Changing the Rules of Media

(9 am. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

We have seen over the years how the media went from being our friend to being our foe.  What used to be the public “watchdog” against government evolved into a force requiring its own watchdog; the public.  At Media Matters, there is an endless display of inaccuracy and dishonesty.  The internet blog rose to prominence because of this dishonesty by our “traditional” media sources.  But, did the rules of media actually change?  I had thought so until I read this:

Cindy Sheehan to RAW STORY on Their Coverage of Her Upcoming Bush/Dallas Protest: ‘Eff’ You!

The article that Cindy Sheehan is responding, found here, was authored by Stephen Webster and David Edwards.

The rules of the traditional media became: a) provide balance in your story lest you be seen as advocating a position, b) if it isn’t sensational, it doesn’t get reported, or worse, is derided as “boring”, and c) don’t tell the full story.  It was these rules by the traditional media that prompted people to start blogs and internet news sites.

I am a fan of Raw Story.  I think that Larisa Alexandrova has put together an excellent investigative team.  I also think that Raw Story failed when they printed this article by Webster and Edwards.

A) Provide balance in your story lest you be seen as advocating a position

Of course, Cindy is quite comfortable being ridiculed by practically all sides (including her own). The “Peace Mom,” as she became known, was hit by the right for criticizing the invasion of Iraq and, eventually, by the left for being a perpetual spotlight-seeker.

Was Cindy Sheehan really criticized by “the left” for being a perpetual spotlight-seeker?  Yes, she was.  In her own words, posted on Daily Kos:

I have endured a lot of smear and hatred since Casey was killed and especially since I became the so-called “Face” of the American anti-war movement. Especially since I renounced any tie I have remaining with the Democratic Party, I have been further trashed on such “liberal blogs” as the Democratic Underground. Being called an “attention whore” and being told “good riddance” are some of the more milder rebukes.

While there may have been those “on the left” who attacked Ms. Sheehan, who, exactly, on “the left” attacked her, and what for?

Markos Moulitsas, founder and Kos from Daily Kos, wrote in 2005:

And to them (and the 101st Fighting Keyboardists, who aspire to membership in the punditry class), everything is partisan politics. Everything. The elephant flies higher than the Stars and Stripes. CIA agent outed? To the barricades! Must protect the leakers at all costs! A grieving mother protests the circumstances of her son’s senseless death? To the barricades! Tear her apart! Make an example out of her – anyone who dare criticize Bush or any of his actions must be destroyed!

Sometimes, an event is simply apolitical. Bush could’ve difused this early with a gracious 30 minute meeting with Sheehan. Instead, he loosed the attack dogs on her. Every attack on Sheehan from the Right is a reflection of their moral decay, their unamerican disdain for her right to protest her son’s death, and yet more evidence of Bush (and Rove’s) tacit endorsement of the politics of personal destruction — even when the target is a grieving mother.

In fact, out of the thousands of diaries at Daily Kos posted over the past four years, the only opinions posted by those on “the left” trashing Cindy Sheehan as being an attention seeking media whore were authored by people other than Kos and his staff, ie, private citizens with an opinion.

Arianna Huffington, of the Huffington Post, wrote in 2005:

The right wing attacks on Cindy Sheehan — desperate, pathetic, and grasping at straws — expose much less about their target than about the attackers.

I mean, trying to slime a grieving Gold Star mom because she is inconveniently questioning the reasons her son was sent off to die in Iraq? Why that would be like trashing a much-decorated war hero or outing an undercover CIA agent…

The most “trashing” I’ve found is from Obsidian Wings, but, never did the article call her anything other than a grieving mother with the wrong ideas.

In fact, every post I’ve found mentioning “the left” and Cindy Sheehan remark, almost verbatim, “attacked by some on the left”.  No attribution to who on “the left” those “some” included by name.  Webster and Edwards address this in their article:

I would link to sources on that, but that bit comes first-hand. After spending months covering Cindy’s activity for The Lone Star Iconoclast in Crawford, I understand many of the various opinions expressed about this woman’s activism. Especially the whole “figurehead” syndrome which any normal person gets when tens of thousands swarm and lift her up as a hero.

So, because Webster and Edwards heard the attacks “first hand”, by “some”, they simply do not need to attribute those attacks to anyone.  It was, in their mind, simply enough to report they heard them, by “some” and “firsthand”, just like the traditional media reports “some people claim”, “anonymous officials report”, and “we’ve heard”.  In other words, it was lazy reporting at best and unsubstantiated at worst.

B) If it isn’t sensational, it doesn’t get reported, or worse, is derided as “boring”

Eventually, as my friend and former colleague Nathan Diebenow once quite accurately summarized, her constant angling for the spotlight and failure to significantly modify her tactics made Cindy into a “media bore” (as opposed to the oft referenced “media whore” insult so many on the right would hurl at her).

Yes, because if you don’t keep it sensational, then you become “boring” to the media regardless of the cause.  Even Markos Moulitsas stated this fact in an article:

Media savvy will carry a movement much further than any march, regardless if it had 100,000 or 500,000 or a million people. Cindy Sheehan had the right idea with the Crawford protest — there was a story line and drama which the media could use to create a narrative, hence a long-running story. People marching on the street? Boring. Unless you 1) have violence, or 2) crazy people making crazy speeches. It’s a lose-lose situation, and at best a single news cycle story.

You see, protesting is boring, and even “those on the left” say so, except, I actually found a quotable reference, unlike Webster and Edwards.  But, the fact that protesting is “boring” to the media savvy, the act of protest is as old as our nation.

While the story of a mother who lost her son in the Iraq war sitting in a ditch in Texas to protest had its day, and use, to the media, the fact that a person would take that drastic step speaks more to the resolve of the Cindy Sheehan than anything else.

CommonDreams.org ran this article on Cindy Sheehan.  

Perhaps more than either Rosa Parks or Jane Fonda, Cindy Sheehan is really the child in the fairy tale who declared that the emperor had no clothes. It was his unadorned innocence against the arrogant casuistry of the local pundits that finally awoke the town to what everybody could see but were too embarrassed to admit: they had been taken.

The servile idolatry of authority that so insecurely needs to suppress a lone woman’s protest against such a transparent and tragic fraud as the War in Iraq is a far greater threat to America than is that simple protest itself. If we truly believe in America, the merits of the Iraq War notwithstanding, we must honor and defend Cindy Sheehan’s act. Even more, we must join it to defend it against the faux patriots who would ruthlessly, happily silence not only Sheehan but all of the rest of us as well.

C) Don’t tell the full story

Cindy Sheehan, who gave the Bush-era’s peace movement a proper kick-off by camping out in a ditch down the street from the former president’s ranch after her son died in Iraq, is still honing her protest craft.

Because really, to her, the Bush administration will never truly end until its key players are prosecuted.

On Monday, June 8, Cindy and friends will march on former President Bush’s new home in the well-to-do Dallas suburb of Preston Hollow.

********************

In spite of the sympathy I feel for her cause, I can’t help but wonder what this is meant to accomplish … Aside from, ah, annoying the neighbors. Looks like a lot of Dallasites feel the same.

That piece of writing alone displays the utter disgust that Webster and Edwards hold against Cindy Sheehan when they wrote that article.  

As Paul Harvey would have said, “The rest of the story” is that Cindy Sheehan has been protesting the war in Iraq since 2005.  Despite a change in the Presidency, a Congress that swapped from Republican to Democratic majority in 2006 then gaining even more of a majority in 2008, and promises from the Democratic Party to end the war in Iraq, to this day, we are still in Iraq.  Worse, even though our nation signed a withdrawal agreement, our military leaders are still angling to remain in Iraq against the wishes of the Iraqi government.  Finally, through the years, we have learned that the justifications for war with Iraq were lies, that the Bush administration used torture, and that despite all of the evidence already in the public record, there has been, nor will there likely ever be, prosecutions.

While it may be true that protesting outside of former President Bush’s residence may do nothing more than annoy him and his neighbors, it is still a far cry more than what our government under President Obama, and our Congress, is doing.

Also, again invoking Paul Harvey, “The rest of the story” on those who attacked Cindy Sheehan from “the left” only started doing so once she was no longer politically an asset.

This diary from Daily Kos by diarist TomT:

Let me start by saying that I admire Cindy greatly.  I cannot imagine losing my son in this war and channeling that grief and anger into the constructive activism like Cindy has.  I would probably crawl into a hole and die.

That being said, I have to wonder if her increasingly significant role in the Democratic Party is going to help us win back the Senate and House this fall.  I keep thinking about how her showing up at the State of the Union address wearing that T-shirt will play in the red states we are trying to win Senate and House seats in.  I can’t believe that it will play well in states like Montana, Ohio, and Tennessee—states which are crucial to any hope of a Democratic takeover of the House and Senate.

Nightprowlkitty diaried on Daily Kos in 2007:

But whether Cindy was making her statement for shock value, to move the national conversation to the left, to garner more exposure for the notion of impeachment, or whatever other reason, I disagree with her characterization of my party and with her strategy.

That’s all.  I disagree.  And I agree that if she does run against a Democrat as a third party candidate, it is a no-brainer that a Democratic blog like Daily Kos should not support her.

Okay, now I have that out of the way.

I strongly oppose, however, the personal characterizations made about Cindy Sheehan since she wrote that controversial diary.  Calling her nuts, calling her an attention whore, smearing her personally, nope, I don’t buy any of that.  I don’t care if she made a lot of folks angry.  That anger did not have to be expressed as personal insults.  There is simply no justification for that.

Even Buhdydharma diaried on Daily Kos in 2007:

Whatever you may think of her and her tactics (Cindy, hire a frikkin speechwriter PLEASE!) Cindy Sheehan has done more to get impeachment in the news than anyone else….besides Bush!

Some might say it is the wrong type of publicity, that it makes impeachment look “loony,” but face facts. The initial reaction to impeach by the general public is going to include that anyway. It will only be after the subject is introduced that we can start introducing OUR talking points that will take it out of the “loony” range.

Like it or not Cindy just gave the process of literally “getting the word out” a huge boost.

For Cindy Sheehan, her protest against the war wasn’t about political gain for a Party, it was about ending a war that never should have been fought, that her son never should have died fighting in.

Her political “aspiration” in challenging Nancy Pelosi was more a cry against the inaction of our Congress who promised, PROMISED, to end the war, than an actual aspiration to ascend as a political player.

The war in Iraq has had great cost to us as a nation.  For the families of the military men and women who have died fighting this war, the cost was personal.  Because President Bush wouldn’t allow the coffins of our dead to be shown to the public, the true cost of the war, the only way to bring that loss to the attention of the public was to protest, repeatedly, to become “boring”, stay “boring”, and force the media to cover it.  Because our Congress failed, continues to fail, the only way to bring that failure to the public was to make the statement that she would challenge Pelosi’s seat, because, without that cry to the media, our media would’ve simply continued to ignore that failure.  And while “some on the left” wrung their hands worrying about an election, hoping Ms. Sheehan would fade into the night quietly, this mother who lost her son, her family, almost bankrupted herself fighting for her cause, these same people “on the left” were initially trumpeting her cause.

This was a woman who felt betrayed by her President, Congress, political Party, and then, ultimately, by some of the very same people who had trumpeted her cause until she was no longer politically useful to them.  What does she have left to believe in if not her cause?  Today, our media still tries to make torture into a “he said/she said” issue, ignoring the lies that led to the invasion of Iraq because that was so last year’s news, treating those of our military who are still dying in Iraq as a mere blast kills soldier” footnote.  Face it, without Cindy Sheehan being “boring”, “politically inconvenient”, and “annoying to George Bush’s neighbors”, our traditional media would simply find the next sensational story to put on the air 24/7.

It is one thing when citizens posting opinions on a blog attack Cindy Sheehan.  Not everyone likes her, nor, do they all agree with her and we still do have our First Amendment rights.  But, for an investigative reporting site to sanction the posting of an article, like the one Raw Story allowed by Webster and Edwards, that holds no value to it other than to demean Cindy Sheehan’s protest, is a journalistic travesty on par with the usual traditional media’s dishonest tactics and “hit pieces”.

As for Ms. Sheehan’s response to that article, I, for one, agree 100% with Ms. Sheehan’s rebuttal, even if I believe that she could have found a more appropriate medium for her response than doing it in the comments section.  I am posting her response in full:

Eff whoever wrote this article and Nathan Dibenow from the Lonestar Icnonoclast.

Yes, I am doing all this for attention, because obviously the wars are over and George Bush and Dick Cheney have been prosecuted and everything is happy crappy and I should just go home and suffer in silence.

A.) WE SHOULD ALL BE PROTESTING OBAMA AND HIS POLICIES EVERY CHANCE WE GET.

B) DICK CHENEY HAS BEEN GOING EVERYWHERE BRAGGING ABOUT THE CRIMES OF THE BUSH REGIME AND OVER A MILLION PEOPLE ARE DEAD; OVER 4 MILLION HAVE LOST THEIR HOMES AND TENS OF THOUSANDS OF OUR OWN SOLDIERS ARE WOUNDED AND WE AREN’T EVEN TALKING ABOUT THE INCREASE IN SUICIDE FROM OUR TROOPS.

C) I REALLY LOVE THAT THE ICONOCLAST EXPLOITED MY PROTESTS FOR THEIR OWN AGENDA THEN STAB ME IN THE BACK.

D) NO ONE “CO-OPTED” ME…I AM STILL DOING THE SAME THING I DID BEFORE CAMP CASEY AND WILL BE DOING UNTIL THE WRONGS HAVE BEEN RIGHTED. I COULD GIVE A SHIT LESS IF ANYONE COVERS ME OR NOT…THE WORK STILL NEEDS TO ME DONE.

E) DOES ANYONE KNOW THAT I RAN AGAINST NANCY PELOSI AND BANKRUPTED MYSELF AND EXPENDED GREAT AMOUNTS OF EFFORT? NO? WHY? BECAUSE NOBODY COVERED MY CAMPAIGN…BUT I STILL DID IT, BECAUSE IT WAS THE RIGHT THING TO DO.

F) I RECEIVED A SCARY DEATH THREAT TODAY AND MAYBE IF I AM LUCKY, I WILL BE KILLED AND I WILL GET SOME GOOD NEWS COVERAGE.

G) FINALLY, I GUESS ALL OF OUR SOLDIERS DESERVE TO BE KILLED BECAUSE THEY ENLIST….THIS IS ONE OF THE WORST ARTICLES I HAVE EVER READ.

SEE YOU IN DALLAS

CINDY SHEEHAN

There are “some people on the left” who are protesting President Obama’s policies.  Glenn Greenwald speaks out regularly.  Keith Olbermann has spoken out, having Jonathon Turley on his show regularly to comment.  Jane Hamsher has spoken out.

Dick Cheney is all over the networks, with his daughter, bragging about how he used torture.  Millions of Iraqi’s were displaced in the Iraq war.  Tens of thousands of our troops have been wounded, with more casualties still occurring to this day.  Suicides in the service have increased.

The Lone Star Icon did give her favorable coverage, and then, negative coverage.  In fact, “stabbed in the back” is being kind compared to the words used in the Icon.

I could continue, but why?  All of her points are 100% valid.  Sure, it was an emotional response.  It was, however, a much more measured response than I anticipated.  Yes, it would have had more effect if it was a formal response instead of a rant in the comments section.  But, that doesn’t change the substance, even of her last comment, as I too found the Raw Story article to be far below the usual outstanding standards of Raw Story, offensive in its tone and content, and nothing more than a “hit-job” worthy of a right-wing blog.

UPDATE:  Raw Story Editor responds to Brad Blog

That was a blog at Raw Story, written by one reporter here, who – of course – is free to express his own opinions (at least in the blog section).

I personally think Cindy Sheehan rocks. I think she’s been a tremendous voice against the war in Iraq and I applauded her quixotic campaign against Pelosi. Sometimes I don’t agree with her, but not only do I thank her for her voice, I wish that other relatives of our troops pro or con against the war could be heard, as well, because they all deserve the biggest spotlight that there is.

Ron Brynaert

Executive Editor

www.rawstory.com

Here are the problems I have with this statement; why are reporters allowed to blog their opinion in association with a media outlet that is not opinion oriented, and, don’t media outlets understand that opinion sections that are linked to the organization are detrimental?  

This is not the same as, say, the WSJ, who has a news section and a separate editorial/op-ed section.  You only get to read the editorial if you get the paper itself, and, you understand that there are idiots (usually right-wing idiots), giving you their opinion.  On the internet, there is absolutely no reason for a news site to also include a blog section for the opinion of its reporters.  They can simply get their own domain and blog their opinion till their heart’s content.

The Wall Street Journal was highly regarded as a newspaper.  You heard little from its editorial/op-ed sections until it was taken over by Murdoch, who, breaking his promise, turned the editorial section into neo-con central.  Because of that move, not only did staff at the WSJ revolt, but, so too did many of its readers.

The State newspaper tried this same setup of letting its reporters, editors, blog their opinion in addition to providing news reports when Brad Warthan, former VP and editor, had a blog associated with newspapers website.  Notice, he is now a FORMER employee.  While The State will tell you that his layoff, in conjunction with 38 others from The State, was due to budget cutbacks, he was regularly called out in his blog for his idiotic “opinions” which didn’t really give a lot of credibility to The State newspaper.

Maybe this is will be Raw Story’s wake-up call.