Davids Medienkritik

Maybe the German Media was Right...

(By Ray D.)

We admit it...the President is trying to intimidate, bully, coerce and control the American media to suit his agenda...with noticeable success.

But why aren't more German media outlets enraged, indignant, angry and up-in-arms about this story...?

Financial Times Deutschland: America on a Slow Path to Fascism

(By Ray D.)

We at Medienkritik have seen a lot of media folly in three years. But few articles exhibit greater ignorance and the ability to warp views on the nature of democracy in the United States than Thomas Klau's recent column in Financial Times Deutschland. The article, entitled "In Patriotic Morass" makes the following assertion:

"America's military leadership discusses with remarkable openness whether excessive brutality and a lack of cultural sensitivity have contributed to driving Iraqis into the resistance. Whoever follows the political debate and the media reporting in the USA on the matter, however, can hardly find an independently researched word not authorized by the military."

That's right: Mr. Klau honestly believes that the debate over Iraq in the United States is somehow controlled by the US military (and that means Bush must be behind it all.) He believes that the USA has devolved into a land of mind-numbed robots so blinded by patriotism that independent thought is nearly impossible. He continues:

"However in the media something more fundamental is reflected: A society which has dedicated itself, to an unimaginable degree for Europeans, to a cult of Fatherland, flag, soldiering and manliness. "Salute our Heroes," is the name, for example, of a job fair for veterans that is not being organized by the Pentagon, but instead by the "New York Times." The ad contains a snappy photo of a soldier whose aesthetic would remind many, not only Germans, of undemocratic times. And it would be unthinkable in any civilized European nation that a left-liberal newspaper like the "New York Times" would publish a guest commentary in which was written: "Our warriors are the hunters, not the hunted, and we should celebrate them as we did in the past (...) The strength of the pack is the wolf."

Cowardly Politicians

What America's television and daily press ignore is certainly not touched by America's political system. In the public diction of the Republicans and Democrats the US Armed Forces are the best and purest in the world, and their members all heroes, the flower of the nation. A few of the only points of light are offered by monthly magazines such as "New Yorker" and "Vanity Fair." They cultivate a culture of debate that often exceeds that of European counterparts and promotes critical thinking.

But seen as a whole, America's public has been swimming on a wave of patriotic fervor that has hardly subsided since September 2001 and drowns out introspection and the ability to judge all too often in a morass of overly emphatic love of country. In the USA of today the military discusses its own failures more openly and harder than the press and politicians dare to. That says it all. America's democracy must come to its senses before the USA can again live up to its claim to moral and practical leadership in the world."

Of course. Only the "civilized" Europeans can truly claim moral leadership in the world. Put differently, Mr. Klau believes America is on a slow path to Fascism. He believes that freedom of the press is withering in the United States and that no one has the courage to challenge Bush or the military. Apparently the ridiculous assertion that the US media is muzzled or afraid rings more true to the author than the very real dismantling of media freedoms in places like Russia. How many newspapers, radio stations, corporations or political organizations have been shut down lately by the government in the USA?

So we have to ask: What United States is Mr. Klau talking about? Has he missed the daily body counts on CNN and FoxNews? Has he missed the media obsession with Cindy Sheehan? Has he missed President Bush's low approval ratings? Has he missed Michael Moore and Gore Vidal and Al Gore and Al Franken and the hundreds upon hundreds of anti-Bush books published in the USA over the past several years that can be found in virtually any bookstore anywhere in the country? Did he miss the American media's coverage of Abu Ghraib and Haditha? Did he miss the recent media revelation (straight from the New York Times) that the US was eavesdropping and monitoring banking records to track terrorists? Has he completely missed statements by Jack Murtha or Ted Kennedy or John Kerry on US troops and operations in Iraq? Has he missed all of the anti-war demonstrations that have taken place in the US since 2001?

Somehow it seems that Mr. Klau is living in a fantasy vacuum of his own making where only facts that correspond to his worldview are actually acknowledged and real. His citation of an ad for a veterans job fair and an editorial in The New York Times as magic proof that America is becoming a militarist state is so absurd that it would be laughable if so many Germans didn't actually believe it. Mr. Klau is so far out of touch with reality that it is physically painful to imagine how a newspaper like the Financial Times Deutschland could have possibly allowed such pathetic trash to run in the first place. And the German people keep swallowing this garbage day in and day out, believing it to be legitimate and based in fact. Sad but true...

Endnote: Just to be clear, Mr. Klau does not explicitly state that America is on a path to Fascism in his article. We interpret his writing as a clear indication, however, that he sees the situation as such. Thus our title.

ARD Tagesschau: US Soldiers Guilty Until Proven Innocent

(By Ray Drake)

It has happened before: Members of the German media have tried and convicted American soldiers of alleged war crimes before they ever go to trial. The latest case involves an article featured on the homepage of ARD tagesschau, a large, state-sponsored news program:

The headline above speaks of a "massacre" even though it has not been conclusively determined that the killings were part of an actual massacre. Additionally, the lead paragraph claims that the 24 civilians involved were "murdered." Certainly, if an investigation and trial determine that the soldiers in question are, in fact, guilty of murder and participation in a massacre, they should be punished to the fullest extent of the law. But the bottom line is that the German media has no right to conclusively label the killings murders (and thus imply that the soldiers are murderers) until all the facts are known and until said soldiers are found guilty and convicted.

The fact that other media outlets, including ZDF and the BBC, have chosen their words more carefully further highlights ARD's blatant bias and lack of professionalism. Just compare this ZDF piece to the ARD piece. You will notice that ZDF has a question mark after the word "massacre" and reports that the soldiers allegedly killed the 24 civilians in an act of revenge and that they may well stand trial for murder. In other words, ARD immediately jumped to the conclusion that the soldiers are murderers, ZDF did not.

Ironically, the same ARD journalists who can't seem to stop screaming about the denial of judicial due process to Guantanamo inmates are not even willing to afford the same privilege to American soldiers, despite the fact that American soldiers stood guard for decades and guaranteed their freedom of speech during the Cold War. In the ARD world, Guantanamo terrorists are innocent until proven guilty, American soldiers guilty until proven innocent. The agenda of ARD and many on the Angry Left in dealing with the alleged massacre is best summarized in the following passage by John Gibson:

"It was last November and according to the story that is now shaping up, Marines went on a rampage after one of their own was killed by a roadside bomb. In the end, it appears they killed 24 people, including women and children.

The original story of the incident said the civilians were also killed by the roadside bomb that killed the Marine. That appears to be not true and the military is running a full-scale investigation. If it turns out to be not true, then the crime is doubled: first the massacre, then the cover-up.

I'm against massacres of civilians — I think we all are. I'm against cover-ups — you probably are too.

But I'm also against taking an incident in which our troops overreact and commit an arguably criminal act and making it stand for the entire war. The war in Iraq is not the story of massacres by Americans. If Iraqis know their own history they know this is true. Massacres have been committed in Iraq by warring parties for millennia piled on millennia. This is the part of the world that was in on the massacre game early, played it often and the last character to be up to his eyeballs in massacres was the very guy we went in to regime change: Saddam Hussein himself.

Those people who oppose the war and want to make those who supported it pay with shame, embarrassment and a complete loss of credibility and reputation, want desperately for this massacre — if it turns out to be what happened — to be the name this war is known by forever. Haditha — My Lai — Iraq — Vietnam: it all fits together neatly in a slime fest designed to win elections and set the direction of the history books.

The Iraq War may not be the best war we ever fought. When the dust settles we'll know for sure. But it accomplished a great goal that no one else had managed for the last 15 years at least: ridding the world of Saddam. No matter what the political spinners say, that was a great thing. And the Iraq War should be known for that fact — Saddam is gone — not for one incident of alleged revenge killing in a place called Haditha." (emphasis ours)

That is exactly what this is about for ARD, SPIEGEL ONLINE, Stern, SZ and other members of the anti-American German media establishment. This is about shaming the United States of America and those who supported the war, regardless of the facts, right or wrong. This is about seizing the moral high ground, pure and simple. The killing of two dozen Iraqi civilians suddenly matters to the German media elite. Why? Because it has the potential to discredit the United States, Bush and supporters of the war. Conversely, the same media cynics stood by and largely ignored the mass murder of hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians during the Hussein regime. Today they stand by and ignore the fact that their own government continues to promote trade with a government guilty of an ongoing campaign of mass murder in Sudan.

Finally, to top it all off, Germany's media cynics continue to blatantly mislead the German people by insinuating that the American media is somehow in bed with the Bush administration and only presenting a heroic view of the war that ignores the suffering. The most recent examples come from correspondents Udo Lielischkies of ARD in Washington (who claims the US media is only presenting a one-sided, heroic view of the war) and Sebastian Heinzel of SPIEGEL ONLINE in New York (who claims that almost nothing in American society or media exists to remind people of the war). Apparently these "journalists" just haven't seen the daily television news or read many newspapers while in the United States. They must have missed the thousands and thousands of articles and televised news features on bombings, beheadings, killings and kidnappings in Iraq run day for day for day in the US media with no positive story in sight. They must have missed all of Michael Moore's books and films, (quite an accomplishment for a German!) They must have missed Noam Chomsky and Gore Vidal and Cindy Sheehan and Air America. They must have missed George Clooney's Syriana. They must have missed the recent parade of retired generals calling for Don Rumsfeld's head. They must have missed John Murtha and Cobra II. They must have missed the daily casualty count on CNN, FoxNews, MSNBC and every other significant news network in the United States.

Simply put: The "journalists" in question must be blind, deaf and dumb. Or they must be lying our their asses to the German people. We strongly suspect it's the latter...

UPDATE: Michelle Malkin is also on the case...

UPDATE #2: Below is ARD's confusing new homepage summary of its latest Haditha piece. The headline calls the Haditha incident a "massacre" while the introductory paragraph that follows speaks of an "alleged massacre." So which is it at this point? As a reader, you really wouldn't know by looking at tagesschau online.

Unfortunately, ARD continues to call the 24 killings "murder." Again, whether it was murder or not ought to be determined by the appropriate legal and investigative authorities, not by the mainstream media or anyone else.

UPDATE #3: American troops are also guilty until proven innocent at SPIEGEL ONLINE. The Haditha incident has given SPON and other members of the Angry Left a new excuse to make further brain-dead comparisons to Vietnam.

UPDATE #4: Now members of the German media are referring to wide segments of the US military as "White Trash." Where does this end...?

Blog Carnival: "The Day I Woke As Pro-American"

(By Ray D.)

One of the great advantages of German-American blog carnivals is that you discover other blogs with a wealth of interesting postings. Case in point: A two-part piece on the blog "Pursuit of Serenity" (a blog written in English by a German from Dusseldorf.) entitled, "The day I woke as pro-American." (Part I and Part II.)

Money passage:

"...And then, there was the bright morning of 9/11. I still can recall the wheather conditions at the very moment the breaking news came in...

I was surfing the internet at that moment. And I kept on surfing the internet for the rest of the day. I simply couldn't move. Since I didn't own a TV set (I hate TV, to put it mildly), I turned on the radio. I sensed the growing tide of fear, anger and disbelief without myself being influenced by any pictures. It soon became pretty obvious to me, that the USA was under attack and that this day would have a deep impact on the identy of the USA and would deeply affect the transatlantic relationship.

A few days later, I attented the demonstration in Berlin to commemorate 9/11. I remember a lot of people, holding "solidarity with the USA"-signs. I remember then-ambassador Dan Coats thanking us for showing our sympathy and expressing our solidarity. I remember fighting back tears during the performance of "Amazing Grace". But one thing I found disturbing: apart from the signs calling for solidarity, there were also posters reading "No war!", and I thought by myself: "Hm. This meeting is supposed to be about mourning and commemorating. It's not an anti-war rally. It's not the right moment to tell the USA once more what to do (or not)."

We all know what happened in the aftermath of 9/11. Since the topic of this post is neither 9/11 nor the war on terror or the war in Iraq, I only want to take on one point concerning this aftermath. Paying attention to the news coverage by German MSM, I got the impression that U.S. citizens all thought alike and that their only news source seemed to be Fox News Channel. I wasn't too happy about that and I couldn't understand why the Americans deliberately dumped freedom of speech and variety of thought in favor of watching Fox News. Then again, I came across plenty of articles, colums, op-ed pieces etc. dealing with the war on terror and the war in Iraq and expressing a vast variety of viewpoints and opinions. "Who the heck is going to read all this stuff, if anyone down there is watching Fox News all the time?", I wondered.

This latter thought came on my mind again, when I got intrigued with China. German MSM don't provide much in-depth information about China. Hence, I had to use sources from the U.S. And again: loads of articles, columns, op-ed pieces on "The rise of China", "A new super power in the making", "The power of the dragon" etc. And again the question: If all Americans are such war-mongering lunatics, their heads filled with air - why all those journalists, pundits and experts care to launch all this stuff?" (emphasis ours)

Two interesting points: First, the anti-war posters observed by the author (Marian Tobias Wirth) shortly after 9/11. This is further evidence that the squandered solidarity myth is just that: A myth.

Second, the author's description of how the German media shaped his view of Americans (as a bunch of mind-numbed, brainwashed, war-mongering, lunatic Fox News junkies.) Here we have evidence that another myth, namely the "gleichgeschaltet myth" is alive and well in Germany.

Finally, Marian's first-hand account is just one more concrete example of the massive problem we've been talking about for three years on this site. The fact that many Germans are daily exposed to distorted, biased, one-sided disinformation on the USA. This sad reality has noticeably damaged German-American relations and significantly complicated transatlantic communication. All too often, Germans' views of America are dominated by spin, negative media images, and stereotypes. That is what we've set out to change.

Endnote: Marian mentioned that German media do not always provide in-depth coverage of China. With a few exceptions, that is generally true. They're not particularly interested in Sudan either, despite the fact that the German government is actively promoting trade there while the Sudanese government is involved in genocide and massive human rights abuses. Double-standards?

UPDATE: Joerg of Atlantic Review wanted us to remind readers that the German-American blog carnival is still seeking submissions, particularly articles in German. The deadline for submissions has therefore been extended to March 22. Please click here for more information on how to participate.

Austrian Journalist: US "Media Under Pressure"

(By Ray D.)

This past New Years Day, an editorial from across the Alps caught our attention. It was published in "Der Standard," Austria's self-described "leading quality newspaper": According to columnist Barbara Coudenhove-Kalergi, American journalism has been on the ropes ever since President Bush took office. And because of the President and his scheming corporate pals, American media have come under unparalleled "pressure" to censor themselves, refrain from criticizing the government, ignore topics involving the rest of the world and avoid domestic "social" issues such as single, homeless, oppressed, depressed, drug-addicted mothers. Coudenhove-Kalergi opens her commentary as follows:

"Media under Pressure
Since the Bush era, a further pillar of US democracy, American journalism, has begun to waver - Columns by Barbara Coudenhove-Kalergi

For over a century, American journalism was and is the unattained model for all European media people - independent, unafraid, the motto of the venerable New York Times requires "all the news that's fit to print." But that's how it used to be. Since the Bush era, a further pillar of US-democracy, American journalism, has begun to waver, according to a study from the New York Review of Books. Along with a hostile White House, increased political pressure from the right and media owners greedy for money, the study states that it is, above all, the self-censorship of journalists that is pressuring the standard. Experience teaches us that what happens today in the USA will happen tomorrow in Europe. At the beginning of a new year we all have reason to take this warning sign from America seriously.

The gravest defeat for the US media was naturally the gullibility with which they once believed the government lie on Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. But media critics count an entire row of other failings. The most important: Reporting from abroad is growing ever thinner and the reporting on domestic social questions as well."

A few initial observations. Throughout her editorial, Ms. Coudenhove-Kalergi fails to so much as mention the recent emergence of two significant new media fields in the United States: Blogs and talk radio. In fact, the only US media that she actually identifies by name are CBS, The New York Times and the New York Review of Books. This remarkably narrow understanding of "US media" may help to explain the author's acutely limited viewpoint. Of course it may also be that the author believes that blogs and talk-radio are all just a part of the vast right-wing conspiracy that is supposedly putting pressure on "objective" and "independent" media outlets like CBS News and The New York Times. It could also be that she's never heard of Daily Kos, Josh Marshall, AMERICAblog.com or Air America or any of the thousands of left-wing media outlets in the new American media landscape.

And perhaps Ms. Coudenhove-Kalergi has never considered the possibility that new media outlets, including blogs like this one, have dramatically increased overall coverage of foreign countries and domestic social issues for American news consumers. Perhaps that is because she is largely unaware of the shift taking place in the United States away from "traditional" media and towards "new" or "alternative" media. That may also be because the media landscape in German-speaking nations remains dominated by "traditional" forces and largely insulated from the dramatic changes taking place across the Atlantic.

Additionally, Ms. Coudenhove-Kalergi continues to assume, as many European journalists do, that the claim Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction was an intentional lie fabricated by the Bush administration to justify the war in Iraq. And although the idea of a fabricated "government lie" perpetrated by a sinister cabal surrounding President Bush may be emotionally satisfying and comforting to the readers of "Der Standard", it has precious little basis in fact or reality. What the author is conveniently forgetting to tell her readers is that many individuals, organizations and governments around the world, ranging from German and French intelligence to Bill Clinton to John Kerry, believed that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction shortly before the outbreak of hostilities in 2003. So does Ms. Coudenhove-Kalergi believe that they, too, were all part of a massive "right-wing conspiracy" to dupe the American media into silence?

Later in her editorial, Coudenhove-Kalergi continues with the following:

"No wonder that the inhabitants of the only superpower know so little about the rest of the world. They know equally little about the growing poverty in their own country, about working conditions in the under-classes, about the constantly growing power of corporations.

Here too the numbers speak volumes: The New York Times has 60 reporters for the "business" section, one single reporter for labor (union) questions. And the media corporations themselves are a part of the "business" world. They know that with articles on successful managers they can acquire a lot of advertising, but with articles on unemployed single mothers none at all. The result: Large segments of reality, from the many civilian dead in Iraq to unemployment in many cities of the American Midwest whose industries are being outsourced remain omitted in the media landscape.

Certainly, optimists see signs that the pendulum has, in the meantime, begun to swing back in the other direction. Hurricane Katrina and the misery of the residents of New Orleans opened the eyes of many American media people to the fact that there is another world beyond Hollywood and Wall Street about which the citizens ought to be informed. Since then, government and civil authorities are again being more critically questioned and self-criticism is being exercised in some opinion sections. The famous American journalism isn't going to die that quickly."

Of course! How could we have all been so blind and ignorant! How could we have all missed the obvious for so long: The New York Times and other mainstream media have indeed stopped reporting on homelessness, unemployment and civilian deaths in Iraq or anything beyond "Wall Street" and "Hollywood." How fortunate we are to have courageous, crusading journalists in Austria like Ms. Coudenhove-Kalergi to open all of our eyes for us! For three long years, no one in the media critically questioned the Bush administration and it took Hurricane Katrina and the brave European media elite to wake the American media from its long slumber! President Bush, corporate America and the vast "right-wing conspiracy" had the entire US media under their collective thumbs for far too long! Bush lied and people died! Drop Bush - not bombs! Make love - not war!

OK. Stop. Everyone take a deep breath. Let's get serious for a moment. Here is the sad, disheartening truth: A lot of people in Austria, Germany and Europe actually believe what Ms. Coudenhove-Kalergi is editorializing here. They honestly believe that American mainstream media have stopped reporting on unemployment, homelessness, poverty and civilian deaths in Iraq. They honestly believe that American media have withheld criticism of the Bush administration for years on end because they are allegedly under so much "pressure." They honestly believe that mainstream American media are being gravely threatened by corporate interests and a vast right-wing conspiracy. They honestly believe that American journalism and democracy are on the brink of collapse. They honestly believe the "gleichgeschaltet" lie to be true. They honestly believe that Americans are too ignorant and ill-informed to understand social problems in their own country. And, worst of all, they voraciously consume the steady diet of fallacious anti-American propaganda that journalists just like Ms. Coudenhove-Kalergi have been feeding them for years. Sadly, anti-Americanism has grown into a profitable industry with a sizable consumer base.

And then the same European "journalists" who write these cynical, mendacious propaganda pieces turn around and wonder why Americans and Europeans just can't seem to understand each other anymore. Must be all Bush's fault!

Addendum: Two More Postings on the Coudenhove-Kalergi Editorial

Stefan of Politically Incorrect deserves special thanks for bringing this piece to our attention. Stefan has his own write-up (in German) on the Coudenhove-Kalergi editorial in which he opines that mainstream media, including The New York Times and CBS News, are slowly losing market share because they have long been perceived by many as arrogant, elitist and biased towards the left, not because (as Ms. Coudenhove-Kalergi suggests) they have become too pro-Bush, too conservative or too self-censoring. Numerous studies conducted over the past few decades strongly support Stefan's position. Be sure to check out his site.

We also received an outstanding commentary on Ms. Coudenhove-Kalergi's editorial in the form of an email from our regular commenter Helian. (Please note that Helian has done his own translation work, which explains some minor differences with our article.) Here is his take:

"As regular readers of Medienkritik are aware, Germany’s mass media are not exactly paragons of disinterested objectivity. Compared to Austria’s however, they are as a great city of light to a provincial backwater. Anyone with doubts on that score need read no further than an article by Barbara Coudenhove-Kalergi (CK) entitled “Medien unter Druck,” which recently appeared in “Der Standard.”

The theme of the article appears to be...

SZ: US Journalists "Intimidated by Government Propaganda, Bloggers and Conservative Interest Groups"

(By Ray Drake)

Sueddeutsche Zeitung: America's "Patriotic" Media Bound by "State-Serving Corset"

Hard to believe but true: Many in Germany's media "elite" believe that George W. Bush has intimidated the US media into docile submission. They believe that, for the most part, the American "mainstream media" has become a willing servant to the Republican agenda.

For anyone who doubts this belief runs strong in Euroland, we submit to you the most recent exhibit from the Sueddeutsche Zeitung, entitled "Catastrophe Zone New Orleans: Mr. Brown, Where Were Your Buses?" The article, authored by Carla Palm, recently appeared at the very top of SZ's homepage. The opening paragraphs read:

"The wave of patriotism after September 11, 2001 damaged American journalism more than it benefited it. Now the country has gone through a new key experience: Hurricane Katrina destroyed thousands of existences – however the television reporters have this time found their own voice and are losing their inhibitions to bite.

The state-serving corset burst along with the dams in New Orleans that many journalists – intimidated by government propaganda, bloggers and conservative interest groups – had put on. George W. Bush’s political backing in the media collapsed.

Even his reliable mouthpiece, the 24 hour news broadcaster Fox News could no longer ignore that the government leadership left the mostly minority populace of New Orleans in the lurch.”

What a profound and lucid argument. Yes indeed...wasn't it clear all along? A dark cabal of government propagandists, bloggers and conservative interests have been intimidating the US media into submission ever since September 11. The mainstream media has been forced to kowtow to the interests of mighty emperor Bush. What nuance...what attention to detail...what bullshit!

Let's be serious for a moment: Ms. Palm never provides her sophisticated Eurosnob readers a single concrete example of "government propaganda." She never specifies which "bloggers" are "intimidating" journalists or how. She never mentions the existence of thousands of widely-read, left-wing blogs in the United States that have been in operation for years now with an audience of tens of millions or more. She never mentions which "conservative interest groups" have supposedly cowed American journalists into fearful submission nor does she provide a single shred of evidence that such intimidation has ever taken place.

Ms. Palm also never mentions the fact that conservatives, the people who allegedly control the media, are vastly underrepresented in American journalism, and, according to numerous recent studies, are significantly outnumbered by liberals throughout virtually all sectors of the US media. She never stops to consider how a Michael Moore could earn millions and win an Oscar in a media culture supposedly dominated by conservative intimidators. Finally, she never mentions the results of a major study done by Columbia University's Project for Excellence in Journalism in late 2004 that found the following:

"In the closing weeks of the 2004 presidential race, the period dominated by the debates, President George W. Bush has suffered strikingly more negative press coverage than challenger John Kerry, according to a new study released today by the Project for Excellence in Journalism.

The Project for Excellence also concluded in its "The State of the News Media: 2005" report that:

"When it came to the campaign, on the other hand, the criticism that George Bush got worse coverage than John Kerry is supported by the data.² Looking across all media, campaign coverage that focused on Bush was three times as negative as coverage of Kerry (36% versus 12%) It was also less likely to be positive (20% positive Bush stories, 30% for Kerry)."

But how could that be? Hasn't Bush thoroughly intimidated the media since September 11? Oh wait...maybe he has the journalism program of Columbia University under his thumb too...yeah, that must be it...yeah...he must have dispatched a gang of violent, right-wing reactionary bloggers to scare them all...oh yeah...

Welcome to Fantasy Land...

Here's the bottom line: Ms. Palm was either profoundly uninformed or she had on a particularly thick pair of ideological blinders when she sat down to write this article. Either way, she clearly occupies a fantasy world born of her own prejudice and ignorance. The problem is that many in the German (and European) media elite are living on the very same planet. SPIEGEL ONLINE has already done several misleading pieces to promote the "gleichgeschaltet" myth in German society. NDR ran a particularly nasty piece of bias along the same lines. And the phenomenon is hardly confined to Germany: Take Matt Wells at the BBC. His recent editorial, entitled "Has Katrina saved US media?", is strikingly similar in tone. Here are excerpts:

"Amidst the horror, American broadcast journalism just might have grown its spine back, thanks to Katrina.

National politics reporters and anchors here come largely from the same race and class as the people they are supposed to be holding to account.

They live in the same suburbs, go to the same parties, and they are in debt to the same huge business interests.

Giant corporations own the networks, and Washington politicians rely on them and their executives to fund their re-election campaigns across the 50 states.

It is a perfect recipe for a timid and self-censoring journalistic culture that is no match for the masterfully aggressive spin-surgeons of the Bush administration."

Not surprisingly, numerous German-language online media immediately chimed in with articles parroting the Well's editorial and labeling the entire situation Bush's "Katrinagate."

Who Will Save the German Media?

But when we at Davids Medienkritik look closely at coverage of the Katrina catastrophe, our first thought is not who will save the US media, but rather: Who will save the German media? Take for example the recent Philipp Mausshardt editorial in the Tageszeitung (TAZ). (click link below to continue)

SPIEGEL ONLINE: "Press Policy of the Bush Government: Bite-Sized Propaganda Films"

(By Ray Drake)

SPIEGEL ONLINE is on the warpath again.

The objective: Convince the German people that the American media is "gleichgeschaltet" or dominated by George W. Bush and his government's neo-conservative agenda.

Last month, we reported on a SPIEGEL ONLINE article entitled: "Bush's Perfect Propaganda Machine". The article complained that the Bush administration was producing PR films that were being used by the media without reference to the producer. Naturally, the authors failed to mention that the Clinton administration produced the very same sort of PR films. And only in the article's final paragraph did they admit that it was the sole responsibility of journalists to cite the sources of their material and to inform readers that the PR films in question are in fact government produced and represent the government's view. In our posting, we also pointed out that SPIEGEL ONLINE failed to mention that the mainstream media was clearly biased against President Bush in the critical period immediately preceding the 2004 election, a fact that contradicted the entire premise of the "Bush's Perfect Propaganda Machine" article.

Now we have the latest installment in SPIEGEL ONLINE's "gleichgeschaltet" series: An piece entitled "Press Policy of the Bush Government: Bite-Sized Propaganda Films". The first striking aspect of the article is that it repeatedly labels PR films produced by the Bush government as "propaganda." This time, however, the authors don't wait until the final paragraph to blame journalists who use the government-produced films without citing the source. They also have the decency to mention that the Clinton administration produced the same sorts of PR films. But they go on to bitterly complain that the Bush government has spent twice as much on these films as his predecesor and continue by criticizing the government's payments to journalists to support state policy, a practice which the Bush administration has long since declared out of bounds.

After reading "Press Policy of the Bush Government: Bite-Sized Propaganda Films", most readers are left with the impression that the Bush government is deviously attempting to manipulate and dominate the US media in order to brainwash the American people with pro-government "propaganda."

But, as always, a vitally important piece of information about the American media has been repeatedly kept from the German public by the German media. Why? Because this vitally important piece of information is at least as applicable and damning to the German media's credibility as it is to the American media's.

Endemic Leftwards Bias

Many Germans have picked-up the erroneous impression from the German press that the American media is dominated by conservatives in Fox News, talk radio, the blogosphere and the Bush administration. This impression has been largely created by journalists at publications like SPIEGEL ONLINE who feel deeply threatened by conservative, free market ideals and whose intent it is to convince the German public that the American media is dominated (i.e. gleichgeschaltet) by a sinister cabal of scheming neo-conservatives pulling the US media's strings in the background and secretly plotting to control the minds of America.

But the evidence collected over several decades tells an entirely different story that the German media has ignored time and time again: Surveys and studies of American journalists conducted over a period of more than thirty years have repeatedly and consistently revealed a long-standing, widespread and overwhelming bias in favor of Democrats and liberal ideals and against Republicans and conservative ideals.   

Here is just some of that evidence:

I. A survey of 547 journalists and media executives conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press in 2004 found the following:

"Journalists at national and local news organizations are notably different from the general public in their ideology and attitudes toward political and social issues. Most national and local journalists, as well as a plurality of Americans (41%), describe themselves as political moderates. But news people ­ especially national journalists ­ are more liberal, and far less conservative, than the general public.

About a third of national journalists (34%) and somewhat fewer local journalists (23%) describe themselves as liberals; that compares with 19% of the public in a May survey conducted by the Pew Research Center. Moreover, there is a relatively small number of conservatives at national and local news organizations. Just 7% of national news people and 12% of local journalists describe themselves as conservatives, compared with a third of all Americans.

In this regard, Internet journalists are similar ideologically to local journalists: 57% describe themselves as moderates, while 27% say they are liberals and 13% conservatives. Local TV and radio journalists include the lowest percentage of liberals of any of the journalist groups surveyed (15%). Even among local TV and radio journalists, however, just 13% describe themselves as conservatives."

II. A study of the media conducted by Columbia University's Project for Excellence in Journalism in late 2004 found the following:      

"In the closing weeks of the 2004 presidential race, the period dominated by the debates, President George W. Bush has suffered strikingly more negative press coverage than challenger John Kerry, according to a new study released today by the Project for Excellence in Journalism.

More than half of all Bush stories studied were decidedly negative in tone (1). By contrast, only a quarter of all Kerry stories were clearly negative. (...)

Stories primarily about the President were more than three times as likely to be negative than were stories mostly about Kerry (52% Bush versus 17% Kerry).

Negative Bush stories also outweighed positive ones. Only 15% of Bush stories on TV cast him in a clearly positive light. The largest number, 33%, were neutral.

Kerry fared far better. Indeed, his coverage was more than twice as likely to be positive during this period as negative. Fully 57% of stories primarily about Kerry were positive and another 26% were neutral.

Most of the network TV stories were not solely about Bush or Kerry but discussed both candidates. While these stories tended to be more neutral than stories about primarily one candidate or the other, even here there was a pattern of Kerry coming out better. In all, 11% of these stories were clearly negative about Bush, versus 4% for Kerry. Likewise, 16% were positive about Kerry, versus just 7% about Bush."                  

III. A survey of 1,149 journalists from print, television and radio conducted in 2002 and sponsored by the Knight Foundation found:

 "Compared with 1992, the percentage of full-time journalists who claim to be Democrats has dropped 7 percentage points in 2002 to slightly above 37 percent, moving this figure closer to the overall population percentage of 32 percent, according to a July 29-31, 2002 Gallup national telephone poll of 1,003 adults. This is the lowest percentage of journalists saying they are Democrats since 1971. 

 Slightly more journalists said they were Republicans in 2002 (18.6 percent) than in 1992 (16.3 percent), but the 2002 figure is still notably lower than the percentage of U.S. adults who identified with the Republican Party (31 percent according to the Gallup poll mentioned above)."

IV. According to MediaResearch.org:

"The "National Survey of the Role of Polls in Policymaking", completed by Princeton Survey Research Associates for the Kaiser Family Foundation in collaboration with Public Perspective, a magazine published by the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research, was released in late June 2001".

The poll questioned 1,206 members of the public, 300 "policymakers" and 301 "media professionals, including reporters and editors from top newspapers, TV and radio networks, news services and news magazines."

The Kaiser Family Foundation survey found that members of the media were four times as likely to identify themselves as "liberal" than as "conservative:"

V. A survey of 1,037 newspaper journalists at dozens of newspapers conducted by the American Society of Newspaper Editors in 1996 entitled "The Newspaper Journalists of the '90s" found the following:

144. What is your political orientation?

	T	'88	F	W	B	H	AA	G
Democrat or liberal	36	34	44	35	41	39	50	64
Republican or conservative	8	11	6	8	1	2	3	3
Lean to Democrat/liberal	25	28	25	25	30	35	30	22
Lean to Republican/conservative	7	11	5	7	2	6	5	1
Independent	24	17	19	25	25	18	12	9

• T = Percentages of the total responses from the original workforce   sample (n = 1,037).   
• '88 = Overall percentages from the 1988 ASNE workforce survey (n =   1,200).   
• F = Female journalists in the workforce sample (n = 379).   
• W = Whites in the workforce sample (n = 903).   
• B = Blacks in the workforce sample and further survey of black journalists   (n = 154).   
• H = Hispanics in the sample and further survey of Hispanic journalists   (n = 92).   
• AA = Asian Americans in the sample and further survey of Asian American journalists (n = 98).
• G = Gays, lesbians and bisexuals from the sample and further survey of gay/lesbian/bisexual journalists (n = 181).

More key facts on historic bias in the US media can be found here.

The numbers are even more striking when compared to the general political leanings of the American public. Depending on what poll numbers you look at, around 30-40% of Americans describe themselves as conservatives while only around 15-25% of Americans describe themselves as liberals. 
      
If Germans really knew about the long-standing, visceral and deep-seated bias in the US media against conservative ideals and values, they would probably have a little more sympathy towards the PR efforts of the Bush administration. Unlike the Clinton administration, Bush's government has to fight a daily uphill battle of ideas in a media environment in which political opponents and hostile journalists have predominated for decades. With these facts in mind: Is it any wonder that the Bush people have spent twice as much on PR films?

If SPIEGEL ONLINE wants to talk about "propaganda" in America, they ought to start by pointing out how the left-leaning mainstream media in America has worked in favor of the liberal, Democrat agenda for decades on end. The cold, hard facts simply do not bear out wild conspiracy theories that George Bush has any significant advantage or control of the mainstream media, let alone the ability to call the shots. The facts have clearly and repeatedly demonstrated that the very opposite is true.

Just as the 9/11 conspiracy theories running rampant in Germany were publicly challenged and debunked in the German media, so too must the "gleichgeschaltet" myth eventually be exposed and debunked for the garbage that it is. But right now, Bush-bashing is still much too lucrative for large German media publications to tell the German people the real truth about the American media.

Above all, criticizing the leftwards bias in the US media would be an unimaginable breach of political principle for a hard left-wing publication like SPIEGEL ONLINE that actually views itself as mainstream. Such criticism would put the publication in an awfully awkward position: It would be comparable to a hardcore heroin addict condemning a recreational pot-smoker as a junkie.

Clearly: The main problem is that it is difficult to convince most Germans that the US media is biased against Bush when many of them can't even recognize the obvious bias and widespread anti-Bush conformism in their own media...

One step at a time as they say.

Endnote: Here are other articles on this subject.

SPIEGEL ONLINE: "Bush's Perfect Propaganda Machine"

(By Ray Drake)

Watch out world! SPIEGEL ONLINE has once again uncovered evidence that the US media is firmly in the grasp of the Bush administration and its well-oiled propaganda machine!

That's right! The American people are being influenced by the Bush administration's deviously clever manipulation of the television news. In an article entitled "Bush's Perfect Propaganda Machine," SPIEGEL ONLINE points to a report in the New York Times detailing the US government's increasing use of "prepackaged TV news." SPON writes:

"The US government offers a service for American local broadcasters that they are using more and more: Complete news reports. The original source gladly goes unmentioned. In this way the administration elegantly delivers its view of things to the people.

Hamburg - The Bush government is using a method that PR agencies have successfully used for years. Prepackaged TV news reports are sent to TV stations that thankfully take the material because they are often financially strapped. According to a report from the "New York Times" this type of propaganda has dramatically increased in the past years."

Of course SPIEGEL ONLINE conveniently fails to mention these quotes from the very same New York Times' report:

"The practice, which also occurred in the Clinton administration, is continuing despite President Bush's recent call for a clearer demarcation between journalism and government publicity efforts. (...)

Federal agencies have been commissioning video news releases since at least the first Clinton administration. (...)

Under the Bush administration, federal agencies appear to be producing more news releases, and on a broader array of topics.

A definitive accounting is nearly impossible."

In other words, the practice is hardly unique to the Bush administration. It was widely used by the Clinton administration and continues to be widely used in the private sector. The New York Times' claim that the practice has increased under Bush may well be true. However, the newspaper openly admits: "A definitive accounting is nearly impossible."

Speaking of accounting, even SPIEGEL ONLINE cannot completely ignore the obvious fact that the individual television networks are ultimately responsible for the news they run and how it is presented. The article's (you guessed it) final paragraph reads:

"The US government rejects the propaganda claim of the newspaper. It is ultimately the responsibility of the broadcaster to inform that reports on government policy came from the government."

"Gleichgeschaltet"

Unfortunately, SPIEGEL ONLINE's "Bush's Perfect Propaganda Machine" is itself part of a propaganda-like campaign on the part of many German media outlets. The objective is to convince the German people that the majority of US media are dominated or at least strongly influenced by the Bush administration.

Many Germans have even been led to believe that most US media are "gleichgeschaltet." In other words, many Germans have come to the conclusion that the majority of US media display a uniformity of opinion that strongly favors the President and his policies, particularly when it comes to the Iraq war. SPIEGEL ONLINE's article, "Bush's Perfect Propaganda Machine," must be viewed in this context to be fully understood by outside observers.

Bush's Perfect Propaganda Machine...Apparently Not So Perfect

The problem with the "gleichgeschaltet" idea is that it is factually untenable. To put it another way, it is ludicrous bunk.

A recent study conducted by Columbia University's Project for Excellence in Journalism provides enough evidence to quickly demolish the notion that American television network media are dominated or even significantly influenced by a Bush administration's so-called "perfect propaganda machine." (It should be noted that Columbia University, located in the heart of New York City, is hardly a bastion of conservative, right-wing, Republican thought.)

The study found that in the critical period leading up to the 2004 election, television network news' reporting was overwhelmingly biased against President Bush:

"In the closing weeks of the 2004 presidential race, the period dominated by the debates, President George W. Bush has suffered strikingly more negative press coverage than challenger John Kerry, according to a new study released today by the Project for Excellence in Journalism.

More than half of all Bush stories studied were decidedly negative in tone (1). By contrast, only a quarter of all Kerry stories were clearly negative. (...)

Stories primarily about the President were more than three times as likely to be negative than were stories mostly about Kerry (52% Bush versus 17% Kerry).

Negative Bush stories also outweighed positive ones. Only 15% of Bush stories on TV cast him in a clearly positive light. The largest number, 33%, were neutral.

Kerry fared far better. Indeed, his coverage was more than twice as likely to be positive during this period as negative. Fully 57% of stories primarily about Kerry were positive and another 26% were neutral.

Most of the network TV stories were not solely about Bush or Kerry but discussed both candidates. While these stories tended to be more neutral than stories about primarily one candidate or the other, even here there was a pattern of Kerry coming out better. In all, 11% of these stories were clearly negative about Bush, versus 4% for Kerry. Likewise, 16% were positive about Kerry, versus just 7% about Bush."

Remember, these are the very same television network news channels that, according to SPIEGEL ONLINE, have been so cleverly and "subtly" influenced by the "Bush administration's perfect propaganda machine." In light of the facts, it would appear that "Bush's perfect propaganda machine" is not nearly so perfect or influential as SPIEGEL ONLINE would like its readers to believe.

The major problem is that studies like the one carried out by Columbia University's Project for Excellence in Journalism are never mentioned by SPIEGEL ONLINE despite the fact that they are widely published and readily available in journalistic circles. Why? Because the facts that they present don't fit into the publication's portrayal of the United States as a nation hijacked by scheming neo-cons in which the devious hand of the Bush administration is stealthily controlling the nation's media.

To understand this phenomena of denial, it is critical to understand "root causes." Sadly, SPIEGEL ONLINE's readership has developed a junkie-like addiction to the vilification of the United States that the news magazine now feels obliged to supply. To present facts contrary to this general view would mean to deeply upset the addict-pool. And that would directly upset SPIEGEL's cash flow. So is it any wonder that America-friendly token articles by Henryk Broder and others have become so few and far between of late?

Simply put: SPIEGEL ONLINE's "Bush's Perfect Propaganda Machine" is yet another classic example of the triumph of sensationalism and bias over substance and balance in the German media. Put another way: If you don't like the facts, just ignore them! We wouldn't want to upset the junkies, now would we?

(Note: Emphasis ours in quoted sections throughout the text.)

Convinced of American "Conformism"

(By Ray Drake)

Former U.S. diplomat Joseph Wilson, along with Richard Clarke and former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neil, are among the most beloved in a family of anti-Bush “whistleblowers” frequently referred to by the German media as living proof that the Bush administration is supposedly corrupt. In a recent article on Joseph Wilson entitled “Huerensoehne ueberall” or “SOBs everywhere” SPIEGEL magazine profiled the avid Bush hater as a “symbol figure for the protest against the politics of the policy of the US president.” But, as usual, the German weekly took things a step further and clearly implied that the US media is being systematically intimidated into silence by the Bush administration. Not surprisingly, the SPIEGEL author used a quote from resident expert Wilson to make the magazine's point:

“Some of them (journalists) answered that they are afraid. One said he didn’t want to be sent to Guantanamo, which I saw as a metaphor, another said he had two kids in private school and a mortgage on the house. Even light criticism of this administration leads to calls from high government circles to the editors-in-chief.”

The inclusion of this particular quote from Wilson is no accident. It is a part of a larger conscious effort by SPIEGEL and other German media outlets to portray the U.S. media as “Gleichgeschaltet” meaning that they are all uniform supporters of the Bush party line. Claims that the American press is under the control of a massive neo-con conspiracy led by Rupert Murdoch and Fox News are made on a regular basis in political debates and forums across Germany and other parts of Europe.

The idea that the US media is “Gleichgeschaltet” would seem laughable to anyone who has had any real exposure to the US media…laughable that is until you realize how many people actually buy into the idea. If you don’t believe me, just read what German columnist Henryk Broder recently wrote (click on link above for complete article in German) about Germans living in the USA: