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NEW YORK TIMES public editor Clark Hoyt has offered a response to media activists who
wrote to the paper about its non-coverage of last month's Winter Soldier hearings. Hoyt's
explanation is that reporters at the Times had "not been aware of the group or its meeting," but
likely wouldn't have covered it if they had been aware of the event.
The idea that the Times was unaware of Winter Soldier is remarkable; the paper's D.C.
reporters were repeatedly sent press releases about the events, the same ones that other
media outlets received that did manage to cover the event, ranging from Pacifica Radio's
Democracy Now! to the New York Times' corporate sibling the Boston Globe.
Hoyt's letter in full:
***
Dear Reader,
Thank you for writing about the Winter Soldier event in Maryland last month and its
lack of coverage by the Times.
My assistant checked with various editors at the Times to see if there was any
discussion about covering the Winter Soldier meeting. The editor in the Washington
bureau who oversees national security coverage said he had not been aware of the
group or its meeting. The Times normally has three Pentagon reporters. The meeting
fell within their area of coverage, and one of them probably would have been
assigned had editors chosen to staff the event. But one is on book leave, one was
traveling with the secretary of defense, and one was in Iraq covering the war. The
Times also did not cover an announcement the following day by Vets for Freedom, a
group supporting the war and claiming more than 13 times the membership of Iraq
Veterans Against the War, the group which organized Winter Soldier.
One group was emphasizing what it charged were war crimes, war profiteering and
war mismanagement. The other group was protesting what it charged was the failure
of the media to report more fully on signs of progress in Iraq, such as rebuilt schools
and infrastructure.
News organizations like the Times, with its own substantial investment in
independent reporting from Iraq tend to prefer their own on-scene accounts of the
war, rather than relying on charges and counter-charges at home by organizations
with strongly held political viewpoints about the war.
Sincerely,
Clark Hoyt
FAIR'S PERSPECTIVE:
The Times' D.C. bureau editor's claim to have not heard of the hearings is remarkable, given
that the AP newswire carried a story on the hearings, and IVAW has confirmed to FAIR that the
D.C. bureau had been sent three separate rounds of different IVAW press releases. In
addition, at least 150 Times staffers were sent press releases about Winter Soldier by the
Institute for Public Accuracy, a group that encourages inclusion of overlooked facts and
progressive perspectives in media coverage. Given that media organizations operating on a
small fraction of the Times' budget were aware of and able to find the resources to cover these
hearings, the Times' D.C. bureau's plea to ignorance about the hearings is all the more
disappointing.
Meanwhile, Hoyt's justification of the Times failure to cover Winter Soldier on the grounds that
they also did not cover "an announcement the following day by Vets for Freedom, a group
supporting the war and claiming more than 13 times the membership of Iraq Veterans Against
the War, the group which organized Winter Soldier," draws a far-fetched parallel between a
group presenting eyewitness testimony about atrocities in Iraq and a group releasing a press
release about media bias. (As a group that often puts out press releases about media bias
that don't get covered by the Times, the comparison strikes us as rather absurd.) Further, the
size of IVAW and Vets for Freedom are not directly comparable, as IVAW is a group of
veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, whereas anyone can sign up on the Vets for
Freedom website, which stipulates that "non-veterans can also be members of Vets for
Freedom."
Hoyt's claim that "news organizations like the Times, with its own substantial investment in
independent reporting from Iraq, tend to prefer their own on-scene accounts of the war" is akin
to asserting that reporters on the police beat prefer to write about crimes they have seen
themselves rather than talking to eyewitnesses. Given that Times reporters, like all Western
journalists in Iraq, have great difficulty travelling freely outside the Green Zone, it is hard to
imagine that they could provide a full and accurate picture of the war without interviewing
people who have participated in it. And of course the paper does often interview U.S. military
personnel about what they've seen, though when they are whistleblowers trying to call
attention to what they describe as "the human consequences of failed policy," the Times
suddenly has much less interest in what they have to say.
The New York Times' decision to assign one of its two available correspondents to tour with
the Secretary of Defense instead of hearing the first-hand accounts of the Winter Soldiers
demonstrates a very strange notion of "independent reporting."
For more information, contact FAIR at fair@fair.org
wrote to the paper about its non-coverage of last month's Winter Soldier hearings. Hoyt's
explanation is that reporters at the Times had "not been aware of the group or its meeting," but
likely wouldn't have covered it if they had been aware of the event.
The idea that the Times was unaware of Winter Soldier is remarkable; the paper's D.C.
reporters were repeatedly sent press releases about the events, the same ones that other
media outlets received that did manage to cover the event, ranging from Pacifica Radio's
Democracy Now! to the New York Times' corporate sibling the Boston Globe.
Hoyt's letter in full:
***
Dear Reader,
Thank you for writing about the Winter Soldier event in Maryland last month and its
lack of coverage by the Times.
My assistant checked with various editors at the Times to see if there was any
discussion about covering the Winter Soldier meeting. The editor in the Washington
bureau who oversees national security coverage said he had not been aware of the
group or its meeting. The Times normally has three Pentagon reporters. The meeting
fell within their area of coverage, and one of them probably would have been
assigned had editors chosen to staff the event. But one is on book leave, one was
traveling with the secretary of defense, and one was in Iraq covering the war. The
Times also did not cover an announcement the following day by Vets for Freedom, a
group supporting the war and claiming more than 13 times the membership of Iraq
Veterans Against the War, the group which organized Winter Soldier.
One group was emphasizing what it charged were war crimes, war profiteering and
war mismanagement. The other group was protesting what it charged was the failure
of the media to report more fully on signs of progress in Iraq, such as rebuilt schools
and infrastructure.
News organizations like the Times, with its own substantial investment in
independent reporting from Iraq tend to prefer their own on-scene accounts of the
war, rather than relying on charges and counter-charges at home by organizations
with strongly held political viewpoints about the war.
Sincerely,
Clark Hoyt
FAIR'S PERSPECTIVE:
The Times' D.C. bureau editor's claim to have not heard of the hearings is remarkable, given
that the AP newswire carried a story on the hearings, and IVAW has confirmed to FAIR that the
D.C. bureau had been sent three separate rounds of different IVAW press releases. In
addition, at least 150 Times staffers were sent press releases about Winter Soldier by the
Institute for Public Accuracy, a group that encourages inclusion of overlooked facts and
progressive perspectives in media coverage. Given that media organizations operating on a
small fraction of the Times' budget were aware of and able to find the resources to cover these
hearings, the Times' D.C. bureau's plea to ignorance about the hearings is all the more
disappointing.
Meanwhile, Hoyt's justification of the Times failure to cover Winter Soldier on the grounds that
they also did not cover "an announcement the following day by Vets for Freedom, a group
supporting the war and claiming more than 13 times the membership of Iraq Veterans Against
the War, the group which organized Winter Soldier," draws a far-fetched parallel between a
group presenting eyewitness testimony about atrocities in Iraq and a group releasing a press
release about media bias. (As a group that often puts out press releases about media bias
that don't get covered by the Times, the comparison strikes us as rather absurd.) Further, the
size of IVAW and Vets for Freedom are not directly comparable, as IVAW is a group of
veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, whereas anyone can sign up on the Vets for
Freedom website, which stipulates that "non-veterans can also be members of Vets for
Freedom."
Hoyt's claim that "news organizations like the Times, with its own substantial investment in
independent reporting from Iraq, tend to prefer their own on-scene accounts of the war" is akin
to asserting that reporters on the police beat prefer to write about crimes they have seen
themselves rather than talking to eyewitnesses. Given that Times reporters, like all Western
journalists in Iraq, have great difficulty travelling freely outside the Green Zone, it is hard to
imagine that they could provide a full and accurate picture of the war without interviewing
people who have participated in it. And of course the paper does often interview U.S. military
personnel about what they've seen, though when they are whistleblowers trying to call
attention to what they describe as "the human consequences of failed policy," the Times
suddenly has much less interest in what they have to say.
The New York Times' decision to assign one of its two available correspondents to tour with
the Secretary of Defense instead of hearing the first-hand accounts of the Winter Soldiers
demonstrates a very strange notion of "independent reporting."
For more information, contact FAIR at fair@fair.org
WINTER SOLDIER BLACKOUT: NEW YORK TIMES FAILS AMERICA'S VETERANS (from Fairness in Accuracy and Reporting) APRIL 8, 2008 |