Media: The Template Theory
I know most folks here have a theory about major media. Most folks on the left do, too. I've got my own, and I share it with you today because I've just been living through empirical evidence of it.
The story starts with my own experience as a callow youth working for Newsweek in Los Angeles. I was below the low man on the totem pole, but occasionally I got to cover big stuff--when it happened on weekends. One day a "twx" came in from the Life and Leisure section editor in New York, asking reporters around the country for evidence of "rooftop living". He'd apparently been near-snoozing post-lunch, and, as he stared out his skyscraper window he must have noticed some stuff going on on nearby roofs. Hence, a trend story.
I duly called the obvious source: Capt Max Schumacher, LA's pioneering helicopter traffic pilot. He told me the obvious: LA has plenty of land, nobody needs to put anything on their roof, but...And he pointed me to three property owners who had, one being Mr. John B. Zurlo, who had a swimming pool surrounded by Greek columns on the roof of his Sunset Strip tower. I filed an interview with Zurlo, topped with the advisory that he was an anomaly in spacious SoCal.
When I returned from covering a space shot a few days later, the draft of the magazine story was waiting for me. The paragraph containing the Zurlo quotes began, "Typical of LaLa Land, the area burgeons with rooftop living." I called the researcher in NY and said, "read my file, you can't say that." She aurally nodded. When the magazine came out, nothing had changed. LaLa Land still burgeoned.
An editor sat in NYC and got a template of a story in his mind. Reporters were needed to mine quotes to fill out the template. Reporting that challenged the template was...irrelevant.
Flash forward. I've made a documentary film, "The Big Uneasy", the theme of which is (based on the conclusions of two independent forensic engineering investigations) that the flooding of New Orleans was caused, not by Hurricane Katrina, but by almost five decades of engineering design and construction errors in the "hurricane protection system" built by the Army Corps of Engineers. It's a theme radically at odds with the dominant media template of the New Orleans flood: big storm, city below sea level, nuff said. NB: the movie deals not at all with the response, the aftermath, all of which has been covered and argued about endlessly. My focus was simply to let the people who'd actually investigated the disaster and who knew what they were talking about tell their story.
Some media outlets actually did choose to cover the story of this film. CBS, NBC, and ABC did not. CBS, which we had been told might mention the thesis of the film on Friday's Evening News, instead ran an impossibly credulous piece on what great work the Corps was doing to rebuild the system. Anderson Cooper's show thought footage of Chilean miners was more significant; that's fair. NPR refused to cover the story on either flagship news program, and, when I took the obvious next step--bought "underwritiing announcements", i.e., ads--the real magic began.
NPR legal issued an edict that the following words could not be spoken in the announcement: "...documentary about why New Orleans flooded." Approved language: "...documentary about New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina". Even though the first sentence in the film says that, had the system not failed catastrophically, Katrina would have given New Orleans only "wet ankles".
Since the Corps' work stretched through administrations of both parties, it's hard for me to see a left/right thing here. What I see is a media in love with its own template of the story, loathe to let facts upset it.
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Jul '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
This reminds me of Hearst's "You furnish the pictures, I'll furnish the war." Today it's "We'll furnish the explanation, you furnish the details." In that order.
And the real trouble is, once an explanation for an event settles in the public imagination, planted there by the elites who run the major media, it takes an upheaval of seismic proportions to shift it. Meanwhile, alternative research like yours, Harry, seeking simply to follow the facts wherever they lead, struggles to find the light of day.
Here's you hoping you beat 'em this time.
Re: Media: The Template Theory
This is perhaps what disturbs me most. NPR is not going to bite the federal hand that feeds it by documenting Army Corps of Engineer's shortcomings. Viewed in light of federal efforts to bail out failing news outlets and exercise increasing influence over media content, I see where this leads, and it isn't exactly what Thomas Jefferson had in mind.
Jun '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
I'll be at the theater watching, Monday Night. I just hope history doesn't make Anderson Cooper and Shep Smith the "experts" on what happened during Katrina. The other tragedy of Katrina was how "reporters" like Cooper and Smith let unfiltered rumors take over the coverage. I thought the standard advice to journalists was, "if your mother tells you she loves you, get an independent source to confirm it."
Edited on August 28, 2010 at 8:11pmMay '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
I plead guilty.
When I first heard of your film, I applied the my template of what I thought a Katrina doc would be all about (conservatives will know exactly what I mean) and had no interest in seeing it.
Now I do.
May '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
I had a bit of this media conversation with a friend last week. He was using the typical "blame Fox News" angle to defend his beloved Barry O. The left have made Fox News the network equivalent of George W. Bush; a one stop blame-all that frees them from having to generate even the tiniest quark of critical thought.
Fox News was created in a vast vacuum of liberal bias, and is really just a natural bi-product of a one sided MSM that had long since done away the notion of journalistic integrity. I submit as Exhibit A: Neilsen Ratings.
As with most things that have gone bad these days, I blame the baby boomers (but I base this premise on actual evidence). Journalism slowly died out with the retirement of those reporters born in the Last Great Generation. For baby boomers, activism and "social justice" became reasons to get into journalism, rather than something the media covers.
Fast forward a few decades and the journalistic landscape includes Anderson Cooper "reporting" on large gatherings of Americans taking to the public square by using a sexual association you might expect from a kid about to enter junior high.
May '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
...and having said all that (and maxed out my word limit), your Template Theory seems quite plausible Harry.
Re: Media: The Template Theory
From child actor on the Jack Benny radio show to man about town in Hollywood to radio host to Smithers and Mr. Burns on "The Simpsons" to documentary film maker. The first thing I'd like to say you, Harry, is that I envy you your glorious career. The second is, of course, welcome to Ricochet. And the third? Simply this:
Keep thinking about the way big government, through the agency of the Army Corps of Engineers, made a mess of New Orleans, and about the way in which big media still won't tell the story. You're moving our way, Harry. I'm not sure a mere week as a guest contributor here on Ricochet will do the trick. But somewhere deep inside you, there's a conservative struggling to get out.
Aug '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
The "template" theory explains a lot. I know I have never read a completely accurate news story about any subject with which I was intimately acquainted. There are inevitably errors of omission and commission. I've always chalked that up to journalistic laziness. But Harry's "template" is the darker theory. Journalists write the story they wanna write - regardless the facts.
And while I'm here, I gotta say to Harry - from all the working musicians on the planet - thanks for "Spinal Tap." (Every session musician I know can pretty much quote the entire film.) In truth, "This is Spinal Tap" was a much more accurate documentary about the music business than all the news reports I've ever read or seen on TV.
Jul '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
Why is it when I visualize a newspaper editor or a network news chief I see Conrad Burns? Damn you, Harry Shearer!
Jun '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
And the kicker is they are repeating their mistake. Again rebuilding to allow thousands of people to live below sea level. All those billions would be better spent subsidizing the relocation of those same thousands. As for the media, the one that really matters now is the one we're currently using in this forum.
Jul '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
I am actually really surprised about the ruling from NPR's legal. I basically expect coverage from the major networks not to challenge convention and keep their coverage pretty shallow. I guess I hold or held NPR in higher esteem.
Also could anyone tell me what a twx is?
Also what can I do to get Harry's documentary shown in my area?
Jul '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
It is not a "mistake" to live below sea level. We're Americans. We have the ability to live anywhere. Heck, look at the deserts around the world. Give Americans a desert and We build Las Vegas.
May '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
As in global warming.
BTW, you were great in "Mighty Wind"
Jun '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
A heartfelt welcome to you, Harry. Thank you for guesting with us, and I hope you enjoy the experience. We may not pay as well as HuffPo, but we'll respect you in the morning.
In the coverage we've seen of the larger national issues and in the experiences you've shared with us, I think the underlying theme isn't bias so much as a desire to control the flow of information. The larger newspapers (what's left of them) all spent years denigrating new media, mainly because they kept getting scooped. If they had any kind of brains they would've thrown some cash or recognition the way of the bloggers early and they wouldn't be in the straits they're in today. Instead, they've collectively become the creepy old guy in the college bar, wearing a not-quite-right approximation of young duds and talking out-of-date slang. Also, they're bastards.
May '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
As a stock analyst I speak to the media routinely several times a week and this pre-set bias has always been true. I am called as a supposed expert and the questions are all couched that way, but within 30 seconds I can already figure the thesis. If I disagree and work VERY hard, I can sometimes dissuade them from writing anything ("these are not the droids you seek...") But there is no way to turn the story around and IMPOSSIBLE if the story has been encouraged/launched by someone in government.
I don't disagree with your basic thesis Harry, but I actually think that the implicit anti-government message echoes a meme that the mainstream media is currently working against. If your story had been about evil private contractors being responsible for the poor construction and a corresponding cover-up and/or about the noble Army Corps. coming in to clean up the poor job of private enterprise -- well that would have represented a more popular meme and I daresay would have been better received.
Aug '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
Trace, the problem with your thesis is that the Army Corps, as we document in the film, is basically the Army Corps of Contract Administrators. As Dr. Bob Bea of UC Berkeley (who started his career with the Corps) points out, the Corps does very little of its own engineering and none of its own constructing any more. Private contractors do that work.
Now what?
Aug '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
LATE UPDATE: Credit where due department: Brian Williams did, I hear, mention the film and its subject matter this a.m. on Meet the Press. Meanwhile, npr told the NYPost their decision was made to comply with "FCC guiidelines". You know, those guidelines that prohibit advertisers from saying what their product is....
Re: Media: The Template Theory
In the movie, Dr. Bea is a pretty compelling figure.
Harry, to follow up a bit on Trace's thought, the lovely hymns I've been hearing in the media about the Army Corps of Engineers do seem to have a "we're from the government and we're here to help" vibe, which your movie effectively demolishes. When the federal government does something stupid -- like mis-constructing levees, or building the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MR. GO) -- it spends almost as much time and money defending itself later from any culpability. Conservatives tend to think that's just a given when dealing with a giant federal bureaucracy, which is why we instinctively favor market-based, private industry solutions. (Defense, of course, is an exception, but only a small one. When the US Armed forces loses a war, like Vietnam, it engages in an immense amount of self-examination and reform. The armed forces of today are vastly different from the armed forces before Vietnam. My guess is, the Army Corps pretty much runs the same, even after Katrina's failures.)
What do you think?
Aug '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
Yes, Rob, I think "lessons learned" in the Army Corps add up to this: critics say the Dutch have better ideas about living with water, so the Corps hires a couple of Dutch guys and continues to build big, static structures. The government didn't have to spend a lot of money defending the Corps from culpability--except in the case of MR-GO, which was built as a navigation channel--because Congress granted the Corps blanket immunity in the 1927 Flood Control Act. I think a reasonable viewer of the film may well conclude that the crux of the problem is not in a bureaucracy, but in the Congress.
May '10
Re: Media: The Template Theory
Congress is part of that bureaucracy. It builds it, sustains it, funds it, and wallpapers over its manifold failings. If Congress took its jobs seriously, there'd be little bureaucracy.