March 18, 2006
The truth just isn’t as important as it was back in the day
Our fine president and his entire administration speak of virtue and doing the right thing, but time after time their apparent problem with telling the truth gets them, and our entire nation in trouble. They love to look for the loopholes and doublespeak to get themselves out of a jam, but more and more their problematic fibs are blowing up in their face.
Now I’m not talking about the whole Iraqi war run-up and those ethereal WMDs were all told to be afraid of. I’m not gonna go on about whether or not our government sanctioned torture or when decision makers learned that the New Orleans levees had burst. I’m not even going to comment on how after years of fomenting societal suspicion of Arabs and Muslim extremists, the populace balked at the notion of putting America’s East coast ports under the control of the Emirate of Dubai.
Nope, instead I’m going to tell you about one of our fine presidents and his people’s littler fibs and how it shows their disrespect for and misunderstanding of the role a free press plays in a successful and free democratic society. It seems our fine president paid a recent visit to a Mississippi gulf coast construction site to buck up the spirits of those poor souls who lost everything in Katrina last year. But since he doesn’t really like to have to talk to that majority of Americans who don’t think much of him, our fine president sent some advance scouts ahead to find him a friendly resident to host him. These scouts told the home owner they were reporters from Fox News doing background reporting for a future story. Then after the president left the site, they revealed their true identity. Coverage of the incident is available here courtesy of the Biloxi Sun Herald, but outside of the journalist community this didn’t get much play.
It’s unfortunate that our fine president, a man who can not profess his love of democracy often enough, doesn’t understand the role the press plays in its success. He seems to view everything from a business standpoint, an ultra capitalist stance that what is best for the industry of industry and the business of business will lead to the best of everyone. In a free democratic society, the press serves as the people’s eyes and ears. The media watches things and then blabs about them to everyone. This is very helpful because most people are out working and can not waste their time watching every government meeting or business transaction. These activities can have major effects on people’s lives, so it’s kind of nice to have people working to make sure we all know about them. The media as an institution has many flaws, but at its core it serves a vital purpose. However, this purpose is easily corrupted if the populace is taught not to trust their press.
Trust is the only thing that makes the media effective. If people think their news source is full of crap, they might not even believe when the press shouts fire and waiting until things are getting pretty hot before running from a fire is kind of a bad idea. Our fine president and his merry band of handlers and lackeys don’t see the press as vital. They want the populace to take their every word as gospel, even after being so wrong so many times.
But worst of all, they actively work to discredit the media. By posing as reporters, their operatives or by paying to run slanted news copy in the Iraqi media and even on our own television networks here in the USA, they make it a bit more likely for someone to not trust the next real reporter they encounter. This might seem benign to some, but if people can’t tell a reporter from a federal agent they might be a bit less willing to come forward and let the world know when the people in power are abusing the trust of the public that put them there.
Well, according to The Washington Post the administration now feels really bad about all this. They’re going to “verbally reprimand” the two mysterious figures who impersonated Fox News representatives. Unfortunately, no one seems to be able to pin down just who these guys were and what department they work for. Maybe our fine president will just walk out of the oval office, belt out the reprimand to whoever is hanging about and consider the job done. I just worry that with White House staffers impersonating Fox News reporters some unlucky citizen is gonna mistake those devious Fox News Security forces for the harmless hired goons of the administration.