Essay: The Media and The Mayor - 2/29/08

Patriotism, Samuel Johnson said in the 18th century, is the last refuge of a scoundrel. These days, when scoundrels get caught, they first thing they do is blame the media.

Now, that doesn’t mean the media doesn’t deserve blame for its failings. In fact, the media makes me cringe daily, especially when I see the word “news” next to the words “Britney Spears.”

I was sometimes ashamed to be a journalist during the later Clinton years, when the rising tide of al-Qaeda was largely ignored in favor of coverage of stains on a blue dress.

And, I have probably been the most relentless critic of the Detroit Free Press. Too often, the newspaper’s coverage has been dumbed down, especially since the paper was sold to Gannett in 2005. Two years ago, the newspaper utterly ignored a historic joint lecture by three Nobel Peace Prize winners in Detroit.

Instead, they ran a story on the front page the next day about how the editor liked to eat peanut butter right out of the jar.

But in its coverage of what is being called “Textgate,” the newspaper has been doing work in keeping with the finest traditions of American journalism. Indeed, I think the paper deserves a Pulitzer Prize for public service, if not investigative journalism.

Both Detroit papers, in fact, have been admirably serving the public in their coverage of the mayor, and I find very little to criticize what they have done. And their jobs haven’t been easy.

Detroit is nearly ninety percent black, and its two newspapers are each owned by out-of-town corporations. They worry about being seen as carpetbaggers and closet racists.

The current mayor is a talented, charismatic man-child who has charmed the business community. But he also has behaved as if being mayor meant the city is his playpen. The newspapers documented a vast range of mayoral abuses throughout 2005, and the voters then reelected Kwame Kilpatrick anyway.

I worried then that the papers would stop scrutinizing the mayor. But their reporters stayed alert, and relentless. Let me make something clear – whatever anyone says, this isn’t about race, and it isn’t really about sex. It is about a pattern of abuse of power that already has cost the taxpayers of one of the nation’s poorest cities more than nine million dollars.

It took lots of hard work, many man-hours and a considerable amount of money to bring this to light. This is what journalism at its finest does. This is a public service that, whether the citizens appreciate it or not, is absolutely essential to a free society.

Journalists are a scruffy and unpopular lot. When we do our best work, we are normally telling you that your food is tainted and your water is polluted and your politicians are corrupt.

You mostly don’t want us at your banquet. But deep down, you know you really need us, and what we do. And if you ever forget that, our democracy will clearly be down the drain.

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Comments

[ThinkLife]

On WJR's Paul W. Smith show, Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick wondered why people are calling for him to resign:

Kilpatrick: "I don't understand, when people say resign... Because what, we're going to stop all of the progress that we've made? We're not doing that."

· Is he out of touch?
· Is his "spin machine" running so fast he's dried out his brain?
· Is he so deluded that he truly thinks he is the victim of the press with scandals he created and paid out, on the city's dime, $9 million + to cover up?

Not really. The denials from this spin doctor are transparent evasions, misdirections and lies. Of course he wants to keep the vehicles, the $175K salary, the power and the perks.

So does his wife, who appears not to mind his cheating so long as the money keeps rolling in. Not a peep from her about Beatty, the massages at fancy, expensive hotels. Poor thing, she had to give back the city the SUV Kwame misappropriated for her a few years back. The heck with Detroit's needs and the careers of three whistleblowers--the Kilpatricks have a cash cow to milk! And milk it together, in a perfect image of holy matrimony!

Kilpatrick is responsible for obvious malfeasance--using public funds to cover his personal scandals and trysts. And soon a judge will determine the obvious: that he and his paramour Christine Beatty perjured themselves in court.

Kwame Kilpatrick continues to misuse public money, lie, misdirect and try to evade responsibility for his crimes. This embattled city of homeless, drug addicts, poor and jobless--many living in a dire world without hope--needs him like a gaping, gushing wound. Their lifeblood pours out through Kwame, who's feeling no pain, as he spends more and more to defend himself.

I hope for a quick end to the reign of "Gimme Crookpatrick" as the self-serving Emperor of Detroit.

--
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[Jane]

One thing missing from Jack's writing on the mayor is criticism of Kwame's lawyer, Sharon McPhail. She's been an embarrassment, but it's hard to criticize your friends.

[Jack Lessenberry]

Sharon McPhail has indeed become nothing more than the paid mouthpiece of the mayor, and that is sort of a sad place to be, but the scandal is scarcely about her.

[Thrasher]

I am not willing yet to give our local newspapers any Pulitzer Awards for doing what is expected of good newspapers which consistent and fundamentaly sound journalism. Both of our papers as well as the radio and tv oulets have for decades had contempt for Detroit and it's overwhelmingly Black residents. Of late this contempt has even started to contaminate WDET with it's coverage of this saga.

It is becuase our local journalists have betrayed so many for so long in this region and have so much contempt and so many have a low level of expectation( soft bigotry is what our prez Bush calls this posture) I am withholding my award celebration for any of the media outlets in this region.

I want a comprehensive and long time focus on objective, racially contempt free journalism from our media outlets until that is observed I still have my reservations about how events and issues are reported and covered in this region whenever race, class, and other demographics are a part of the story..

[Jose Santiago]

A good reminder of the need for investigatory journalism. It's just a shame that many times the sensational wiggles its way into the story.

As for Thrasher, perhaps the Michigan Citizen or Chronicle will suffice. Those bastions of truth and objective reporting are not well understood by us crackers who wake up in the morning looking for ways to disenfranchise the black community. Or WCHB and their lineup of objective, arms-length and fact based radio shows.

[Markmond Lactoby]

Let's not kid ourselves. The Detroit papers are playing into stereotypes of black males -- thugs, womanizers -- by using Mayor Kilpatrick to sell newspapers to suburban whites.

The newspapers aren't interested in reporting the positive changes in Detroit under Mayor Kilpatrick, because the white suburban readership doesn't live there and rarely travels there. But, white suburbanites love to sneer at the plight of black Detroit, to amuse themselves with the troubles of the city and its residents (especially its mayor) and that's what this media-manufacturered "crisis" is all about.

[Jose Santiago]

Markmond:

Yes, you are correct that this manufactured crisis is about the white suburbanite crackers who enjoy the ineptitude and incompetence that is Detroit. Third world metrics, tragic public schools, siege mentality populace and yes that shining example of executive leadership. Fractured logic with absolutely no factual basis. Pure racist diatribe. Are you and Thrasher smoking the same crack pipe?