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Jay Rosen, at PressThink, has a superb analysis piece on the NYTimes and the lack of transparency there regarding the publication of the NSA piece. Definitely worth a read and some serious thought. Jay describes Bill Keller as a "watch our pages man" rather than being an editor who is willing to devote page space or interview time to explaining what went wrong or any decisionmaking process to readers.
Here’s my question: Why should I pay my hard-earned money for the newspaper, when Bill Keller doesn’t think he owes me and all of his other readers more than a "too bad, we don’t owe you anything but what we’re in the mood to print at the moment?"
As Rosen writes, the question of transparency is one that the NYTimes has been schizophrenic about for quite a while.
Alex Jones, a former reporter for the Times, and a biographer of the ruling family, noticed it. “It’s as though there are two Times minds at work here,” he told Salon. The first is stoic, and hostile to “meta” communication, which in this view detracts from the primary work. Traditionally (that is to say up until the ground shifted beneath them a few years ago) the editors of the New York Times tried not to talk about the New York Times, or indeed to “notice” it, and you saw little in the way of self-examination. It just came out with more journalism.
In that era, the ideal answer to any question about faulty reporting or editorial priorities was: watch the paper. Don’t ask us to talk about it; we’ll just give you non-replies. In Ken Auletta’s recent New Yorker profile of Sulzberger, he quotes Keller at a November staff meeting saying he was concerned about “orgies of self-absorption that distract us from our more important work.” That being open about decision-making counts as newsroom narcissism is also part of the stoic view.
Like I said, the Rosen piece is a must read. I’d hope for some self-examination by the Times editorial staff, but I refuse to contemplate anything that would result in orgies of any kind between Keller and Sulzberger. That’s just wrong.
UPDATE: HAHAHAHA Go read TBogg. Just go do it. You’ll thank me later.
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Relax, tryggth. The same thing happened to me (and mine) Thanksgiving week. The ticketing agent explained that our reservations were in the system, but our tickets weren’t. She explained further that the screw-up was unusual, because the more common problem is to have one’s ticket in the system but not one’s reservation.
We laughed it off as Seinfeldian. Too surreal to be venal, short of a cavity search and/or missed flight.
[Although you’ll never know — will you? — whether Homeland Security paid me to write this reassuring post…]
Ladies,
Surely the King is subject to the Act of Settlement?
IV. And whereas the laws of England are the birth-right of the people thereof, and all the Kings and Queens, who shall ascend the throne of this Realm, ought to administer the government of the same according to the said laws, and all their officers and ministers ought to serve them respectively according to the same: the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, do therefore further humbly pray, That all the laws and statutes of this Realm for securing the established religion, and the rights and liberties of the people thereof, and all other laws and statutes of the same now in force, may be ratified and confirmed, and the same are by His Majesty, by and with the advice of the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, and by authority of the same, ratified and confirmed accordingly.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/mona…..39,00.html
tryggth
“Ya betterwatch out, you better nnot cry, better not pout I’m tellin’ you why….”
Like Redd and several others, I’m having a sugar crash!
Seriously, it would make me nervous too!
I simply cancelled my newspaper subscription( The Sacramento Bee) when I realized that they were simply not reporting on the treason related scandals and were featuring conservative columnists at about a 4:1 ratio. I sent them a letter asking them to cancel my subscription and told them why. I recommend similar action for anybody who is not satisfied with their MSM outlet. Just don’t support them and TELL THEM WHY.
It really may have been some sort of computer glitch. It was just strange. I entered my confirmation number at an e-ticket terminal a couple of times and it said it could not complete the ticketing process. I asked the guy at the baggage counter, he took my name, entered it and then showed me the “Contact Superviser” screen.
Maybe they just overbooked and that is the way it shows up.
In any case, he walked off and came back a short while later and just gave me a boarding pass without explanation. I was too surprised to ask him what the problem was.
Like, I said, I’m just getting fidgety.
I’m as furious as anyone at the Times for sitting on the NSA story, but it’s nothing more than loose bloggity talk to say that they sat on the story to deliberately hand Bush the election.
As I noted in an earlier thread, it was the Times that broke the Al Qaqaa ammunition dump scandal in October 2004, which could have served as the October surprise that sank Bush for good, if the Democrats had had the stones to use it.
Imagine what the Republicans could have done, two weeks before an election, with the revelation that a Democratic administration had failed to secure massive caches of high explosives that were at that moment being used to blow up American troops.
Keller and Slutzberger (hmmm…a typo, but I think I’ll keep it) chickened out, IMO, because they got spoofed and spooked by Bush’s bogus national security arguments. Keller had been drinking that Kool Aid (neo)liberally for years, as evidenced by his insufferable OpEds prior to his ascension to ExecEd. And we need hardly enumerate Slutzberger’s gullibility issues.
Redd,
I read an unsubstantiated comment that Cheney is the top Freemason in the US. Any way to check on this?
new thread: “Silence”
Judas — he can’t be a Skull & Bone. Fitz went to Amherst as an undergrad and to Harvard Law. Skull & Bones is a Yale frat. organization.
No connection whatsoever for Fitzie.
Judge Scalia (spit!) whopped Bush pretty good in a recent Gitmo case…
just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you…
but seriously, if you were on a watchlist, how did you get off it long enough to get your flight? what did you have to prove or show?
I am waiting for Judge (strict constructionist) Bork to body slam Bush, the AG, and the DOJ for ignoring the 4th Amendment and arguing the polar opposite of “strict constructionism.”
can somebody please substantiate or (preferably) debunk rumour that Fitz is a Skull&Bone?
OK, I’m probably just being paranoid. But the ticket person did show me his computer screen which said “Contact Supervisor”.
Recent news is making me nuts, perhaps…
well, “tryggth” sounds kinda foreign, now that you mention it…
Someone with a better grasp of journalistic history will correct me if I’m wrong, but my impression is that the NYT and WaPo both got their reps as “(crusading)(liberal)papers of record” on the strength of just one story each.
For the NYT, that story was The Pentagon Papers. For WaPo, it was Watergate.
Also, IIRC, in both cases the stories originated from outside the normal political coverage circles, and had to be championed by editors in the face of opposition from inside and outside the paper. In other words, the Pentagon Papers and Watergate coverage weren’t actually a product of an established “crusading, truth-telling” culture; they were anomalous.
If and when NTY and WaPo really weigh in hard against the Bush Admin on any issue – if they ever go after Bush the way they went after Clinton – it will only be after there’s a already a general consensus that Bush is on the downhill slide AND that Democrats are on an upswing.
Wow, weird off topic experience.
Flying home to Seattle, no problem. Flying back to CA this morning my name apparently showed up on a watch list.
Any other FDLers have this experience in the past?
in the case of Sulzberger, he and his family own the paper. As some wag observed: freedom of the press is for those who own them. OR never argue with somebody who buys ink by the barrel.
That’s for sure! Lock ‘em up. Jay Rockefeller’s providing good momentum on this Times business.
NYT & WaPo:
As for these two neo-rags, I simply no longer read them. Well…that is, I speed read them. Very speedily too. The only use I have for these two pieces of pulp is to vaguely notice what the opposition is up to, and for cat-box liners. These two once respectable organs are being stiffed. And their publishers, editors, the many so called reporters, op-ed’ers and columnists keep trying to stiff their readers. And as for the see-thru tandem bike riding newsboys, Keller and Shulzberger, I can’t figure out why these guys are still an issue. How come they haven’t been fired? Like ages ago. We had the age of reason and the age of enlightenment. I wonder how long the age of deception will be with us.
Oh god yes, angry old broad!
We have a fetish for “business” in this country that is unreal!
I don’t even think much of “business” is related to the theoretical, much-beloved free market either—it’s just a big fraternity of people shifting other people’s money around, dipping their greedy paws in at every opportunity; depending on the valuation of their work on other members of the fraternity—NOT the consumers; finally, adept at only one thing—the upright ape’s noblest gift: the ability to dissemble convincingly.
Here’s my question: Why should I pay my hard-earned money for the newspaper, when Bill Keller doesn’t think he owes me and all of his other readers more than a “too bad, we don’t owe you anything but what we’re in the mood to print at the moment?”
here’s the answer;
the ny times used to be my window into the word
I didn’t buy the “liberal ny times” myth, but it still had more actual data then corporate media
since I found out that the ny times is in league with the adminstration, and handed the election to this president by withholdin vital information that the public needed to know, I don’t even visit the paper unless a source I trust links to it
raw story, think progress, and a host of other sources are much more informative
they have already begun the slide to corporate mindlessness and they’ve already lost the most important supporters of their paper.
the new york times is dead
Give it time Joe. There are many ongoing investigations that may produce many more indictments and trials. Think about how depressed we all were at this time last year. Look how far Bush has fallen. Who knows where we and the Dems will be at this time next year?
“We fight every fight. We answer every lie. We stand in every empty space and we shout with whatever voice we have and we use the time that we have in the best ways we can and we make a better world because of it, regardless of the results of any election this year or any year. We make ourselves known and we DO NOT SHUT UP about the things that matter and if we talk ourselves hoarse, then so fucking be it, because this is who we are, this is what we’re about, and that’s all there is to say.
Not.
One.
Inch.
A.
Athenae | 08.02.05 – 9:13 pm |”
(originally posted at Eschton)
A theory I have is that much of this sort of bullshit comes from running the whole blessed world”like a business”.”Business”doesn’t give a rat’s ass about life or lives,and it has no loyalty to People or Country,therein is the Problem.
I understand that you have to have a certain amount of business savvy and smart financial plans of action for government and business both to operate smoothly,and for people to do well overall.But the second you forget any kind of humanity while you’re doing that is when things begin going into the ditch.As we see.
As someone trying to sort out this nightmare on her own(by reading alot and talking to a few people I trust),I find it,umm,uncomfortable to say the least, that business accumen seems to be the only thing people give a shit about anymore.Is it just me or are there ALOT of youngish MBAs doing minion work these days? And hell,as the village idiot of DC proves,you don’t even have to be GOOD at it as long as the right people funnel money your way.
The NYT pisses me off,but they just have the same damned disease the rest of the “media”has.Kiss ass,get paid,lather ,rinse,repeat. The only time the bastards tell the truth is when they think it’s gonna sell more papers as the shit hits the fan.Ack.
This is all about greed and power drunken madness at it’s core.There’s a HUGE web of corruption here,and if there’s ever any Justice in all this,those complicit in this PR/propaganda machine should be subject to the same punishments as the PNAC neocons and the rest of the pack of thieves.
Man I loathe these bastards.I want our country back from them before we have nothing left to get back.
I’m not cynical. I think that a level of realism has reached those who hoped Bush would easily be ousted because of his many manifestly impeachable and criminal offenses. It’s not going to be easy to get rid of Bush; on the other hand, Republicans are not going to like keeping Bush, unless he becomes crowned Caesar—which seems not out of the question.
I am getting really cynical about prospects for change in 2006. As I reflect on 2004 and 2005, it seems to me with all the scandals, corruption, complicity of the right wing media, the national outrage meter is still barely registering and not generating any spines for the opposition party.
How can Keller explain sitting down in the Oval Office with Bush and his minions, getting his arm twisted into not running a story like the NSA spy operation? Sure, the conversation started friendly and nice, and there were expressions of concern for national security. That conversation probably shifted quickly. (Oh, to be a fly on that wall!)
Now Keller doesn’t want to admit/explain his reasoning. He’s embarrased. Resigning would be honorable, but I doubt that will happen either.
Now we know of 2 stories that the WH tried to keep from being printed. How many more stories were actually not printed because of WH pressure?
Mmmph! Bud I can’t keeb mmy hads off du peanud Budder Chrzmuz drees, mmmph, chomp mmm!
Swopa: “As Iraqi’s stand up, we’ll hand them a time bomb and stand back.”
http://www.needlenose.com/
I was a good girl! I stayed out of the Fudge …… well…. I had a few pieces ;)
Oh Kathi — I think it is too much fudge. My brain is sugar addled. LOL
Redd
Ah! You too are suffering from
Elfsheimers and have become Elfincrepit!
This is the a disease that is permeating not nly the MSM , but our leaders as well. Questioning yourself is just,”Bad Think!”
I don’t want to get all tinfoil hatty, but does Karl Rove still have his security clearance so he can go thru the NSA collected emails and phone calls of Democrats? Bush sure as hell doesn’t, there are way to many details for Little Boots little brain to deal with.
There can’t be many people in the WH looking at that kind of data for political operations. (Plenty of NSA folks looking for threats, yes. Just not political.)
Or maybe I’ve eaten too much holiday candy and my sugar soaked brain needs a rest. Hard to tell. ;)
From the NYT:
The volume of information harvested from telecommunication data and voice networks, without court-approved warrants, is much larger than the White House has acknowledged, the officials said. It was collected by tapping directly into some of the American telecommunication system’s main arteries, they said.
snip
Yikes!
Notes to self: Unplug Cable Box before discussing where the next Drinking Liberally meeting will be held. Adhere BUSH/CHENEY sticker to front door and have religion channel on before cable guy gets here. Call cable and ask how much is HBO without the spy channel.
as a good Catholic Filipina, she understands the significance of the thirty pieces of silver she receives…
I read the Malkin piece. How much do the Bushies pay this woman? Certainly that information is out there somewhere.
Poor Michelle. She couldn’t find a logical thought if it jumped up and bit her.
[on Malkin] Hypocrisy, what’s that? [off Malkin]
Redd,
I’ve been one a those folks who thinks Fitz’s second shoe is gunna be a big one and that if he proves true ta form there will be a third and fourth and…but what about the possibility of a couple a pseudo journalists ending up on charges, plea bardained, immunized er unindicted co-cons? There is jest too much institionalized corruption goin on in the mainstream ta think that Fitz isn’t gunna use some a these “creatures of the night” to make his cases.
Oops — that was “wasn’t about them both being men.” SIGH I’m clearly too food-laden and tired today to be blogging.
Ah Wilson, it was about them both being men. It was about them being Sulzberger and Keller. That’s just a mental image that no one needs. ;-)
as a gay man who just a week ago helped pass a GLBT human rights ordinance in Indianapolis(!), I felt I needed to add that caveat of tolerance…
The NYTimes knew about the 9-11 threat before it happened, and haven’t published anything to date about that fact.
See this link: http://www.cjr.org/issues/2005/5/judycode.asp
In July of 2001, Steve Engelberg, then an editor at The New York Times, looked up to see Judy Miller standing at his desk. As Engelberg recalls, Miller had just learned from a source about an intercepted communication between two Al Qaeda members who were discussing how disappointed they were that the United States had never attempted to retaliate for the bombing of the USS Cole. Not to worry, one of them said, soon they were going to do something so big that the U.S. would have to retaliate.
Mwahaha Wilson. I considered adding that, but thought I’d be gilding the lily.
not that there’s necessarily anything wrong about it…
fitz?