Whom Do You Trust for Your News? Liberal and Conservative Voices

Author: May Boeve and Drew Pugsley

The word "victory" on the cover of Time magazine at a newsstand was so large that I read it from 50 feet away. So I guess that means that freedom and democracy are flowing into Iraq at the same speed as the smooth stream of oil on its way out. I dislike cynicism, but cannot help but be exasperated by the mainstream media's sugarcoating of war's consequences and wonder about its truthfulness.
"Our victory in Iraq is certain, but it is not complete," President George W. Bush said last Tuesday. We are still at war, then, and as citizens of this warring nation, where do we turn to inform ourselves about the acts we are committing? Turning left, we are presented with stories that seek to illuminate details often absent in the mainstream press. Turning to the right illuminates the quest of an altruistic nation seeking to remove the dictator our nation currently loves to hate following those evil communists who were fashionable to despise in the 1980's. Obviously, neither of these opposing directions yields a balanced perspective that most emphasizes the truth. But more and more, I wonder about this truth we demand from the news media. Is this precious commodity something deliverable by way of a television screen, newspaper or radio announcement?
In last Saturday's New York Times a large, full color photo of children stacked in a refrigerated room (for lack of hospital space and) shocked me. This is truth, pure and unadulterated: the truth of war casualities. Imagine if these images were all we knew of the conflict: not the optimistic quotes from the battlefield or the promises that we are indeed saving yet another country for democracy (a.k.a. working for our well-oiled capitalist machine). If all we saw was the sort of unassailable truth of graphic photographs, I doubt that so many could stomach the justification garbage we've been spoon fed ever since we didn't get the foothold we wanted in the Middle East after the last Persian Gulf conflict.
So in order to expect a corporate entity (the U.S. "free press") to capture this suffering most truthfully is much to ask: for. News of others' suffering should not be easily accepted. Anyone who has ever attempted to put into words something they have seen, be it commonplace or noteworthy, comes short of truly portraying the event. Coming short of fully encapsulating what occurs in the context of war is not a violation of The Truth, but a mere shortcoming of the human vocabulary.To travel, then, from the reporters' eye to a five-second blurb on CNN is a far cry from accuracy in reporting. But it is not dishonest. That is, of course, if the corporate controllers of the news have not bought the stories or the government has not used its influence to bastardize them.
In these cases, the news can be very dishonest. For example, the coverage of the CIA's invasion of Guatemala and installation of a dictator, resulting in 200,000 deaths. The headline? "Guatemalans Spontaneously Revolt Against Their Elected President and Welcome a Military Government Endorsed by the U.S." In the face of such shocking examples, how do we keep abreast of the real news?
Fortunately, there are a growing number of alternative news sources like Truthout and Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), that present a different picture, focusing on fine points.
However, without the corporate funding that most other news sources enjoy, the coverage within alternative media sources is not as comprehensive, even though individual stories go into more detail. Thus, the best way I've come across to stay well informed is to consult both types of sources, using one to verify the other.
The mainstream news media is not inherently flawed, but as long as we keep watching, listening and believing, we give it a generous gift: the power to influence how we think. When this power is manipulated, so is the truth that the news is supposed to contain. While we can pursue the truth in the news media, we cannot expect it. Whether we deserve it is an entirely different matter. Eyes and ears wide open, then, in pursuit of "truth."

-May Boeve '06.5


Although everything should be taken with a grain of salt, I have never seriously considered the veracity or bias of the American media. Certainly everyone from every perspective has an agenda. As large, profit-maximizing corporations, we can fairly assume that most media outlets want to sell the most papers or attract the most viewers. However, the bias or balance in recent coverage of the conflict in Iraq has been heavily scrutinized by advocates of alternative news sources.
One of the more mainstream alternative news sources is Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR, www.fair.org). While many more mainstream news sources may be becoming more entertainment based, more careful consideration of this topic has yields no cause for alarm. Fox News notwithstanding, the United States press corps is not overly patriotic and has always been willing to offer its criticisms.
FAIR's mission, however, is "providing constructive critiques when called for and applauding exceptional, hard-hitting journalism."
I have a difficult time believing in their fairness and accuracy when FAIR dedicates an entire segment of its Web Site to criticizing President Georege W. Bush. A particular excerpt from Mark Crispin Miller continues to debate Bush's "non-election" in 2000.
Also questionable are four of the top articles on FAIR's "What's New at FAIR" page entitled "Is Killing Part of Pentagon Press Policy?," "A Lethal Way to 'Dispatch' the News," "Media Should Follow Up on Civilian Deaths: Journalist's Evidence that "U.S. Bombed Market Ignored by U.S. Press" and "U.S. Media Applaud Bombing of Iraqi TV."
In the fourth story, a March 27 media advisory, U.S. media officials discuss the dismantling of Iraqi television facilities and FAIR claims, "It's worth noting that CNN, like other U.S. news outlets, provides all these functions for the U.S. government." The media in Iraq was a state-owned institution that Saddam Hussein used to manipulate and brainwash his people. To compare the United States and its leaders and media to Saddam Hussein's former Iraqi regime is outrageously asinine.
In an op-ed piece, Eason Jordan, CNN's chief news executive, tells how the Iraqi government silenced him. Iraqi officials threatened bodily harm to Jordan, his family and his co-workers in order to ensure that the truth never reached the United States. He tells the story of a cameraman from CNN's Baghdad Bureau, an Iraqi citizen, who was abducted and tortured.
This man endured weeks of electro-shock torture and beatings in hopes that he would tell the Iraqi government that Jordan was a CIA operative. Through this article, Jordan proved his moral and journalistic integrity as well as Iraq's obvious disregard for international law and human rights. This story, which ran in the April 11 edition of The New York Times, was, strangely, not picked up by FAIR.
The language in the titles of some of these articles is incredibly inflammatory and certainly does not live up to FAIR's standards of "exceptional, hard-hitting journalism." The beautiful thing about freedom, any Iraqi will now be able to tell you, is that debate is expected on virtually every issue.
The front page of the latest National Review will direct you to articles dealing with America's successes and failures in the war with Iraq. National Review is not a generally unbiased publication, but how many of you New Republic readers subscribe to the National Review for a differing opinion?
Sept. 11 has resulted in an admirable amount of patriotism in war supporters and protesters alike. The mainstream media has, as a profit-maximizing enterprise, cashed in. However, alternative news sources that show pictures of sick children in Iraq present their argument from some intellectual high ground that, among people who are making fact-based arguments, does not exist.
An informed person who has participated in deba
te and considered the facts can come to a reasonable conclusion that the United States should not have fought in Iraq. A decision to support the war can be equally reasonable.
Alternative news sources, in an almost condescending way, present what they think is some sort of revealed truth. I know that all the information necessary to make an informed decision on any issue is available in the United States, which is more than can be said for many countries. If everyone can see past the agendas that are inherent in every liberal democracy, we all can have more informed, intelligent debate.

-Drew Pugsley '04