Do Cable TV Wars Cause Real Wars?

We tend to think that the three major cable news networks just compete against each other. They do, but they also compete for our attention against the entire universe of cable networks. Whether it's E!, Bravo or ESPN, they all want us to watch. It's a war -- a cable TV ratings war -- to get and keep our attention.

The daily rundowns of any cable news network can be unexciting. There's a limit to the number of medical breakthroughs we have each day. There aren't all that many dogs that save their owners by dialing 911. And when the news itself is boring, it's hard to keep people watching. That's only attained with big stories. Gone are the days when news divisions were "loss leaders" for a network or a company.

So what happens? News networks naturally become desperate for the big stories, the ones that allow them to roll out emblazoned graphics that say "BREAKING NEWS" along with dramatic music and sound effects to remind us that this news, unlike yesterday's, really is breaking.

News networks get so jacked up about big stories, they literally throw all their resources at them -- even to the exclusion of the rest of the news.

It's as though networks can't hold two competing thoughts in their heads at the same time. It's Egypt or Wisconsin, Japan or Libya, Libya or domestic politics, one or the other. Sometimes it's a matter of resources, but mostly it's a matter of ratings.

In the case of our politics, the need for the "big story" may be one of the reasons our discourse has degraded, why there's so much anger and vitriol. Each side yells louder, and says more extreme things, in order to get heard and get covered most. And if our politicians aren't being extreme, pundits and opinion shows will do it for them.

Bipartisanship, cooperation and civility just aren't "entertaining." They don't pay the bills. The guy who's willing to say each side has good ideas and tries to find practical, workable solutions is boring. If he weren't, he'd get a lot more coverage and we might get a lot more done as a country.

The same holds true when it comes to international events. The "big story" gets more coverage, because it feeds the ratings monster. And with more coverage, it seems even bigger, more serious and important than it often really is. In the case of war, that attention -- taken to the extreme -- may even make it seem like something needs to be done by us. Coverage can drive a short-sighted outcry for intervention.

My point is not to take away from the seriousness of wars or debates on important domestic issues and government policies, or to question the coverage of these issues or our involvement as a country. My point is to question the relative amount of coverage a story gets and why it gets that coverage.

In other words, do ratings wars drive us toward actual wars?

If Libya weren't good for ratings, would we have seen the pictures of death, destruction and brutality for the past month to the extent we have? Would we have seen the constant stream of reports showing how events in Libya affect not just Libyan men, women and children -- or even the region -- but us? How often has someone reported on whether we will "pay more at the pump?"

And if we hadn't seen those stories, would we be enforcing a no-fly zone right now? If we had seen that same level of reporting on Rwanda, all day long, night after night, with the story leading most if not all newscasts as "breaking," would we have done something to stop that genocide?

What drives the difference in coverage between the two stories? What drives the difference in determining US intervention? That Libya is part of a revolution -- and potentially democracy -- sweeping the Arab world? That Gaddafi is crazy? That Libya is an OPEC country with the ninth-largest oil reserves in the world? That Rwanda has virtually no natural resources, its economy is centered on subsistence agriculture and that it's ranked as one of the world's poorest countries? All of the above?

Some may believe that this is a chicken-and-egg situation: it's impossible to know whether the coverage is driving the story or if the story is driving the coverage. They also believe that our national interest, not the degree of coverage, ultimately drives our response as a country.

National interest undoubtedly is the motivation. But I believe it's also the case that cable news fuels the fire and "sells" us on a course of action. Too much coverage carries with it the risk of creating a false sense of importance or urgency. Example: we're now knee-deep in a military intervention in Libya, and we still don't really know who these Libyan rebels are. We're supporting a group that no one -- at least in the media -- has really bothered to take a closer look at.

There's no easy solution to controlling extreme coverage and overexposure other than restraint, a sense of fair play and what my University of Minnesota writing professor called the most important tool of our craft: good judgment.

The solution is recognizing the difference between reporting and over-reporting, between informing and inundating, between highlighting and hyping. The solution is to have good individual judgment -- by reporters, producers, network news heads -- prevail over the need for ratings and profits by their owners, the large media conglomerates. It's a tall order, but there's no other choice. Otherwise, we run the risk of having what's good for cable news becoming what's good for our country. That's not something we need to just be aware of, but also wary of.

This piece originally appeared in The Huffington Post

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Senatorial Misstep: Giving Hate an Aura of Authenticity

You know how things sometimes just don't add up, signaling to us right away that something's just not right? Or that someone is not exactly telling the truth? You don't need to be trained as a journalist to figure it out when it happens. All you need is common sense.

When it comes to detecting B.S., almost everything I know comes from parenting: my wife and I have four kids, with ages ranging from elementary school all the way to college. They keep us on our toes and keep our B.S. detectors quite keen. B.S. detectors usually come with adulthood.

But there are two adults in the great state of Arizona -- public officials no less -- who either don't have B.S. detectors or simply decided not to use them one day last week.

What they did in their official capacity boggles the mind. Theirs is not an errant off the cuff comment, or the trap of a "gotcha" interview, which I've fallen prey to myself. No, what they did cannot be explained away that easily. These two public servants, representatives of the people of Arizona, apparently read, studied and then proceeded to disseminate hate-filled B.S. right into the official record of the Arizona State Senate.
Senate President Russell Pearce and Senator Lori Klein claim they got a letter from a constituent named Tony Hill, a substitute teacher in Glendale, Arizona. Klein read Hill's letter into the Senate record. The letter is plainly dubious, filled with accusations all too familiar to those of us who are used to hearing attacks against Latinos veiled in disguise as part of a legitimate "debate" about our nation's broken immigration system.

Those attacks usually go something like this: "Hispanics are lazy and dumb. They're a lower species that want to take over America and destroy our way of life." When taken to the extreme, those attacks can get barbaric and ugly; just over two weeks ago, another fine public servant -- Kansas State Representative Virgil Peck -- "joked" about shooting illegal aliens "like hogs."

Most of us know from even a cursory review of our nation's history that these same types of attacks were leveled against Germans, the Irish, Jews, the Chinese, Italians and just about every other immigrant group that has come to America.

But back to Pearce and Klein. Maybe they haven't read that part of our history because when they got a letter from a substitute teacher saying those types of things, they bought it hook, line and sinker. And then they disseminated it, read it on the floor of the Senate and into the official record, as though it were fact.

Here is what substitute teacher Hill wrote about his experience teaching history to Glendale 8th graders: he said his students refused to recite the Pledge of Allegiance and claimed those students said, "We are Mexicans and Americans stole our land." Hill goes on and says that when he asked the students to stop speaking Spanish in class, they told him, "Americans better learn Spanish and their customs because they are taking the land back..."

Hill seemed bent on describing his Latino students as untamed and out of control. He says they refused to open their textbook, tore out pages, and threw them at each other. And then he added, "most of the Hispanic students do not want to be educated, but rather be gang members and gangsters."

Sound familiar? It's a perfect match to the Hispanic stereotype, the caricature, which is pushed all too often. There's only one problem: the children and the school claim none of it is true. According to District spokesman Jim Cummings, "Based on our conversations with students, based on our conversation with the teacher involved, we simply believe what he said is extremely exaggerated and not reflective of what our school is all about."

So where did Tony Hill get this story? The teacher, who hopes to get a job at a community college and now regrets sending the letter, told the Arizona Republic, "It just upset me that this was what's occurring... to see this disregard for America and their hatred towards it and their entitlement."

Tony Hill no doubt has some legitimate complaints about the problems caused by our inoperative immigration system, especially as a resident of a border state. But his diatribe laced with accusations against 8th grade children is shameful. Sadly, comments like Hill's have been and probably always will be a part of our collective struggle to grow and get along as a nation of immigrants.

The real danger isn't what Hill wrote, or even what he believes. No, the danger is how it went unchecked and was then read into the official record by two state senators who should, one would hope, know better.

In a TV interview, Senator Klein decided to double down. She stood by her actions and then went after the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States. "We have an organization here called La Raza, which is a far-leftist racist organization that is inciting young Hispanics to act out, not say the Pledge, spit on America, and say it's our right to take America back, and this is really creating a problem here," Klein said. She said that, "this kind of behavior... [is] not acceptable from any race" and that she's received, "countless emails from other educators, saying that they've also had this experience."

"I've seen a lot of things like this, it's not that out of the ordinary," Anti-Defamation League regional director Bill Straus told the Phoenix ABC affiliate KNXV. "What is out of the ordinary is that it gets the credibility of a state senator reading it word-for-word on the floor of the Senate. It's a disgrace." It certainly is.

The school district has now launched an inquiry into Hill. I can only hope that the inquiry also extends to examining the broken B.S. detectors and the judgment of Senators Pearce and Klein.

This piece was originally published in The Huffington Post

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Why South of the Border Matters North of the Border

Mr. President, you were right to go to Latin America. And your critics on the right, and your supporters on the left, were both wrong for criticizing you and for supporting you for the wrong reasons.

Latin America is used to being short-shrifted by U.S. presidents. Your predecessors, Mr. Clinton and Mr. Bush, did little to change that. And you, Mr. President, bungled the 2009 Honduras coup d'état, which only further exemplified your lack of coherent leadership when it comes to the region. So it was time to give this important region the attention and respect it deserves, to go there and meet with their leaders, and to do right by Latin America.

Speaking of the "right," some Republicans say you should not have gone to Latin America in the first place because it's like taking your family on a vacation, a spring break. Some said you "bolted to Brazil."

Translation: there is nothing substantive in Latin America, just parties and Rio de Janeiro. And there's certainly nothing significant for an American president to do there.

It's an insulting insinuation, one that takes aim at one of the world's most important regions as well as this nation's fastest-growing minority: Hispanics. It's no wonder that Hispanic support for Republicans is fading faster than Arizona Governor Jan Brewer's make-up on a hot summer day.

Ostensibly, Republicans say their criticism is based on the fact that there's just so much other "stuff" right now, most notably Japan and Libya, and that having you travel means you're not focused on -- and can't be focused on -- what's going on elsewhere. But that's also a straw man because there's always other stuff going on.

Lest anyone forget, we live in the 21st century. This isn't the Kennedy White House with a big red phone on the desk, where we have to stand idly by waiting for it to ring. Today, you can get that 3 am phone call anywhere: we live in an age of remote offices, secure communications -- faxes, emails, phone calls, teleconferences -- satellites, computers, BlackBerries, iPhones, and Internet access and cable television 24/7.

In fact, Air Force One boasts a mobile Oval Office. The plane is capable of refueling mid-air, has hardened electronics capable of withstanding an electromagnetic pulse, and has advanced secure communications that allow it to serve as a mobile command center in the event of an attack against the U.S. I hear they even have pens and pencils on board.

And you know what? It works. This past weekend, with you in Latin America and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Paris, you coordinated and ordered military airstrikes against Libya's Muammar Gaddafi.

You and Secretary Clinton weren't the only ones working remotely. Joining Secretary Clinton in Paris was British Prime Minister David Cameron, whose country also took part in enforcing the no-fly zone in Libya.
The idea that a trip or other important presidential business needs to be put on hold, otherwise everything will come to a screeching halt, is ludicrous. You coordinated with Secretary Clinton in Paris, Ambassador Rice in New York, the Pentagon in Washington, military commanders on the ground in the region, and none of it -- not one bit of it -- would have been any different if you were sitting at your desk in the White House instead of your desk on Air Force One.

But before we pass judgment on Republicans alone, let us consider what the Democrats are saying -- which also minimizes the importance of this trip. Sure, they're defending your trip to Latin America. But they're doing so with simple arguments about how this is important "for American jobs."

Well, they're just as wrong as their counterparts.

Going to Latin America isn't a party, it doesn't interfere with your duties, and it's not about job creation. It's about far more than that. Going to Latin America is the work of the president, important and essential work, and it's in our national and strategic interest.

It's about treating Latin America as equal partners, something you, President Obama, promised at the Summit of the Americas in 2009. It's about cultivating a stronger relationship with this part of the world and sending a message to Latin America, as well as Latino-Americans here at home, about their importance in the global economy as well as national and international politics.

Even in the face of a Japan reeling from a series of incomprehensible natural disasters and a Libya in turmoil, our relationship with Latin America needs to be nurtured and strengthened for reasons often ignored by the U.S. news media.

Latin America's importance to the global economy is immense and growing. Capital investment into the region has increased 405% to $6.6 billion in the last year alone, and Brazil is leading the pack. The country has the fifth largest population in the world and the seventh largest economy in the world. It will host the World Cup in 2014 and the Olympics in 2016, and more significantly, may be on the verge of tapping significant oil fields. It's in our national interest for the U.S. to be on the ground floor of Brazil's growth and to become an important and essential ally to them.

Investment opportunity in the Americas isn't just a one-way street. 3G Capital, a firm backed by Brazilian investors, recently purchased Burger King for $3.3 billion -- the largest restaurant acquisition in a decade. And in 2008, Belgian-Brazilian beer giant InBev acquired Anheuser-Busch for $52 billion. It doesn't get any more American than hamburgers and beer.

President Obama, you will always be needed both domestically and internationally. But by going to Latin America this past week, you showed the region -- and Latinos here at home -- that we matter. Thank you for doing the right thing.

This originally appeared in The Huffington Post


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