fredag, august 05, 2005

Medier med skyklapper på - USA som eksempel

Weekly Standard har en interessant artikel om en korruptionssag der har kørt et stykke tid i den amerikanske blogosfære, men stort set er blevet ignoreret af den vesntreorienterede amerikanske presse:

Michael LeBoeuf once commented that the elements of the perfect fiction would involve religion, royalty, sex, and mystery--and then boiled it down to one sentence: "My God," said the Queen, "I'm pregnant. I wonder who did it?" Is there a grand-unified theory of media interest and if so, what elements need to come together to make the perfect journalistic storm? ..

Thus, the perfect journalistic storm would arise when powerful people victimize the poor and downtrodden, breaking laws or at least ethical constructs, by taking money meant for their benefit. That sort of story will get anyone's attention. All it takes is one reporter to tell the story, and the rest of the media will jump all over it. Right? ..

ACTUALLY, this perfect-storm story is already percolating in the blogosphere, and oddly enough, hardly anyone in the mainstream media is paying attention to it. Brian Maloney at Radio Equalizer noticed a short blurb in the local-only July 26th edition of the New York Daily News reporting that a well-known corporation had taken money from a Bronx non-profit charity--city government grant money earmarked for poor kids and Alzheimer's patients. The corporation's CEO had also served on the board of directors for Gloria Wise Boys and Girls Club and had quarterbacked a "loan" to his struggling company using these earmarked funds. The Daily News also noted that the money added up to almost a half-million dollars, funds that should have provided services to the elderly and the disadvantaged children of the borough. ..

In fact, the amount in question now totals $875,000, which the corporation's new ownership discovered on its own but never revealed to authorities. This company has now belatedly agreed to repay the money--but over two years, while the charity remains under funded for its tasks and suffered the loss of other government contracts due to its nonperformance on these earmarked grants. What a story! What a blockbuster!

Yet most of the mainstream media has been oddly silent. Why?

WELL, FOR ONE THING, we have thus far neglected to name the corporation involved. The company that took money from poor kids and Alzheimer's patients to pay off its high-priced employees is Air America and the CEO was its original founder, Evan Cohen. Air America broadcasts its liberal views on American politics in several cities around the country, attempting to compete with the much more robust conservative talk-radio industry and mostly failing.
The mission of the mainstream media to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable, to tell truth to power, and to hold the reverse Robin Hoods accountable for their malfeasance wouldn't depend on the politics of the criminals.

Would it?

Sørgeligt.

Henrik