More on the Huffington Post and JFK

[Jim DiEugenio]

This is meant as a complement to the thread about Huffpo

http://www.ctka.net/2009/huffpo.html

I wrote about this very troubling trend in the so called New Media many months ago when Ed Epstein did a truly horrific article for Huffpo.

Now we see that Daily beast is buying Newsweek.
The liberal blogosphere, what a joke it has become

[Jim DiEugenio]

Here is one I wrote about Daily Kos and Firedoglake vs Caroline Kennedy. This was a truly defining moment for the blogosphere. And they flunked it.

http://www.ctka.net/2009/hamsher.html

THis column drove Jane Hamsher up the wall. If you read it all the way through to the two other links and you will see what I mean.

This episode convinced me that the blogosphere really did not want to change anything. They just wanted to tweak the MSM ever so slightly.

Meanwhile the horrific scandals that have ruined this country would remain untouched. THat is why I ended my previous article with Katherine Harris and FLorida 2000.

THere will never be a New Media nor an effective democracy unless it willing to face the truth of how we got into this mess. WHich is one reason why Obama is such a thundering disappointment.

[Keith Millea]

THere will never be a New Media nor an effective democracy unless it willing to face the truth of how we got into this mess.

Jim
This is the new media that I find is willing to face the truth.THE YOUNG,they all have video phones,communicate spontaineously using twitter,things go up fast on youtube.

I would really like to see this trend evolve.As an embroyonic vision of what could be,grass roots people power (anytime anyplace),check out the video below.They never see it coming!Posted on youtube,picked up by blogs,and websites.It's a start...........

Inspired by this protest

[Dawn Meredith]

This is nothing new. The liberal media has always been horrid on this issue. Back in the day-(70's) JFK reaserchers had to get articles published in porn mags.

Liberals are blind when it comes to conspiracy. Give me a right wing conservative any time on this issue. At least this has been my personal experience.

And lawyers are the worst. I bring books on the Kennedy assassination to court and people - lawyers who are otherwise friends, look on in dismay. Over lunch a few years ago one debated me, citing Posner. A third attorney- (who subsequently read JFK and the Unspeakable)- told me I beat him, hands down. But he refuses to read anything truthful. The liberal media is the same. That is why I am so grateful for David Talbot, Jeff Morley and Russ Baker.

I wonder if Huffington has even read anything of worth on these matters. Russ Baker and she are freinds and he told me that she will not read his book. Nuff said.

Dawn

[Magda Hassan]

And lawyers are the worst. I bring books on the Kennedy assassination to court and people - lawyers who are otherwise friends, look on in dismay.
Dawn

How strange. Especially when you consider how many people end up in court on various conspiracy charges.

[Dawn Meredith]

How strange. Especially when you consider how many people end up in court on various conspiracy charges.

Oh attorneys believe in conspiracy just not the deep political ones. And that is out of profound ignorance. They just refuse to read on these issues. My friend who read JFKU said her eyes were totally opened.

Great stuff btw, Jim.

Dawn

[Albert Doyle]

This episode convinced me that the blogosphere really did not want to change anything. They just wanted to tweak the MSM ever so slightly.

The American public exists in a relationship with its media and government where it is happy not hearing the democratic truths it needs to hear in order to take responsibility. It's called "Philistinism". A natural human tendency where those who present pre-chewed, smooth-edged information saying what the public wants to hear are given a much warmer reception than those who present raw truth. American democracy is, really, a failed attempt at making a silk purse out of a sow's ear. While the internet has given birth to new refreshing edges in free speech and democracy it has been accompanied by some of the worst tyrants of the modern day in the form of internet moderators and site owners who can censor and discriminate at will. The public will welcome free speech and democracy up to the point where they can't ignore it anymore. However once you force them to confront the truth where they actually have to do something about it you'll find them less receptive if not outright hostile.

[David Sellers]

Oh attorneys believe in conspiracy just not the deep political ones. And that is out of profound ignorance. They just refuse to read on these issues. My friend who read JFKU said her eyes were totally opened.

Great stuff btw, Jim.

Dawn

Could it be they feel the speaking out of conspiracy may effect their careers? I have been told numerous times I shouldn't even discuss this stuff online as "they" could find out and it could effect me in numerous ways! I think the country has been slowly conditioned not to speak out against these kinds of things for the most part. Luckily, there are many people who do not feel we have been told the truth in regards to JFk and they do pass this on, but newer events like 9/11 are another ball of wax as many won't even dare claim it was the "c" word for fear of being a "kook!"

[Jim DiEugenio]

Thanks Dawn.

The Caroline Kennedy one really outraged me.

Talk about stupidity.

[Jan Klimkowski]

Jim - important articles. Thank you for writing them and for pointing out clear and significant errors - both factual and lack of due diligence - to the likes of the Huffington Post.

Your analysis contains much truth. As an additional and complementary perspective, I would suggest that we are also talking here about a lack of journalistic standards and of covert editorializing.

I have a couple of decades of insider MSM experience - as a science, history, business and current affairs documentary maker for the likes of the BBC, Discovery and National Geographic. NatGeo even has a "fact checking unit", known colloquially as "the Gestapo", who pore over every word and comma of the final scripts of documentaries.

Once, when finishing a Seconds From Disaster drama-doc about a four-storey hotel collapsing into a ground floor bank in Singapore, I recall "the Gestapo" informing me that the date on which the incident occurred was a Sunday, therefore the bank could not have been open, and several scenes in the film (eg customers and staff being hit by falling debris) could not have occurred.

Since I had personally interviewed two highly dignified Singaporean bank staff who had spent days trapped in the basement rubble, spoken with family members, interviewed emergency service personnel who had rescued them, seen original documents praising the bravery of named individuals, and even obtained archive film of the two being rescued, it was clear to me that the NatGeo "Gestapo" was barking up a very strange tree. However, it was not until I was able to produce a historic calendar showing that the date in question was not in fact a Sunday that the "Gestapo" backed down and allowed the flim to continue.

I tell this story because it highlights the fundamental myopia of MSM organisations, and the process and techniques they use to ensure "factual accuracy". In principle, a 12-year-old can look at a calendar and identify the day of the week a certain date falls on. So junior and inexperienced staff are employed as "fact checkers" to ensure a basic level of factual accuracy is delivered. However, it is not so easy to determine which of several conflicting accounts of a historical event is accurate.

So, an MSM "fact checker" is quite likely to turn to a work by such as Edward Epstein and regard it as "accurate" and "objective". If the "fact checker" is sufficiently diligent to discover that Epstein's reliability has been challenged, they are likely to ignore "leftist", "rightist", or "conspiratorial" critiques of his work, and rely instead on his MSM credentials.

In the case of the Huffington Post, they should have higher stands, and should have been aware of, for instance, the critique of Epstein's work by Cleveland Cram. Once they had read Cram's reservations, this should have led to serious consideration before taking Epstein's piece as gospel and printing it. In reality, as you discovered, Huffington Post editorial staff were not even aware of Cram's criticisms until you brought them to their attention.

At the broader level, most major "editorial judgements" are not made by "fact checkers". They are made by those who commission, or agree to publish, the project.

So, for instance, I spent a decade trying to get a film about Jonestown commissioned. My judgement about the true nature of Jonestown shares substantial common ground with the excellent work undertaken by John Judge and Jim Hougan. It transpired that no MSM commissioner would touch my Jonestown project. However, during the same timeframe, several documentaries were commissioned by the BBC, Discovery and NatGeo which were in substantial accord with the official narrative (cover up) of cult crazies drinking the charismatic preacher's Kool Aid.

There are, occasionally, commissioners at MSM organisations who are willing to allow projects to be published "under the radar". For instance, the Allan Francovich Gladio trilogy was made in the BBC Timewatch strand, but the documentaries were not seen by management until broadcast because they were commissioned out of BBC Wales. When top BBC management, (the ones who put Christmas trees on the HR files of potential security risks), watched the documentaries they were apoplectic. I know this to be true because I witnessed some of the beetroot-faced fury first hand.

Ultimately, the true nature of a media organisation can be judged with a high degree of reliability by its editorial approach to "controversial" subjects. An obvious example are MSM series on "conspiracies": they give the broadcaster a ratings boost by covering subject matter which will attract high audiences, but are hardly ever genuine journalistic investigations into their subject matter.

Instead the films are commissioned and framed as "conspiracy theories". If any evidence which genuinely challenges the official narrative makes it through to the final cut, and survives with its credibility intact, then nine times out of ten this is due to a persistent and determined director who managed to face down his, or her, commissioner.

I respect and salute you for bringing the Huffington Post to task. Unfortunately, the problems are systemic and persistent.