There seems to be some serendipity in the upcoming release of former CBS News Producer Mary Mapes’ book and media acknowledgment of its own biased coverage of Hurricane Katrina. Indeed, in the past two days, at least two leading conservative bloggers (Hugh Hewitt and Powerline) have commented on both topics. Just as the MSM tailored its reporting of the hurricane to fit the story it wanted to tell–that the slow recovery was all Bush’s fault–so did Ms. Mapes tailor her reporting of the president’s National Guard service to fit the conclusion she had reached long before she obtained memos which supposedly confirmed her theory.
Mary Mapes, as you many recall, had been pursuing the story of the president’s National Guard service for five years. Like many on the left, she believed the president’s father pulled strings to get his son a National Guard post so he wouldn’t have to serve in Vietnam and that once there, the future president shirked his duty. But, she could come up with no hard evidence to prove her case until a man she called an “unimpeachable source” came up with documents which confirmed that theory.
Alas (for her), bloggers quickly determined the memos to be forgeries, largely based on the typeface (CBS claimed the memos were from the early 1970s, yet they used proportional spacing typical of computer word-processing programs). The bloggers’ case was strengthened when CBS revealed that the “unimpeachable source” was Bill Burkett, a man with a long history of hating George W. Bush.
Ms. Mapes let her bias, her own belief that Bush had to have shirked his duty, cloud her judgment just as the MSM did in pinning the blame on president Bush for failures in the relief effort in the aftermath of Katrina. Though Dan Rather, Ms. Mapes comrade-in-arms in the Memogate scandal, called the MSM’s coverage of the Hurricane, “one of television news’ finest moments,” in the past couple of days, even the LA Times, an MSM mainstay, has found that coverage to be distorted.
I thought they had delivered the wrong paper to my front door this morning when I read this headline, “Katrina Takes a Toll on Truth, News Accuracy: Rumors supplanted accurate information and media magnified the problem. Rapes, violence and estimates of the dead were wrong,” to an article in the paper. But I checked the masthead and sure enough it was the LA Times. That paper faults a numbers of news outlets, even itself, in finding that “Hyperbolic reporting spread through much of the media” as “wild rumors filled the vacuum and seemed to gain credence with each retelling.”
So, it seems that many of the things that the MSM claimed “shouldn’t” be happening in America weren’t happening in America. For example, Lorie Byrd noted yesterday that Jefferson Parish Aaron Broussard lied when he told Tim Russert that the “grandmother of his emergency services director who was left to drown by evil federal officials.” Michelle Malkin reported (3 weeks ago!) that a CNN report, “Firms with White House ties get Katrina contracts,” failed to note that some of those firms also had ties to the Louisiana Democratic Party and the Pelican State’s increasingly unpopular Governor.
Powerline cites a Seattle Times article to show that “lurid reports of widespread criminality in New Orleans, and especially of crime and chaos at the SuperDome and Convention Center, were almost entirely untrue.” Some reports suggested that more than 200 people died in the Superdome, yet, in the end, only six people died there (during the evacuation), four of whom died of natural causes, one of an overdose and the other an apparent suicide. (HT: Michelle Malkin).
All this reminds Roger Simon of media coverage of “Baghdad immediately after the invasion.” Roger holds :
Of course the major intent of the misdirection and distortion in Baghdad and New Orleans was the same – to embarrass George Bush. Frankly I don’t care that much about George Bush. He’s just one guy. But I do care, intensely, about democracy. The media’s dislike of George Bush easily trumps their love of democracy. That’s why they’re reactionaries.
While this blog may care a little more about President Bush than does Roger, I agree with his conclusion. The media has become so obsessed with President Bush that when they see a problem, or find that the federal government’s has imperfectly handled a situation, they rush to blame the president, before even checking the facts. And more often than not when facts emerge that show the president in a better light, they downplay them — or bury them on page A16 (where the LA Times puts today’s article on Katrina).
Mary Mapes has become emblematic of the MSM’s coverage of President Bush. That in their zeal to prove their theory that President Bush is a horrible, no good, very bad man, they will jump on any sensationalized charge leveled against him, reporting it without following standard journalistic practices to determine its accuracy. After all, they know W to be a bad man, so the charge must be true. If facts emerge which prove them to be wrong, they reply, as Ms. Mapes does in her book, by calling their critics names.
This is not journalism; it’s obsession. And I’m still trying to figure out why so many in the MSM, just like Cindy’s friends, have become so obsessed with the president of the United States that their attitude towards him oftentimes seems more a pathology than responsible reporting — or criticism.
-Dan (AKA GayPatriotWest): GayPatriotWest@aol.com
ADDENDUM: In one of my first posts to this blog, I commented on CBS’s obsession with the president’s National Guard Service:
CBS could not come up with a single National Guard veteran who had served with the president and who challenged his fitness to command. Not one who questioned his service.
UPDATE: Commenting on the media exaggrations, Jonah Goldberg writes:
Setting aside the no doubt authentic concerns and outrage of the press, who can deny that there wasn’t a certain amount of Schadenfreude at work here? Almost instantly, Katrina was declared George W. Bush’s debacle and proof of myriad long-simmering gripes against the president, from his alleged hatred of the poor to his cartoon villainy on global warming.
Jonah doesn’t fail to criticize the president either. So read the whole thing to get his take.
I think I read that “stuck on stupid” applies to Mapes’ interview. With Rather, the comment was “stuck on crazy.”
I was so impressed that my local NBC affiliate actually showed one of the counter protestors from this past weekend.
That must have hurt more than having wisdom teeth pulled.
Dan Rather still thinks the memos were real. Apparently, he’s still clinging to that Sam-Beckett/Quantum Leap theory. Never mind that Sam couldn’t have transported a word processor back to 1972 even with Ziggy’s help.
Dan was on with Marvin Kelb last night, praising the media’s Hurricane Katrina coverage. Today, we find out that much of the Katrina hype about murder and mayhem in the Superdome never happened. It was 6% fact 94% hype. Sweet!
As a native Texan, I want to say that I am ashamed that both Dan Rather and his crotchety predecessor, Walter Cronkite, originated from the Lone Star State.
Therefore, I apologize on behalf of all Texans, especially for the vast majority of us who have helped the state carry the GOP in all national elections since 1980. (The election of Ann Richards as governor in 1990 was strictly a fluke – it was either her or Clayton Williams. Talk about a rock-and-a-hard-place choice!)
If I could, I’d revoke Rather’s state citizenship. Maybe I can petition the state Legislature to do it.
Boy, talk about having a Dixie Chicks moment….!
Regards,
Peter Hughes
#4
How about that Dan Rather Media Center or whatever at Sam Houston State?
Think they might rename it for Marvin Zindler? ;P
#6 – We can only hope.
Regards,
Peter Hughes
A humorous but realistic vew of the key media messages from hurricane reporting…
Things I have learned from watching hurricane coverage on TV during the last two weeks:
1. White folks don’t make good news stories.
2. The hurricane only hit black families’ property.
3. New Orleans was devastated and no other city was affected by the hurricane.
4. Mississippi is reported to have a tree blown down.
5. New Orleans has no white people.
6. The hurricane blew a limb off a tree in the yard of an Alabama resident.
7. When you are hungry after a hurricane, steal a big screen TV.
8. The hurricane did 23 billion dollars in improvements to New Orleans. Now
the city is welfare, looters and gang free and they are in your city.
9. Don’t give thanks to the thousands that came to help rescue you, instead
bitch because the government hasn’t given you a debit card yet.
10. Only black family members got separated in the hurricane rescue efforts.
11. Ignore warnings to evacuate and the white folks will come get you and
give you money for being stupid.
It seemed amazing to me that the media coverage of hurricanes did not include some level of investigative look in to the structure and process of our government.
When issues, such as abortion rights, gay and lesbian rights, educational rights, etc. are raised, the media regularly covers the implication of “States Rights” yet wit the hurricane coverage there was a fanatical rush to show that George Bush and his federal government screwed up. If balanced coverage were in place a few things might have gotten more attention such as:
1) The National Guards are state militia who report to their state Governors who is there Commander-In-Chief, not the President of the United States. This is is to allow the states to have militias that serve as a check and balance to any potential coup/overthrow of the government by a federal dictator to me and is also embodied in the constitutional right to bear arms. Only when federalized for action outside of the US does the President become share the Commander-In-Chief role for for National Guard Troops. Very little was done to question the Commander-In-Chief of the Louisiana National Guard as to her response to the emergency in her role as Commander-In-Chief and her control and use or lack thereof of troops and equipment at her disposal. Is the Governor responsible to the people of her state to ensure they have a good emergency plan regardless of the federal government role? Does she understand states right and her authority and responsibilities as commander-in-chief and governor?
2) The federal government is not allowed, by law, to deploy troops withint the borders of the United States in a police type of capacity. National Guard troops, under the command of the state Governors, are not subject to this limitation. So, for many of the control efforts, George Bush could not legally provide policement to help enforce laws. The Governor could.
3) Prior to the hurricane hittin New Orleans, the Mayor of New Orleans declared a mandatory evacuation of the city yet the Governor would not approve the order, even after the hurricane stuck, flooding was occuring, etc. She continuted to take a “Wait and See” attitude. In TV coverage, a few questions were asked if she and the mayor were on the same page with absolutely no foloow up questions when it appeared they were not.
4) After the hurricane struck, the Governor said she should not have to ask the Federal Government for help. This help should have been automatically provided, yet, both democratic and republican administrations have been very aware of the states rights and other legal issues that require a Governor to initiate requests for federal aid, support or intervention. The Governor even posted a copy of the letter she sent President Bush asking for military help, help from other state National Guards, and naming an overall commander to coordinate the state and federal militias. Yet the Governor declined the first offer of support when she learned what this would entail including putting the Louisiana National Guard under the same structure. She she hesitated on the implementation wanting to retain direct control of the LA National Guard and wanting control of all other militia hurricane response resources to be beased in her Louisiana Emergency Headquarters.
5) Did the governor have ulterior motives of keeping all relief internal to the State of Louisiana? I personally know that volunteers from Angel Flight, a group of pilots that ferry people with medical needs to locations to receive that aid, were initially prohibited, by the Governor of Louisiana, from flying anyone needing medical attention to any destination outside of the State of Louisiana. Why weren’t these types of things reported in the media? Was it because theres type of issues would reflect state and local political issues that could not be tied to the federal government or a conspiracy by George Bush against blacks? The net results for citizens of Louisiana was the Governor’s action delayed medical attention to peole requiring it.