Maybe Reporters are the Real Problem... by Hero

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

Maybe Reporters are the Real Problem...

POSTED BY: HERO
UPDATED: Wednesday, October 22, 2008 17:15
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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 10:02 AM

Would the Last Honest Reporter Please Turn On the Lights?
By Orson Scott Card

Editor's note: Orson Scott Card is a Democrat and a newspaper columnist, and in this opinion piece he takes on both while lamenting the current state of journalism.

An open letter to the local daily paper — almost every local daily paper in America:

I remember reading All the President's Men and thinking: That's journalism. You do what it takes to get the truth and you lay it before the public, because the public has a right to know.

This housing crisis didn't come out of nowhere. It was not a vague emanation of the evil Bush administration.

It was a direct result of the political decision, back in the late 1990s, to loosen the rules of lending so that home loans would be more accessible to poor people. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were authorized to approve risky loans.

What is a risky loan? It's a loan that the recipient is likely not to be able to repay.

The goal of this rule change was to help the poor — which especially would help members of minority groups. But how does it help these people to give them a loan that they can't repay? They get into a house, yes, but when they can't make the payments, they lose the house — along with their credit rating.

They end up worse off than before.

This was completely foreseeable and in fact many people did foresee it. One political party, in Congress and in the executive branch, tried repeatedly to tighten up the rules. The other party blocked every such attempt and tried to loosen them.

Furthermore, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were making political contributions to the very members of Congress who were allowing them to make irresponsible loans. (Though why quasi-federal agencies were allowed to do so baffles me. It's as if the Pentagon were allowed to contribute to the political campaigns of Congressmen who support increasing their budget.)

Isn't there a story here? Doesn't journalism require that you who produce our daily paper tell the truth about who brought us to a position where the only way to keep confidence in our economy was a $700 billion bailout? Aren't you supposed to follow the money and see which politicians were benefiting personally from the deregulation of mortgage lending?

I have no doubt that if these facts had pointed to the Republican Party or to John McCain as the guilty parties, you would be treating it as a vast scandal. "Housing-gate," no doubt. Or "Fannie-gate."

Instead, it was Senator Christopher Dodd and Congressman Barney Frank, both Democrats, who denied that there were any problems, who refused Bush administration requests to set up a regulatory agency to watch over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and who were still pushing for these agencies to go even further in promoting sub-prime mortgage loans almost up to the minute they failed.

As Thomas Sowell points out in a TownHall.com essay entitled "Do Facts Matter?" ( http://snipurl.com/457townhall_com] ): "Alan Greenspan warned them four years ago. So did the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to the President. So did Bush's Secretary of the Treasury."

These are facts. This financial crisis was completely preventable. The party that blocked any attempt to prevent it was ... the Democratic Party. The party that tried to prevent it was ... the Republican Party.

Yet when Nancy Pelosi accused the Bush administration and Republican deregulation of causing the crisis, you in the press did not hold her to account for her lie. Instead, you criticized Republicans who took offense at this lie and refused to vote for the bailout!

What? It's not the liar, but the victims of the lie who are to blame?

Now let's follow the money ... right to the presidential candidate who is the number-two recipient of campaign contributions from Fannie Mae.

And after Freddie Raines, the CEO of Fannie Mae who made $90 million while running it into the ground, was fired for his incompetence, one presidential candidate's campaign actually consulted him for advice on housing.

If that presidential candidate had been John McCain, you would have called it a major scandal and we would be getting stories in your paper every day about how incompetent and corrupt he was.

But instead, that candidate was Barack Obama, and so you have buried this story, and when the McCain campaign dared to call Raines an "adviser" to the Obama campaign — because that campaign had sought his advice — you actually let Obama's people get away with accusing McCain of lying, merely because Raines wasn't listed as an official adviser to the Obama campaign.

You would never tolerate such weasely nit-picking from a Republican.

If you who produce our local daily paper actually had any principles, you would be pounding this story, because the prosperity of all Americans was put at risk by the foolish, short-sighted, politically selfish, and possibly corrupt actions of leading Democrats, including Obama.

If you who produce our local daily paper had any personal honor, you would find it unbearable to let the American people believe that somehow Republicans were to blame for this crisis.

There are precedents. Even though President Bush and his administration never said that Iraq sponsored or was linked to 9/11, you could not stand the fact that Americans had that misapprehension — so you pounded us with the fact that there was no such link. (Along the way, you created the false impression that Bush had lied to them and said that there was a connection.)

If you had any principles, then surely right now, when the American people are set to blame President Bush and John McCain for a crisis they tried to prevent, and are actually shifting to approve of Barack Obama because of a crisis he helped cause, you would be laboring at least as hard to correct that false impression.

Your job, as journalists, is to tell the truth. That's what you claim you do, when you accept people's money to buy or subscribe to your paper.

But right now, you are consenting to or actively promoting a big fat lie — that the housing crisis should somehow be blamed on Bush, McCain, and the Republicans. You have trained the American people to blame everything bad — even bad weather — on Bush, and they are responding as you have taught them to.

If you had any personal honor, each reporter and editor would be insisting on telling the truth — even if it hurts the election chances of your favorite candidate.

Because that's what honorable people do. Honest people tell the truth even when they don't like the probable consequences. That's what honesty means . That's how trust is earned.

Barack Obama is just another politician, and not a very wise one. He has revealed his ignorance and naivete time after time — and you have swept it under the rug, treated it as nothing.

Meanwhile, you have participated in the borking of Sarah Palin, reporting savage attacks on her for the pregnancy of her unmarried daughter — while you ignored the story of John Edwards's own adultery for many months.

So I ask you now: Do you have any standards at all? Do you even know what honesty means?

Is getting people to vote for Barack Obama so important that you will throw away everything that journalism is supposed to stand for?

You might want to remember the way the National Organization of Women threw away their integrity by supporting Bill Clinton despite his well-known pattern of sexual exploitation of powerless women. Who listens to NOW anymore? We know they stand for nothing; they have no principles.

That's where you are right now.

It's not too late. You know that if the situation were reversed, and the truth would damage McCain and help Obama, you would be moving heaven and earth to get the true story out there.

If you want to redeem your honor, you will swallow hard and make a list of all the stories you would print if it were McCain who had been getting money from Fannie Mae, McCain whose campaign had consulted with its discredited former CEO, McCain who had voted against tightening its lending practices.

Then you will print them, even though every one of those true stories will point the finger of blame at the reckless Democratic Party, which put our nation's prosperity at risk so they could feel good about helping the poor, and lay a fair share of the blame at Obama's door.

You will also tell the truth about John McCain: that he tried, as a Senator, to do what it took to prevent this crisis. You will tell the truth about President Bush: that his administration tried more than once to get Congress to regulate lending in a responsible way.

This was a Congress-caused crisis, beginning during the Clinton administration, with Democrats leading the way into the crisis and blocking every effort to get out of it in a timely fashion.

If you at our local daily newspaper continue to let Americans believe — and vote as if — President Bush and the Republicans caused the crisis, then you are joining in that lie.

If you do not tell the truth about the Democrats — including Barack Obama — and do so with the same energy you would use if the miscreants were Republicans — then you are not journalists by any standard.

You're just the public relations machine of the Democratic Party, and it's time you were all fired and real journalists brought in, so that we can actually have a news paper in our city.

H

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 10:08 AM

WULFENSTAR

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

Wow.

Something honorable, honest and straight forward.

Didnt think I'd get to see that from a "journalist" again.

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 10:21 AM

JONGSSTRAW

Oh please give me a break. Big frikkin' revelation! Anyone with half a brain already knows all that, and anyone with a quarter-brain knows the mainstream media has been in the tank for Obama since they all ganged up to destroy Hillary.

Obama goes to Iraq and all 3 network anchors join him on the trip. McCain goes to Iraq multiple times, and no news anchors go with him. They don't even report it. McCain has to carry his own luggage, with his shattered limbs, for Christ's sake.

Biden opens up his retarded mouth for the umpteenth time over the weekend criticizing Obama, and the networks refuse to cover it for their kool-aid audience.

Talk about fucking censorship! People who still watch that drivel don't know shit about Obama. How could they when all they see is the Couric interview with Palin on endless loop. Nevermind she handled Biden like a pro at the debate, or she's all over the tube now including CNN. They just frame the news for their retarded watchers to suck up. Journalism is fucking dead in this country, and I certainly didn't need Mr. Card to to enlighten me.

Just like it took him a year to watch Firefly after he got it for a present, Mr. Card comes in with the painfully obvious way too late. Nice try OS.

-------------------------------------------------
" Obama is not qualified to be President." Joe Biden

" The Presidency doesn't lend itself to on the job training." Hillary Clinton

" Obama played the race card against Hillary." Bill Clinton

" Barack is saying he doesn't like me now because he's just being a politician." Rev Jeremiah Wright (smiling)

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 10:27 AM

STORYMARK

Card is a Democrat in the same way that a Dolphin is a fish.

I'm getting a kick out of these two comments.

Quote:
"This was a Congress-caused crisis, beginning during the Clinton administration, with Democrats leading the way into the crisis and blocking every effort to get out of it in a timely fashion."

Really? If I remember right Congress was controlled by the Republicans during the Clinton administration. They had a veto-proof majority, as I recall.

Quote:
"If you at our local daily newspaper continue to let Americans believe — and vote as if — President Bush and the Republicans caused the crisis, then you are joining in that lie. If you do not tell the truth about the Democrats — including Barack Obama"

I didn't know Obama was in Congress during the Clinton years?

I also find it amusing how he takes Obama to task, for having received contributions from Fannie and Freddie, but leaves out some rather important details:

1.Obama received contributions mainly from employees, the little folk in the company - NOT the CEOs or the corporations themselves.

2.Davis was paid $2 million over five years as president of an advocacy group set up by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

3.Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae paid Davis's lobbying firm $15,000 a month up until the end of August.

4. The firm was kept on the payroll because of Davis's close ties to McCain.

5. McCain lied when he said that Davis hadn't had any connections to either company for years.

He may be a Firefly fan, but as the wingnuts on this board continually prove, that doesn't preclude him from spewing bullshit.

"I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him."

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 10:56 AM

RIGHTEOUS9

OHHHH!!!

so that explains why banks were giving sub-prime loans to minorities who would have qualified for better loans!!!!

Got it!!! Cuz banks were forced to give out these loans when better loans were qualified for....

By the way, giving people loans is not the same thing as giving them predatory lending rates, something acorn was still trying to stop...so the notion of acorn wanting people to have loans that they couldn't afford to pay back is pretty ridiculous on its face...

and the market drove itself. The housing bubble was such good money why wouldn't companies make bad loans...somebody can't pay it back they either unload the house or you take the house, and sell it for more. Now whether something like introducing more people into the housing market drove that bubble up, is worth discussing, but low interest rates also fed this.

variable interst rates helped to bump people from homes...etc.

I'm not going to state categorically that 'enforced' low income loans had nothing at all to do with this, but you guys are seriously going to sit there and say it had everything to do with it?

show me the numbers then

and show me how a congress that ran into one fillibuster(I"m not even sure about that) was blocked by the democratic minority from reforming the situation.

I do think there's blame to go around by the way, and Frank and Dodd both have something to answer for

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 11:06 AM

FREMDFIRMA

Card's a dixiecrat, like Zell Miller and Strom Thurmond, a throwback to the old south legacy of hatred and intolerance - not that he doesn't have a point, mind you, but on this one he's really dodging the issue that it was a complete fuckup of corruption on both sides of the aisle.

I mean, it's good to see someone rake over the Dems who participated in this mess, sure, but to do it while glossing over and misrepresenting the role of the other party is at best, dishonest.

I don't think anybody involved should get a free pass, especially not Barney, who's such a sleazebag that any ethics committee worth a damn would have booted his ass long before now, but if you're going to point fingers, then leave party out of it, cause this one is sheer greed, and that's a factor that's not limited to one party, not by a longshot.

Is it really too much to ask that someone lay the smack down without partisanship ?

Cause I'd damn sure like to see it, and I ain't seein it here.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 3:11 PM

RUE

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!

It sure would be nice if the FUCKING 'REPORTERS' would get their facts straight !

Fox News host Brit Hume and correspondent Bret Baier suggested that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were heavily involved in the subprime mortgage market "years ago," and falsely suggested that Rep. Barney Frank has opposed stricter regulation of Fannie and Freddie. Neither Hume nor Baier noted that Fannie and Freddie were not active in the subprime market in 2003, or that Frank has supported and authored bills to strengthen oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Baier and Hume completely omitted any mention of Frank's efforts in passing legislation providing greater oversight of Fannie and Freddie. In 2005, Frank, then the ranking Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, worked with committee chairman Rep. Michael Oxley (R-OH) on the Federal Housing Finance Reform Act of 2005, which would have established the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) to oversee the activities of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

***************************************************************

Silence is consent.

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 3:26 PM

FUTUREMRSFILLION

Quote:
Originally posted by Fremdfirma:
Card's a dixiecrat, like Zell Miller and Strom Thurmond, a throwback to the old south legacy of hatred and intolerance - not that he doesn't have a point, mind you, but on this one he's really dodging the issue that it was a complete fuckup of corruption on both sides of the aisle.

I mean, it's good to see someone rake over the Dems who participated in this mess, sure, but to do it while glossing over and misrepresenting the role of the other party is at best, dishonest.

I don't think anybody involved should get a free pass, especially not Barney, who's such a sleazebag that any ethics committee worth a damn would have booted his ass long before now, but if you're going to point fingers, then leave party out of it, cause this one is sheer greed, and that's a factor that's not limited to one party, not by a longshot.

Is it really too much to ask that someone lay the smack down without partisanship ?

Cause I'd damn sure like to see it, and I ain't seein it here.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

What Frem Said!

I am on The List. We are The Forsaken and we aim to burn!
"We don't fear the reaper"

FORSAKEN original

Trolls Against McCain

“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” Mahatma Gandhi

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 3:31 PM

RUE

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!

Barney Frank had NO role in creating Fannie's and Freddie's troubles. And in 2005 he tried to FIX them.

What's the motto - if you repeat a lie often enough ... ???

***************************************************************

Silence is consent.

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 3:41 PM

FUTUREMRSFILLION

I have nothing against Frank, Rue. What I am sick of is all the name calling and finger pointing.

EVERYONE in the House and the senate is culpable because NO ONE did anything about it. And please don't start with the so and so warned about this and so and so said that. The bottom line is they screwed the pooch. All of them.

I am on The List. We are The Forsaken and we aim to burn!
"We don't fear the reaper"

FORSAKEN original

Trolls Against McCain

“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” Mahatma Gandhi

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 4:06 PM

FREMDFIRMA

He didn't try hard enough.

When you see a wave of THAT magnitude forming, and you don't throw everything you possibly can into stopping it, you are by default, somewhat responsible when it hits.

Plenty of blame to go around on this one, even Greenspan is not without some share of it.

Barney though, my problem is with his lack of ethics, which pre-dated even this current problem, mind you - the guys just a slime, and should never have been trusted with the responsibilities and authority he's been given.

Of course, he's far from alone in that respect, and that in and of itself is pretty offensive to me.

Been thinkin on it a little more, and not only should we make them wear uniforms, but I think that in respect to the intent of our founders, who implied it without ever stating it directly...

They should also be paid minimum wage, and stripped of their perks.

Remind em they work for US, not vice versa, and it would cull the ranks to those who actually want to SERVE, not exploit - if we eliminated the ability to get rich off it.

Know what happens to those large campaign funds when they retire, much of which are taxpayer dollars, eh ?

Find out - you won't like that too much, neither.

We ain't peons, they ain't lords, and it's long past time we REMINDED them of that, hard.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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Wednesday, October 22, 2008 5:15 PM

KWICKO

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)

Quote:
Originally posted by Storymark:

If I remember right Congress was controlled by the Republicans during the Clinton administration. They had a veto-proof majority, as I recall.

I didn't know Obama was in Congress during the Clinton years?

I also find it amusing how he takes Obama to task, for having received contributions from Fannie and Freddie, but leaves out some rather important details:

1.Obama received contributions mainly from employees, the little folk in the company - NOT the CEOs or the corporations themselves.

2.Davis was paid $2 million over five years as president of an advocacy group set up by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

3.Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae paid Davis's lobbying firm $15,000 a month up until the end of August.

4. The firm was kept on the payroll because of Davis's close ties to McCain.

5. McCain lied when he said that Davis hadn't had any connections to either company for years.

Oh, you...

You keep letting those pesky details and facts get in the way!

Mike

What, no catchy sig-line?

Trolls Against McCain!

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