[lit-ideas] Re: Religion/State, was Vote Bush if...
- From: Eternitytime1@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 31 Oct 2004 23:32:20 EST
In a message dated 10/30/2004 9:25:31 AM Central Daylight Time,
aamago@xxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
Interest would necessarily wane as earthly political concerns began to push
out, or compete with, spiritual ones.
HI,
I beg to disagree. I think it surely has been a very long time since you
have attended an evangelical or fundamentalist church. Most of them think
that
the political concerns are *the same* as the spiritual ones.
And, while not necessarily from the 'pulpit', the leaders certainly have
other ways of communicating with their folk. (and, the leaders are all brought
together by various and assorted people under the guise of 'minstering' to
them and their spouses--I used to know/be involved in that world and this area
is still very much living and breathing that sort of thing [we have friends
who are evangelical pastors, etc.]
Here is the critical excerpt from Bill Moyers' speech on journalism
(primarily) when he was talking about his upcoming retirement:
"How do we explain the possibility that a close election in November could
turn on several million good and decent citizens who believe in the Rapture
Index? Thatâ??s what I said â?? the Rapture Index; google it and you will
understand why the best-selling books in America today are the twelve volumes
of the
left-behind series which have earned multi-millions of dollars for their
co-authors who earlier this year completed a triumphant tour of the Bible Belt
whose buckle holds in place George W. Bushâ??s armor of the Lord. These true
believers subscribe to a fantastical theology concocted in the l9th century by
a
couple of immigrant preachers who took disparate passages from the Bible and
wove them into a narrative millions of people believe to be literally true.
According to this narrative, Jesus will return to earth only when certain
conditions are met: when Israel has been established as a state; when Israel
then occupies the rest of its â??biblical lands;â?? when the third temple has
been
rebuilt on the site now occupied by the Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa mosques;
and, then, when legions of the Antichrist attack Israel. This will trigger a
final showdown in the valley of Armageddon during which all the Jews who
have not converted will be burned. Then the Messiah returns to earth. The
Rapture occurs once the big battle begins. True believersâ?? will be lifted
out of
their clothes and transported to heaven where, seated next to the right hand
of
God, they will watch their political and religious opponents suffer plagues
of boils, sores, locusts and frogs during the several years of tribulation
which follow.
Iâ??m not making this up. Weâ??re reported on these people for our weekly
broadcast on PBS, following some of them from Texas to the West Bank. They are
sincere, serious, and polite as they tell you that they feel called to help
bring the Rapture on as fulfillment of biblical prophecy. Thatâ??s why they
have
declared solidarity with Israel and the Jewish settlements and backed up their
support with money and volunteers. Itâ??s why they have staged confrontations
at
the old temple site in Jerusalem. Itâ??s why the invasion of Iraq for them was
a warm-up act, predicted in the 9th chapter of the Book of Revelations where
four angels â??which are bound in the great river Euphrates will be released
â??
to slay the third part of men.â?? As the British writer George Monbiot has
pointed out, for these people the Middle East is not a foreign policy issue,
itâ??
s a biblical scenario, a matter of personal belief. A war with Islam in the
Middle East is not something to be feared but welcomed; if thereâ??s a
conflagration there, they come out winners on the far side of tribulation,
inside the
pearly gates, in celestial splendor, supping on ambrosia to the accompaniment
of harps plucked by angels.
One estimate puts these people at about 15% of the electorate. Most are
likely to vote Republican; they are part of the core of George W. Bushâ??s base
support. He knows who they are and what they want. When the President asked
Ariel Sharon to pull his tanks out of Jenin in 2002, over one hundred thousand
angry Christian fundamentalists barraged the White House with emails and Mr.
Bush never mentioned the matter again. Not coincidentally, the administration
recently put itself solidly behind Ariel Sharonâ??s expansions of settlements
on
the West Banks. In George Monbiotâ??s analysis, the President stands to lose
fewer votes by encouraging Israeli expansion into the West Bank than he stands
to lose by restraining it. â??He would be mad to listen to these people, but
he
would also be mad not to.â?? No wonder Karl Rove walks around the West Wing
whistling â??Onward Christian Soldiers.â?? He knows how many votes he is
likely to
get from these pious folk who believe that the Rapture Index now stands at
144 --- just one point below the critical threshold at which point the
prophecy is fulfilled, the whole thing blows, the sky is filled with floating
naked
bodies, and the true believers wind up at the right hand of God. With no
regret for those left behind. (See George Monbiot. The Guardian, April 20th,
2004.)"
*****************************************************
Has anyone on this list read the Left Behind series? (We even have a title
or two from this series in our booktalk collection that we lend out to
bookclubs--this series is constantly on the bestseller list...)
While at a Halloween party tonight, we were discussing the election. (which
was kind of intriguing since it used to be that most of the churches around
here abhorred Halloween--and most do offer alternatives even so--but they do
let some celebrate which didn't use to be so...so there is some lightening up
as this type of church world has grown, I think...)
The couple having the party over Labor Day weekend (the last party at their
home) had been adamantly Bush fans. Tonight they were less so. Part of it
is their son who is in the Navy--and who had registered as a Democrat. (and,
he and his wife have been in Japan--are heading home in January and then to
Washington State) Matt, they said, had received (finally) his absentee
ballot--but I was not clear as to whether or not there is a difference in the
ballots [is there?] or how this happened -- but with his absentee ballot, he
received all sorts of things from the Republican Party.
His mom is still leaning towards Bush because she thinks that a 'change in
leadership' right now would be awful--though when I pointed out that the word
on the street <g> is that Colin Powell will not be there for much longer if
Bush is re-elected--there were nods from her other friends around the table who
had heard the same thing. Most of the people there were all going to the
same Baptist Church (though they still like me <g> as I know more than any of
them so can 'beat them at their own game' if I have to--they don't even try
any more since they don't want to get 'lost' and have to walk through to the
other side--and I would not do that to anyone ... but they respect where I am
and I do the same for them...)
Then we discussed stem cell research and abortion. They all claim that all
Roe vs Wade did was keep governmental money from being spent on abortion and
that it was just not right to spend governmental money on things that they
disagreed with...(though I jokingly pointed out several things that we get
absolutely no say-so on in terms of how our governmental money is spent and
asked
them if they were willing to deal with that <g>) The issue of when life
begins/ends was interesting as I had never shared with them how I believe that
life ends with the heartbeat and thus that is when I believe life
begins--which allows for things like stem cell research on embryos, the
morning after
pill, etc. One of the couples (I only see them at these parties and periodic
other events but know somewhat of what is happening because of other mutual
friends) have a daughter who was recently diagnosed with juvenile diabetes.
They are very staunch Baptists and yet are wrestling with the issue of stem
cell research because of the breakthroughs that have occurred already in
diabetes research because of it.
Funny how things change a bit when issues become personal...
About that time, the older daughter arrived at the party from Sunday night
church--and dropped onto the table the handouts that had been given to them as
they entered church.
All of the handouts had lists of how Bush was for 'this' and Kerry was
'against' it. (no reasons--of course--and very much slanted in how it was
explained.) All VERY professionally done--obviously from whatever national
evangelical group is putting them out-- and that led to another dicussion of
issues.
All of them stating that Bush was a 'man of G-d', etc. etc.
I, too, enjoyed the site from John McCreery--but know that none of those
organizations would be given any credence from these folk that I know. Those
groups are 'deceived' and not really (don't you know?) "Christian". (Of
course, neither are Catholics but they have figured out how to deal with that
issue
because of the Right to Life concepts--it's been fascinating to hear how
they rationalize it...)
Still, it was interesting to me--in spite of the conversations--that they
were actually thinking about a multitude of issues rather than just one or
two.
And, these were all people who, in the beginning of September, were so so
pro-Bush without thinking but simply because he was 'A Man of G-d' -- so
while the bin Laden tape had almost driven them back to Bush, they had
obviously
all been thinking very hard about issues.
Oh, btw. I also heard that the health care system in Canada is simply
AWFUL. My sympathies to those from there. Long lines, never ever getting the
doctor you want, waiting forever for a diagnosis--sounded simply horrible. (I
don't know where they were getting the information--it was a bit different
from that I have heard...<g>) But, it made me feel very sorry for all
Canadians. (and none of them understood that Kerry was talking about buying
into the
federal health care plan that the federal government employees
have--apparently the word on those sheets from the churches just says that it
is going to
be the same as in Canada and take choice away. It was kind of fun to explain
what my siblings pay/get in the federal health care plan and compare it to
what I have to pay/get from my library system--and how appalled they have been
at my coverage ... I'd save alot even if we don't get medicine from other
countries if I could buy into such a plan...)
I'd be surprised, though, if religion will ever go back to separating itself
from politics. It's very tangled up in the individual mindsets now that
they need to be in order to keep their country from being taken over by the
forces of darkness.
Sunday night musing,
Marlena in Missouri
Published on Friday, September 17, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
Journalism Under Fire
by Bill Moyers
Address to the Society of Professional Journalists
Saturday, September 11, 2004
New York City
Thank you for inviting me to share this occasion with you. Three months from
now I will be retiring from active journalism and I cannot imagine a better
turn into the home stretch than this morning with you.
My life in journalism began 54 years ago, on my 16th birthday, in the summer
before my junior year in high school, when I went to work as a cub reporter
for the Marshall News Messenger in the East Texas town of 20,000 where I had
grown up. Early on I got one of those lucky breaks that define a lifeâ??s
course. Some of the old timers were sick or on vacation and Spencer Jones, the
managing editor, assigned me to help cover the Housewives Rebellion. Fifteen
women in town refused to pay the social security withholding tax for their
domestic workers. They argued that social security was unconstitutional, that
imposing it was taxation without representation, and that â?? hereâ??s my
favorite
part â?? â??requiring us to collect (the tax) is no different from requiring
us
to collect the garbage.â?? They hired a lawyer â?? Martin Dies, the former
Congressman notorious for his work as head of the House Committee on
Un-American
Activities â?? but to no avail. The women wound up holding their noses and
paying the tax. In the meantime the Associated Press had picked up our
coverage
and turned the rebellion into a national story. One day after it was all over
the managing editor called me over and pointed to the ticker beside his desk.
Moving across the wire was a â??Notice to the Editorâ?? citing one Bill Moyers
and the News Messenger for the reporting we had done on the rebellion. I was
hooked.
Looking back on that experience and all that followed I often think of what
Joseph Lelyveld told aspiring young journalists when he was executive editor
of the New York Times. â??You can never know how a life in journalism will
turn
out,â?? he said. â??Decide that you want to be a scholar, a lawyer, or a
doctorâ?¦
and your path to the grave is pretty well laid out before you. Decide that
you want to enter our rather less reputable line of work and you set off on a
route that can sometimes seem to be nothing but diversions, switchbacks and a
life of surprisesâ?¦with the constant temptation to keep reinventing
yourself.â??
So I have. My path led me on to graduate school, a detour through seminary,
then to LBJâ??s side in Washington, and, from there, through circumstances so
convulted I still havenâ??t figured them out, back to journalism, first at
Newsday and then the big leap from print to television, to PBS and CBS and
back
again â?? just one more of those vagrant journalistic souls who, intoxicated
with
the moment is always looking for the next high: the lead not yet written,
the picture not yet taken, the story not yet told.
It took me awhile after I left government to get my footing back in
journalism. I had to learn all over again that whatâ??s important for the
journalist is
not how close you are to power but how close you are to reality. Iâ??ve seen
plenty of reality. Journalism took me to famine and revolution in Africa and
to war in Central America; it took me to the bedside of the dying and delivery
rooms of the newborn. It took me into the lives of inner-city families in
Newark and working class families in Milwaukee struggling to find their place
in the new global economy. CBS News paid me richly to put in my
two-cents-worth on just about anything that happened on a given day. As a
documentary
journalist Iâ??ve explored everything from the power of money in politics to
how to
make a poem. Iâ??ve investigated the abuse of power in the Watergate and
Iran-Contra scandals and the unanswered questions of 9/11. Iâ??ve delved into
the â??
Mystery of Chiâ?? in Chinese traditional medicine as well as the miracle that
empowered a one-time slave trader to write the hymn, â??Amazing Grace.â??
Journalism has been a continuing course in adult education â?? my own; other
people
paid the tuition and travel, and Iâ??ve never really had to grow up and get a
day
job. I made a lot of mistakes along the way, but Iâ??ve enjoyed the company of
colleagues as good as they come, who kept inspiring me to try harder.
They helped me relearn another of journalismâ??s basic lessons. The job of
trying to tell the truth about people whose job it is to hide the truth is
almost as complicated and difficult as trying to hide it in the first place.
Unless youâ??re willing to fight and refight the same battles until you go
blue in
the face, drive the people you work with nuts going over every last detail to
make certain youâ??ve got it right, and then take hit after unfair hit
accusing
you of â??biasâ??, or these days even a point of view, thereâ??s no use even
trying. You have to love it, and I do. I remember what Izzy Stone said about
this. For years he was Americaâ??s premier independent journalist, bringing
down on
his head the sustained wrath of the high and mighty for publishing in his
little four-page I.F. Stoneâ??s Weekly the governmentâ??s lies and
contradictions
culled from the governmentâ??s own official documents. No matter how much they
pummeled him, Izzy Stone said: â??I have so much fun I ought to be
arrested.â??
Thatâ??s how I felt 25 five years ago when my colleague Sherry Jones and I
produced the first documentary ever about the purchase of government favors by
political action committees. When we unfurled across the Capitol grounds yard
after yard of computer printouts listing campaign contributions to every
member of Congress, there was a loud outcry, including from several
politicians
who had been allies just a few years earlier when I worked at the White House.
I loved it, too, when Sherry and I connected the dots behind the Iran-Contra
scandal. That documentary sent the right-wing posse in Washington running
indignantly to congressional supporters of public television who accused PBS
of
committing â?? horrors! â?? journalism right on the air.
While everyone else was all over the Monica Lewinsky imbroglio, Sherry and I
took after Washingtonâ??s other scandal of the time -- the unbridled and
illegal fundraising by Democrats in the campaign of 1996. This time it was
Democrats who wanted me arrested. .
But taking on political scandal is nothing compared to what can happen if
you raise questions about corporate power in Washington. When my colleagues
and
I started looking into the subject of pesticides and food for a Frontline
documentary, my producer Marty Koughan learned that industry was attempting
behind closed doors to dilute the findings of a National Academy of Sciences
study on the effects of pesticide residues on children. Before we finished the
documentary, the industry somehow purloined a copy of our draft script â?? we
still arenâ??t certain how â?? and mounted a sophisticated and expensive
campaign
to discredit our broadcast before it aired. Television reviewers and
editorial page editors were flooded in advance with pro-industry propaganda.
There
was a whispering campaign. A Washington Post columnist took a dig at the
broadcast on the morning of the day it aired â?? without even having seen it
â?? and
later confessed to me that the dirt had been supplied by a top lobbyist for
the chemical industry. Some public television managers across the country were
so unnerved by the blitz of dis-information they received from the industry
that before the documentary had even aired they protested to PBS with letters
prepared by the industry.
Hereâ??s what most perplexed us: Eight days before the broadcast, the American
Cancer Society â?? an organization that in no way figured in our story â??
sent
to its three thousand local chapters a â??critiqueâ?? of the unfinished
documentary claiming, wrongly, that it exaggerated the dangers of pesticides
in
food. We were puzzled. Why was the American Cancer Society taking the unusual
step of criticizing a documentary that it had not seen, that had not aired,
and
that did not claim what the society alleged? An enterprising reporter in town
named Sheila Kaplan looked into these questions for Legal Times and
discovered that a public relations firm, which had worked for several chemical
companies, also did pro bono work for the American Cancer Society. The firm
was
able to cash in some of the goodwill from that â??charitableâ?? work to
persuade
the compliant communications staff at the Society to distribute some harsh
talking points about the documentary â?? talking points that had been supplied
by,
but not attributed to, the public relations firm.
Others also used the American Cancer Societyâ??s good name in efforts to
tarnish the journalism before it aired; including right wing front groups who
railed against what they called â??junk science on PBSâ?? and demanded
Congress pull
the plug on public television. PBS stood firm. The documentary aired, the
journalism held up, and the National Academy of Sciences felt liberated to
release the study that the industry had tried to demean.
They never give up. Sherry and I spent more than a year working on another
documentary called Trade Secrets, based on revelations â??found in the
industryâ??
s archives â?? that big chemical companies had deliberately withheld from
workers and consumers damaging information about toxic chemicals in their
products. These internal industry documents are a fact. They exist. They are
not a
matter of opinion or point of view. And they portrayed deep and pervasive
corruption in a major American industry, revealing that we live under a
regulatory system designed by the industry itself. If the public and
government
regulators had known over the years what the industry was keeping secret about
the
health risks of its products, Americaâ??s laws and regulations governing
chemical manufacturing would have been far more protective of human health
than
they were.
Hoping to keep us from airing those secrets the industry hired a public
relations firm in Washington noted for using private detectives and former
CIA,
FBI, and drug enforcement officers to conduct investigations for corporations.
One of the companyâ??s founders was on record as saying that sometimes
corporations need to resort to unconventional resources, including â??using
deceitâ??,
to defend themselves. Given the scurrilous underground campaign that was
conducted to smear our journalism, his comments were an understatement. Not
only
was there the vicious campaign directed at me personally, but once again
pressure was brought to bear on PBS through industry allies in Congress. PBS
stood firm, the documentary aired, and a year later the National Academy of
Television Arts and Sciences awarded Trade Secrets an Emmy for outstanding
investigative journalism.
â??ve gone on like this not to regale you with old war tales but to get to a
story that is the one thing I hope you might remember from our time together
this morning. John Henry Faulk told me this story. Most of you are too young
to remember John Henry -- a wonderful raconteur, entertainer, and a popular
host on CBS Radio back when radio was in its prime. But those were days of
paranoia and red-baiting â?? the McCarthy era â?? and the right wing sleaze
merchants went to work on John Henry with outlandish accusations that he was a
communist. A fearful CBS refused to rehire him and John Henry went home to
Texas to
live out his days. He won a famous libel suit against his accusers and wrote
a classic book about those events and the meaning of the first amendment. In
an interview I did with him shortly before his death a dozen years ago John
Henry told the story of how he and friend Boots Cooper were playing in the
chicken house when they were about twelve years old. They spied a chicken
snake
in the top tier of nests, so close it looked like a boa constrictor. As John
Henry told it to me, â??All the frontier courage drained out our heels â??
actually it trickled down our overall legs â?? and Boots and I made a new door
through the henhouse wall.â?? His momma came out and, learning what the fuss
was
about, said to Boots and John Henry: â??Donâ??t you know chicken snakes are
harmless? They canâ??t hurt you.â?? And Boots, rubbing his forehead and behind
at the
same time, said, â??Yes, Mrs. Faulk, I know that, but they can scare you so
bad, itâ??ll cause you to hurt yourself.â?? John Henry Faulk told me thatâ??s
a
lesson he never forgot. Itâ??s a good one for any journalist to tuck away and
call
on when journalism is under fire.
Our job remains essentially the same: to gather, weigh, organize, analyze,
and present information people need to know in order to make sense of the
world. You will hear it said this is not a professional task â?? John Carroll
of
the Los Angeles Times recently reminded us there are â??no qualification
tests,
no boards to censure misconduct, no universally accepted set of standards.â??
Maybe so. But I think that what makes journalism a profession is the deep
ethical imperative of which the public is aware only when we violate it â??
think
Jayson Blair, Stephen Glass, Jim Kelly. Ed Wasserman, once an editor himself
and now teaching at Washington and Lee University, says that journalism â??is
an
ethical practice because it tells people what matters and helps them
determine what they should do about it.â?? So good newsrooms â??are marinated
in ethical
conversationsâ?¦What should this lead say? What I should I tell that
source?â??
We practice this craft inside â??concentric rings of duty and obligations:
Obligations to sources, our colleagues, our bosses, our readers, our
profession,
and our communityâ?? â?? and we function under a system of values â??in which
we
try to understand and reconcile strong competing claims.â?? Our obligation is
to sift patiently and fairly through untidy realities, measure the claims of
affected people, and present honestly the best available approximation of the
truth â?? and this, says Ed Wasserman, is an ethical practice.
Itâ??s never been easy, and itâ??s getting harder. For more reasons then you
can shake a stick at.
One is the sheer magnitude of the issues we need to report and analyze. My
friend Bill McKibben enjoys a conspicuous place in my pantheon of journalistic
heroes for his pioneer work in writing about the environment; his bestseller
The End of Nature carried on where Rachel Carsonâ??s Silent Spring left off.
Recently in Mother Jones Bill described how the problems we cover â??
conventional, manageable problems, like budget shortfalls, pollution, crime
â?? may be
about to convert to chaotic, unpredictable situations. He puts it this way: If
you donâ??t have a job, â??thatâ??s a problem, and unemployment is a problem,
and
they can both be managed: You learn a new skill, the Federal Reserve lowers
interest rates to spur the economy. But millions of skilled, well-paying jobs
disappearing to Bangalore is a situation; itâ??s not clear what if anything
the
system can do to turn it around.â?? Perhaps the most unmanageable of all
problems, Bill McKibben writes, is the accelerating deterioration of the
environment. While the present administration has committed a thousand acts of
vandalism against our air, water, forests, and deserts, were we to change
managers,
Bill argues, some of that damage would abate. What wonâ??t go away, he
continues, are the perils with huge momentum â?? the greenhouse effect, for
instance.
Scientists have been warning us about it since the 1980s. But now the melt of
the Arctic seems to be releasing so much freshwater into the North Atlantic
that even the Pentagon is alarmed that a weakening Gulf Stream could yield
abrupt â?? and overwhelming â?? changes, the kind of climate change that
threatens
civilization. How do we journalists get a handle on something of that
enormity?
Or on ideology. One of the biggest changes in my lifetime is that the
delusional is no longer marginal. How do we fathom and explain the mindset of
violent exhibitionists and extremists who blow to smithereens hundreds of
children
and teachers of Middle School Number One in Beslan, Russia? Or the radical
utopianism of martyrs who crash hijacked planes into the World Trade Center?
How do we explain the possibility that a close election in November could turn
on several million good and decent citizens who believe in the Rapture
Index? Thatâ??s what I said â?? the Rapture Index; google it and you will
understand
why the best-selling books in America today are the twelve volumes of the
left-behind series which have earned multi-millions of dollars for their
co-authors who earlier this year completed a triumphant tour of the Bible Belt
whose
buckle holds in place George W. Bushâ??s armor of the Lord. These true
believers subscribe to a fantastical theology concocted in the l9th century by
a
couple of immigrant preachers who took disparate passages from the Bible and
wove them into a narrative millions of people believe to be literally true.
According to this narrative, Jesus will return to earth only when certain
conditions are met: when Israel has been established as a state; when Israel
then occupies the rest of its â??biblical lands;â?? when the third temple has
been
rebuilt on the site now occupied by the Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa
mosques; and, then, when legions of the Antichrist attack Israel. This will
trigger
a final showdown in the valley of Armageddon during which all the Jews who
have not converted will be burned. Then the Messiah returns to earth. The
Rapture occurs once the big battle begins. True believersâ?? will be lifted
out of
their clothes and transported to heaven where, seated next to the right hand
of God, they will watch their political and religious opponents suffer plagues
of boils, sores, locusts and frogs during the several years of tribulation
which follow.
Iâ??m not making this up. Weâ??re reported on these people for our weekly
broadcast on PBS, following some of them from Texas to the West Bank. They are
sincere, serious, and polite as they tell you that they feel called to help
bring the Rapture on as fulfillment of biblical prophecy. Thatâ??s why they
have
declared solidarity with Israel and the Jewish settlements and backed up their
support with money and volunteers. Itâ??s why they have staged confrontations
at the old temple site in Jerusalem. Itâ??s why the invasion of Iraq for them
was a warm-up act, predicted in the 9th chapter of the Book of Revelations
where four angels â??which are bound in the great river Euphrates will be
released â??
to slay the third part of men.â?? As the British writer George Monbiot has
pointed out, for these people the Middle East is not a foreign policy issue,
itâ??
s a biblical scenario, a matter of personal belief. A war with Islam in the
Middle East is not something to be feared but welcomed; if thereâ??s a
conflagration there, they come out winners on the far side of tribulation,
inside the
pearly gates, in celestial splendor, supping on ambrosia to the accompaniment
of harps plucked by angels.
One estimate puts these people at about 15% of the electorate. Most are
likely to vote Republican; they are part of the core of George W. Bushâ??s
base
support. He knows who they are and what they want. When the President asked
Ariel Sharon to pull his tanks out of Jenin in 2002, over one hundred thousand
angry Christian fundamentalists barraged the White House with emails and Mr.
Bush never mentioned the matter again. Not coincidentally, the administration
recently put itself solidly behind Ariel Sharonâ??s expansions of settlements
on
the West Banks. In George Monbiotâ??s analysis, the President stands to lose
fewer votes by encouraging Israeli expansion into the West Bank than he stands
to lose by restraining it. â??He would be mad to listen to these people, but
he would also be mad not to.â?? No wonder Karl Rove walks around the West Wing
whistling â??Onward Christian Soldiers.â?? He knows how many votes he is
likely
to get from these pious folk who believe that the Rapture Index now stands at
144 --- just one point below the critical threshold at which point the
prophecy is fulfilled, the whole thing blows, the sky is filled with floating
naked bodies, and the true believers wind up at the right hand of God. With no
regret for those left behind. (See George Monbiot. The Guardian, April 20th,
2004.)
I know, I know: You think I am bonkers. You think Ann Coulter is right to
aim her bony knee at my groin and that Oâ??Reilly should get a Peabody for
barfing all over me for saying thereâ??s more to American politics than meets
the
Foxy eye. But this is just the point: Journalists who try to tell these
stories,
connect these dots, and examine these links are demeaned, disparaged, and
dismissed. This is the very kind of story that illustrates the challenge
journalists face in a world driven by ideologies that are stoutly maintained
despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality.
Ideologues â??
religious, political, or editorial ideologues â?? embrace a world view that
cannot be changed because they admit no evidence to the contrary. And Don
Quixote
on Rocinante tilting at windmills had an easier time of it than a journalist
on a laptop tilting with facts at the worldâ??s fundamentalist belief systems.
For one thing, youâ??ll get in trouble with the public. The Chicago Tribune
recently conducted a national poll in which about half of those surveyed said
there should be been some kind of press restraint on reporting about the
prison abuse scandal in Iraq; I suggest those people donâ??t want the facts to
disturb their belief system about American exceptionalism. The poll also found
that five or six of every ten Americans â??would embrace government controls
of
some kind on free speech, especially if it is found unpatriotic.â?? No wonder
scoundrels find refuge in patriotism; it offers them immunity from criticism.
If raging ideologies are difficult to penetrate, so is secrecy. Secrecy is
hardly a new or surprising story. But we are witnessing new barriers imposed
to public access to information and a rapid mutation of Americaâ??s political
culture in favor of the secret rule of government. I urge you to read the
special report (Keeping Secrets) published recently by the American Society of
Newspaper Editors (for a copy send an e-mail to publications@xxxxxxxxxxxxx).
You
will find laid out there what the editors call a â??zeal for secrecyâ??
pulsating through government at every level, shutting off the flow of
information
from sources such as routine hospital reports to what one United States
Senator
calls the â??single greatest rollback of the Freedom of Information Act in
history.â??
In the interest of full disclosure I digress here to say that I was present
when President Lyndon Johnson signed the Freedom of Information Act on July
4, 1966. In language that was almost lyrical he said he was signing it â??with
a
deep sense of pride that the United States is an open society in which the
peopleâ??s right to know is cherished and guarded.â?? But as his press
secretary
at the time, I knew something that few others did: LBJ had to be dragged
kicking and screaming to the signing ceremony. He hated the very idea of FOIA,
hated the thought of journalists rummaging in government closets, hated them
challenging the official review of realty. He dug in his heels and even
threatened to pock-veto the bill after it reached the White House. Only the
tenacity
of a congressman named John Moss got the bill passed at all, and that was
after a twelve-year battle against his elders in Congress, who blinked every
time the sun shined in the dark corridors of power. They managed to cripple
the
bill Moss had drafted, and even then, only some last-minute calls to LBJ
from a handful of newspaper editors overcame the presidentâ??s reluctance. He
signed â??the f------â??thing,â?? as he called it, and then set out to claim
credit
for it.
But never has there been an administration like the one in power today â?? so
disciplined in secrecy, so precisely in lockstep in keeping information from
the people at large and, in defiance of the Constitution, from their
representatives in Congress. The litany is long: The Presidentâ??s chief of
staff
orders a review that leads to at least 6000 documents being pulled from
government
websites. The Defense Department bans photos of military caskets being
returned to the U.S. To hide the influence of Kenneth Lay, Enron, and other
energy
moguls the Vice President stonewalls his energy task force records with the
help of his duck-hunting pal on the Supreme Court. The CIA adds a new
question to its standard employer polygraph exam asking, â??Do you have
friends in the
media?â?? There have been more than 1200 presumably terrorist-related arrests
and 750 people deported, and no one outside the government knows their
names, or how many court docket entries have been erased or never entered.
Secret
federal court hearings have been held with no public record of when or where
or who is being tried.
Secrecy is contagious. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has announced that â??
certain security information included in the reactor oversight processâ?? will
no longer be publicly available, and no longer be updated on the agencyâ??s
website.
New controls are being imposed on space surveillance data once found on NASAâ??
s web site.
The FCC has now restricted public access to reports of telecommunications
disruption because the Department of Homeland Security says communications
outages could provide â??a roadmap for terrorists.â??
One of the authors of the ASNE report, Pete Weitzel, former managing editor
of The Miami (Fla.) Herald and now coordinator for the Coalition of
Journalists for Open Government, describes how Section 2l4 of the Homeland
Security
Act makes it possible for a company to tell Homeland Security about an eroding
chemical tank on the bank of a river, but DHS could not disclose this
information publicly or, for that matter, even report it to the Environmental
Protection Agency. And if there were a spill and people were injured, the
information given DHS could not be used in court!
Secrecy is contagious â?? and scandalous. The Washington Post reports that
nearly 600 times in recent years a judicial committee acting in private has
stripped information from reports intended to alert the public to conflicts of
interest involving federal judges.
Secrecy is contagious, scandalous -- and toxic. According to the ASNE
report, curtains are falling at the state and local levels, too. The tiny
South
Alabama town of Notasulga decided to allow citizens to see records only one
hour
a month. It had to rescind the decision but now you have to make a request
in writing, make an appointment, and state a reason for wanting to see any
document. The State Legislature in Florida has adopted l4 new exemptions to
its
sunshine and public record laws. Over the objections of law enforcement
officials and Freedom of Information advocates, they passed a new law
prohibiting
police from making lists of gun owners even as it sets a fine of $5 million
for violation.
Secrecy is contagious, scandalous, toxic â?? and costly. Pete Weitzel
estimates that the price tag for secrecy today is more than $5 billion annual
(I have
seen other estimates up to $6.5 billion a year,)
This â??zeal for secrecyâ?? I am talking about â?? and I have barely touched
the
surface â?? adds up to a victory for the terrorists. When they plunged those
hijacked planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon three years ago
this morning, they were out to hijack our Gross National Psychology. If they
could fill our psyche with fear -- as if the imagination of each one of us
were
Afghanistan and they were the Taliban -- they could deprive us of the trust
and confidence required for a free society to work. They could prevent us
from ever again believing in a safe, decent, or just world and from working to
bring it about. By pillaging and plundering our peace of mind they could panic
us into abandoning those unique freedoms â?? freedom of speech, freedom of the
press â?? that constitute the ability of democracy to self-correct and turn
the ship of state before it hits the iceberg.
I thought of this last week during the Republican National Convention here
in New York -- thought of the terrorists as enablers of democracyâ??s
self-immolation. My office is on the west side of Manhattan, two blocks from
Madison
Square Garden. From where I sit I could see snipers on the roof. Helicopters
overhead. Barricades at every street corner. Lines of police stretching down
the avenues. Unmarked vans. Flatbed trucks. Looking out his own window, the
writer Nick Turse (_TomDispatch.com 9/8/04_
(http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?pid=1574) ) saw what I saw and more.
Special Forces brandishing automatic
rifles. Rolls of orange plastic netting. Dragnets. Preemptive arrests of
peaceful protesters. Cages for detainees. And he caught sight of what he calls
â??
the ultimate blending of corporatism and the police state â?? the Fuji blimp
â??
now emblazoned with a second logo: NYPD.â?? A spy-in-the sky, outfitted
â??with
the latest in video-surveillance equipment, loaned free of charge to the
police all week long.â?? Nick Turse saw these things and sees in them, as do
I, â??
The Rise of the Homeland Security Stateâ??
Will we be cowed by it? Will we investigate and expose its excesses? Will we
ask hard questions of the people who run it? The answers are not clear. As
deplorable as was the betrayal of their craft by Jason Blair, Stephen Glass
and Jim Kelly, the greater offense was the seduction of mainstream media into
helping the government dupe the public to support a war to disarm a dictator
who was already disarmed [see the current issue of Foreign Affairs]. Now we
are buying into the very paradigm of a â??war on terrorâ?? that our government
â??
with staggering banality, soaring hubris, and stunning bravado -- employs to
elicit public acquiescence while offering no criterion of success or failure,
no knowledge of the cost, and no measure of democratic accountability. I am
reminded of the answer the veteran journalist Richard Reeves gave when asked
by a college student to define â??real news.â?? â??Real news,â?? said Richard
Reeves
â??is the news you and I need to keep our freedoms.â?? I am reminded of that
line from the news photographer in Tom Stoppardâ??s play Night and Day:
â??People
do terrible things to each other, but its worse in places where everybody is
kept in the dark.â??
I have become a nuisance on this issue â?? if not a fanatic -- because I grew
up in the South, where for so long truth tellers were driven from the pulpit,
the classroom, and the newsroom; it took a bloody civil war to drive home
the truth of slavery, and still it took another hundred of years of cruel
segregation and oppression before the people freed by that war finally
achieved
equal rights under the law. Not only did I grow up in the South, which had
paid
such a high price for denial, but I served in the Johnson White House during
the early escalation of the Vietnam War. We circled the wagons and grew
intolerant of news that did not confirm to the official view of reality, with
tragic consequences for America and Vietnam. Few days pass now that I do not
remind myself that the greatest moments in the history of the press came not
when journalists made common cause with the state but when they stood
fearlessly
independent of it.
Thatâ??s why I have also become a nuisance, if not a fanatic, on the perils of
media consolidation. My eyes were opened wide by the Telecommunications Act
of 1996 which led to my first documentary on the subject, called Free Speech
for Sale. On our current weekly broadcast weâ??ve gone back to the subject
over
thirty times. I was astonished when the coupling of Time Warner and AOL â??
the biggest corporate merger of all time â?? brought an avalanche of gee-whiz
coverage from a media intoxicated by uncritical enthusiasm. Not many people
heard the quiet voice of the cultural critic Todd Gitlin pointing out that the
merger was not motivated by any impulse to improve news reporting, magazine
journalism, or the quality of public discourse. Its purpose was to boost the
customer base, the shareholdersâ?? stock, and the personal wealth of top
executives. Not only was this brave new combination, in Gitlinâ??s words,
â??unlikely to
arrest the slickening of news coverage, its pulverization into ever more
streamlined and simple-minded snippers, its love affair with celebrities and
show business, â??the deal is likely to accelerate those trends, since the
bottom
line â??usually abhors whatever is more demanding and complex, slower, more
prone to ideas, more challenging to complacency.â??
Sure enough, as merger as followed merger, journalism has been driven
further down the hierarchy of values in the huge conglomerates that dominate
what
we see, read, and hear. And to feed the profit margins journalism has been
directed to other priorities than â??the news we need to know to keep our
freedoms.
â?? One study reports that the number of crime stories on the network news
tripled over six years. Another reports that in fifty-five markets in
thirty-five states, local news was dominated by crime and violence, triviality
and
celebrity. The Project for Excellence in Journalism, reporting on the front
pages
of the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, on the ABC, CBS, and NBC
Nightly news programs, and on Time and Newsweek, showed that from 1977 to 1997
the number of stories about government dropped from one in three to one in
five, while the number of stories about celebrities rose from one in every
fifty stories to one in every fourteen. What difference does it make? Well,
its
government that can pick our pockets, slap us into jail, run a highway
through our back yard, or send us to war. Knowing what government does is
â??the news
we need to keep our freedoms.â??
Ed Wasserman, among others, has looked closely at the impact on journalism
of this growing conglomeration of ownership. He recently wrote: â??You would
think that having a mightier media would strengthen their ability to assert
their independence, to chart their own course, to behave in an adversarial way
toward the state.â?? Instead â??they fold in a stiff breezeâ?? â?? as Viacom,
one of
the richest media companies in the history of thought, did when it
â??couldnâ??t
even go ahead and run a dim-witted movieâ?? on Ronald Reagan because the
current Presidentâ??s political arm objected to anything that would interfere
with
the ludicrous drive to canonize Reagan and put him on Mount Rushmore.
Wasserman acknowledges, as I do, that there is some world-class journalism
being done
all over the country today, but he went on to speak of â??a palpable sense of
decline, of rot, of a loss of spine, determination, gutlessnessâ?? that
pervades our craft. Journalism and the news business, he concludes, arenâ??t
playing
well together. Media owners have businesses to run, and â??these media-owning
corporations have enormous interests of their own that impinge on an
ever-widening swath of public policyâ?? â?? hugely important things, ranging
from campaign
finance reform (who ends up with those millions of dollars spent on
advertising?) to broadcast deregulation and antitrust policy, to virtually
everything
related to the Internet, intellectual property, globalization and free
trade, even to minimum wage, affirmative action, and environmental policy.
â??This
doesnâ??t mean media shill mindlessly for their owners, any more than their
reporters are stealth operatives for pet causes,â?? but it does mean that in
this
era when its broader and broader economic entanglements make media more
dependent on state largesse, â??the news business finds itself at war with
journalism.â??
Look at whatâ??s happening to newspapers. A study by Mark Cooper of the
Consumer Federation of America reports that two-thirds of todayâ??s newspaper
markets
are monopolies. I urge you to read a new book â?? _Leaving Readers Behind: The
Age of Corporate Newspapering_
(http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1557287716/commondreams-20/ref=nosim/)
(published as part of the Project on the
State of the American Newspaper under the auspices of the Pew Charitable
Trust)
-- by a passel of people who love journalism: the former managing editor of
the New York Times, Gene Roberts; the dean of the Philip Merrill College of
Journalism, Thomas Kunkel; the veteran reporter and editor, Charles Layton, as
well as contributors such as Ken Auletta, Geneva Overholser, and Roy Reed.
They find that a generation of relentless corporatization has diminished the
amount of real news available to the consumer. They write of small hometown
dailies being bought and sold like hog futures; of chains, once content to
grow
one property at a time, now devouring other chains whole; of chains
effectively ceding whole regions of the country to one another, minimizing
competition; of money pouring into the business from interests with little
knowledge
and even less concern about the special obligations newspapers have to
democracy. They point as one example to the paper in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, with
a
circulation of 23,500, which prided itself on being in hometown hands since
the
Andrew Johnson administration. In 1998 it was sold not once but twice, within
the space of two months. Two years later it was sold again: four owners in
less than three years. In New Jersey, the Gannett Chain bought the Asbury Park
Press, then sent in a publisher who slashed 55 people from the staff and cut
the space for news, and who was by being named Gannettâ??s Manager of the
Year.
Roberts and team come to the sobering conclusion that the real momentum of
consolidation is just beginning â?? that it wonâ??t be long now before America
is
reduced to half a dozen major print conglomerates.
They illustrate the consequences with one story after another. In
Cumberland, Maryland, the police reporter had so many duties piled upon him
that he no
longer had time to go to the police station for the daily reports. But
management had a cost-saving solution: Put a fax machine in the police station
and
let the cops send over the news they thought the paper should have. (â??Any
police brutality today, Officer?â?? â??No, if there is, weâ??ll fax a report
of it
over to you.â??) On a larger scale, the book describes a wholesale retreat in
coverage of key departments and agencies in Washington. At the Social Security
Administration, whose activities literally affect every American, only the New
York Times was maintaining a full-time reporter. And incredibly, there were
no full-time reporters at the Interior Department, which controls millions of
acres of public land and oversees everything from the National Park Service
to the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
Thereâ??s more: According to the non-partisan Project for Excellence in
Journalism, newspapers have 2,200 fewer employees than in 1990. The number of
full-time radio news employees dropped by 44 percent between 1994 and 2000.
And
the number of television network foreign bureaus is down by half. Except for
â??
60 Minutesâ?? on CBS, the network prime time newsmagazines â??in no way could
be
said to cover major news of the day.â?? Furthermore, the report finds that 68%
of the news on cable news channels was â??repetitious accounts of previously
reported stories without any new information.â??
Out across the country thereâ??s a virtual blackout of local public affairs.
The Alliance for Better Campaigns studied forty-five stations in six cities in
one week in October 2003. Out of 7,560 hours of programming analyzed, only
l3 were devoted to local public affairs â?? less than one-half of one percent
of
local programming nationwide.
A profound transformation is happening here. The framers of our nation never
envisioned these huge media giants; never imagined what could happen if big
government, big publishing and big broadcasters ever saw eye to eye in
putting the publicâ??s need for news second to their own interests â?? and to
the
ideology of free-market economics.
Nor could they have foreseen the rise of a quasi-official partisan press
serving as a mighty megaphone for the regime in power. Stretching from
Washington think tanks funded by corporations to the editorial pages of the
Wall
Street Journal to Rupert Murdochâ??s far-flung empire of tabloid journalism to
the
nattering no-nothings of talk radio, a ceaseless conveyor belt -- often taking
its cues from daily talking points supplied by the Republican National
Committee â?? moves mountains of the official party line into the public
discourse.
But thatâ??s not their only mission. They wage war on anyone who does not
subscribe to the propaganda, heaping scorn on what they call â??old-school
journalism.â?? One of them, a blogger, was recently quoted in Rupert
Murdochâ??s Weekly
Standard comparing journalism with brain surgery. â??A bunch of amateurs, no
matter how smart and enthusiastic, could never outperform professional
neurosurgeons, because they lack the specialized training and experience
necessary for
that field. But what qualifications, exactly, does it take to be a
journalist? What can they do that we canâ??t? Nothing.â?? ((The Weekly
Standard,
9/6/2004).
The debate over who and isnâ??t a journalist is worth having, although we
donâ??
t have time for it now. You can read a good account of the latest round in
that debate in the September 26th Boston Globe, where Tom Rosenthiel reports
on the Democratic Conventionâ??s efforts to decide â??which scribes, bloggers,
on-air correspondents and on-air correspondents and off-air producers and
camera crewsâ?? would have press credentials and access to the action.
Bloggers were
awarded credentials for the first time, and, I, for one, was glad to see it.
Iâ??ve just finished reading Dan Gillmorâ??s new book, _We the Media_
(http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0596007337/commondreams-20/ref=nosim/)
, and
recommend it heartily to you. Gilmore is a national columnist for the San Jose
Mercury News and writes a daily weblog for SiliconValley.com. He argues
persuasively that Big Media is losing its monopoly on the news, thanks to the
Internet â?? that â??citizen journalistsâ?? of all stripes, in their
independent,
unfiltered reports, are transforming the news from a lecture to a
conversation. He
â??s on to something. In one sense we are discovering all over again the
feisty spirit of our earliest days as a nation when the republic and a free
press
were growing up together. It took no great amount of capital and credit â??
just a few hundred dollars â?? to start a paper then. There were well over a
thousand of them by 1840. They were passionate and pugnacious and often deeply
prejudiced; some spoke for Indian-haters, immigrant-bashers, bigots, jingoes,
and land-grabbers. But some called to the better angels of our nature -- Tom
Paine, for one, the penniless immigrant from England, who, in 1776 â??just
before joining Washingtonâ??s army â?? published the hard-hitting pamphlet,
Common
Sense, with its uncompromising case for American independence. It became our
first best seller because Paine was possessed of an unwavering determination
to
reach ordinary people â?? to â??make those that can scarcely read
understandâ??
and â??to put into language as plain as the alphabetâ?? the idea that they
mattered and could stand up for their rights.
So the Internet may indeed engage us in a new conversation of democracy.
Even as it does, you and I will in no way be relieved from wrestling with what
it means ethically to be a professional journalist. I believe Tom Rosenthiel
got it right in that Boston Globe article when he said that the proper
question is not whether you call yourself a journalist but whether your own
work
constitutes journalism. And what is that? I like his answer: â??A journalist
tries
to get the facts right,â?? tries to get â??as close as possible to the
verifiable truthâ?? â?? not to help one side win or lose but â??to inspire
public
discussion.â?? Neutrality, he concludes, is not a core principle of
journalism, â??but
the commitment to facts, to public consideration, and to independence from
faction, is.â??
I donâ??t want to claim too much for our craft; because we journalists are
human, our work is shot through with the stain of fallibility that taints the
species. But I donâ??t want to claim too little for our craft, either.
Thatâ??s
why I am troubled by the comments of the former Baltimore Sun reporter, David
Simon. Simon rose to national prominence with his book Homicide, about the
year he spent in Baltimoreâ??s homicide unit. That book inspired an NBC series
for
which Simon wrote several episodes and then another book and an HBO series
called â??The Wire,â?? also set in Baltimore. In the current edition of the
libertarian magazine Reason Simon says he has become increasingly cynical
â??about
the ability of daily journalism to affect any kind of meaningful changeâ?¦.One
of the sad things about contemporary journalism is that it actually matters
very little.â??
Perhaps.
But Francisco Ortiz Franco thought it mattered. The crusading reporter
co-founded a weekly magazine in Tijuana whose motto is â??Free like the
Wind.â?? He
was relentless in exposing the incestuous connections between wealthy elites
in Baja California and its most corrupt law enforcement agencies and with the
most violent of drag cartels. Several months ago Francisco Ortiz Franco died
sitting at the wheel of his car outside a local clinic -- shot four times
while his two children, aged 8 and 10, looked on from the back seat. As his
blood was being hosed off the pavement, more than 100 of his fellow Mexican
reporters and editors marched quietly through the streets, holding their pens
defiantly high in the air. They believe journalism matters. [See _Marc Cooper,
the LA Weekly, July 16_ (http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0715-01.htm) ).
Manic Saha thought journalism mattered. He was a correspondent with the
daily New Age in Bangladesh, as well as a contributor to the BBCâ??s
Bengali-language service. Saha was known for his bold reporting on criminal
gangs, drug
traffickers, and Maoist insurgents and had kept it up despite a series of
death
threats. Earlier this year, as Saha was heading home from the local press
club, assailants stopped his rickshaw and threw a bomb at him. When the bomb
exploded he was decapitated. Manik Saha died because journalism matters.
Jose Carlos Araujo thought journalism mattered. The host of a call-in talk
show in northeastern Brazil, Araujo regularly denounced death squads and
well-known local figures involved in murders. On April 24 of this year,
outside
his home, at 7:30 in the morning, he was ambushed and shot to death. Because
journalism matters.
Aiyathurai Nadesan thought journalism mattered. A newspaper reporter in Sri
Lanka, he had been harassed and threatened for criticizing the government and
security forces. During one interrogation he was told to stop writing about
the army. He didnâ??t. On the morning of May 3l, near a Hindu temple, he was
shot to death â?? because journalism matters.
I could go on: The editor-in-chief of the only independent newspaper in the
industrial Russian city of Togliatti, shot to death after reporting on local
corruption; his successor stabbed to death l8 months later; a dozen
journalists in all, killed in Russia over the last five years and none of
their
murderers brought to justice.
Cubaâ??s fledgling independent press has been decimated by the arrest and
long-term imprisonment of 29 journalists in a crackdown last year; they are
being
held in solitary confinement, subjected to psychological torture, surviving
on rotten and foul-smelling food. Why? Because Fidel Castro knows journalism
matters.
The totalitarian regime of Turkmenistan believes journalism matters â?? so
much so that all newspapers, radio, and television stations have been placed
under strict state control. About the only independent information the people
get is reporting broadcast from abroad by Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty. A
stringer for that service, based in the Turkmenistan capital, was detained and
injected multiple times with an unknown substance. In the Ukraine, Dmitry
Shkuropat, a correspondent for the independent weekly Iskra, who had been
working on a story about government corruption, was beaten in the middle of
the day
on a main street in the city of Zaporozhy and taped interviews for his
pending story were taken. The director of Iskra told the Committee to Protect
Journalists (to whom I am indebted for these examples) that the newspaper
often
receives intimidating phone calls from local business and political
authorities after publishing critical articles, but he refused to identify the
callers, saying he feared retaliation. Obviously, in the Ukraine journalism
matters.
We have it so easy here in this country. America is a utopia for
journalists. Don Hewitt, the creator of 60 Minutes, told me a couple of years
ago that â??
the 1990s were a terrible time for journalism in this country but a wonderful
time for journalists; weâ??re living like Jack Welch,â?? he said, referring to
the then CEO of General Electric. Perhaps that is why we werenâ??t asking
tough
questions of Jack Welch. Because we have it so easy in America, we tend to
go easy on America â?? so easy that maybe Simonâ??s right; compared to
entertainment and propaganda, maybe journalism doesnâ??t matter.
But I approach the end of my own long run believing more strongly than ever
that the quality of journalism and the quality of democracy are inextricably
joined. The late Martha Gellhorn, who spent half a century reporting on war
and politicians â?? and observing journalists, too -- eventually lost her
faith
that journalism could, by itself, change the world. But the act of keeping
the record straight is valuable in itself, she said. â??Serious, careful,
honest
journalism is essential, not because it is a guiding light but because it is
a form of honorable behavior, involving the reporter and the reader.â?? I
second that. I believe democracy requires â??a sacred contractâ?? between
journalists
and those who put their trust in us to tell them what we can about how the
world really works.
Thank you for listening to me. Good luck to all of you in your own work.
###
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