-->Pot Calling Kettle Black
28.04.2003 [03:00]


The headlines read: “Turner Calls Rival Media Mogul Murdoch 'Warmonger'” [Reuters, April 25]; “BBC Chief Attacks U.S. Media War Coverage” [Reuters, April 25]; Dyke, Banfield Criticize War Coverage [Associated Press, April 25]. This got me thinking: did something happen on April 25 that I missed? It seems that the world’s top media magnates are launching unprecedented personal attacks against each other over the war in Iraq news coverage.

The BBC chief Greg Dyke attacked Fox News Channel for its “gung-ho patriotism” and Ted Turner said “he's a warmonger” about rival media baron Rupert Murdoch - the owner of Fox. Murdoch’s news network got better ratings that the CNN. Turner - the owner of CNN - criticized the entire US news media system saying that “the media is too concentrated, too few people own too much.”

“There's really five companies that control 90 percent of what we read, see and hear. It's not healthy”, Turner said. He is right, of course, and his own Cable News Network is the perfect example of “too much in too few hands”. But the entire situation of Fox, CNN and BBC accusing each other of biased coverage of the Iraq conflict is rather comical.

The BBC Director-General Greg Dyke picked the Fox News Channel and Clear Channel Communications Inc., the largest operator of radio stations in the United States, for his attacks on the credibility of the US media. According to Dyke, the coverage of the Iraq war in the US media was so “unquestioningly patriotic and so lacking in impartiality that it threatened the credibility of America's electronic media.” Again, this is an absolutely rational look at the situation.

However, it seems that this exchange of unpleasantness among the world’s top media barons had more to do with ratings than with impartiality of news coverage. During the war Fox got ahead of CNN in ratings, but both CNN and BBC did not fall far behind and saw a huge increase in their ratings as well. This good business came at a price: consumer confidence. Lacking in facts and objectivity mainstream media in both the US and the UK is now paying with its reputation and, even worse, with its ratings.

In this sea of bias, national and corporate interests and plain lack of professionalism it is interesting to point out several mainstream news networks that managed to preserve relatively objective coverage of the events in Iraq. Reuters remains high on my list of credible news sources. Reuters reporters in and around Baghdad did a better-than-average job in covering the events from a reasonably neutral perspective. Al Jazeera showed once again that it is a serious player among the world’s top news media networks.

Top US newspapers turned out to be plain worthless as sources of information, unless they reprinted Reuters or AFP news articles. On the other hand British press provided much more balanced coverage of the war. Particular newspapers to be mentioned here would be The Independent and The Guardian. The Sydney Morning Herald of Australia proved to be a good source of first-hand information and so did the Asia Times.

Russian media lacked any serious interest in the war and most news outlets limited their activity to re-printing news items published in the West. In the Russian press standard Russian paranoia prevailed and the main subject of discussion was the imaginary American armored columns moving on Moscow. Both French and German media provided great up-to-day information about the war.

The fact is that following the war major US and British media networks are rapidly losing their ratings. This is not unusual, but, more importantly, the networks are losing credibility, which is slipping away together with the credibility of Bush and Blair and that of their quest for the elusive Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. With time, of course, something will be found in Iraq to justify the war, even if this “something” would have to be planted in Iraq first. Too much is at stake here.

Over a period of time “evidence” against Hussein will accumulate. Detained Iraqi officials and scientists will say whatever the US needs them to say. It’s a given. But this entire process will not result in much interest or much confidence from the general public. There will be no ‘smoking gun’ but a boring collection of scientific papers, investigation reports and maybe a few rusty metal drums of something that might have been sarin. Or diesel fuel.


Èñòî÷íèê: Venik/www.aeronautics.ru