The People's Forum
THE PEOPLE'S FORUM Vietnam an Issue Dear Sirs: I was much relieved to read Herbert Mitgang's September issue article, "The Politics of Vietnam." The fact is that I had become alarmed at the...
...Note that not only publishers are chal- lenged, but also professional newsmen...
...W. M. Lambert, Jr...
...Canfield Press will publish it in Novem- ber...
...Can any of us do any less than act out of our own greatest possible courage— and, then, a little more...
...Detroit, Michigan Grading the Press Dear Sirs: William Rivers' "Who Shall Guard the Guards...
...Our mercenary troops looted and burned the few struc- tures remaining after the air attack...
...Rivers sounds the same theme in his article...
...James Reston is certainly one of the journalists "suspected of integrity...
...We do not believe in cap- tal punishment, nor in the use of prisons is they are now operated in the United States, but criminals as treasonable as those vho perpetrated the crimes in Southeast Vsia (also Guatemala, Santo Domingo, md other countries) should be banished rom any place in our Government...
...The journalists of Greece are being hounded by a government bent on instilling "responsibility...
...Then we must insist that those niilty of war crimes as outlined in the Geneva Accords (or by the Nuremberg ribunal) be brought to justice...
...The edit would undertake to make a reasonab conscientious effort to inform the publi Grade B papers ("All the news you rea ly need") would suppress any informatic which might embarrass the Government < its major advertisers and would print on as much as was needed to fill the spac between the ads...
...I found it depressing that so keen i student of the press as William L. Rivers :ould think of nothing better to do in lis first "Monitoring Media" column ["Who Shall Guard the Guards?," Sep- ember) than to attempt to breathe new ife into Robert M. Hutchins' tired old idea )f a national press council...
...Responsible" in whose eyes...
...These newspapers—and they deserve the name, often being technically excellent (the local Fifth Estate has better proof- reading than at least one Detroit daily) — show "bias" in their articles...
...A more accurate report might read: U.S...
...I hope Mitgang's article will bring him and the others back to their senses and to the moral values they once emphasized...
...I argue only that it would be useful, and perhaps as useful to the responsible press (which in my definition includes those rau- cous and crude journals that help create diversity) as to the public...
...He certainly has erred...
...I cannot think of any institutions in America more en- tangled with government than the founda- tions...
...His judgment on the Vietnam war (which he did not run) was terrible...
...This being against Army regula tion, they were detained by the militar police...
...Hill's points do not destroy the national press council concept...
...And there is value, of course, in the kind of irrespon- sibility that creates diverse opinion...
...William L. Rivers Stanford, California Press Bias and Objectivity Dear Sirs: William Rivers' "Who Shall Guard the Guards" in your September issue is an ex- cellent article, and I look forward to more of his comments...
...The official body count was given as 180, but may be slightly exaggerated: after an at- tack with phosphorus and napalm, it is often difficult to distinguish small chil- dren from domestic animals...
...Font seems to be delighted to notice that the M.P.s did not dare to arrest the "brothers," because there might be a "full scale race riot...
...If ther are Army regulations, they will have to b obeyed—without regulations there wouli be neither an Army nor the United States The content of the leaflet is irrelevant, b it the Declaration of Independence or Mao's red book...
...This sentence, I think, sums up all that is perni- cious in conventional American liberalism...
...Reston who insisted that his own newspaper should suppress its advance in- formation on the Bay of Pigs invasion...
...Trowbridge H. Ford Associate Professor of Political Science Holy Cross College Worcester, Massachusetts Honor Acts of Conscience Dear Sirs: It is right to honor Daniel Ellsberg and those "many individuals within the Gov- ernment" who have, and are, exposing the manipulations and duplicity of one nation- al Administration after another...
...The Congress- men who hounded CBS for broadcasting "The Selling of the Pentagon," the Federal prosecutors who dragged newspapers into court for publishing the Pentagon Papers •—all these claimed to be acting only in the interests of "responsible" journalism...
...It seems to me, mless the American system is completely corrupt, that the International Monetary Fund, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Ford Foundation, the University of Texas, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Democratic Party should be more di- rectly and immediately concerned with their employment of the war criminals responsible for the disaster...
...Precisely who is to "give the public a voice...
...Edgar Hill Washington, D.C...
...There is a strange leap in his closing mestion, however—i.e., what are we going o do about the disclosures...
...the local chapter of Sig- ma Delta Chi, the professional journalism society, declined to back them...
...and recently it, its publisher, and a reporter were convicted of "receiving stolen proper- ty"—a publicly printed list of narcotics agents, and a Xerox copy of a California Attorney General's office internal memo...
...Hill has weighed the first...
...How can any- one have any confidence, for example, in how the Ford Foundation enjoys its tax- free status and disburses its money when its head is on record as favoring assassina- tion...
...Every newspap or magazine should have complete fre dom to peddle information of any qu2 ity—but it should have to tell us what was selling...
...So much for "devotion to freedom of the (other guy's) press...
...It would carry warning: Reading May Be Harmful t Mental Health...
...I rationalize it on the ground that the issue is pivotal, and because I agree with so much that Mr...
...And what did Font and his friends expect to achieve by distributing this leaflet to the GIs...
...Klaus G. Loewald Armidale, Australia...
...Rivers suggests that the work of a national press council "should be financed by a foundation or a consortium of founda- tions"—this to avoid "entanglements with either press or government...
...I hope, too, that the succeeding "Monitoring Media" articles will be weighed as thought- fully as Mr...
...It would aim to give the reader vague sense of omniscience while shieldir him from reality...
...They will find their own...
...Open resistance, civil disobedience, is clearly not the means available to every- one...
...It matters not whether the forces of the world can actually bring about the execu- tions of America's war criminals—what matters is that there be courageous voices to speak out and demand that there be equal punishment for American war crim- inals as there was for German and Jap- anese war criminals...
...When I say that I agree, I mean that I can find no fault with particulars...
...What is, however, much more disturb- ing is the fact that Mr...
...but most important, he asks, 'What are we going to do about it...
...Hill says...
...But no one has argued that the council would be perfect...
...Mob rule...
...I was especially disappointed to find my favorite Presidential candidate, Senator George McGovern, echoing this shocking position...
...We are frightened to realize that most of what we know does not spring from experience and observation but is a synthesis created by the media...
...Hill points out, in promoting a "responsible" press if govern- ment officials define the term...
...I would have thought that we had learned a thing or two since then...
...Rivers writes, "the time has arrived to give the public a voice through a national press council...
...In the face of such power and such po- tential for evil, it is foolish to rely only upon the random observations of indepen- dent critics...
...McGeorge Bundy does run the Ford Foundation...
...We also need an irresponsible press, for it may turn out to be more responsible than those who claim the virtue...
...And the tens of thousands who, over the years, have risked their free- dom and their futures in resistance to subtle tyranny by demonstrating, sitting-in, burning draft cards, refusing submission to military induction and war taxes...
...Is McGeorge Bundy, who once ran the Vietnam war and now runs the Ford Foundation, qualified to assess in behalf of the public the media's coverage of Vietnam ? The 1947 report of the Hutchins Com- mission was entitled "A Free and Respon- sible Press," and Mr...
...No casualties were suf- fered by allied forces...
...But the "allies" were paid by America, equipped by America, trained by America, transported by America, supplied by Amer- ica, and told what to do by American "ad- visers...
...Grade C ("All the news you real want") would be the standard news mai azine product, processed to suit the pre udices of its editors, advertisers, and rea< ers...
...In fact, we need the broadest diversity of media—re- spectable and raucous, slick and crude...
...Frazier T. Woolard Washington, North Carolina The Progressive opposed hanging German and Japanese war criminals, and continues to oppose capital punishment for any crime.—The Editors A Question for Galbraith Dear Sirs: Where does J. Kenneth Galbraith get the idea (expressed in The People's For- um, July) that the Administration is intel- lectually insulting the country...
...Their courage and integrity are in no way dwarfed if, at the same time, we honor those hundreds of men in civilian and military prisons for resisting the draft and the army...
...I am rather surprised, though, that he didn't even mention one of the main reactions that has developed to the media's credibility problem—the rise of the so-called "underground press," better called the "alternative press...
...Grade D ('All the news that's good f( you") would feature handouts from tr Pentagon, State Department, and Whii House, plus the NAM, the John Birc Society, and the KKK...
...God knows our media need monitoring...
...Se- lected and suspected by whom...
...Certainly James Reston of The New York Times would rank high on any list of journalists "suspected of integrity," yet I recall that it was Mr...
...I like backtalk, and I'll try to restrain my- self so readers can provide it...
...Pentagon pol- icy has been to report all unidentifiable re- mains as "enemy dead...
...There would be weekly tirade by the Subversive Activitie Control Board, and a practical joke b William F. Buckley, Jr...
...I hope that a national press council will be created and that the independent critics will appraise it as well as the media...
...Rivers Comments Dear Sirs: I believe that a reader should be able to react to an article without fear that the writer will be given the last word...
...If they do their job well, the people will not need to be "given" a voice...
...Rivers says some journalists —persons "suspected of integrity"—should be "selected" to serve on the council...
...The euphemisms which we use to describe our own activities in Indo- china are just as nauseating, however...
...He could surely make an excellent case to show that the Administration reflects the intellect which elected it...
...We need a responsible press, of course...
...Igal Roodenko Chairman War Resisters League New York, New York Hanging War Criminals Dear Sirs: In your editorial in the August, 1971, is- sue, "The Price of Secrecy," you write: ". . . The Pentagon Papers make clear that crimes have been committed in our name —America hanged men in Nuremberg and Tokyo for conspiring to plan and wage aggressive war—but we are not suggesting that anyone be hanged...
...Betty Wolfe Cambridge, Massachusetts Need Irresponsible Press Too Dear Sirs: The Progressive's new department of press criticism, "Monitoring Media," is an admirable addition to your magazine, and Dne that could contribute significantly to the urgent cause of creating a better- nformed citizenry...
...Thus, this is a reluctant response to Edgar Hill's letter...
...When the Hutchins Commission first idvanced this plan in 1947, it had the vir- ure, at least, of being consonant with the pirit of the times: It was the prototypical iberal solution to propose creation of a >ody of "enlightened" elitists to deal with the outrages committed by a "reaction- ary" press...
...As Mark Twain said, "A lie can travel lalfway around the world while the truth s getting its boots on...
...Is he qualified to speak in behalf of the pub- lie on the media's sins of omission and commission...
...The mass media have become an increas- ingly significant force, not only because of what they actually do to us and for us but because we have suddenly become aware that we live in a synthetic world...
...Nor— in a manner beyond the understanding of most of us—the self-sacrifice by immola- tion of those Buddhist monks overseas and, from our own midst, Alice Herz, Norman Morrison, Roger LaPorte, Hiroko Hayashi, and Florence Beaumont...
...Rivers and other indepen- dent critics of the media can help bring it back...
...With three others who have had similar experiences, I have written a book titled Backtalk, which is not, as you might suppose, subtitled Conversations with Chi- ropractors but Press Councils in America...
...And the gobbledygook about American lives was merely intended to obscure the fact that we were violating international law and our pledge to respect Laotian neutrality...
...But if I agree in particular, I disagree quite strongly in general...
...We should ose no time in forming a people's lobby o work toward the tribunal needed to try hese criminals...
...William Palmer Taylor Hamilton, Ohio Threat of Mob Rule Dear Sirs: In the article, "In the Course of Humai Events . . . ," in the September issue Louis P. Font states that he and his friend failed to obtain the express approval of th base commander of Fort Lewis before dis tributing any handbills, leaflets, or printe< matter...
...It could best func- tion by keeping us informed, like Consum- ers3 Reports, of what we could get for our money...
...Cora and Corwin Chase Vaughn, Washington System Itself at Stake Dear Sirs: Erwin Knoll's August issue article, What We Know Now," is a wonderful liagnosis of the significance of the 'Pentagon Papers...
...That re- minds me of the days in Germany when the SS smashed every window of shops Dwned by Jews, while the police watched, without making a move...
...This, too, is a potentially dangerous notion...
...What was printed, hov ever, would be fairly reliable...
...2) The proposed national press coun- cil should obviously be created—but it will probably be lost in a fog of controversy if it concerns itself with such matters as Public Interest, Responsible Journalism, or Service to Democracy...
...Clearly," Mr...
...There is only one answer to Mr...
...And that leads us to wonder whether we know too many things that aren't true...
...To me this is disturbing to see you at The Progressive who are always so bold now eating crow by not pushing for actual punishment for America's war criminals...
...Yet not only did they get no support from the local dailies...
...As a human institution, it cer- tainly would be flawed...
...The peoples of the world will be listening for such courageous voices...
...I offer the following two comments as suggestions, not criticisms: 1) The practice of describing all corpses as "Communists" is certainly dishonest and inexcusable...
...Slaughters Laotian Peasants— United States airpower today wiped out the village of Wang Wung, in Southern Laos, for no known reason...
...A newspaper which advertised Grade news ("All the news that's fit to print"' would guarantee that no facts whi< seemed important had been deliberate suppressed or misrepresented...
...An intellect which creates revolutionary situations in its efforts to forestall them, which attempts to destroy institutions the diplomas of which it craves, and which swears by a Constitution which it circum- vents is quite adequately served by a gov- ernment it elects yet does not respect...
...The truth has at ast caught up with the lie...
...Their outlook was well expressed by Paul Eberle in the Los Angeles Free Press, November 22, 1968: ". . . the Amer- ican journalistic tradition of separating news from editorial opinion in no way guarantees objective and honest news pres- entation, and more often than not, hinders it...
...They are valuable, but I have come to believe that a national council is essential in part because of the success we achieved when I operated two local press councils...
...The point is that they make no bones about this, claim- ing with justice to present the view of the news that "straight" papers suppress or distort...
...It would have column by David Lawrence, the wit an wisdom of Attorney General John 1 Mitchell and his gracious wife, the e oquence of Ronald Reagan, Spiro Agnev and George Wallace...
...Knoll's question: we must, as citizens of the United States, rededicate ourselves to our first Drinciples...
...Fritz Kredel New York, New York Banish War Criminals Dear Sirs: Erwin Knoll, in the August issue of The Progressive, gives a comprehensive iccount of the duplicity of our government n the matter of pursuing the war in South- east Asia...
...What else did they expect...
...The fact is that I had become alarmed at the number of statements of liberals in Congress asserting that the most shameful act in all Amer- ican history would not be a major issue in 1972...
...They do not need monitoring, however, Dy a self-appointed, self-perpetuating, and ;elf-important body of Establishment lu- ninaries...
...Will The Progressive be heard...
...This same Los Angeles Free Press, with a huge circulation, has consistently been denied the press passes routinely issued by police even to throwaway shopping weeklies...
...Such diversity is rapidly disappearing from America...
...Even The New York Times will print reports like: "Allied Troops Overrun Enemy Outpost — South Vietnamese ground forces, supported by American air power, occupied the Laotian village of Wang Wung today in what was described as 'anticipatory defensive action to save American lives.' Enemy dead were re- ported to total 180...
...in your September issue is fine...
...But would America today be as open to the revelations of the Pentagon Papers had they not been preceded by these acts of conscience and commitment to public truth...
...May Font and his friends and we never experience mob rule in this country—by "the brothers...
...There is danger, as Mr...
...How can anyone have any confidence that this man's brother will serve the pub- lic interest any better as editor of Foreign Affairs...
...There is no reason why the who sell news should not be required—lil those who sell meat—to state plain which grade they offer...
...The whole character of the American system is on the line, and if it doesn't deal with these immoral, irrespon- sible people in the same manner that it treats other moral offenders, we shall have more to do than just trying to reshape public opinion and elect more responsible leaders...
...THE PEOPLE'S FORUM Vietnam an Issue Dear Sirs: I was much relieved to read Herbert Mitgang's September issue article, "The Politics of Vietnam...
...Even if the Administration is thrown out next year, the intellect which installs the successor will have to show whether it was capable of rising above its present level...
...In short, at this point there is more in- volved than just political leaders and pub- lic policy...
...The news reporter carefully masks his own opinion behind phrases like: 'it is be- lieved,' 'they consider,' 'he stated.' Yet the one thing that would be most meaningful and enlightening to the reader is omitted, namely, the point of view of the writer and the publisher...
Vol. 35 • August 1971 • No. 10
