis and editorials which aren't the same thing as reporting. See my response to Wnes. I'm saying we should get our news from a diverse range of news services. That is what I noted is that the major media is either for profit companies or quasi governmental entities. There's no such thing as free news since everyone even the lone blogger, actually especially the lone blogger, is inherently serving other interests be it for profit or their own opinion. Further its impossible to have omniscient news. Every media source has some level of bias because the decisions on what stories to report and how many reources to devote are made by people with their own POV's and not robots. As I said the most we can do is to get our news from a diverse range of sources to try to cancel out inherent biases.
this is not quite accurate- most conservatives are less concerned with whether the MSM is biased or not, they assume it is, but with whether that bias is acknowledged. look at the journal and the NYTimes. the editorial pages of both stake our very clearly defined ideological positions, although to my mind the journal is much less shrill. by contrast, the news pages of the wsj or devoid of the type of thinly disguised editorials we commonly see on the, ostensibly, news pages of the times. it's this hidden bias that should concern anyone who's interested in accuracy in reporting.
