Presswatch / Double Standards

...Notice, however, that there is no self-censorship when it comes to our covert activities...

...Nor is there any serious dispute about the motives behind the legislation: Senator Hollings put the language into the Continuing Resolution at the behest of Senator Kennedy, who hates the Boston Herald (it's conservative...

...N ow, you might have expected that the conservatives would have gotten excited about this blatant effort to shut them down in New York and Boston...

...Congress can certainly pass a law forbidding cross-ownership...

...Sophistries...

...Nor can anyone argue—although the New York Times's chief sophist in residence, Anthony Lewis, has feebly tried—that this is a matter of high principle, since only Murdoch currently holds waivers...

...Indeed, the only occasion in the recent past when the Times editorialists seemed to worry about national security concerns during a major investigation is this one, which was into Soviet espionage activities in and around the American Embassy in Moscow...

...It isn't, for the usual, sad reason...

...It is not an all-out attack on the covert action launched by Kennedy and Hollings, and no one, at least as of this writing, has picked up the war cry of Mayor Koch:newspapers, magazines, and television stations, have to make movies and write and publish books...

...Nor did they worry when the names of sensitive intelligence sources were published by the Tower Commission...

...So what kind of investigation should be limited...

...Anything and everything done by the CIA, DIA, military intelligence groups, special forces, even the NSA, seems to be fair game...

...So this was clearly a political maneuver, aimed at Murdoch, executed by his political enemies...

...Nowhere is this more evident than in the gingerly treatment our media give to the Soviet Union...

...Murdoch also knew the Supreme Court ruling, and could always hope to change the regulation (after all, the Fairness Doctrine died last year, why shouldn't the "cross-ownership" regulation perish as well...

...Hollings's concern about cross-ownership of media...

...Along the way, one encounters this remarkable sentence: "Thus, without successful reform the Soviet economy will go the way of Britain's, slipping toward senescence...

...That's no trespass on press freedom...

...it's Hollings, the messenger, who gets the most attention...

...Egad...

...If Mr...

...the conservativesstanding awkwardly to one side, clucking their tongues but not fighting...

...Murdoch is willing to subsidize it from his television station in order to have the power of a newspaper proprietor in New York, that may be the only way to keep it going...

...Back when Brezhnev was in charge (a man best described by an Italian Communist friend of mine as looking like a rotten tomato), and the attempted assassination of the Pope took place, Flora Lewis of the New York Times wrote that it was in everybody's best interests to leave the story alone, because if it turned out the Russians had done it, world peace might be threatened...

...That sentence may be worthy of the Disinformation Award of 1987 for the best short example of the art form...

...The lead editorial on December 27 (entitled "Has Gorbachev Already Lost Round I?' note the Roman numeral, just like in the Super Bowl) meandered around the subject of the Gorbachevian reform movement and concluded that one could not expect quick results...

...You must compete with the left, which prizes influence over the media, and resorts to all manner of stratagem to obtain and expand it...

...It's a double standard...

...So their malfeasances are treated differently from ours...

...When the "cross-ownership" regulation was introduced, there were "grandfather" clauses that permitted certain existing "cross-ownership" situations to continue...

...Moynihan (who doesn't qualify anymore) and D'Amato (who may) complained loudly, but their efforts seem primarily designed to save the jobs of 1,200 workers at the Post...

...And the editorialists at the Wall Street Journal pointed out that the Kennedy-Hollings covert operation was unconstitutional, since it illegally deprived the FCC of the option of issuing a waiver in specific cases...

...one more sin-by-omission for the conservatives...

...During that period, the editorial column was the strong whip hand on the Joint Committees' flank, urging the committees on to ever greater investigatory exertions...

...The Kremlin should be so lucky as to have an economy half as dynamic as the British...

...Right he is (but where was he when the Select Committees on the Iran-contra matter violated their own rules by deciding, behind closed doors, not to call witnesses who had been damaged by previous public testimony...

...It is the kind of issue a fair-minded Federal Communications Commission should hear and decide...

...The commentary has been lively...

...Republicans, and traditional conservatives generally, don't like the rough-andtumble world of the media...

...So, as befits the sophist in residence, he's gotten it both ways...

...Enforcement is supposed to be carried out by agencies of the executive, or so I thought...

...he isn't...

...diversity of press ownership is essential to the whole idea of the First Amendment...

...They are vaguely uncomfortable with mass politics, and prefer to do things in an orderly fashion, among gentlemen, preferably at the country club with good brandy...

...But that is not the point at all...

...Even the Pope is looked at more critically than the Kremlin leaders, and it is not merely, as some would have it, because of the public-relations skills of Comrade Gorbachev...

...but the Times is not against investigations per se...

...The Supreme Court had previously stated that "waivers are potentially available" in cases where to deny a waiver might lead to closing a newspaper (which may well happen in the case of the Post, a multimillion-dollar annual loser...

...The FCC regulations currently in force forbid common ownership of more than one outlet per media market...

...I will support no candidate—in either the primaries or the general election—who does not join in this defense of the First Amendment...

...No talk about letting the chips fall in that column...

...The Times thinks the Navy went overboard (to coin a phrase) in investigating Soviet espionage...

...Murdoch knew the rules when he bought the properties...

...All journalists think of themselves as part of the policy-making process, so they and their editors are highly chip-conscious...

...The issue is the new ability of powerful committee chairmen to corrupt the legislative conference by delivering on political contracts—in a tight little club behind closed doors—that they could never get away with on the floor of the House or Senate...

...The ultimate double standard...

...one more step towards expanding the hegemony of the left over the media...

...I cannot imagine such a line nowadays...

...After his lecture on Madisonian principles, Lewis reverses himself: The New York Post, losing money, is really in danger of disappearing...

...And finally, don't they know at the Times that the British economy is decidedly on the way up...

...Every time I speak to a conservative group on the subject of the media, I am asked, "What can be done to make the media more representative, more objective, more thorough...

...So they are careful...

...It can even pass the law it has now passed...

...The best article of all came from New York City's mayor, Hizzoner Edward Koch...

...But there is yet another double standard at work here, for the New York Times itself owns a radio station in New York City, and another company owns both Channel 11 and the Daily News...

...But the Times doesn't like the "legislating on the sly" indulged in by Hollings (they only mention Kennedy once...

...For there is no doubt that the bill would have been defeated if it had been debated openly...

...Just as there is no doubt—even in Anthony Lewis's mind—that it is a bad measure...

...Don't for a minute buy that nonsense about limiting an investigation because of national security concerns...

...The New York Times editorialists weighed in with their usual double standard: the end was worthy, but the means were tainted...

...the KGB at the American Embassy in Moscow: "The naval investigators need to be made aware that there are limits to the conduct of an investigation, even—perhaps especially—one that invites compelling national security questions...

...I urge others to take the same stand...

...Murdoch asked for a waiver to consider his options, obtained it, and was studying his next move when the conference committee of Congress, in the dead of night (3 a.m., we are told), introduced the hitherto-undiscussed and unheard-of requirement that no further by Michael Ledeen waivers could be granted, and that the FCC regulation could not be changed...

...Here's the New York Times editorial of December 23, 1987...

...I always respond, "People with different points of view have to get involved, have to buy THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR MARCH 1988 25...

...How is that, you ask...

...The Soviet Union got another gift from the Times editorialists just four days later...

...Murdoch owns television stations in each city, and a newspaper in each as well (the New York Post and the Boston Herald...

...To date no one, even supporters of the legislation, has argued that the most likely outcome of the act—Murdoch will sell the Post and one of the two properties in Boston—is a good thing...

...At the behest of Senator . . . Kennedy, Senator Hollings won an amendment that forbids extending the deadline...

...Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts that he was introducing a bill "aimed directly" at Rupert Murdoch...

...He noted that Hollings didn't tell New York Senators D'Amato 24 THE AMERICAN SPECTATOR MARCH 1988 and Moynihan about the bill, but, in Koch's memorable language: For some strange reason, however, Hollings did remember to notify Sen...

...Kennedy and Hollings An award is due to Alex S. Jones of the New York Times for discovering, in the seemingly endless bowels of the infamous Continuing Resolution, a nasty piece of legislation aimed at compelling Rupert Murdoch to sell two media properties he owns in New York and Boston...

...His campaign isn't doing well, but he has picked up one ally: Pat Buchanan, who had the wit to write in the Washington Times that this ought to be a major issue for the Republicans...

...But no...

...You think I'm overdoing it...

...Congress is a legislative branch, not an executive body...

...Here we see it all at work once again: the Kennedys using covert operations to strike against their conservative opponents in the media...

...I sympathize with their desire to live in a more tranquil environment, but I deplore their abandonment of the media arena, which is where most of the important decisions are made...

...To enforce the FCC's more limited regulation is plainly within Congress's power...

...But he appeals to high principle: And then he adds, "Midnight legislation prevents careful weighing of such issues...

...Congress could, if it wished, forbid any cross-ownership of print and broadcast outlets...

...Nor did the Times editorialists express concern that the torrent of sensitive information that swamped the world during the hearings might jeopardize national security...

...PRESSWATCH DOUBLE STANDARDS rr he old, street-wise reporter in the 1 films I grew up with always used to tell the young cub out of school, "Just tell the story, and let the chips fall where they may...

...William Safire went directly to the heart of the political issue: The issue here is not Mr...

...As if they hadn't had their chances...

...the Times showed no such sensitivity during the Iran-contra investigations...

...Anthony Lewis doesn't like Rupert Murdoch, and is clearly happy to get him out of Boston's press...

...Later it turned out that the trail of ink-stained footsteps led straight to Ted Kennedy's door and that he himself had encouraged Hollings to do what he did...

...And that use of the future tense ("will go"), as if today the Soviet economic system is more advanced...

...they get the kid gloves, we are smashed by the iron fist...

...So the attitude of the New York Times is best encapsulated in the old slogan, "I've got mine, Mac, so up yours...

...And we will shortly hear the conservatives whining, "Why doesn't somebody do something about the media...

...The same editorial calls for a congressional investigation . . . of the Navy's investigation...

...Murdoch vs...

...And although it is a commonplace that the media are more powerful than in the past, the media elite imagine their products (stories or broadcasts, as the case may be) to have earth-shaking consequences...

...The issue is whether such actions can be tolerated when they are done in the dark of night in defiance of the will of the legislature...

...James Madison's vision of many independent newspapers giving the people different views is threatened by today's concentration of ownership...

...I am calling upon every presidential candidate, Democratic and Republican, and upon President Reagan himself to urge Congress to reconvene immediately and undo this deplorable act...

...The subject is the (apparently botched) investigation into allegations of Marine complicity with Michael Ledeen is senior fellow in international affairs at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C...

...they don't like stories that hurt their heroes and their causes...