With the Furor over Armstrong Williams...

[Batman Jr.]

...why hasn't disgrace equally if not more so fallen over the Bush administration, which used $240,000 of our hard-earned taxes to bribe the conservative commentator to encourage his audience to support the NCLB policy and to cajole fellow pundits into adopting it for themselves? It seems as if the media is letting them off the hook as if this malfeasance counted as nothing.

 

[varwoche]

...why hasn't disgrace equally if not more so fallen over the Bush administration

It's very strange and I don't get it.

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

Because ultimately, NCLB helps kids. Think of the children!

 

[Luke T.]

Could it be that there are other media organizations guilty of the same thing?

 

[CapelDodger]

Re: Re: With the Furor over Armstrong Williams...

It's very strange and I don't get it.

Look, on one side there's a black guy, on the other there's a recently-elected president who's intimately connected with Karl Rove. An (apparently) friendly Congress, and Supreme Court seats probably falling vacant. No election for four years. Say you're in the media business, family, home-loan, ambition, all the usual junk.

Waddya gonna do? Shoot for an award and the approbation of your peers? I don't think so.

 

[Batman Jr.]

Good news:

Keith Olbermann just singled out this outrageous act of thievery on his show on MSNBC with consultation from liberal scholiast Margaret Carlson. Let's just hope others will follow suit, though given those others' past histories, I would seriously doubt that they will.

Originally posted by Luke T.
Could it be that there are other media organizations guilty of the same thing?

Perhaps. Even without the graft, you can probably still point out so many places where there are conflicts of interest, especially with the kind of oligarchic transformation we've been seeing in the news media. Everything we see and hear is governed by what's pratically just a couple corporations that might not want to sacrifice the benefits they receive from the current administration's fiscal policies for a little bit of honesty.

 

[Luke T.]

It seems to me this story is getting a lot of coverage. I've seen it on Fox and CNN and ABC. I have not checked other networks.

On the net, Reuters, UPI, all the major players.

The man himself is all over the networks. He isn't in hiding.

What more do you guys want?

 

[shecky]

It seems to me this story is getting a lot of coverage. I've seen it on Fox and CNN and ABC. I have not checked other networks.

On the net, Reuters, UPI, all the major players.

The man himself is all over the networks. He isn't in hiding.

What more do you guys want?

Nobody is saying the story is being overlooked. The title of the thread even describes it as a "furor".

The Bush administration seems to have been mostly spared so far... thus the point of the thread. Who knows... that may change by tomorrow.

Armstrong did hint that others may be guilty of the same sin. Who knows? Got any info? I'm sure it has happened more than we know. I kinda doubt it's very widespread, though. Closest thing I can think of is discussed a bit here, govt manufactured fake news stories seeded out to media. No actual payoff I know of, but being "pre-packaged" may save the media outlet some production money. And of course the content isn't quite fair and balanced. Here, the media outlets must know that the origins of these stories are a bit fishy.

 

[corplinx]

A furor erupted today when the Bush administration used funds earmarked to push a new bill to pay someone to promote the bill.

"I am shocked and outraged, my eyes would bug out if they weren't like that all the time" said Nancy Pelosi.


The furor is two fold.
A. they paid the guy too much, why are we paying people to promote bills, pork barrel yadda yadda
B. Armstrong didn't disclose it to his audience

Now, point A is no big deal after years of hearing about 500 dollar hammers and government excess. Bush is not known as the fiscal tightwad president. In other words, the shock factor is low.

Now, if they had raised the money by selling arms to Iran, the media would be having a real field day.

 

[hgc]

It seems to me this story is getting a lot of coverage. I've seen it on Fox and CNN and ABC. I have not checked other networks....

Ah, but the coverage on Fox has a special scent. Armstrong was the guest on O'Reilly and on Fox & Friends, and on both shows stated that the controversy was over that the government 'bought ads' on his show. He was not challenged on this blatant falsehood (even if they did buy ads, it's a lie of ommission -- he was paid specifically to sprinkle his commentary with favorable references to NTLB).

No Spin Zone strikes out again.

 

[corplinx]

Ah, but the coverage on Fox has a special scent. Armstrong was the guest on O'Reilly and on Fox & Friends, and on both shows stated that the controversy was over that the government 'bought ads' on his show. He was not challenged on this blatant falsehood (even if they did buy ads, it's a lie of ommission -- he was paid specifically to sprinkle his commentary with favorable references to NTLB).

No Spin Zone strikes out again.

You will have to show me a transcript that verifies this. I saw coverage of this fox news sunday, special report, and oreilly and dont recall this spin.

Yes, they did buy ads on his show which stated who paid for them. The controversy is him not disclosing his paid spokesperson role as well.

 

[hgc]

You will have to show me a transcript that verifies this. I saw coverage of this fox news sunday, special report, and oreilly and dont recall this spin.

I'll see if I can. Otherwise you'll just have to trust me. That's not so hard, is it?

Yes, they did buy ads on his show which stated who paid for them. The controversy is him not disclosing his paid spokesperson role as well.

Yes, pretty much true. I would say it a little differently. Since it's obvious that he couldnt' disclose it without de facto declaring "i'm not a real journalist," then its the act of accepting the job of peppering his commentary with propoganda that's the real outrage.

 

[Tmy]

Why does every story mention that hes a "BLACK" talk show host or "BLACK" conservative. I never saw his show, is race intergral to the shows format? Otherwise why mention his race all the time.

 

[Luke T.]

Nobody is saying the story is being overlooked. The title of the thread even describes it as a "furor".

The Bush administration seems to have been mostly spared so far... thus the point of the thread. Who knows... that may change by tomorrow.

Armstrong did hint that others may be guilty of the same sin. Who knows? Got any info? I'm sure it has happened more than we know. I kinda doubt it's very widespread, though. Closest thing I can think of is discussed a bit here, govt manufactured fake news stories seeded out to media. No actual payoff I know of, but being "pre-packaged" may save the media outlet some production money. And of course the content isn't quite fair and balanced. Here, the media outlets must know that the origins of these stories are a bit fishy.

At first glance, it does seem strange that John Kerry and Ted Kennedy and friends aren't LEAPING at the chance to go after Bush on this issue. And that is what it would take for this to really take off.

But, you see, Kennedy and Kerry, and many other Democrats are big pushers of the No Child Left Behind Act, and to go after Bush for using taxpayers money for payola to a black commentator means that NCLB would be a casualty.

That's my guess.

 

[hgc]

Why does every story mention that hes a "BLACK" talk show host or "BLACK" conservative. I never saw his show, is race intergral to the shows format? Otherwise why mention his race all the time.

I think he was hired specifically because the DOE wanted to reach the black community with the positive political message of NCLB. Or was it the White House that wanted to reach the black community with a positive political message about Bush, and chose NCLB, through DOE, to do it. I guess we'll need a bunch of FOIA requests and an acronym translator to figure out where the outrage was born.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I guess we'll need a bunch of FOIA requests and an acronym translator to figure out where the outrage was born.

[pedantic mode]It's only an acronym if you pronounce the word formed by the initials. NASA is an acronym, because you say "nasa". MLB isn't, because you don't say "mlb". It's just initials.[/pedantic mode]

 

[Lurker]

You will have to show me a transcript that verifies this. I saw coverage of this fox news sunday, special report, and oreilly and dont recall this spin.

I think Mediamatters.org excerpts some of it. Take a gander.

Lurker

 

[corplinx]

I'll see if I can. Otherwise you'll just have to trust me. That's not so hard, is it?
Yes, pretty much true. I would say it a little differently. Since it's obvious that he couldnt' disclose it without de facto declaring "i'm not a real journalist," then its the act of accepting the job of peppering his commentary with propoganda that's the real outrage.

I wasn't aware that he was considered a real journalist. I thought he was another radio personality / columnist news analyst type. I'm not familiar with his work so I have to go on what I hear to an extent.

 

[hgc]

[pedantic mode]It's only an acronym if you pronounce the word formed by the initials. NASA is an acronym, because you say "nasa". MLB isn't, because you don't say "mlb". It's just initials.[/pedantic mode]

From one pedant to another, it's called an initialism, of which acronyms are a subset. But who in the hell knows that except me and you?

 

[corplinx]

I think Mediamatters.org excerpts some of it. Take a gander.

There is a reason I asked for a transcript to be reviewed. Sites like media matters, MRC, and newsmax selectively quote the sources they are bent on attacking and also frame excerpts to add a context of bias to poison the well.