In Media Res

This was good to see, though I don't quite agree with Avedon that Hedges "gave better than he got." Why should he get flustered just because some corporate toady calls him a "left wing nutjob"? I'm not all that concerned about such labels, and I have the impression that most of the OWS people aren't either, but I don't feel defended when Hedges says that those who oppose the corporate state are "the real conservatives." It's a claim that can be defended, but why waste time doing so? If Occupy Wall Street be left wing nutjob-ism, make the most of it!

Which reminds of something I should have written about last week. Sarah Sobieraj's recent book Soundbitten: The Perils of Media-Centered Political Activism (NYU Press, 2011) ought to be read by anyone who's interested in strategy for the current movement. I have some minor quibbles, for example that her discussion of media ignores people like Noam Chomsky, Ed Herman, Mark Crispin Miller and others who've done important work on the subject; she does cite Nina Eliasoph's Avoiding Politics: How Americans Produce Apathy in Everyday Life (Cambridge, 1998), but I don't remember Eliasoph reaching the conclusions Sobieraj attributes to her; that may just mean it's time for me to reread Eliasoph. My only real complaint is that Sobieraj doesn't follow her arguments quite far enough, but if other people see what I see and draw the same conclusions, it won't matter much.

Sobieraj is a sociologist who studied and observed political activists during the 2000 and 2004 Presidential campaigns, primarily the party conventions and the debates between the nominees. She went for breadth more than depth, intending to cover as broad a range of organizations as possible. What she observed was that media-savvy activists who put together big actions aimed at getting the attention of the media failed almost entirely to do so, for two main reasons.

First, reporters chose to cover the conventions and debates themselves, with only cursory accounts of what was going on outside. At most, activists appeared as a faceless, nameless sea of nobodies, putting on an incomprehensible performance that no one could possibly understand. Second, even when a group was identified by name and an activist spoke on camera, their aims and reasoning were ignored. Neither of these points will be news to many activists, but they continue trying to get corporate-media attention anyway, apparently in the belief that someday they'll crack the code that will give them the media access they seek.

Sobieraj finds revealing contradictions on the reporters' side, though. For example, after describing the scriptedness of the nominees' debates, she writes (page 71),

In light of this … it seems entirely plausible that the press would prefer to cover the activists, gravitating toward the less predictable, more colorful set of events and organizations clamoring for attention in its wings. Yet this is not the case. Why is there such [sic] little news about these groups and their activism, and why is the news that does circulate so prone to exclude political content? I argue that this dismal showing in the news is a product of a set of unwritten expectations that govern the coverage of political “outsiders,” which is diametrically opposed to the professional norms and work routines involved in the creation of most political news stories.

Or as "Dustin, a reporter with a primary newspaper for a major metropolitan area" (77) put it:

… "If people riot, we’ll pay attention. We’ll wanna know why they’re so damn upset."

The newspaper articles, however, suggest this is not the case, that there actually is minimal interest in “why they’re so damn upset.” In the conflict / crime model stories, associations usually receive more extended attention than in local stories, but they are still largely unsuccessful at injecting their issues and perspectives into the mainstream discourse.

But Sobieraj overlooks the way that coverage of the debates and conventions is also "prone to exclude political content." In The Bush Dyslexicon Mark Crispin Miller describes at length how, after the third debate between Al Gore and George W. Bush in October 2000,

the "analysts" at CNN said not one word about the substance of the candidates' exchange but just kept harping on the general "statements" were putatively "trying" to make about themselves through their tone and body language.

Although a waste of time, the postdebate bull session was at least not strongly biased, nor was its anti-intellectualism too pronounced. On ABC there was a far more noxious session on the subject of the third debate.

This session, featuring Sam Donaldson, George Stephanopoulos, Cokie Roberts, and George Will, "captures perfectly the the barbarous synergy between the right and TV news, each feigning populism for its own elitist purposes." Roberts complained that the issue debated by the candidates wasn't "the important point there. ... Because that's not what comes across when you're watching the debate. What comes across when you're watching the debate is this guy from Washington doing Washington-speak" [pages 68-69]. The irony of four Beltway media insiders denouncing Al Gore for being a Beltway insider, while delicious, was totally lost on Roberts. It's a reminder of how little facts matter, but personalities do matter, to the corporate media. And that means that if activists did manage to secure the magical gaze of TV cameras on the same level as political insiders, their ideas and programs would still be ignored in favor of image and presentation, just as they are now.

Political insiders, of course, are virtually guaranteed ample coverage, whether or not they have anything substantial to say. Reporters profess to be frustrated by this, but they go along with the program: it's their job. They have a different set of standards for "outsiders," which Sobieraj discusses (page 83):

I watched, time and time again, as reporters gave the cold shoulder to voluntary associations following standard industry practices. In many respects, those organizations that followed the rules most judiciously were the least attractive to the news workers they were courting. Journalists accept press releases, press conferences, and spokespeople in their routine political reporting, but their coverage of activism was governed by a very different set of rules and practices, which in many ways was diametrically opposed to those employed in routine newsgathering. When activists attempted to conform to journalists’ model for routine newsgathering, they failed, not because they didn’t conform to the “implicit rules of newsmaking,” but because they were following the wrong rules.

When journalists looked at activists, they weren’t looking for talking points, they were looking for authenticity.

"Authenticity" means that

"real" activists are politically driven as a result of personal connection to an issue. Reporters preferred sources who discuss issues as individuals with stories to share, rather than as publicly minded advocates. This is primarily because the journalists were not looking to write about issues or about associations, they were looking to tell stories about individuals [94].

... It is a fine line to walk, because fervor simultaneously attracts and repels the news media. Too little passion and the associations are inauthentic, too much and they are zealots [96].

Now, there’s a double bind. To add to the problem, Sobieraj noticed that many organizations were so busy courting the media that they made no plans for engaging the public that they presumably were trying to reach.

Activists lost opportunities to connect meaningfully with nonmembers by treating bystanders as passive audience members and offering pedestrians symbolic acts rather than interactions. Their public performances were often compelling but rarely engaging. In most cases, onlookers had no structured opportunity to ask questions, share insights, or probe behind the chants, comedic skits, or dramatic displays of emotion. Speech about politics was central to association activities around the conventions and debates, but talk about issues – two-way exchange – was exceedingly rare. The same flamboyant techniques that groups concocted to draw the media often captured pedestrians’ attention, but the activists did not know what to do with that attention once they had it [111].

... When I later asked Eli [of Republican Freakshow] why they didn’t “work the crowd” a little more, he explained that they were mostly focused on being available to journalists. When I pressed him, commenting that there were no journalists around, he indicated that he just wanted to get ready to do the routine again in hopes that some would come by ... Most activists were more responsive to pedestrians than were Eli and his colleagues, but they often deferred interested parties to websites or handed them a pamphlet. They were usually prepared to direct bystanders to resources, but they seemed noticeably unprepared or unwilling to actually talk with them [118-9].

If I understand the purpose of media outreach, it is to use the media as a means to the end of reaching the public. Since this mostly fails, it would be wise to forget about the middleman -- the medium -- and try to reach the public directly. This may be slow -- Noam Chomsky, for example, remembers speaking against the Vietnam War to tiny groups in people's living rooms at the beginning of the anti-Vietnam war movement -- but it produces more real understanding. Even if the media gave more coverage to activists' performances, the task of building a movement would still remain. (My own -- limited -- experience with activist groups is that they sometimes begin by organizing, and only afterward try to think of something to do.)

From what I've seen, compared to the groups Sobieraj observed, the Occupy movement is less obsessed with media attention and more interested in putting people together with people. Her account of the way the corporate media cover activism fits well with mainstream journalists' frustration that they don't know what OWS wants, which shows that this isn't a new theme. But the media aren't interested in, or capable of even hearing, what activists want. That's not news in itself; it's been noticed for a long time, from the "anti-globalization" protests of the late 1990s to the antiwar protests between 2001 and 2003.

So it seems to me that reaching the corporate media ought not to be a high priority for serious activists. It should be a low priority, after seeking the attention of fellow citizens, welcoming them into the group or movement, and dealing with other strategic concerns like the hostility of government at all levels. Sobieraj notices that many groups put most of their energy into grooming members to deal with the media or to hide from them; during her fieldwork she often had trouble getting rank-and-file activists to talk to her because they thought she was media and they hadn't been cleared to talk. She suggests, and I believe she's right:

If members could understand the organization, its work, and its priorities. their unrehearsed responses to journalists’ questions would be “on message.” In other words, talk is exactly the type of association activity that builds these relationships, and with stronger ties, activist groups could worry less about being derailed by their members and could begin to benefit from them. Promoting healthy dialogue, then, would likely yield both cultural and instrumental benefits [151].

But even if she's wrong, it's more important, and more effective, to build numbers and organizational strength by concentrating on the members' interests and morale than to court the corporate media, because building the organization is an end in itself, as well as a means of producing social and political change.

In Media Res

This was good to see, though I don't quite agree with Avedon that Hedges "gave better than he got." Why should he get flustered just because some corporate toady calls him a "left wing nutjob"? I'm not all that concerned about such labels, and I have the impression that most of the OWS people aren't either, but I don't feel defended when Hedges says that those who oppose the corporate state are "the real conservatives." It's a claim that can be defended, but why waste time doing so? If Occupy Wall Street be left wing nutjob-ism, make the most of it!

Which reminds of something I should have written about last week. Sarah Sobieraj's recent book Soundbitten: The Perils of Media-Centered Political Activism (NYU Press, 2011) ought to be read by anyone who's interested in strategy for the current movement. I have some minor quibbles, for example that her discussion of media ignores people like Noam Chomsky, Ed Herman, Mark Crispin Miller and others who've done important work on the subject; she does cite Nina Eliasoph's Avoiding Politics: How Americans Produce Apathy in Everyday Life (Cambridge, 1998), but I don't remember Eliasoph reaching the conclusions Sobieraj attributes to her; that may just mean it's time for me to reread Eliasoph. My only real complaint is that Sobieraj doesn't follow her arguments quite far enough, but if other people see what I see and draw the same conclusions, it won't matter much.

Sobieraj is a sociologist who studied and observed political activists during the 2000 and 2004 Presidential campaigns, primarily the party conventions and the debates between the nominees. She went for breadth more than depth, intending to cover as broad a range of organizations as possible. What she observed was that media-savvy activists who put together big actions aimed at getting the attention of the media failed almost entirely to do so, for two main reasons.

First, reporters chose to cover the conventions and debates themselves, with only cursory accounts of what was going on outside. At most, activists appeared as a faceless, nameless sea of nobodies, putting on an incomprehensible performance that no one could possibly understand. Second, even when a group was identified by name and an activist spoke on camera, their aims and reasoning were ignored. Neither of these points will be news to many activists, but they continue trying to get corporate-media attention anyway, apparently in the belief that someday they'll crack the code that will give them the media access they seek.

Sobieraj finds revealing contradictions on the reporters' side, though. For example, after describing the scriptedness of the nominees' debates, she writes (page 71),

In light of this … it seems entirely plausible that the press would prefer to cover the activists, gravitating toward the less predictable, more colorful set of events and organizations clamoring for attention in its wings. Yet this is not the case. Why is there such [sic] little news about these groups and their activism, and why is the news that does circulate so prone to exclude political content? I argue that this dismal showing in the news is a product of a set of unwritten expectations that govern the coverage of political “outsiders,” which is diametrically opposed to the professional norms and work routines involved in the creation of most political news stories.

Or as "Dustin, a reporter with a primary newspaper for a major metropolitan area" (77) put it:

… "If people riot, we’ll pay attention. We’ll wanna know why they’re so damn upset."

The newspaper articles, however, suggest this is not the case, that there actually is minimal interest in “why they’re so damn upset.” In the conflict / crime model stories, associations usually receive more extended attention than in local stories, but they are still largely unsuccessful at injecting their issues and perspectives into the mainstream discourse.

But Sobieraj overlooks the way that coverage of the debates and conventions is also "prone to exclude political content." In The Bush Dyslexicon Mark Crispin Miller describes at length how, after the third debate between Al Gore and George W. Bush in October 2000,

the "analysts" at CNN said not one word about the substance of the candidates' exchange but just kept harping on the general "statements" were putatively "trying" to make about themselves through their tone and body language.

Although a waste of time, the postdebate bull session was at least not strongly biased, nor was its anti-intellectualism too pronounced. On ABC there was a far more noxious session on the subject of the third debate.

This session, featuring Sam Donaldson, George Stephanopoulos, Cokie Roberts, and George Will, "captures perfectly the the barbarous synergy between the right and TV news, each feigning populism for its own elitist purposes." Roberts complained that the issue debated by the candidates wasn't "the important point there. ... Because that's not what comes across when you're watching the debate. What comes across when you're watching the debate is this guy from Washington doing Washington-speak" [pages 68-69]. The irony of four Beltway media insiders denouncing Al Gore for being a Beltway insider, while delicious, was totally lost on Roberts. It's a reminder of how little facts matter, but personalities do matter, to the corporate media. And that means that if activists did manage to secure the magical gaze of TV cameras on the same level as political insiders, their ideas and programs would still be ignored in favor of image and presentation, just as they are now.

Political insiders, of course, are virtually guaranteed ample coverage, whether or not they have anything substantial to say. Reporters profess to be frustrated by this, but they go along with the program: it's their job. They have a different set of standards for "outsiders," which Sobieraj discusses (page 83):

I watched, time and time again, as reporters gave the cold shoulder to voluntary associations following standard industry practices. In many respects, those organizations that followed the rules most judiciously were the least attractive to the news workers they were courting. Journalists accept press releases, press conferences, and spokespeople in their routine political reporting, but their coverage of activism was governed by a very different set of rules and practices, which in many ways was diametrically opposed to those employed in routine newsgathering. When activists attempted to conform to journalists’ model for routine newsgathering, they failed, not because they didn’t conform to the “implicit rules of newsmaking,” but because they were following the wrong rules.

When journalists looked at activists, they weren’t looking for talking points, they were looking for authenticity.

"Authenticity" means that

"real" activists are politically driven as a result of personal connection to an issue. Reporters preferred sources who discuss issues as individuals with stories to share, rather than as publicly minded advocates. This is primarily because the journalists were not looking to write about issues or about associations, they were looking to tell stories about individuals [94].

... It is a fine line to walk, because fervor simultaneously attracts and repels the news media. Too little passion and the associations are inauthentic, too much and they are zealots [96].

Now, there’s a double bind. To add to the problem, Sobieraj noticed that many organizations were so busy courting the media that they made no plans for engaging the public that they presumably were trying to reach.

Activists lost opportunities to connect meaningfully with nonmembers by treating bystanders as passive audience members and offering pedestrians symbolic acts rather than interactions. Their public performances were often compelling but rarely engaging. In most cases, onlookers had no structured opportunity to ask questions, share insights, or probe behind the chants, comedic skits, or dramatic displays of emotion. Speech about politics was central to association activities around the conventions and debates, but talk about issues – two-way exchange – was exceedingly rare. The same flamboyant techniques that groups concocted to draw the media often captured pedestrians’ attention, but the activists did not know what to do with that attention once they had it [111].

... When I later asked Eli [of Republican Freakshow] why they didn’t “work the crowd” a little more, he explained that they were mostly focused on being available to journalists. When I pressed him, commenting that there were no journalists around, he indicated that he just wanted to get ready to do the routine again in hopes that some would come by ... Most activists were more responsive to pedestrians than were Eli and his colleagues, but they often deferred interested parties to websites or handed them a pamphlet. They were usually prepared to direct bystanders to resources, but they seemed noticeably unprepared or unwilling to actually talk with them [118-9].

If I understand the purpose of media outreach, it is to use the media as a means to the end of reaching the public. Since this mostly fails, it would be wise to forget about the middleman -- the medium -- and try to reach the public directly. This may be slow -- Noam Chomsky, for example, remembers speaking against the Vietnam War to tiny groups in people's living rooms at the beginning of the anti-Vietnam war movement -- but it produces more real understanding. Even if the media gave more coverage to activists' performances, the task of building a movement would still remain. (My own -- limited -- experience with activist groups is that they sometimes begin by organizing, and only afterward try to think of something to do.)

From what I've seen, compared to the groups Sobieraj observed, the Occupy movement is less obsessed with media attention and more interested in putting people together with people. Her account of the way the corporate media cover activism fits well with mainstream journalists' frustration that they don't know what OWS wants, which shows that this isn't a new theme. But the media aren't interested in, or capable of even hearing, what activists want. That's not news in itself; it's been noticed for a long time, from the "anti-globalization" protests of the late 1990s to the antiwar protests between 2001 and 2003.

So it seems to me that reaching the corporate media ought not to be a high priority for serious activists. It should be a low priority, after seeking the attention of fellow citizens, welcoming them into the group or movement, and dealing with other strategic concerns like the hostility of government at all levels. Sobieraj notices that many groups put most of their energy into grooming members to deal with the media or to hide from them; during her fieldwork she often had trouble getting rank-and-file activists to talk to her because they thought she was media and they hadn't been cleared to talk. She suggests, and I believe she's right:

If members could understand the organization, its work, and its priorities. their unrehearsed responses to journalists’ questions would be “on message.” In other words, talk is exactly the type of association activity that builds these relationships, and with stronger ties, activist groups could worry less about being derailed by their members and could begin to benefit from them. Promoting healthy dialogue, then, would likely yield both cultural and instrumental benefits [151].

But even if she's wrong, it's more important, and more effective, to build numbers and organizational strength by concentrating on the members' interests and morale than to court the corporate media, because building the organization is an end in itself, as well as a means of producing social and political change.

Sawing Off the Limb You're Sitting On, and Other Tactics of Professional Politicians

The Daily Show
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

Maybe I'll get one of those Union soldier caps myself.

Stewart has some good jokes there, at the expense of the right people. It has also occurred to me that Occupy Wall Street actually can claim to speak for a majority of Americans, while the Tea Party really only represents the lunatic fringe of the Republican Party and its Democratic collaborators.

Ian Welsh recently posted a critique of the liberal darling Elizabeth Warren, a reputed consumers' champion who was sold out by Obama but is now running for a Senate seat from Massachusetts. When asked about Occupy Wall Street, Warren reportedly said that people should obey the law, and (according to Welsh) she wasn't talking about the NYPD. Welsh wrote:

Leaving all else aside, this is awful politics in the most technical sense. Her statement, if she didn’t want to endorse #Occupy should have been something like “this movement shows that until we reform Wall Street and the Banking system unrest will continue to grow,” or something similar. As a politician, when asked about something, say it proves the need for your program. In Warren’s case it’s even plausible.

But let’s be frank, she is a stalking horse for Obama. She is deep in his pockets, supported strongly by his organization. She is the spokesman for “saving the Middle Class”, saying things which Obama can no longer say and pass the laugh test. The problem with “saving the Middle Class” is that for the people in #Occupy movement, it’s too late. Most of the core people are no longer in the middle class. Saving those still in it will do nothing for them, even if the policies suggested would work, which they wouldn’t.

But what this mainly reveals is that Warren is incompetent. She has just told most of the left, the very people who are reluctant to work for Obama, that there is no real point in working for her. She may believe in some consumer protections, but she’s still a conservative Democrat, who just wants to tweak the status quo. She regards the #Occupy people as illegitimate, as law breakers. She wants to keep the war on drugs going, even though, as a Law Prof, she has to know it doesn’t work and causes unimaginable suffering.

A few Obama apologists jumped in to attack Welsh, accusing him of telling people not to vote for Warren -- the usual crap. As you can tell from what I've quoted here, he was saying that Warren was telling people not to vote for her, just as Obama has been telling people in his base not to vote for him, by dismissing important issues and expressing contempt for them. (Saying in effect, "Just so you won't be surprised or disappointed, let me tell you in advance that I'm going to sell you out" is certainly helpful to voters, but not a good way to get their vote. Neither is "Only a deranged professional leftist would even expect me not to sell them out!") Answering a commenter who sought to defend Warren, Welsh pointed out that "this is a question she should have been ready for and prepped on by her staff. I mean, it was close to 100% it was going to be asked." (This is something I've noticed about Democrats generally, and Obama in particular: no one could have predicted that they'd be asked questions about hot-button contemporary issues! Who's screening these questions, anyway?)

Meanwhile, decent citizens and public servants continue to demonstrate their respect for the law, this time in Tennessee. Remember when I asked where the adults were when gay kids were being harassed and beaten up, and when antigay students wore t-shirts that read "SILLY FAGGOT, DICKS ARE FOR CHICKS"? Why, the adults were busy assaulting other students for wearing pro-gay t-shirts!

Sawing Off the Limb You're Sitting On, and Other Tactics of Professional Politicians

The Daily Show
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

Maybe I'll get one of those Union soldier caps myself.

Stewart has some good jokes there, at the expense of the right people. It has also occurred to me that Occupy Wall Street actually can claim to speak for a majority of Americans, while the Tea Party really only represents the lunatic fringe of the Republican Party and its Democratic collaborators.

Ian Welsh recently posted a critique of the liberal darling Elizabeth Warren, a reputed consumers' champion who was sold out by Obama but is now running for a Senate seat from Massachusetts. When asked about Occupy Wall Street, Warren reportedly said that people should obey the law, and (according to Welsh) she wasn't talking about the NYPD. Welsh wrote:

Leaving all else aside, this is awful politics in the most technical sense. Her statement, if she didn’t want to endorse #Occupy should have been something like “this movement shows that until we reform Wall Street and the Banking system unrest will continue to grow,” or something similar. As a politician, when asked about something, say it proves the need for your program. In Warren’s case it’s even plausible.

But let’s be frank, she is a stalking horse for Obama. She is deep in his pockets, supported strongly by his organization. She is the spokesman for “saving the Middle Class”, saying things which Obama can no longer say and pass the laugh test. The problem with “saving the Middle Class” is that for the people in #Occupy movement, it’s too late. Most of the core people are no longer in the middle class. Saving those still in it will do nothing for them, even if the policies suggested would work, which they wouldn’t.

But what this mainly reveals is that Warren is incompetent. She has just told most of the left, the very people who are reluctant to work for Obama, that there is no real point in working for her. She may believe in some consumer protections, but she’s still a conservative Democrat, who just wants to tweak the status quo. She regards the #Occupy people as illegitimate, as law breakers. She wants to keep the war on drugs going, even though, as a Law Prof, she has to know it doesn’t work and causes unimaginable suffering.

A few Obama apologists jumped in to attack Welsh, accusing him of telling people not to vote for Warren -- the usual crap. As you can tell from what I've quoted here, he was saying that Warren was telling people not to vote for her, just as Obama has been telling people in his base not to vote for him, by dismissing important issues and expressing contempt for them. (Saying in effect, "Just so you won't be surprised or disappointed, let me tell you in advance that I'm going to sell you out" is certainly helpful to voters, but not a good way to get their vote. Neither is "Only a deranged professional leftist would even expect me not to sell them out!") Answering a commenter who sought to defend Warren, Welsh pointed out that "this is a question she should have been ready for and prepped on by her staff. I mean, it was close to 100% it was going to be asked." (This is something I've noticed about Democrats generally, and Obama in particular: no one could have predicted that they'd be asked questions about hot-button contemporary issues! Who's screening these questions, anyway?)

Meanwhile, decent citizens and public servants continue to demonstrate their respect for the law, this time in Tennessee. Remember when I asked where the adults were when gay kids were being harassed and beaten up, and when antigay students wore t-shirts that read "SILLY FAGGOT, DICKS ARE FOR CHICKS"? Why, the adults were busy assaulting other students for wearing pro-gay t-shirts!

Follow the Money

One of my Facebook friends, a fellow blogger, posted a link today to this article from the Fiscal Times, "Why Taxpayers Are So Angry and So Wrong About Spending." The author, Mark Thoma, begins:

Republicans, emboldened by public support for spending cuts, have taken the country to the brink of default as they fight to dial back government programs and vehemently oppose any tax increases to attack the deficit. But is the fight over the debt ceiling really an ideological battle between the two parties over the size and role of government? Or is a lot of the public support for GOP positions driven by myopia about entitlement spending and misplaced public anger?

I immediately wondered about this. From what I've seen, polls show that most Americans vehemently support tax increases (for the rich, anyway), and do not support the Republican / Obama program of cutting government programs that help ordinary Americans. So I clicked through that first link, which took me to a Gallup Poll report on the debt ceiling, which not only didn't mention tax increases but explained, "The question wording did not mention the rationales for or against raising the debt ceiling, nor did it explain that any such move would ultimately be a part of a broader budget bill involving spending cuts and perhaps tax increases."

Next I did some digging to see what polling on taxes showed. This FAIR blog post pointed out that in the political mainstream, "raising taxes on the wealthy is considered a non-starter--even though most Americans would support it." As evidence, two links: one to a Reuters poll which found that 12% of respondents favored tax increases to reduce the deficit, and 56% favored a combination of spending cuts and tax increases, for a total of 68% who were willing to increase taxes, with only 19% favoring only spending cuts. A Pew poll came up with exactly the same numbers.

The second link was to a Bloomberg article which begins:

Americans want Congress to bring down a federal budget deficit that many believe is “dangerously out of control,” only under two conditions: minimize the pain and make the rich pay.

That aversion to sacrifice is at odds with a spate of recent studies, including one by President Barack Obama’s debt panel, that say reductions in Medicare, Social Security, military and other spending are necessary to curb a deficit that totaled $1.29 trillion in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, or 9 percent of the gross domestic product.

Of course that debt panel was packed with men whose biases toward cutting social programs was well-documented before they began their "study."

The article goes on to cite polling data and interviews. Some of the poll results are surprising at first glance, but maybe not so much when you think about it. It turns out that it's at best a half-truth even to say that "Republicans ... vehemently oppose tax increases to attack the deficit." For example,

While Republican congressional leaders have opposed increases in taxes paid by high-income families, sentiment among the party’s rank and file is mixed. Republicans are divided on eliminating the tax cuts for the wealthy, with 50 percent opposing and 47 percent supporting. An increase in the cap on earnings subject to Social Security taxes splits Republicans almost evenly.

The poll shows there’s little appetite across all parties and demographic groups for changes to entitlements.

Eighty-two percent of respondents opposed benefit cuts to the Medicare health-insurance system for the elderly, with about half of Republicans wanting to see both the current Medicare and Social Security systems preserved. Just 35 percent of all respondents back a system in which government vouchers would help people pay for their own health insurance.

“Nobody wants to fail to take care of children who need medicine or the elderly,” said Tea Party supporter Randy Thorman, 45, a high school social studies teacher in Pryor, Oklahoma. “We don’t want to throw people out without some type of help.”...

Cathy Freeman, a 64-year-old Republican and retired bookkeeper from Waco, Texas, said the deficit should be addressed by ending tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations, not slashing the entitlement programs her family relies on.

“We need to look at that before you start hurting the little guys,” Freeman said. “Let’s look at some things that aren’t fair in our system.”

A majority of 72 percent also opposes reducing benefits for the Medicaid health program for the poor. This is true even of Tea Party supporters who have built a movement around smaller government, with 66 percent against reducing Medicaid benefits. Seventy-two percent of those earning $100,000 or more also are opposed.

And so on. I should mention that Thoma's article turned out not to be quite as bad as I thought: he favors social spending and professes himself disappointed by Obama's failure to be the progressive Thoma had hoped for when he was elected. The trouble is that Thoma has bought into the corporate media line that most Americans support the Republican program. A much more accurate headline would be something like "Why Republican and Media Elites Are So Angry and So Wrong About Spending." But that wouldn't be news, I guess.

Follow the Money

One of my Facebook friends, a fellow blogger, posted a link today to this article from the Fiscal Times, "Why Taxpayers Are So Angry and So Wrong About Spending." The author, Mark Thoma, begins:

Republicans, emboldened by public support for spending cuts, have taken the country to the brink of default as they fight to dial back government programs and vehemently oppose any tax increases to attack the deficit. But is the fight over the debt ceiling really an ideological battle between the two parties over the size and role of government? Or is a lot of the public support for GOP positions driven by myopia about entitlement spending and misplaced public anger?

I immediately wondered about this. From what I've seen, polls show that most Americans vehemently support tax increases (for the rich, anyway), and do not support the Republican / Obama program of cutting government programs that help ordinary Americans. So I clicked through that first link, which took me to a Gallup Poll report on the debt ceiling, which not only didn't mention tax increases but explained, "The question wording did not mention the rationales for or against raising the debt ceiling, nor did it explain that any such move would ultimately be a part of a broader budget bill involving spending cuts and perhaps tax increases."

Next I did some digging to see what polling on taxes showed. This FAIR blog post pointed out that in the political mainstream, "raising taxes on the wealthy is considered a non-starter--even though most Americans would support it." As evidence, two links: one to a Reuters poll which found that 12% of respondents favored tax increases to reduce the deficit, and 56% favored a combination of spending cuts and tax increases, for a total of 68% who were willing to increase taxes, with only 19% favoring only spending cuts. A Pew poll came up with exactly the same numbers.

The second link was to a Bloomberg article which begins:

Americans want Congress to bring down a federal budget deficit that many believe is “dangerously out of control,” only under two conditions: minimize the pain and make the rich pay.

That aversion to sacrifice is at odds with a spate of recent studies, including one by President Barack Obama’s debt panel, that say reductions in Medicare, Social Security, military and other spending are necessary to curb a deficit that totaled $1.29 trillion in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, or 9 percent of the gross domestic product.

Of course that debt panel was packed with men whose biases toward cutting social programs was well-documented before they began their "study."

The article goes on to cite polling data and interviews. Some of the poll results are surprising at first glance, but maybe not so much when you think about it. It turns out that it's at best a half-truth even to say that "Republicans ... vehemently oppose tax increases to attack the deficit." For example,

While Republican congressional leaders have opposed increases in taxes paid by high-income families, sentiment among the party’s rank and file is mixed. Republicans are divided on eliminating the tax cuts for the wealthy, with 50 percent opposing and 47 percent supporting. An increase in the cap on earnings subject to Social Security taxes splits Republicans almost evenly.

The poll shows there’s little appetite across all parties and demographic groups for changes to entitlements.

Eighty-two percent of respondents opposed benefit cuts to the Medicare health-insurance system for the elderly, with about half of Republicans wanting to see both the current Medicare and Social Security systems preserved. Just 35 percent of all respondents back a system in which government vouchers would help people pay for their own health insurance.

“Nobody wants to fail to take care of children who need medicine or the elderly,” said Tea Party supporter Randy Thorman, 45, a high school social studies teacher in Pryor, Oklahoma. “We don’t want to throw people out without some type of help.”...

Cathy Freeman, a 64-year-old Republican and retired bookkeeper from Waco, Texas, said the deficit should be addressed by ending tax breaks for the wealthy and corporations, not slashing the entitlement programs her family relies on.

“We need to look at that before you start hurting the little guys,” Freeman said. “Let’s look at some things that aren’t fair in our system.”

A majority of 72 percent also opposes reducing benefits for the Medicaid health program for the poor. This is true even of Tea Party supporters who have built a movement around smaller government, with 66 percent against reducing Medicaid benefits. Seventy-two percent of those earning $100,000 or more also are opposed.

And so on. I should mention that Thoma's article turned out not to be quite as bad as I thought: he favors social spending and professes himself disappointed by Obama's failure to be the progressive Thoma had hoped for when he was elected. The trouble is that Thoma has bought into the corporate media line that most Americans support the Republican program. A much more accurate headline would be something like "Why Republican and Media Elites Are So Angry and So Wrong About Spending." But that wouldn't be news, I guess.

News Through the Eyes of the Investor Class

Having to get up at 5:30 a.m. to go to work does not agree with me. Fortunately it'll end on Friday, and I'll be back to my regular hours, 10:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m., for the rest of the month. (Working early through most of May, oddly, didn't do my posting regularity any harm. But then I was able to sleep till 7 then, an hour and a half later.)

Meanwhile, while most American media are obsessed with the Andrew Weiner scandal, life goes on, both in the US and in the rest of the world. Amy Goodman wrote an article for the Guardian, titled "A Perfect Storm of Stupid," and I thought it would be a critique of the media vortex engulfing Weiner like this one (via), say, but it's about global warming.

But this is what I meant to tell you about: Peru just elected a left-wing president. (Or "left-wing" -- I don't know yet if he's left-wing except by the standards of American corporate media, where the New York Times and the Washington Post are "liberal" and CNN and NPR are "left".) FAIR has a blog post up about US media coverage of the left's fortunes in elections, which contains this memorable conclusion:

Viewing elections through the eyes of the investor class might be helpful for some, but it's doubtful that it's a great way to understand what the people in any country are thinking.

The link to a quite good Guardian piece on the Peruvian election is worth clicking through, but isn't that a great description of the "mainstream" media in the US? Looking at the news through the eyes of the investor class isn't a bad thing per se; openly espousing an identified bias is better than pretending to be objective. The trouble is that you have to do some digging to find news coverage done through any other filter. Wouldn't it be nice if the TV broadcast and cable news networks, and the mastheads of elite print media used that phrase as a tagline? Not "All the News That's Fit to Print," not "Fair and Balanced," but "News Through the Eyes of the Investor Class." Then we'd all have fewer illusions about what we were getting.

News Through the Eyes of the Investor Class

Having to get up at 5:30 a.m. to go to work does not agree with me. Fortunately it'll end on Friday, and I'll be back to my regular hours, 10:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m., for the rest of the month. (Working early through most of May, oddly, didn't do my posting regularity any harm. But then I was able to sleep till 7 then, an hour and a half later.)

Meanwhile, while most American media are obsessed with the Andrew Weiner scandal, life goes on, both in the US and in the rest of the world. Amy Goodman wrote an article for the Guardian, titled "A Perfect Storm of Stupid," and I thought it would be a critique of the media vortex engulfing Weiner like this one (via), say, but it's about global warming.

But this is what I meant to tell you about: Peru just elected a left-wing president. (Or "left-wing" -- I don't know yet if he's left-wing except by the standards of American corporate media, where the New York Times and the Washington Post are "liberal" and CNN and NPR are "left".) FAIR has a blog post up about US media coverage of the left's fortunes in elections, which contains this memorable conclusion:

Viewing elections through the eyes of the investor class might be helpful for some, but it's doubtful that it's a great way to understand what the people in any country are thinking.

The link to a quite good Guardian piece on the Peruvian election is worth clicking through, but isn't that a great description of the "mainstream" media in the US? Looking at the news through the eyes of the investor class isn't a bad thing per se; openly espousing an identified bias is better than pretending to be objective. The trouble is that you have to do some digging to find news coverage done through any other filter. Wouldn't it be nice if the TV broadcast and cable news networks, and the mastheads of elite print media used that phrase as a tagline? Not "All the News That's Fit to Print," not "Fair and Balanced," but "News Through the Eyes of the Investor Class." Then we'd all have fewer illusions about what we were getting.

Actually, They Do Make Ignoramuses (Ignorami?) Like They Used To

My friend the ambivalent Obama supporter sent me a link to this article which linked to this blog post by one Larry Kramer -- not the bloated and inflamed asshole famed for his public temper tantrums, but a corporate-media guy with the same name.

The article, by one Alex Wexprin, declares

In a nutshell, Kramer argues that today’s busy media consumer, lacking the time to dig in to issues themselves, instead relies on cognitive shortcuts to familiarize themselves with what the “correct” opinions are, based on their preexisting ideology.

Wexprin quotes Kramer approvingly -- "We are creating a less-informed but more opinionated public" -- while disagreeing with him tangentially.

First: the problem of opinion fragmentation and people going to outlets that reinforce their existing beliefs is hardly a new phenomenon. If the problem has gotten worse over the last few years, it is more likely to be due to the Internet than an ideological shift in TV news. ...

[Second]: most people in this country do not watch cable news.

The trouble is, neither Wexprin nor Kramer provides any evidence that "the problem has gotten worse over the last few years." "In the past," Kramer declares, "many of those people would have spent the time with a more objective outlet, like CNN or the New York Times, done more research of the candidate, and made up their own minds. Now, it’s just faster to have someone do that for you." Calling CNN and the Times "objective" is funny enough, but when did most people do "more research" and "make up their own minds"?

Americans don't seem to me to be any less-informed than they were when I was in high school forty years ago, before the Internet or cable news, but they were very ill-informed then. Almost twenty years ago, just after the first Gulf War, a "study, conducted by the University of Massachusetts' Center for Studies in Communication, found that the more people watched TV during the Gulf crisis, the less they knew about the underlying issues, and the more likely they were to support the war." Fox News didn't exist then, but CNN did, and dutifully misled its audience.

Kramer writes that "In an effort to appear totally unbiased, CNN ridded itself of opinion or emotion." When was this, I wonder? Was it before or after Lou Dobbs quit? Before or after "new CNN chairman Walter Isaacson met with top Republican lawmakers in Washington, D.C. to discuss how to improve relations between the cable news network and conservative Republicans"?

I'm not sure where my peers and their parents went for their misinformation in the 60s, but there was the Reader's Digest, a reliable fount of right-wing propaganda with an enormous circulation, and there were plenty of right-wing radio commentators even before the Fairness Doctrine was abolished. It was as if there was a sewer in which their blatantly racist, hysterically anti-communist material marinated until it was ready to dump into receptive ears. Morris Kominsky's book The Hoaxers: Plain Liars, Fancy Liars, and Damned Liars (Branden Press, 1970) was a debunking of a lot of this stew. The three big broadcast networks varied slightly in their politics, with ABC notoriously the farthest right of the three in the late 60s, but if you wanted accurate information about US foreign policy, business and the economy, or social issues, you didn't rely on them, "objective" though they were supposed to be.

Rereading FAIR's account of the University of Massachusetts study of Gulf War Coverage, though, I find myself wondering.

While most respondents had difficulty answering questions about the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy, 81 percent of the sample could identify the missile used to shoot down the Iraqi Scuds as the Patriot. That media consumers know facts relating to successful U.S. weapons but not about inconsistencies in U.S. foreign policy, the researchers argued, "suggests that the public are not generally ignorant—rather, they are selectively misinformed."

Were media consumers more knowledgeable about the names of US missiles than about the circumstances leading up to the war only because of skewed media coverage, or might it have been partly because such trivia, like the names of professional athletes, their records and their rankings, were what most media consumers considered important, interesting, and therefore memorable? The first Gulf War was notorious for the way it was covered as if it were the Superbowl, but that was also, probably, the best way to sell it, and I can't think of many people I know who were interested in knowing anything else about it.

Actually, They Do Make Ignoramuses (Ignorami?) Like They Used To

My friend the ambivalent Obama supporter sent me a link to this article which linked to this blog post by one Larry Kramer -- not the bloated and inflamed asshole famed for his public temper tantrums, but a corporate-media guy with the same name.

The article, by one Alex Wexprin, declares

In a nutshell, Kramer argues that today’s busy media consumer, lacking the time to dig in to issues themselves, instead relies on cognitive shortcuts to familiarize themselves with what the “correct” opinions are, based on their preexisting ideology.

Wexprin quotes Kramer approvingly -- "We are creating a less-informed but more opinionated public" -- while disagreeing with him tangentially.

First: the problem of opinion fragmentation and people going to outlets that reinforce their existing beliefs is hardly a new phenomenon. If the problem has gotten worse over the last few years, it is more likely to be due to the Internet than an ideological shift in TV news. ...

[Second]: most people in this country do not watch cable news.

The trouble is, neither Wexprin nor Kramer provides any evidence that "the problem has gotten worse over the last few years." "In the past," Kramer declares, "many of those people would have spent the time with a more objective outlet, like CNN or the New York Times, done more research of the candidate, and made up their own minds. Now, it’s just faster to have someone do that for you." Calling CNN and the Times "objective" is funny enough, but when did most people do "more research" and "make up their own minds"?

Americans don't seem to me to be any less-informed than they were when I was in high school forty years ago, before the Internet or cable news, but they were very ill-informed then. Almost twenty years ago, just after the first Gulf War, a "study, conducted by the University of Massachusetts' Center for Studies in Communication, found that the more people watched TV during the Gulf crisis, the less they knew about the underlying issues, and the more likely they were to support the war." Fox News didn't exist then, but CNN did, and dutifully misled its audience.

Kramer writes that "In an effort to appear totally unbiased, CNN ridded itself of opinion or emotion." When was this, I wonder? Was it before or after Lou Dobbs quit? Before or after "new CNN chairman Walter Isaacson met with top Republican lawmakers in Washington, D.C. to discuss how to improve relations between the cable news network and conservative Republicans"?

I'm not sure where my peers and their parents went for their misinformation in the 60s, but there was the Reader's Digest, a reliable fount of right-wing propaganda with an enormous circulation, and there were plenty of right-wing radio commentators even before the Fairness Doctrine was abolished. It was as if there was a sewer in which their blatantly racist, hysterically anti-communist material marinated until it was ready to dump into receptive ears. Morris Kominsky's book The Hoaxers: Plain Liars, Fancy Liars, and Damned Liars (Branden Press, 1970) was a debunking of a lot of this stew. The three big broadcast networks varied slightly in their politics, with ABC notoriously the farthest right of the three in the late 60s, but if you wanted accurate information about US foreign policy, business and the economy, or social issues, you didn't rely on them, "objective" though they were supposed to be.

Rereading FAIR's account of the University of Massachusetts study of Gulf War Coverage, though, I find myself wondering.

While most respondents had difficulty answering questions about the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy, 81 percent of the sample could identify the missile used to shoot down the Iraqi Scuds as the Patriot. That media consumers know facts relating to successful U.S. weapons but not about inconsistencies in U.S. foreign policy, the researchers argued, "suggests that the public are not generally ignorant—rather, they are selectively misinformed."

Were media consumers more knowledgeable about the names of US missiles than about the circumstances leading up to the war only because of skewed media coverage, or might it have been partly because such trivia, like the names of professional athletes, their records and their rankings, were what most media consumers considered important, interesting, and therefore memorable? The first Gulf War was notorious for the way it was covered as if it were the Superbowl, but that was also, probably, the best way to sell it, and I can't think of many people I know who were interested in knowing anything else about it.

And the Beat Goes On

Though they perpetrate more than their share of outright falsehood, a lot of what is wrong with corporate media is distortion, tone, and viewpoint.



A good example of what I'm talking about is this AOL.com post, "Commando Raid May Be Strategic Blow to Israel Itself." Joseph Schuman, Senior Correspondent, writes that the attack "may have played right into the hands of Hamas and the Islamist Palestinian group's principal sponsor, Iran." It would be nice if Israel's malfeasance were to backfire, but what about the people Israel just killed, and for that matter what about the Palestinians? No, it's all about Israel, and a little later it's all about Obama too. This writer makes it clear right off the bat which side he's on.



He laments that "even the most moderate Palestinian leaders [are] unwilling to talk to Israel," and that Obama's "international effort to impose tough new United Nations sanctions on Iran over its suspect nuclear program is now likely to be overshadowed by a Middle East agenda dominated by the Israeli raid for weeks or months to come." Considering Israeli rejectionism and the manifest falsehood of Obama's charges against Iran, these are not necessarily bad outcomes.

Israel has enforced the blockade of Gaza partly in response to the rockets regularly fired from there into Israel since 2007, when the militant group Hamas gained control of the territory.

First, rockets were not "regularly fired into Israel" -- the assaults were sporadic at most -- and Hamas has stopped them from being fired into Israel at all for the past couple of years, even after Israel's vicious attack on Gaza at the end of 2008. If that were the rationale for the blockade, it no longer exists. (If violence against civilians justified a blockade, by the way, Israel should have been blockaded decades ago.) And Hamas actually "gained control of the territory" by winning the 2006 elections, for which the Palestinians were harshly punished by the US and Israel. The US and Israel then encouraged the other Palestinian faction, Fatah, to attempt a coup against Hamas. The coup failed. But all this, as Noam Chomsky would say, cannot be acknowledged in the official media.

Once the passengers resisted with force, Netanyahu said, "our soldiers had to defend themselves."

As I have said before, aggressors and murderers have no right of self-defense. The legal situation, as John Caruso writes, is clear enough.

But the footage of slingshots and the marbles they launched are just as likely to be used as propaganda by Hamas to argue the passengers faced a David-vs.-Goliath fight against the heavily armed Israelis.

It isn't just Hamas who will use that footage as "propaganda"; after all, the video was intended to be Israeli propaganda, but it may have backfired. The world just doesn't understand that a civilian with a slingshot is Goliath, and an Israeli soldier with an automatic weapon is David.

Other details of the flotilla may point to what seems to be a clear mission of provocation, such as the inclusion among passengers on the Mavi Marmara of "women, children, and the elderly, all of whom are organizers," as a correspondent for Al Jazeera reported before communication from the ship was cut.



But the consensus of international opinion was overwhelmingly against Israel.

It couldn't possibly be, could it, that Israel was in the wrong and that the consensus of international opinion (often appealed to by US propaganda against Iran and North Korea) might just be right for once? And I'm not entirely clear as to how including "women, children, and the elderly, all of whom are organizers," constitutes a "mission of provocation." By this logic, establishing a Jewish state in the Middle East, including women, children, and the elderly, would have to be seen as a mission of provocation.



Aside from the misrepresentations about Hamas, then, there are few outright lies in this article. It's the way that the writer takes for granted that gallant little Israel and her ally Barack are the good guys, beset by "propaganda" and "missions of provocation" as they engage in "self-defense" and try to bring peace to the Middle East.



P.S. This post at FAIR.org details more distortions elsewhere in the corporate media's coverage of the attack, and quotes Glenn Greenwald: ""Just ponder what we'd be hearing if Iran had raided a humanitarian ship in international waters and killed 15 or so civilians aboard."



Incidentally, at the United Nations (via) the US has blocked a strong condemnation of the attack by Turkey:

The Obama administration refused to endorse a statement that singled out Israel, and proposed a broader condemnation of the violence that would include the assault of the Israeli commandos as they landed on the deck of the ship.

It's only to be expected, of course, given Obama's enthusiastic support for Israeli crimes, but that doesn't make it less appalling.

And the Beat Goes On

Though they perpetrate more than their share of outright falsehood, a lot of what is wrong with corporate media is distortion, tone, and viewpoint.



A good example of what I'm talking about is this AOL.com post, "Commando Raid May Be Strategic Blow to Israel Itself." Joseph Schuman, Senior Correspondent, writes that the attack "may have played right into the hands of Hamas and the Islamist Palestinian group's principal sponsor, Iran." It would be nice if Israel's malfeasance were to backfire, but what about the people Israel just killed, and for that matter what about the Palestinians? No, it's all about Israel, and a little later it's all about Obama too. This writer makes it clear right off the bat which side he's on.



He laments that "even the most moderate Palestinian leaders [are] unwilling to talk to Israel," and that Obama's "international effort to impose tough new United Nations sanctions on Iran over its suspect nuclear program is now likely to be overshadowed by a Middle East agenda dominated by the Israeli raid for weeks or months to come." Considering Israeli rejectionism and the manifest falsehood of Obama's charges against Iran, these are not necessarily bad outcomes.

Israel has enforced the blockade of Gaza partly in response to the rockets regularly fired from there into Israel since 2007, when the militant group Hamas gained control of the territory.

First, rockets were not "regularly fired into Israel" -- the assaults were sporadic at most -- and Hamas has stopped them from being fired into Israel at all for the past couple of years, even after Israel's vicious attack on Gaza at the end of 2008. If that were the rationale for the blockade, it no longer exists. (If violence against civilians justified a blockade, by the way, Israel should have been blockaded decades ago.) And Hamas actually "gained control of the territory" by winning the 2006 elections, for which the Palestinians were harshly punished by the US and Israel. The US and Israel then encouraged the other Palestinian faction, Fatah, to attempt a coup against Hamas. The coup failed. But all this, as Noam Chomsky would say, cannot be acknowledged in the official media.

Once the passengers resisted with force, Netanyahu said, "our soldiers had to defend themselves."

As I have said before, aggressors and murderers have no right of self-defense. The legal situation, as John Caruso writes, is clear enough.

But the footage of slingshots and the marbles they launched are just as likely to be used as propaganda by Hamas to argue the passengers faced a David-vs.-Goliath fight against the heavily armed Israelis.

It isn't just Hamas who will use that footage as "propaganda"; after all, the video was intended to be Israeli propaganda, but it may have backfired. The world just doesn't understand that a civilian with a slingshot is Goliath, and an Israeli soldier with an automatic weapon is David.

Other details of the flotilla may point to what seems to be a clear mission of provocation, such as the inclusion among passengers on the Mavi Marmara of "women, children, and the elderly, all of whom are organizers," as a correspondent for Al Jazeera reported before communication from the ship was cut.



But the consensus of international opinion was overwhelmingly against Israel.

It couldn't possibly be, could it, that Israel was in the wrong and that the consensus of international opinion (often appealed to by US propaganda against Iran and North Korea) might just be right for once? And I'm not entirely clear as to how including "women, children, and the elderly, all of whom are organizers," constitutes a "mission of provocation." By this logic, establishing a Jewish state in the Middle East, including women, children, and the elderly, would have to be seen as a mission of provocation.



Aside from the misrepresentations about Hamas, then, there are few outright lies in this article. It's the way that the writer takes for granted that gallant little Israel and her ally Barack are the good guys, beset by "propaganda" and "missions of provocation" as they engage in "self-defense" and try to bring peace to the Middle East.



P.S. This post at FAIR.org details more distortions elsewhere in the corporate media's coverage of the attack, and quotes Glenn Greenwald: ""Just ponder what we'd be hearing if Iran had raided a humanitarian ship in international waters and killed 15 or so civilians aboard."



Incidentally, at the United Nations (via) the US has blocked a strong condemnation of the attack by Turkey:

The Obama administration refused to endorse a statement that singled out Israel, and proposed a broader condemnation of the violence that would include the assault of the Israeli commandos as they landed on the deck of the ship.

It's only to be expected, of course, given Obama's enthusiastic support for Israeli crimes, but that doesn't make it less appalling.