Leslie Stahl of 60 Minutes and Cokie Roberts, ABC commentator, are two media talking heads who have denounced the Internet in early 1997. Ms. Roberts, along with her husband Steve, make a sleazy attempt to discredit the Internet as a reliable source for information in their syndicated column. They (major media) want you to believe "their" version of events, and theirs only.In other words, individuals exchanging ideas and communicating on the Internet, without the pronouncements by major media gurus like Stahl and Roberts, are dangerous and cannot be trusted.
Last week Washington Weekly joined the swelling chorus of Bronx cheers emanating from electronic journalists on the World Wide Web and directed at mainstream journalists Steve and Cokie Roberts, a husband and wife team who recently co-authored a column in which they excoriated the Internet for promoting every social ill from pornography to participatory democracy.I will not reiterate the deadly accurate bull's-eyes scored in the Washington Weekly article, which is available in the archives of this publication. I do believe that some of the reaction on the Web is worth noting, however, as it underscores the rapid changes that are occurring in the way nformation is disseminated in our society and hints at possible implications for our
political system.Jon Katz, writing in Hotwired, observes that:
"The column serves as a window into the dark and disconnected heart of Washington journalism, a culture that fiercely defends its own freedom but has mixed feelings about everyone else's."It's one of those things you almost wish he hadn't said -- if only because it would have been so nice to have said it yourself. The self-absorption of Washington journalists is really too much to be believed. It never seems to occur to them that the First Amendment applies to anyone but themselves. Perhaps this is the result of their having had everything pretty much their own way for as long as anyone can remember.Brock Meeks of MSNBC finds "the hysterical tone of the column" to be "astounding," particularly the authors' expression of dread at the notion "that computers facilitate the ability of people to
get in touch with each other on public policy issues," sort of like an "electronic town meeting," an analogy that they aver "makes our blood run cold."Steve and Cokie elaborate:
"To us it sounds like no more deliberation, no more consideration of an issue over a long period of time, no more balancing of regional and ethnic interests, no moreThey whine that the Founding Fathers made explicit "their advocacy of representative government as opposed to direct democracy."
protection of minority views."With all due deference, this sudden resurgence of respect for the views of the Founding Fathers seems a little bit out of place for a couple of politically correct Washington snobs who have seemed to regard the Supreme Court as a sort of continuing constitutional convention and the Constitution itself as an "evolving" document that means whatever nine black-robed old phuds say it means on any given day. All but the First Amendment, that is, which is immutable -- at least insofar as it applies to them. Who are they kidding? These people are from a culture that regards the Founding Fathers as "a bunch of farmers," to whom they feel intellectually and morally superior, although it would be impolitic to say so openly.
But, of course, they are without shame, which is what makes them such effective propagandists. They go on to quote the words of James Madison from the Federalist Papers, "the public voice pronounced by the representatives of the people will be more consonant to the public good, than if pronounced by the people themselves convened for the purpose."
Nobody gets it right every time -- had Madison been able to witness the recent budget deal in which both sides sold out their constituents and then assured them that they had produced a balanced budget in five years time (based on wildly optimistic revenue estimates that are certain to fluctuate with the economy and some dubious legerdemain involving the consumer price index), he might have wished to revise and extend his remarks.
The Roberts tell only part of the story with their Madison quote. In a book that should be familiar to every citizen, Democracy in America, Alexis de Toqueville noted that, "Americans determined that the members of the legislature should be elected by the people directly, and for a very brief term in order to subject them, not only to the general convictions, but even to the daily passions, of their constituents."
Using Toqueville's criteria, electronic democracy seems the very thing needed to put the people who presume to represent us back in touch with their constituents -- term limits would be helpful as well. Meeks gives us a look at the way electronic democracy might be expected to work. The example he cites is "a nationwide town hall meeting, cybercast by Democracy.Net with Rep. Rick White, R-Wash."
The interview with White was broadcast in RealAudio with simultaneous live chat. In other words, the participants could listen to the congressman at their home computers and respond with questions of their own. For those who couldn't make it in real time, there is "a full audio archive of White's remarks along with a full transcript of the chat."
Meeks sees this as a way of bridging the gap between representatives and a public that is "far too removed from its government and impotent when it comes to being a part of the process." Steve and Cokie Roberts fear that unless they do something to put the voters back in the loop, "Congress could eventually find its very existence threatened, thanks to the Internet."
The Internet certainly makes a convenient scapegoat for all the paranoid fantasies that a couple of mainstream scribes can dream up in an afternoon, but I suspect that this is not what really troubles them. Neither is it the threat of "Cyber seduction, cult by computer, kids caught in an indecent web!" which the Roberts hype with numerous lurid allusions. "Kiddie filters," already commercially available, are effective in blocking out such rubbish, as Steve and Cokie must be well aware. Like many of their mainstream colleagues, they can't seem to resist an opportunity to indulge themselves in a sleazy, demagogic attack upon an institution of which they disapprove, much as the mainstream media worked itself into a feeding frenzy blaming conservative talk radio for the Oklahoma bombing. Did Tim McVeigh, John Doe 2, Dennis Mahon and Andy Strassmeir sit around for three hours every afternoon listening to Rush Limbaugh until the pressure had built up to such a peak they just had to reach out and bomb someone? I don't think so.
Mr. Katz in his article, "Mrs. and Mr. Roberts' Neighborhood," seems to have it weighed off about right:
"The couple embodies the power of the Washington press corps to set the national agenda and, in the best traditions of the 'few-to-many' information model, tell the rest of us what's important. It is both a lucrative and powerful position."And, of course, people in lucrative and powerful positions will often do most anything to hold on to those positions. As Mr. Katz says:"What they are arguing for, of course, is not just the rights and power of elected officials, but the control reporters in that city have wielded for so many years. Call it 'representative journalism.' "The truth is, a big star such as Cokie Roberts is far more influential than the average senator or congressman -- and, in a sense, is just as much a part of the government. For very little actually gets done in Washington without at least the tacit assent of big media. They can make, or break, most politicians at will. Ronald Reagan was an exception -- Newt Gingrich is not. Most Americans are quite certain that Newt has done something truly awful, although few can tell you just what they think he did. The Republicans attempted to govern without the concurrence of big media in 1995 -- they won't soon make that mistake again.Economist Joseph Schumpeter wrote in his book, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, that politicians "are able to fashion and, within very wide limits, even to create the will of the people." That is why they need the media. That is also why the decision of the electorate means very little unless the media concur. The choice of the electorate in 1994 was about as decisive as these things ever get, yet within a year, the media had convinced them that they didn't really mean what they had said.
Mr. Katz seems to understand this, up to a point at least:
"Some of them are as arrogant and clueless as we think they are. They really do think they are smarter than everybody else. They really are trained to dismiss even the clearest expression of public will. The differences between old and new information cultures are profound."And why would big media not be arrogant? For decades now, they have had things pretty much their own way. Granted, they didn't always get their way during the Reagan years, but prior to that, they turned on Lyndon Johnson and Johnson promptly quit; they decided that Nixon must go, and Nixon was hounded out of office; they turned against the Vietnam War, and we pulled out of Vietnam, abandoning our erstwhile allies to their fate; they favored Bill Clinton, and Clinton was twice elected to the presidency, despite his involvement in scandals sufficient to scuttle the careers of a dozen Republican politicians. Why would big media be impressed by an expression of public will? When all is said and done, it is usually they who determine the public will."Washington reporters," writes Katz, "have learned to dismiss what their consumers think as irrelevant, even dangerous. Readers do not know what's good for them . . ."They have been able to get away with this because, even though their average consumer expresses suspicion of the mainstream media, there was, until quite recently, no alternative source of information -- at least none that the average consumer was aware of. With very few exceptions, the entire mainstream media are singing from the same songbook.While the more docile among them may find this acceptable, to the thoughtful consumer the very unanimity strikes a discordant note. The opinions of intelligent people who are thinking freely simply do not mesh all that harmoniously. Add to this the enlightenment that comes to those who learn to use the Internet as an effective source of information, and the cause of the incipient panic among mainstream journalists becomes clear, for the skilled net surfer understands that the mainstream media present only a heavily censored subset of the daily news. In the mind's eye of the surfer, his daily newspaper must look very similar to those French newspapers published during the German occupation, with large blank spaces where the censor had excised articles considered a bit too sensitive for public consumption.
For example, to the average news consumer, the Oklahoma bombing case centers on Tim McVeigh and Terry Nichols, the alleged perpetrators (unless they happen to be among the four thousand or so subscribers to the McCurtain Gazette, or the relative handful who read the London Telegraph, or belong to the ten percent of the population who get their news from the Internet, or talk radio). Thus, only about one in ten Americans are presently aware of the vast, dark underside of this story that is not being told by the mainstream press.
Why then, we might ask, are mainstream journalists becoming so alarmed? Because, within the decade, the Internet will become available to anyone with digital TV -- and there will be only digital TV. The "mene-tekel" has been there on the wall long enough to be grasped by even the slowest readers among them.
The Washington Weekly article makes the point that while the American people see a tyrannical government as the greatest potential threat to democracy, mainstream journalists are inclined to see democracy menaced by free enterprise -- and the people themselves -- and government as "the instrument to control that threat."
That would explain why, in every case where government malfeasance has been alleged, e.g. Ruby Ridge, Waco, Vince Foster, "mainstream reporters side blindly" with the government. An illustration of this was given recently by none other than Cokie Roberts.
During a recent panel discussion held at American University in Washington, D.C., Cokie was told by John Clarke, a Washington attorney representing Patrick Knowlton -- without pay -- of the crimes committed against his client by agents of the United States Government. He then asked her, "Isn't it incumbent upon you to report the truth about my client and the obstruction of justice in the death investigation of White House Counsel Vincent W. Foster?"
Cokie replied, "Thousands of reporters have looked into the death of Vincent Foster and everyone including the numerous investigations have concluded that his death was a suicide."
Those familiar with the Foster case will recognize this as the standard cover story, prattled by mainstream journalists almost without variation whenever they are queried on the Foster case. It isn't clear whether they are all required to memorize it, or perhaps have it tattooed on the insides of their eyelids.
As cover stories go, this one is a complete crock. There have really been only two investigations, the original police investigation conducted by the U.S. Park Police, using largely inexperienced personnel who were easily cowed and brushed aside by White House luminaries, and a subsequent investigation by Louie Freeh's FBI, under the direction of special counsel Robert Fiske, who distinguished themselves primarily by suborning and browbeating witnesses and falsifying evidence (their specialty, I believe). One can but marvel at the fact that we are still expected to regard the work of the FBI with childlike trust and reverence in light of the recent report by the inspector general of the Justice Department indicating that the agency has routinely and massively falsified evidence. Perhaps we are supposed to have forgotten about that already.
The remaining "investigations" were little more than slapdash reviews of the two original, hopelessly flawed investigations. The present Starr investigation is really a continuation of the flawed Fiske investigation, using the same compromised FBI investigators. Although nothing appears to be happening in the present investigation, a final report has still not been issued after more than three and one-half years. That alone should be enough to induce a free press to apply pressure for release of the report -- if we had a free press in this country.
Instead, we have a steady parade of media hirelings, who are content to carry water for the government by announcing periodically that Starr is about to release a report declaring Foster's death to be a "suicide." Starr invariably denies this and the story is filed away for use the following year. But, wait a minute -- according to Cokie, hasn't Foster's death already been declared a suicide in "numerous investigations"? Why then is this such a big (perennial) story? How about it, Cokie? Is there something you haven't told us?
One of the major problems with the mainstream media is the type of people who occupy the top slots. Many of them are really not journalists, but political operatives of one sort or another. For example, Tim Russert, now a very big wheel at NBC, worked for New York Gov. Mario Cuomo and Sen. Patrick Moynihan until almost the mid-80s. And Ken Bode, now with PBS, was an aide to Morris Udal's presidential campaign in 1976. Perhaps even more to the point, ABC news president Roone Arledge, a friend of the Kennedy family, was responsible for spiking a documentary that examined the possible involvement of the Kennedy brothers, JFK and RFK, in the death of Marilyn Monroe. ABC has spiked a number of documentaries since then, including a recent one on the Oklahoma bombing.
As for Cokie Roberts, she is the daughter of Hale Boggs, a former Democratic House Whip who was the product of a corrupt Louisiana political machine that dates back to Huey Long. Interestingly, Boggs was made a member of the Warren Commission that investigated the death of JFK. According to John H. Davis, author of The Kennedy Contract, a book that explores a possible Mafia connection in the assassination, Boggs "could be relied upon to...see to it that his principle financial backer, and behind-the-scenes power in the state government, Carlos Marcello, would not be mentioned in the commissions deliberations, which, as it turned out, he never was."
Marcello was the Gulf-Coast Mafia boss who some observers believe was involved in the JFK assassination, although this was never proven. I will not go into the Boggs family's present connections with the corrupt Clinton administration, which were described in some detail in the Washington Weekly article.
The point of all this is that covering up government corruption must seem like pretty old hat to Cokie Roberts -- nothing really out of the ordinary. The more things change, the more they stay the same -- until that distant day when public awareness of what has been done to our country in the interest of going along in order to get along finally reaches critical mass and the citizens reclaim their government -- and their history.