The New York Review of Books recently had a two part series ["End of News?" and "The Press: The Enemy Within"] by Michael Massing on the state of the media today. It was interesting reading; not totally convincing in all its aspects, but making some good observations and points.
The first article discussed "the external pressures besetting journalists today, including a hostile White House, aggressive conservative critics, and greedy corporate owners." The over the top nature of the White House, including its cult of secrecy (see a good book by John Dean), has been addressed in this blog before. The second factor is notable, but it comes with the program -- you can underline the size of the "enemy" as well as some of their more seedy aspects (more propaganda wing than true news sources), but aggressive conservatism alone is not something we can really complain about. Free market of ideas, etc. The corporatization of the news, including monopoly control that waters down content also is a serious problem. Interestingly, the articles did not discuss the opposition to the recent attempt by the FEC to weaken anti-monopoly provisions even more.
The piece had a telling comment about the "Fairness Doctrine," which in effect admitted that critics were right, but did not face up to the fact. Not only does it trouble me that broadcast media somehow has to be more "fair" then the print, especially since the latter often has fewer "outlets" in any given locale, but if the net result is in effect less speech, is it really beneficial? To wit:
An even more consequential, though much less visible, change took place in 1987, with the abolition of the Fairness Doctrine. Introduced in 1949, this rule required TV and radio stations to cover "controversial issues" of interest to their communities, and, when doing so, to provide "a reasonable opportunity for the presentation of contrasting viewpoints." Intended to encourage stations to avoid partisan programming, the Fairness Doctrine had the practical effect of keeping political commentary off the air altogether. In 1986, a federal court ruled that the doctrine did not have the force of law, and the following year the FCC abolished it.
Also, it is suggested that the blogsphere is dominated by conservatives with eight of the top ten being conservatives (one of the two being the Daily Kos, the other unclear from the piece). Furthermore, though there are some liberal/progressive blogs, they do not have the synergy the conservatives have with the broadcast media. Well, first, people like Atrios are on broadcast media, especially Air America. Second, I really do not read conservative blogs, but do read a handful of blogs overall ... and not obscure ones. So, there does seem to be a notable liberal blog presence. The articles did not reference the Dean Campaign's use of the Internet to promote its views.
The second piece focused on the media itself, including its misguided furtherance of "balance" over the actual news (the news is not always shades of gray, especially with this national leadership), failure to truly cover "hard" news, and lack of courage to truly be the counterpoint to a sometimes corrupt government. The piece made a good (and sad) point that it took the war and Bush's opinion ratings going downhill before the press started to supply more stories on the negative parts of the war. But, war -- even good ones -- are inherently negative in some fashion. It does not tell the whole story not to underline the dark side, including the negative reactions from Iraqi civilians.* To wit:
Only by reading and watching such accounts is it possible to fathom the depths of Iraqi hatred for the United States. It's not the simple fact of occupation that's at work, but the way that occupation is being carried out, and the daily indignities, humiliations, and deaths that accompany it. If reports of such actions appeared more frequently in the press, they could help raise questions about the strategy the US is pursuing in Iraq and encourage discussion of whether there's a better way to deploy US troops.
This is telling. A taste of history underlines the point. It might not be too popular to say, but the reasons that drove us to declare independence were arguably not compelling, or at least not quite a list of unbearable abuses from a tyrant. But, there were abuses and clashes ... often small ones that blew up in the faces of the British and lingered in memory. Take the "Boston Massacre," which arose from one of many clashes with colonists egging on the British occupying army. Or, the shock at a small tax on tea ... or resisting colonial violations of British trade laws.
It really did not do the British too much good to suggest many of these things were not abuses, or when there were unfortunate excesses, it was just the unfortunate result of a bad situation. Oh, we also didn't like British mercenaries. Cf. "Private Security Guards in Iraq Operate With Little Supervision."
The fact that such stories are out there suggests the media still does its job, even if it does not always do it well enough.
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* One gray area is the whole rendition issue, the current use of which underlines "how complicated it can be to correct errors in a system built and operated in secret." A case can be made that this technique is legitimate in some limited contexts, but as currently performed, it is dubious. Also, without adequate coverage and debate, how can we fully determine the correct route? Meanwhile, the clear cases of mistake -- worsened by the current policy -- further hatred and distrust. And, not just to the victims.