Fraters Libertas

Do You See What I See?

On Wednesday night, the Center for the American Experiment hosted a Dinner Forum, addressing the role played by the Power Line bloggers in uncovering the use of fraudulent documents by CBS News with regard to President's Bush's service in the National Guard. The holding of the event on the occasion of Dan Rather's final CBS News broadcast might have led to the reasonable assumption of a triumphalist yawp on behalf of the sponsors (as might have pre-event hype on web sites like Fraters Libertas).

But I was there and I'm here to testify that's not how it went down at all. Witnessing the CAE's and MC Mitch Pearlstein's professional tone and style throughout, I doubt that was ever their intent.

In truth, no one at the event even watched the CBS News broadcast until the last segment, when the volume was finally turned up loud enough to distract us from the food and witty, urbane conversation (yes, I was at the Atomizer's table.)

In that last segment, Rather's use of 9/11 imagery probably took whatever partisan spunk that existed out of the crowd, but at the end he received a very respectful round of applause, which I took as a salute to, if nothing else, the passing of an American icon.

Then Scott Johnson and John Hinderaker took the stage and they barely mentioned Dan Rather in their remarks. Their presentation concentrated on their process of gathering evidence and how the CBS story was unraveled systematically. Quite clinical it was, and as such, made for kind of a boring speech for everyone but kerning wonks and non-standard military acronymophiles (the Atomizer).

The Powerline guys were very gracious in acknowledging their role as merely aggregators, and they credited numerous other individuals and Web sites as equally vital to the process. Any presumption that the event or the featured speakers were "exalting" or "celebrating" anything is ill-informed and incorrect.

Which makes the mainstream media coverage of the event quite curious.

To be honest, the Star Tribune story by is reasonably fair. While the Pioneer Press story directly furthers the notion of the event as a celebration of someone's demise. Out of context (that being Rather's documented record of egregiously partisan antics in the guise of news, and the fact he was removed from that job for those very transgressions.) that is an extremely negatively value laden characterization. A celebration no reasonable person would participate in. And yet those conservatives did! (Cue sneers and outraged gasps all across Mac-Grove).

I don't want to parse these stories too finely, but both did have the tendency to utilize very naive sounding quotes and position them in a way that emphasized this perceived naivety of the attendees. From the Star Tribune:

Blogs have arrived and for now have won the plaudits of people such as Abby Ludvigson of Eden Prairie, who, after hearing Johnson and Hinderaker speak at Wednesday night's dinner, said she finds she can't trust the traditional sources of news.

"I don't trust many media sources anymore," she said. "So it's really good to see these faces and see that they're genuine and see that they give their reasoning to back everything up."

The plaudits blogs have received are only "for now," meaning what - they're subject to change shortly? And we're to believe the interview subject came to this opinion only after hearing J & H speak on Wednesday? That sounds like brainwashing to me. Is that what the reporter wants me think? (If so, who's brainwashing who here?)

This from the Pioneer Press:

Others (sic) conservatives attending the event - titled "The 61st Minute: Blogging on the Eve of Dan Rather's Retirement" - felt that Rather favored liberal and Democratic causes, and agreed ... that the rise of an aggressive Internet presence is a welcome development

"They're going to have to watch their p's and q's and make sure they present the truth right, because there's too many people watching them," said Judy Fornicoia of Apple Valley, who also described herself as politically conservative. "It's good to know that our news is going to be on the up and up - it's going to be honest - because there are people watching."

There they go again, those aggressive conservatives and their "feelings" about liberal media bias and their lynch mob mentality!

Yes, I know, there could very well be practical, mundane reasons for the use of those quotes. Maybe the reporters got unlucky and happened to talk only to those who were truly naive. Or, maybe the ambush nature of that type of interview necessarily produces a blunt, less thoughtful response from the interview subject and they only appear to be naive. Or, maybe space limitations prevent the reporter from providing the proper context of those quotes - or from listing the specific questions that elicited those responses, again making the interviewee appear to be naive.

Entirely valid excuses, I suppose. But good excuses don't make the reporting any more accurate. And if that's the best we can expect to get, maybe newspapers aren't the optimal way to access information on an event like this.

If only we had an alternate medium to transmit information and to provide a check and balance on newspaper reporting.

Far worse than either article were the headlines used for them.

The Star Tribune: Twin Cities bloggers exult in Rather departure

The Pioneer Press: Rather's critics celebrate sign-off

Pure, unadulterated BS. Conclusions, stereotypes really, reaching far beyond the evidence presented in the articles beneath them. It is my understanding that the reporters don't write their own headlines. According to the Star Tribune Reader Representative, a copy editor does the headlines. Meaning a person that (presumably) wasn't even at the event is in charge of its primary characterization. One that will stick with the tens of thousands of readers who merely skim the headlines on articles that aren't of critical interest and the tens of thousands of more who will casually read the article with the headline framing in mind.

So, for all practical purposes, we have people who weren't at the event doing primary reporting on it. That, fellow citizens, is a problem.

The initial City Pages coverage of the event is just abysmally clueless:

After Dan Rather signed off for the last time yesterday, the Power Line boys and their pals at the Center of the American Experiment spent the evening celebrating together at a high-tone frat house kegger. Many hoary old lies about "liberal media" were repeated, many anal vapors sniffed, and a good time was had by all.

Since I presume that paragraph's anonymous author was not in attendance either, one is left to wonder if his gleefully derisive impressions were based on the Star Tribune and Pioneer Press distortions alone. If so, one can only grimly speculate about how many other readers in the Twin Cities have been similarly misled and will now proceed with these misrepresentations coloring their opinions of the Power Line duo, the Center for the American Experiment, and of those in attendance who recognized the very real service to journalism provided by Hinderaker and Johnson last fall.

Grimmer speculation yet, when considering these types of misrepresentations are prone to happen every single day, and they have for years. Maybe for as long as newspapers have existed, such is the fallible nature of human beings, the inherent cultural filters on their perceptions, and their sometimes blatant and unethical political partisanship (see Dan Rather for details on that).

If only we had an alternate medium to transmit information and to provide a check and balance on newspaper reporting.

Actually ... let's hear one of those naive quotes again:

"They're going to have to watch their p's and q's and make sure they present the truth right, because there's too many people watching them," said Judy Fornicoia of Apple Valley, who also described herself as politically conservative. "It's good to know that our news is going to be on the up and up - it's going to be honest - because there are people watching."

On second thought, that Judy Fornicoia is one perceptive gal.

Who comes closer to the truth of this event? My reporting and perspective filters or the Strib/PiPress reporters and their perspective filters?

You decide for yourself - tonight. Pop some popcorn, turn the lights down, fasten your filters on tight, and kick back for 56 minutes of the Hinderaker and Johnson Experience. It's live on tape on CSPAN tonight (Saturday) at 7 PM, replay at 10 PM (both times Central Standard).

Make sure to hang in there for the Q & A portion after the presentation, the highlight, accurately reported by the City Pages Molly Priesmeyer:

"You guys are just heroes," one woman from the Center of the American Experiment told the Power Line and Fraters bloggers.

Now that's some objective truth we can all rally around.
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