But Bush is Tainted... -

But Bush is Tainted... - Howard Kurtz, in the NY Post, on the NY Times' undisclosed interests in and involvement with Enron.

As Andrew Sullivan said about this piece:

Not only have New York Times columnists, like Paul Krugman, had sweet-heart consulting deals with Enron, but the Times itself is knee-deep in Enron collusion. Howie reveals that the Times has had a 5-year "newsprint swap" deal with Enron that it has never disclosed in all its hyper-ventilating editorials on the subject. He also reveals that - oh joy! - the Times has practised exactly the same stock options maneuver that it has so piously attacked others for. Arthur Sulzberger Jr., the mega-rich kid who finances Howell Raines' diatribes against corporate executives, has almost $2 million worth of stock options that are not counted as expenses and Times president Russell Lewis says the Times has no plans to alter its policies. Don't you think the Times should practise what it preaches in this respect? Then there's this column in the New York Post, criticizing the Times' front-page denigration of the rival plans to rebuild the WTC site, without disclosing its own corporate interest in keeping office space limited in New York City, given its massive investment in new midtown offices. So let's check this out: president Bush is tainted because of corporate corruption scandals but the Times, which has been deeply involved with Enron and doesn't count stock options as expenses, is squeaky clean. Those guys on 43d Street are as self-righteous as they are full of it.

I was going to say "the big media everywhere is deeply involved in such back-room sweetheart deals" - but it's not even just the big media.

I remember at my first radio gig in North Dakota, in 1979 - a job that was 50% disk jockey and 50% news - when the station's owner and manager said "The official policy of this station is to support the Garrison Diversion Project [a '70's era project to divert Missouri River water to eastern North Dakota for irrigation - a pork-fest of the most immense proportions], and our news coverage will reflect that support." Of course, every businessman in my little hometown stood to benefit handsomely from the project's side-effects. But then, most people there did...

But if you scratch the surface of the NY TImes' coverage of Enron, or the Star/Trib's reportage on Light Rail, or the Pioneer Press' on the St. Paul Twins stadium, you'll find just such unstated self-interest behind the facade of detachment.

And those who do know this need to get busy teaching everyone else...

Posted by Mitch at July 19, 2002 08:40 AM