"Democracy Now!" looks at "War Made Easy," by Norman Solomon

Our group here in Athens wants the local public radio station, WOUB, to include Democracy Now! in its weekly programming. We think that there is a need here for broadened news coverage that reflects another perspective, that offers a different interpretation of the news, and that covers stories that are not covered by public radio.

With this in mind, I watched Democracy Now! today (though I had the option of listening to it), and, after the headlines, the program focused on Norman Solomon's new DVD, War Made Easy. It's based on his book by the same name. There is not much on public radio and television in the DVD - or the book - but what there is doesn't make me confident that they can always be counted on to capture the real or full picture.

Well into Solomon's video, there is a short segment from an interview with Jim Lehrer in which Lehrer admits that his program, The Lehrer News Hour, never thought to question the administration's rationale for invading and occupying Iraq. They just went with the media flow, along with Fox, CNN, and MSNBC.

This implies, I think, that, for example, they uncritically accepted the fallacious testimony that Colin Powell gave at the U.N. in February of 2003. In his book, Solomon writes that "Powell's star turn at the United Nations elicited an outpouring of media adulation. In the process of deference to Powell, many liberals were among the swooners (p. 45). As Solomon's video establishes, Lehrer admitted to being one of the swooners. Democracy Now! remained critical, though few people had the opportunity to watch or listen to its criticisms. We all would have benefited from the information and critical perspective that Democracy Now! brought to its coverage of the pre-invasion news on Iraq.

In the book, Solomon also gives some examples of how NPR was also among the swooners, as it covered the early months of the war in a way that did little to help listeners to understand and become informed citizens on events in Iraq. Here's two examples:

"News stories about [Jessica] Lynch swiftly approached flood stage. On Wednesday, the Baltimore Sun devoted more than a thousand words to Lynch in a page-one article datelined from her hometown of Palestine. The next morning, National Public Radio did its bit by interviewing Lynch's kindergarten teacher, and correspondent Wade Goodwyn closed his report by declaring: 'For the family and friends of those who are held prisoner or who are missing in action, the advance of the American Army toward Baghdad cannot go fast enough" (206)

"A year after the invasion, Marine Corps spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Rick Long told a University of California symposium: 'The reason we embedded so many journalists is that we wanted to dominate the information environment." (Solomon that describes how reporters from an NPR affiliate was embedded and did nothing to raise questions about the validity of the U.S. occupation.) Solomon continues:

"...the National NPR program All Things Considered aired an on-the-scene description from Eric Niiler, a reporter with member station KPBS who was accompanying the 1st Marine Division as it fought to gain control of Fallujah. The report was more stenographic than journalistic. His first words were: "What I understand from the commanders here...." And his account of events seemed to be largly based on statements by those he later referred as 'Marine commanders here.' To the casual listener, it might have sounded like Niiler was actually a Marine himself, as when he began his response to a question from the NPR anchor by saying, 'Well, what's happened is that in the areas where we patrolled today, it's really very quiet.'"

On the basis of these few examples, public radio and television offered little counter-spin to the administration's early celebration of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. How many more examples are there of NPR just reporting the official line at critically important junctures in hugely important news events? We need Democracy Now! to provide critical balance - and independence - in our media news coverage.

Bob Sheak

Readings From Howard Zinn's "Voices of a People's History of the United States"

On Memorial Day Democracy Now spends the hour with readings from a Voices of a People's History of the United States edited by historian Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove. It is the companion volume to Zinn's legendary People's History of the United States - which has sold over a million copies.

You will hear dramatic readings of speeches, letters, poems, songs, petitions, and manifestos. These are the voices of people throughout U.S. history who struggled against slavery, racism, and war, against oppression and exploitation, and who articulated a vision for a better world.

Performances include Danny Glover as Frederick Douglass, Marisa Tomei as Cindy Sheehan, Floyd Red Crow Westerman as Tecumseh and Chief Joseph, Sandra Oh as Emma Goldman and Yuri Kochiyama, and Viggo Mortensen as Bartolomeo de Las Casas and Mark Twain.

In other words, no great speeches by Generals, or worse, Presidents.

Smiddie

OU student featured on Democracy Now!

The following DN! report featured OU journalism graduate student Marshall Thompson, on his return from Iraq.

"Army reservist Sergeant Marshall Thompson spent a year in Iraq working as a military journalist. He reported from across Iraq, interviewing thousands of US soldiers. Now back home in his native Utah, he is planning a 500-mile walk across the state to protest the war and call for a withdrawal of US troops." [read full story]

Bill Moyers, on why "Democracy Now!" should be on the public airwaves

"BUT THERE IS SOMETHING ELSE I WANT YOU TO THINK ABOUT. Something else you can do. And I'm going to let you in here on one of my fantasies. Keep it to yourself, if you will, because fantasies are private matters, and mine involves Amy Good man. But I'll just ask C-Span to bleep this out. Oh, shucks what's the use. Here it is. In moments of revelry, I imagine all of your returning hometo organize a campaign to persuade your local television station to start airing Democracy Now! I can't think of a single act more likely to remind people of what public broadcasting should be, or that this media reform conference really means business. We've got to get alternative content out there to people, or this country is going to die of too many lies. And the opening rundown of news on Amy's dailed show is like nothing else on any television, corporate or public. It's as if you opened the window in the morning and a fresh breeze rolls over you from the ocean. Any doesn't practice trickle-down journalism. She goes where the silence is, and she breaks the sound barrier. She doesn't buy the Washington protocol that says the truth lies somewhere in the spectrum of opinion between the Democrats and the Republicans.

"On Democracy Now! the truth lies where the facts are hidden, and Amy digs for them. And above all, she believes the media should be a sanctury for dissent, the Underground Railroad tunneling beneath the plantation. So go home and think about it. After all, you are the public in public broadcasting and not just during pledge breaks. You live there, and you can get the boss man at the big house to pay attention."

Bill Moyers (January, 2007)

[read speech on the Democracy Now! web site]

Local Democracy Now Group First Meeting ­-- my notes/thoughts

I. Our goal -- ­ To broaden WOUB’s coverage by including Democracy Now ­ an hour-long program five days a week. Broaden can mean one or two things:

• A news program with a different perspective on the same or similar news items ­ somewhat ideological
• A news program with different stories than are typically covered on WOUB’s regular news programming

II. One way of thinking about the process of trying to get WOUB Radio to adopt Democracy Now

1) Immediate contacts with WOUB

• Make a request
• Get an initial response
• Follow up contacts
• Think of ways to respond to their rejection or postponement ­ i.e., what are our reaons/rationale
• Possibly seek out a Community Advisory Board person to talk to
• Continue honing reasons/rational
  

2) The process of developing a rationale and a set of reasons ­ which at some point members are satisfied with (although this will undergo continuing changes). Some methods:

• A blog in which members can pass on their ideas; examples of DN’s program; examples of how DN handles particular issues/topics different from WOUB….
• Student tutorials directed at DN, WOUB, or related issues.
• Specific projects for members ­ e.g., looking up some of Bill Moyers’s speeches and identifying what he says, if anything, about NPR and Democracy Now
• Generally, looking for articles that discuss/criticize NPR and/or Democracy Now, in order to deepen our knowledge about the two broadcast systems.
  

3) Collect signatures ­ on a petition which states our reasons for wanting Democracy Now

4) Start a letter-writing effort ­
* The risk here is that you antagonize current supporters

III. There may some in our group who would like the group to be more direct and confrontational in our approach to the goal of getting WOUB to incorporate DN into its programming. If there is such a position, I think we should discuss its merits ­ and risks ­ and not simply dismiss this approach ­ or any other.

In a quick search for books on NPR this morning, I identified two that may be of interest to some of us. I’m not sure I’ll bother to read them myself.

Micheal P. McCauley, NPR: The Trials and Triumphs of National Public Radio ($31.35)

Jack W. Mitchell, Listener Supported: The Culture and History of Public Radio ($39.95)

===========

Bob Sheak

Let's Get Started

So, who wants better media? I can tell you about one group of people who met this morning at Donkey Coffee in Athens, Ohio to talk about how to get better media, starting right here in Athens.

But first things first. Last Wednesday (May 16, 2007) the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism hosted the "Media Consolidation and Media Reform" conference (see the Web site). It was an important part of the discussion, and part of a national conversation on media reform.

At about the same time that students in the school were organizing this conference, a group of folks in the community were asking the question: why can't we get the broadcast program "Democracy Now!" on our public airwaves in southeast Ohio?

Today, these two groups came together to meet each other, to talk about the goals and issues at hand, and to see if there might be a way to move the common goals of the students and community members forward. One of the outcomes of that meeting was this group blog, which we've established to move the conversation forward, and into the public sphere. Anyone interested in being part of this conversation is welcome to join the group blog, and we encourage everyone to read it, post comments, questions, etc. We'll delete span posts, but otherwise we'll try to leave all posts as they are. Any change in that policy will be discussed and explained.

Our first goal is to get Democracy Now! onto the local airwaves, so that folks without Internet access can hear what we think is an important program. We're hoping to meet with the WOUB honchos to find out what we need to do to "make the case." We'll also be posting comments on this blog on a regular basis, comparing "DN!" coverage to other public broadcasting coverage. If you want to be part of this effort, simply add a comment of your own.

Oh yeah, a bit about me: I'm the administrator of this blog, and a faculty member in the School of Journalism at Ohio University (since 1987). I teach in the online journalism sequence in the school and am the director of the school's Institute for International Journalism. You can reach me at stewartr@ohio.edu.

Now, let the conversation continue.
Bob Stewart