31
Oct
Halloween Happenings: Have We Won One?
*MEDIA ACTIVISTS SCORE*
*DEMS OUT OF TOUCH
*TEUN VOETEN’s “HOW DE BODY”*
Program Note: Tonight at nine, PBS stations nationwide launch Frontline’s new WORLD show. Globalvision’s Rory O’Connor and filmmaker Gil Rossellini preview their new film HOLE IN THE WALL on the show — a story about kids in India who found a unique way to transcend the digital divide. Watch it if you can. The film will premiere at the UN on December 9th.
*CRITICS COMPLAIN; TIMES AND NPR RESPOND*
Does Media Activism work? Sometimes I am not sure, but there is a sense of some movement in activist circles in the aftermath of acknowledgments by the New York Times and National Public Radio that they understated the size of the peace marchs last Saturday. As readers know, I have been harping on this issue all week as has FAIR and others. Heide Banks sends along this account circulating on the Internet:
“After receiving a ‘tidal wave’ of complaints organized in part by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR -
NPR Retraction on Oct. 29, 2002:”On Saturday, Oct. 26, in a story on the protest in Washington, D.C. against a U.S. war with Iraq, we erroneously reported on All Things Considered that the size of the crowd was “fewer than 10,000.” While Park Service employees gave no official estimate, it is clear that the crowd was substantially larger than that….We apologize for the error.
New York Times on Oct. 30, 2002:”Emboldened by a weekend antiwar protest in Washington that organizers called the biggest since the days of the Vietnam War, groups opposed to military action in Iraq said they were preparing a wave of new demonstrations across the country in the next few weeks.
“The demonstration on Saturday in Washington drew 100,000 by police estimates and 200,000 by organizers’, forming a two-mile wall of marchers around the White House. The turnout startled even organizers, who had taken out permits for 20,000 marchers. They expected 30 buses, and were surprised by about 650, coming from as far as Nebraska and Florida…
“Note: the Times did not at all refer to the mischaracterization of it’s original story of the protest and refused to join NPR Ombudsman Jeffrey Dworkin on Democracy Now to talk about this pattern of major media outlets minimizing the level of protest.”
*CBS ALSO PART OF THE PROBLEM*
Veteran anti-war activist Walter Teague noted in a letter to the Times sent to me:
“I’ve been going to demonstrations for 40 years. Afterwards, I would read with dismay the news reports that grossly understate the numbers and distorting the intentions of civil rights and anti-war demonstration I’d attended. So, I began to count. I’d count the numbers passing by and make rough calculations and usually I’d come up with a figure that was well beyond the media’s eports….Imagine my amazement and disgust when driving home, I heard an announcer on CBS News say “several thousand” anti-Iraq war demonstrators turned out in Washington that day…! ‘Several thousand! When did ’several’ mean ‘tens’ much less a hundred thousand?…”
*DEMOCRATS MAY WIN, BUT THEY LOST IT*
Meanwhile, what is happening on the campaign trail? Here in New York, Republican Governor George Pataki has positioned himself as a green candidate while Democrat Carl McCall often sounds like a Republican. Robert Kuttner writes in the Boston Globe (Boston.com) that the Democrats are “not seizing the moment.”
“The Democrats could well hold onto the Senate next Tuesday. But if they do, it will be the result of two bizarre twists that resulted in the late entryof two septuagenarians - former Democratic senators Frank Lautenberg, 78, in New Jersey, and Walter Mondale, a spry 74, in Minnesota.
“Lautenberg, who retired in 2000, is the stand-in for the discredited incumbent Robert Torricelli. Mondale, who last saw Senate service 22 years ago, will likely hold the seat tragically vacated by the death of PaulWellstone.
“The rescue of the people’s party by two people who came out of retirement is not a bad metaphor for the Democrats’ general plight. They are just notrenewing themselves as a progressive party, at the level of leaders, or themes, or voter energy. Wellstone was the rare exception to this trend.”
In Minnesota outgoing Gov Jesse The Body Ventura, who seems to have lost his mind, is blasting the partisan nature of the memorial service for Paul Wellstone as if Wellstone’s whole life was not defined by his politics. Most interesting this morning was a History Channel documentary on Minnesotan Hubert Humphrey, the Mondale of his era, who abandoned many of his values in a loosing bid for the Presidency.
*THE “HIT” PARADE*
The Hip Hop Nation was shocked to hear of the shooting yesterday of “Jam Master Jay,” turntable maestro of the group RUN DMC. He is the latest high profiler from this world to die from gun violence, thus joining Tupac and Biggie in the pantheon of slain rap stars. While the TV media exploit this story for all its worth, as CNN, the Daily News and AOL did this morning, no one except Michael Moore and Bob Herbert in the New York Times are looking at the deeper causes and possible solutions. Writes Herbert in another must read Op-ed:
“Despite the terrible toll that guns in the wrong hands are taking, there is tremendous resistance to even the most modest efforts to control the spread of guns among criminals. That resistance is led, as usual, by the National Rifle Association, which can always be counted on to provide a comfort zone for the perpetrators of gun violence in America.
“The N.R.A. is opposed, for example, to the creation of a national computerized system for tracing bullets and shell casings to the guns that fired them — a crime-fighting tool that has come to be known as ‘ballistic fingerprinting.’…'Close the loophole and save lives? Move toward ballistic fingerprinting? They sound like good ideas. But the U.S., with more than 15,000 homicide victims a year, can’t get it done.”
*RIGHT WING VIOLENCE?*
Yesterday I asked who is bombing Soweto after 10 bombs went off in the the Johannesburg area. Today South African President Thabo Mbeki offered an answer: The hard right. Reports the Mail and Guadian;
“Wednesday’s bomb blasts in Soweto were the work of criminals seeking to introduce a terrorist campaign in South Africa, according to President Thabo Mbeki.”
The paper also reports: “Two more men were arrested on Wednesday in connection with an alleged plot to overthrow the government, police reported. Detective services representative Phuti Setati said thus far 17 people had been arrested in connection with the coup plot by white extremists.”
Have you read anything about this in the US media?
Indonesian police now say they have a name for one of the ten men they are seeking in connection with the bombing in Bali. The Australians meanwhile defended a raid on the home of a Muslim family. Reuters reports:
“Australian authorities brushed aside criticism over raids on Muslim homes by heavily armed security forces, saying they were a necessary part of the hunt for possible Islamic militant ’sleepers.’
“Civil libertarians slammed the raids as publicity stunts to prove Australia was tough on terrorism, Muslims said the heavy-handed police methods had left the community shocked and scared, and Indonesia’s vice president said the raids could hurt bilateral relations.”
ISRAEL? TRICK OR TREAT?
That’s the question I keep coming back to on this Holloween as a government headed by Ariel Sharon who has bewitched Israeli politics for decades faces the fall of his government. The Labor Party has briefly found some courage but is focusing on budget issues arguing that Sharon favors money for settlers, not the poor. It also calls for a diplomatic initiative towards Palestinians. I saw no coverage of this on any of our Cable news nets although BBC World was reporting fears that Israel may not move even further right and in the process alienate even of the public opinion in countries that the US hopes to entice into the coalition that hopes to make war on Iraq.
Meanwhile in Israel, Danny Rubinstein wrote last week in Ha’aretz that any war that included an attack on Israel could make the possibility of what the Israelis call “transfer” more likely. Transfer is another term for ethnic cleansing and would involve moving whole Palestinian communities out of areas Israel wants to annex. A week ago in Al Quds, Shin Bet chief (head of Israeli intelligence) says “If the US attacks Iraq and during the attack there is a mega terrorist attack in Israel then Ariel Sharon could exploit the outbreak of rage in the Israeli public to conduct mass transfer of Palestinians.”
The article notes that a covert transfer scenario has been in effect for the past years with Israel making life so miserable for Palestinians that they are packing up and leaving — many coming to the US. In public the Israelis describe their military operations in what they call “the terroritories” as a defense against terrorism. Palestinians fear that their real purpose is to irradicate their people from the land they are now on.
Is this paranoia? It is significant that Israeli writers are not dismissing them out of hand. Although here’s one that sounds like it could be plausible but is not based on any evidence. Palestine Media Watch reports: “A senior writer in the Palestinian Authority official daily claims that the attack in Moscow by Islamic terrorists was a CIA plot. According to the writer, the US hopes that having the Russians suffer a Muslim terror attackwill convince them to vote with the US in the UN in support of attacking Iraq. France, who also has been opposing the US on! the coming UN vote, may be next in line to suffer a Muslim terrorist attack initiated by the US,according to the Palestinian Authority daily.
TRUTH AND LIES IN MOSCOW
And what about the Russians? They are completely non-apologetic for their use of a gas that has so far killed 120 of the hostages (an official figure) they claim they were rescuing in that Moscow theater. The official defense of the use of a gas the Putin government insists was legal has been accompanied. According to the NY Times by a “new agressiveness” in tracking down and warring on Chechens. Adam McConnel reports on the basis of his media monitoring that their war is being escalated: “BBC World and Turkey’s NTV reported this morning that the Russian military had surrounded (and, according to NTV, entered) Chechen refugee camps on the border between Chechnya and Ingushetia.”
Journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who has covered the war in Chechnya and negotiated with the hostage takers last week, said there was a chance that negotiations would succeed. She told reporters that the government was not really interested in the lives of the hostages. “I have the feeling that an operation was staged to destroy terrorists as a show of strength and that we would not give way — but not to free the hostages. Those are very different things,” Politkovskaya said.
HOW MANY DIED?
And what is the truth of what happened in Moscow? You won’t find it the US press. Yesterday I quoted an account by a Russian journalist about her failed attempts to get some negotiations going, Today, she is being quoted as condemning the government. “I have the feeling that an operation was staged to destroy terrorists as a show of strength and that we would not give way — but not to free the hostages. Those are very different things,” Politkovskaya said.” Writing in the Progressive Sociologists list, Maria Menconi comments:
“I’m really upset about this situation in Russia, because I’ve had a lot of background/experience with that part of the world, including having lived there 1991-1997 (not in Moscow though). So I’m following the news pretty closely.
“Yesterday I read in Pravda about one parent in a hospital that returned after having seen her daughter who was a hostage in the morning and then found that she wasn’t there any more and couldn’t find news about what happened to her.
“Now Pravda has an article where they are trying to run down how many people were in the theater (the figures evidently have varied and even the attorney general doesn’t seem to know - the journalist thinks that since this is a crime case they should know). And there are still tens of people with relatives who were hostages but don’t know what happened to them - they haven’t been able to find these hostages since they were released - not in the hospitals or morgues.
“So there is a lot of discussion going on about this, whether the government is purposely being hush-hush to cover up the extent of the tragedy, or what.
“In trying to account for everyone, today’s Pravda article counts how many were released before the storming, how many are still officially declared in the hospitals, how many dead, and how many already released from the hospitals. That comes to 823 in the Hall.
But there is a site “vazhno.ru” for seeking the hostages, which has a list of 1002!”
“GIVE ME YE TIRED, YE POOR BUT NOT HAITIANS”
Haitians are in the news in Florida although conditions in Haiti are not. The Haitian refugees who jumped ashore illegally yesterday have galvinized a big debate including questions on Fox News about our “security.”
They coulda have had explosives suggsted one of the meatheads on Fox this morning. Karen Wald points to the differences in the treatment of Cubans and Haitians by the US government and by extension in the media;
“It is taken for granted in the Cuban Adjustment Act thatALL Cubans need asylum. All they have to do is get here. No political asylum hearings are necessary. It is irrelevant that most of the Haitians AND the Cubans are coming here for economic reasons, as everyone knows, and that of the two, the Haitians are in much greater need. It is even irrelevant that of the two groups, the ones most likely to have been escaping real, life-threatening political persecution were the Haitians, notthe Cubans. It is US policy to brand Cuba as both an evil dictatorship and an economic basket case (showing socialism is a failure) It has also been USpolicy to ignore the ferocious (US supported) dictatorships of Papa Doc and his son Baby Doc and their personal death squads, the Tonton Macoutes, during all of last century, the remnants of which still pray on all the truly democratic Haitian politicians and their followers/…”
COURAGE UNDER FIRE
Journalists often face life and death situations but only a few live to write about near death experiences. Photographer Teun Voeten has produced a vivid account of his experiences covering the undercovered conflict in Sierra Leone in West Africa. He will read from his fabulous new book “How De Body” next week in New York. He invites Mediachannel readers in New York in an email listing the times and places:
“Monday Nov. 4th, 7 pm, at The Half King, 505 West 23rd Street. I will read from ‘How de Body” together with Ian Stewart who will read from his book “Ambushed” in which he describes his harrowing adventures in Sierra Leone. Tuesday Nov 5th, 7.30 pm, at Barnes & Noble, Astor Place. This reading is organized in conjunction with the NY chapter of Amnesty International.”
I asked Teun to share some of his writing and experience. He was delighted to do so, and I am more than pleased to bring you this excerpt from How De Body (Thomas Dunne Books):
“I jump up off the bench, too, and am starting to make a run for it when I hear an order: “Stop! Stay where you are!” Right behind me, I hear the clicking of weapons being cocked. I turn around and find myself looking down the barrels of five rifles. A bunch of crazily rigged-out, excited teenagers are holding me at gunpoint. The one in front is wearing a bright red bandanna, which he has tied round his head in pirate fashion. His face is covered in scars and a necklace of cowry shells hangs at his throat. He has a wild look in his eyes.
“His friend’s eyes are devoid of expression. He is sporting an orange life vest from which coconuts and hand grenades dangle. Natives with life vests and machine guns are always bad news. They think that the vests are bulletproof. But the coconut doesn’t look as if he thinks anything at all. A stupid hanger-on with a face like the back end of a bus, a protruding mouth and thick lips. A white plastic rosary hangs around his neck. What a photogenically villainous face, I think to myself.
“I don’t take in what the others look like, just a vague impression of black bandoleers of anti-aircraft caliber hanging from naked, muscular torsos; knives, daggers and pistols sticking out from the waistbands of pants and tight football shorts. These are real, hard-core dickheads, straight out of a Mad Max film.
“Dirty white man!” screams the hysterical leader with the bandanna, “On your knees!” He tears off my watch. His friend with the coconuts grabs me by the hair and shoves me to the ground.
“Something inside me makes me get up and sit on the bench again. “Back on the ground,” the bandanna screams once more. But there’s no way I’m going to be picked off like a snake on the ground in the dust. I remain sitting on the bench. “Please, calm down,” I try. To my surprise I sound calm, icy cool. I pull a pack of cigarettes from my pocket and offer them one.
“I don’t smoke!” screams Bandanna. He snatches the pack furiously out of my hand, rips it up and throws it away. There goes my first hope. A cigarette usually works wonders. A brief breathing space, a moment of concentration on lighting up, shifting the attention from the potential victim to the cigarette for a second. Soothing nicotine being sucked in by murderers’ lungs. A couple of seconds’ reprieve in which the original mission – Kill! Maim! Rape! Destroy! – is momentarily forgotten
I see the crumpled pack of Gauloises roll and bounce across the ground as the others thrust the barrels of their guns up against my head, chest and belly. All our bodyguards have disappeared. I knew it. This is no good, no good at all. So this is what it’s like in practice. The umpteenth death in some foreign rathole. This is it; now they’re going to blow me away.
DO FACTS MATTER?
My editor Jeanette Friedman is on a boil again about the way the news is being spun. She and I argue a lot about what I often find to be a knee jerk approach to the Islamic world, Palestinian rights, and many of the stories I carry. I am pleased she does have the tolerance and commitment to hang in there as a volunteer editor, even if her need to make a living often conflicts with her available time to edit a weblog which desperately needs daily editing as I know all too well. Yesterday in my haste I misspelled the name of a prominent columnist. Anyway, She has asked that I carry her latest comment which reflects her outlook, and so I am:
“Like the Muslims in Russia need help from the CIA. How many apartment buildings have they blown up already, with no help from anyone? What has that got to do with reality…like Russia hasn’t been at war with Chechnya since the beginning of the end of the FSU.
“Here’s the problem….FACTS HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH THE NEWS ANYMORE. WHO LIES LOUDEST WINS.
“HOT NEWS FLASH EXCLUSIVE TO MEDIACHANNEL. DISSECT THIS:
“The CIA has stuck a special umbrella up my ass. When aliens approach the United States, the umbrella pops out of my asshole and acts as a receiving antenna, just like Cartman’s does on South Park. When it is fully extended it sends an “SOS I’m melting” signal to Langley. Then the CIA comes to New Jersey and blows me up like an air mattress, instead of pouring water on me, because this wicked witch looks better as the Hindenburg than she does as a puddle of pee.
“What? You’t believe me? Just ask LeRoi Jones, or whatever the fuckhead’s name is today, the one who is NJ’s state poet. He’s got the facts, man, just the facts. 4,000 Jews never went to work at the WTC on 9-11 and Israel knocked it down.
“FACTS! HISTORICAL FACT! Wazzat? Doh. NEWS–News is just the latest opinion from the spin doctors.
“Facts? They died with truth. Facts. That’s not even a word worth considering anymore. Imagination is what makes the NEWS.”
HAPPY HALLOWEEN
I could keep going, but I will give you all a break. If you can Trick or Treat for your friends at Mediachannel, we would pleased. We need your support. Interested in joining us? Let us know. Remember to watch “Hole in the Wall” on PBS’s FRONTLINE WORLD if you can, and keep your emails coming. Write Dissector@Mediachannel.org
