New York Times’ Public Editor Edits Out The Public

Email from the Author ^ | October 26, 2004 | Bruce Kesler

[The Shrew]

NOTE: Please feel free to publish this or pass on.

New York Times’ Public Editor Edits Out The Public

By Bruce Kesler

The New York Times’ exalted view of itself extends to naming Daniel Okrent its Public Editor. Other newspapers have Ombudsmen (or women) or Readers’ Representatives. There’s real meaning in that different nomenclature.

Daniel Okrent does not represent the concerns or corrections of the New York Times’ readers to the Times’ management and reporters, to improve the Times’ reporting. Although Mr. Okrent labels himself the readers’ representative, his record shows, instead, he represents his own views, and in effect that of Times’ management, to the readers.

Below are excerpts from my correspondence with Mr. Okrent, to which his assistant Arthur Bovino replied, along with some temporal context.

Following the August 2004 uproar over the contentions of the Swift Boat Veterans For Truth in their book “Unfit for Command”, first almost entirely covered in the conservative media and then declaimed by Kerry spokespeople in the more liberal mainstream media, I wrote to Mr. Okrent on September 8:

“According to one count, the New York Times has used the word ‘unsubstantiated’ 17 times to describe the contentions raised in Unfit For Command. Since the New York Times has not done any investigation of the actual events described…the use of the word ‘unsubstantiated’ is quite misleading….I challenge that any book has ever so affected a US political campaign since the Federalist Papers…(no I am not otherwise comparing the books). That is more the reason for careful and not political analysis and investigation. The New York Times has, sadly, failed its responsibility.”

Contained in that email was my Short Guide to the Kerry-Vietnam Contentions, “which may be useful to any who do wish to investigate and report.” That Short Guide was also published in the Augusta Free Press on September 10 (“30 Questions”). Informed reporters responded favorably to its balanced outline of the supporting evidence to the Swiftees and of issues unresolved as John Kerry refuses to release his full military records and his journal. For example, Michael Dobbs of the Washington Post, the only mainstream reporter who bothered to try an investigation of one of the incidents, of Kerry’s Bronze Star, wrote me: “Thanks for your Short Guide. You make some good points. We will follow the story.” (8/28/04) Mr. Dobbs’ August 22 investigation stated he was denied access to Kerry’s full records and journal, to resolve issues.

Did Daniel Okrent, then, represent the readers, or ignore them and rely on the Times’ own highly incomplete and partial articles for his report back to the readers? On September 12, Mr. Okrent wrote his next column. In it he said: “Instead of considering the hundreds of messages from irate readers that accumulated while I was gone” he read some of the Times’ coverage of the “Swift Boat dust-up”. Okrent concluded from this read of the Times, “official records contradict the central charges leveled in the ads. However, it is not accurate to say, as Senator Kerry has, that he spent Christmas 1968 in Cambodia. If my summary is wrong, the Times erred. If it’s accurate, the paper did a fine job.”

I wrote a letter to the editor of the New York Times on September 13, “Mr. Okrent is not supposed to be an ordinary reader but the seeker of truth about the caliber of the Times’ coverage.” The letter was not published by the New York Times. I also wrote to Mr. Bovino, “Mr. Okrent’s column amply demonstrates that JUST relying on the NYT’s coverage of the swiftboat contentions results in a very partial understanding of the evidence as compared to the adjectives….I and many others feel strongly the US needs and deserves the civic center that the NYT once served as a detailed, objective paper of record, and only want to see that restored.”

On September 13, I also pointed out to Okrent another Times use of “unsubstantiated”, again without any support by the Times, but just as a repeated adjective whenever referring to the Swiftees. On September 13, I also sent Okrent the 17 specific citations and contextual quotes from various Times reporters similarly dismissing the Swiftees as “unsubstantiated”, without any investigation or specifics justifying that adjective. Arthur Bovino responded for Okrent, “Thanks for this. I’m going to point this out to Mr. Okrent for his upcoming column…”

By this time, even a mainstream media brother of the New York Times, ABC in its NewsNotes, ridiculed the Times’ approach to coverage of the issues: “Sometimes you just want to say: Really, New York Times…who else BUT Bush backers would you expect to give money to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth? Kerry backers? Non-partisans?” (September 13, 2004)

I asked Mr. Bovino when to expect Mr. Okrent’s “upcoming column”? On September 14, Mr. Bovino replied: “At some point between now and the election but sooner rather than later.” (September 14, 2004)

On September 23, I wrote to Okrent again about new, continued “unsubstantiated” abuses. Mr. Bovino replied (September 24), “I have already noted these concerns to Mr. Okrent several times but will add your points to those I am compiling as a report to Mr. Okrent as reference material for his upcoming column.”

On September 30, I wrote to Mr. Okrent again, with more documentation, saying, “Please add this to Mr. Okrent’s folder.” Mr. Bovino replied, “I will.”

On October 9, I wrote to Mr. Okrent regarding the Book section’s review of Unfit For Command by a reporter on Kerry’s bus, who obviously without reading the book, and without any military analysis qualifications, blatantly repeated ad hominem Kerry personal attacks against the author and failed to deal with the details of the book. Mr. Bovino replied: “Mr. Okrent has said that he will be writing about the book review at some point during his tenure so I will keep your message on file for use as reference material.”

On October 12, I wrote to Okrent: “From our correspondence, I felt led to expect Mr. Okrent to speak out on this, especially when so well-documented and so blatant….Yet, three columns have passed, and no Mr. Okrent.” I also wrote a letter to the editor of the New York Times: “Mr. Okrent…wrote [October 12] that essentially the Times is providing balanced reporting of the election. His anecdotal proof is that he receives criticisms from liberals and conservatives. He, however, fails to provide any empirical evidence of the Times’ balance.” The New York Times did not publish this letter.

MSN Slate’s Mickey Kaus commented that same day: “Er, what was Okrent’s job again? Defender of the Times against the Public?…What’s the use of an ombudsman who doesn’t think his paper ever screws up…?”

On October 17, I sent more documentation to Mr. Okrent.

On October 17, rather than do his job of ombudsman, readers’ representative, impartial independent analyst of the New York Times actual reporting, Mr. Okrent turned his column over to two outside left and right general commentators on the Times. On October 24, Mr. Okrent continued to not do his job of investigating and analyzing problems in New York Times reporting, as he turned his column over to a few semi-innocuous general comments from readers without Mr. Okrent dealing with any details of Times stories or slants.

So, what is “unsubstantiated”?

"Substantial" is defined as "of solid character or quality; firm, stout, or strong..." In newspaper parlance, substantial may be seen as "reasonable weight of evidence".

1. Over 60 direct witnesses, many then or now senior Naval officers, independent of the Bush campaign, have provided affidavits and details that stand in contrast to only several lower ranked enlisteds or officers directly employed by the Kerry campaign. The weight of credibility is with the Unfit For Command book.

2. Kerry did not want to go to Vietnam, or combat: Kerry only enlisted when his application for after graduation further deferment to visit Paris for a year was denied. Kerry only applied for Swift Boats when they were still an offshore patrol unit.

3. 1st Purple Heart: The senior officer, later Admiral and senior JAG officer, who directly witnessed, says there was not enemy action which is necessary for an even slight wound, even accidentally self-inflicted, to rise to Purple Heart. No battle report, therefore, was filed at the time, and the senior officer (Hibbard) denied the application by Kerry. Refusal by Kerry to release his full military records blocks investigation of how Kerry wangled the award months after the direct contrary witnesses had left Vietnam. -- Treating doctor for the thorn-sized scratch also confirms contrary evidence to the hagiography of Kerry-Brinkley (Tour Of Duty author).

4. Silver Star #1: Even Kerry defender Rood (Chicago Tribune editor) says that the situation had already been mopped up when Kerry chased a Viet Cong and killed him. -- John Kerry, himself, in Douglas Brinkley’s “Tour of Duty” says he only faced and chased a single, lone, wounded VC. ABC Nightline’s VC also say they had already “ran away”. -- Also, although Rood defends the tactic, it was against military and common-sense procedure to beach the boat, as it made it a sitting duck, and to singly chase ashore, as it exposed the entire unit to danger from revealment of sensitive operational intelligence if Kerry were to have been captured. -- Does not rise to extraordinary heroism of a Silver Star.

5. Silver Star #2: Kerry campaign exhibits a "V" for valor on his Silver Star, although the Navy says there is no such designation that is allowed to anyone.

6. Bronze Star: Dobbs' investigation in Washington Post clearly demonstrates that Kerry left the scene of danger, while others stayed, only returning later to pick up Rassmann just before another boat was going to. -- Rassmann says he was under water most of the time, and thus a weak witness to whether there was any hostile fire at the time that Kerry picked him out of the water. Other involved witnesses say there was not hostile fire at that time, although there are conflicting accounts of whether there may have been some earlier. There were no bullet holes to any of the boats from that 3/13/69 incident, which supports the "no hostile fire" witnesses. -- Further, there is substantial evidence that the basis for the mis-awarded Bronze Star was a misleading after-action report that came from Kerry.

7. 3rd Purple Heart: It was admitted that Kerry's rear-end wound came from an earlier, unrelated incident, his own grenade blowing up Viet Cong rice. His arm "contusion" came from falling within his own boat while leaving the scene of the 3/13/69 mining incident against another boat. There is no credible evidence it resulted from hostile action against Kerry's boat.

8. Cambodia: Every evidence has disproven this 50+ times repeated by Kerry fantasy.

9. Post-Vietnam:

A. Kerry's 1/71 Winter Soldier hearings, upon which defenders say his 4/71 testimony to the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee was based, were organized by US and foreign communists and radicals, funded by Jane Fonda and friends (who supported North Vietnam's cause), and many of the witnesses were proven later to be frauds.

B. Any examiner of the 4/71 Kerry testimony, then or now, and of its public consequences, reports that Kerry believed and spread the smear of all Vietnam veterans, national leadership, and of the US as engaged in a war criminal action, and that negatively colored the reputation of Vietnam veterans then through now.

C. Kerry visited the Viet Cong-North Vietnamese delegations in Paris in 1970 and 1971, and did publicly support their proposals in contrast to the US proposals. That would have, aside from other matters, left US POW's in enemy hands.

D. POW's have affirmed that their North Vietnamese interrogators used Kerry's specific words against them to break them down (Galanti, Cordier, Warner, now-Congressman Johnson).

10. Kerry Failure to "Come Clean":

A. Kerry never apologized nor recanted for his "youthful exuberance";

B. Kerry created a self-aggrandizing biography on all the above, and was abetted by Douglas Brinkley's hagiography which failed to then or now seek or publish contrary witnesses or evidence;

C. Kerry highlighted his brief service 35-years ago as a junior officer as seemingly his sole qualification to lead the US and world now, and invited inspection of that. Yet, he and apologists scream invectives at those who do investigate and report.

D. Kerry has refused to release his full military records by signing a DOD Form 180, and to release his journals (despite Brinkley exposing Kerry's lie that they were restricted by a contract with Brinkley). These records are necessary to the resolution of many gray and open items in Kerry's disputed Vietnam service, as many careful reporters and observers have publicly noted. Yet, THE NEW YORK TIMES HAS FAILED TO PUBLICLY DEMAND THAT KERRY RELEASE HIS RECORDS.

[The Shrew]

Bruce Kesler served as a Sergeant in the Marine Corps, G-2, in Vietnam in 1969-70, enlisting after graduating Brooklyn College, where he led support for the war. Mr. Kesler was one of the organizers of the 1967 Support Our Men In Vietnam parade down New York’s 5th Avenue, the longest parade since WWII. He also wrote numerous articles and debated all over the East Coast. Following his service, Mr. Kesler organized the Vietnam Veterans for A Just Peace to counter Kerry and the Vietnam Veterans Against the War in 1971. He left his doctoral studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where he also worked at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. Mr. Kesler's articles have been published in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Freedom At Issue (Freedom House), Orbis, The National Observer, Twin Circles, and many other periodicals. He has worked as a finance and operations executive for Fortune 100 companies, and now owns an employee benefits consulting and brokerage firm in Encinitas, California. Mr. Kesler's proudest accomplishment is being the mid-life father of 4-year old Jason, with another on the way. As Bruce says, Semper Fi!

[The Shrew]

Here is an article for your review re: The New York Times. Please hit your ping list.

Regards,

TS

[Howlin]

Ping-a-ling!!!

[The Shrew]

Please hit your ping lists with this one folks.

Regards,

TS

[Mo1]

PING A LING!

[jmstein7]

Done!

[Grampa Dave]

This POS Daniel Okrent is either a rabid/vile gay who pushes the gay agenda including hate GW, or it is a left winger who pushes the Gay Agenda and hates GW.

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/005300.php

December 06, 2003
Introducing Daniel Okrent

One of the post-Howell Raines reforms at the New York Times was the appointment of Daniel Okrent as "public editor." The theory is that Okrent is to serve as a "readers' representative" who will regularly critique the Times' performance and respond to readers' concerns. Okrent is to have a column once every two weeks, more often "if necessary."

Today Okrent introduced himself to readers. While there is no reason to pre-judge his work, his self-description doesn't inspire a lot of confidence:

"By upbringing and habit, I'm a registered Democrat, but notably to the right of my fellow Democrats on Manhattan's Upper West Side. When you turn to the paper's designated opinion pages tomorrow, draw a line from The Times's editorials on the left side to William Safire's column over on the right: you could place me just about at the halfway point. But on some issues I veer from the noncommittal middle. I'm an absolutist on free trade and free speech, and a supporter of gay rights and abortion rights who thinks that the late Cardinal John O'Connor was a great man. I believe it's unbecoming for the well off to whine about high taxes, and inconsistent for those who advocate human rights to oppose all American military action. I'd rather spend my weekends exterminating rats in the tunnels below Penn Station than read a book by either Bill O'Reilly or Michael Moore."

Anyone who thinks Bill O'Reilly is on a par with Michael Moore is not exactly in touch with mainstream America.

The Times is actually in the midst of a three-pronged crisis. First, it suffers from an instutional corruption that was generally associated with Raines and led to the Jayson Blair scandal. Bill Keller's reforms have recognized and tried to deal with this part of the problem. Second, the general level of competence of its reporters and editors has fallen to an appallingly low level. We have many times pointed out the lack of basic, high-school level knowledge of history, mathematics and other topics that is documented in the Times' Corrections section. And finally, the Times is grotesquely biased against Republicans and conservatives.

It is not clear whether Keller and his fellow executives recognize the latter two problems. Whether Okrent contributes anything to solving them, time will tell. I intend to be one of his frequent correspondents. One significant point in Okrent's favor: he is a huge baseball fan, and claims to have invented rotisserie league baseball. If so, it is a more notable contribution to civilization than anything he is likely to achieve with the Times.

[anniegetyourgun]

LOL.....

[E.G.C.]

BTTT!!!!!!!

[The Shrew]

Woo Hoo!

Thanks for the ping!

;-)

TS

[Grampa Dave]

fyi and ping lists, thanks.

[The Shrew]

Hugs!

Thanks for the Ping!

TS

[Howlin]

Have you ever seen anything like what is going on today with these newspapers/media???

[The Shrew]

Great additional info. I'll pass it along to Bruce.

Regards,

TS

[anniegetyourgun]

I wonder if they realize the rest of the world is watching their collective meltdown.....that they are standing in the middle of the room naked....and we're all laughing....

[MeekOneGOP]

New York Times’ Public Editor
Edits Out The Public

Please let me know if you want ON or OFF my General Interest ping list!. . .don't be shy.

[The Shrew]

Every article needs a suitable graphic!

Thanks for posting that.

Regards,

TS

[Grampa Dave]

Please pass this Yahoo Search link on Daniel Okrent Gay to your friend. It could be very interesting for him.

http://search.yahoo.com/bin/search?p=Daniel%20Okrent%20Gay

[68-69TonkinGulfYachtClub]

Spread the word on the internet!

Post on internet boards AND e-mails!

LATEST SWIFT BOAT VETS AD!

http://humaneventsonline.com.edgesuite.net/unfittolead.html

Hanoi Approved of Role Played By Kerry and VVAW

http://www.nysun.com/article/3756

Kerry's Dishonorable Discharge

http://federalistpatriot.us/current/

"...As many Vietnam veterans who served their nation with dignity and honor will recall,
Jimmy Carter's first official act as president was the signing
Executive Order 11967
http://www.archives.gov/federal_register/codification/executive_order/11967.html
and Presidential Proclamation 4483
http://www.usdoj.gov/pardon/carter_proclamation.htm

--less than an hour after his inauguration on 21 January 1977. EO 11967 and Presidential Proclamation 4483
provided general amnesty for draft evaders, war protesters and other offenders of that era.

Its corresponding, and equally dubious, DoD directive took effect in March of 1977,

expanding that amnesty to include separation from military service by other than honorable discharges.

The DoD specified an appeal procedure whereby discharges could be reviewed on an individual basis
to determine whether the status of a particular discharge could be revised..."


The whole 42:09 Stolen Honor online FREE right now! E-mail it NOW!

Stolen Honor nails Kerry and the VVAW
and how they lied at Winter Soldier.
And how Kerry lied to the US Senate in 1971
And how Kerry and his pack of liars caused our POW's to suffer!

Kerry and the DNC cannot stop
EVERYONE on the internet from seeing this!

http://stolenhonor.com/documentary/watch-video.asp

E-mail the FREE 3:52 clip to everyone NOW!

Windows Media Player Broadband

http://www.videopa.com/kerry/excerpt3.asx

Windows Media Player Dial Up

http://www.videopa.com/kerry/excerpt3_low.asx

RealPlayer

http://www.videopa.com/kerry/excerpt3.ram

Click Here for
All the Latest Swift Boat Vets Ad!
http://www.swiftvets.com/

Click Here for
All the Swift Boat Vets Ads!
View for FREE!
http://www2.swiftvets.com/index.php?topic=Ads

"Liar!Liar!Liar!Creepy Liar!" Video
of Democrat losing it on MSNBC!
Lawrence O'Donnell screamed Liar! for 20 minutes!
And attacked John O'Neil
This is just a 3:28 sample of his attack.
PS O'Donnell never served in the military
BUT "knows" all about it?
What a loser!
http://64.91.230.181/~recycler/videos/windbag.WMV

Free online version of
John Kerry and the VVAW
"The New Soldier"
Banned by the DNC!
You can read it online right now.
http://ejsmithweb.com/fr/newsoldier/

The Swiftvets news conference on C-SPAN can be found here.
AND other valuable Video and Audio links.
http://www.peteandrews.net/media.htm

The Children of Viet Nam Veterans Video (Not an easy one to watch)

Please remember the 58,000 + Names on the Wall on Nov 2

Please watch this video

Thank You

http://kerrylied.com/otherdocs/flash.htm

Tick, Tick, Tick, Tick

[MeekOneGOP]

My pleasure. :^D

Thanks for posting this thread .....