DOWNLOADS: (1574)

PLAYS: (5042)

Embed

Wow. Look how much CNN wanted him out of there:

CNN was so sick of Lou Dobbs, it gave him an $8 million severance package to leave, The Post has learned.

"They wanted him out," according to a source.

Dobbs, who a source said had a year and a half to go on his $12 million contract, shocked viewers last Wednesday by announcing he was quitting.

CNN boss Jonathan Klein and Dobbs, 64, had been publicly feuding over the kind of reporting Dobbs was doing on his show -- especially stories about illegal immigration and the anti-Obama "birther" movement, which contends the president was not born in Hawaii and is not an American citizen.

But it was not clear until now that CNN was willing to pay Dobbs so much money to leave.

"What they do is their business," Dobbs said yesterday. "I tried to accommodate them as best I could, but I've said for many years now that neutrality is not part of my being."

Klein long believed Dobbs was at odds with CNN's desire to position itself as an opinion-free, middle-of-the-road alternative to its cable news rivals -- conservative Fox News and liberal MSNBC.

Digby linked to this excellent piece by Edward Wasserman in the Miami Herald the other day and I just got around to reading it. He basically solves the news problem that we face.

You know, like how bogus claims are repeated endlessly throughout the media (like the health bill contains "death panels") and even though they are debunked---the damage is already done.

So this time, when it came to the "death panels," The Washington Post's influential media reporter, Howard Kurtz, observed: "For once, mainstream journalists did not retreat to the studied neutrality of quoting dueling antagonists." Reporters took the additional step of pointing out, on their own authority, that the proposals don't contain any such provision. To "he said, she said," was added: "we say."

Trouble is, it hasn't really mattered. Even though news organizations debunked the claim, 45 percent of respondents to an NBC poll still believe the reforms would indeed allow the federal government to halt treatment to the elderly -- a staggering number.

Why? Maybe because, by Kurtz's count, Palin's "death panels" were mentioned 18 times by his own paper, 16 times in The New York Times and at least 154 times on cable and network news (not including daytime news shows.)

Plainly, refuting a falsehood doesn't keep it from doing harm. The solution isn't some cheap fix, first giving end-of-the-world play to some incendiary fantasy and then inserting a line that says the preceding was utter rubbish. The real problem goes to the core of traditional news practices. As Greg Marx noted in a sensible Columbia Journalism Review posting, the solution is "making a more concerted effort not to disseminate false or dubious claims in the first place."

Isn't that simple? All the media has to do is fact check a story first and present the truth instead of repeating lies over and over again in the interest of "balance". Then we won't have to worry about an ill-informed public not getting the information they need on important issues. Issues that actually have an impact on their lives, like health care. Unfortunately, that appears too much to ask:

As the saying goes, what really matters isn't what people think, it's what they think about: Debunking falsehoods is fine, but the more that news media embrace it as if it's a cure-all, the worse we'll all be. The solution isn't to refute, it's to ignore. End the practice of rewarding the most sensational, the most irresponsible, the most baseless allegations with top-of-the-news billing. The media bury worthwhile news all the time; how about burying the worthless stuff?

There, however, the problem isn't so much with reporters, it's with their bosses, the ones who insist on running the screaming footage from "town meetings," on giving dramatic lies a prominence they don't deserve -- ensuring an audience, but also ensuring the lies a public life no reasoned refutation can end.

"He said, she said" has always been a dubious way to report the world. "We say" helps, but only a little. The real solution is simple: It's called news judgment.

Don't you love that? "News Judgment." What a miraculous concept. I wonder how we could actually make that happen?

Thank Edward for this rare bit of sanity from the media: edward_wasserman@hotmail.com

This is bad, bad news for all of us...

vnunet.com: (h/t Scarecrow)

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has decided to abandon net neutrality and allow telecoms companies to charge websites for access.

The FTC said in a report that, despite popular support for net neutrality, it was minded to let the market sort out the issue.

This means that the organisation will not stand in the way of companies using differential pricing to make sure that some websites can be viewed more quickly than others. The report also counsels against net neutrality legislation.

Information Week via Save The Internet:

The news story about the FTC report notes that "the FTC sided with high-speed Internet providers such as AT&T and Verizon," and trotted out once again hollow justifications like "such rules could stifle innovation" and ""This report recommends that policy makers proceed with caution in the evolving, dynamic industry of broadband Internet access, which generally is moving toward more - not less - competition," which it probably didn't even think up itself, but copied from industry propaganda.[..]

Technological innovation in broadband access is a threat to corporate profits, and the FTC report comes down on the side not of the public interest but of the private interests.

As a government policy, this isn't working. Communication Workers of America union puts it this way:

Our reliance on market forces, deregulation, and inadequate governmental programs has not served us well. We invest relatively less on communications; we are charged more for slower speeds; millions encounter a significant digital divide based on income and geography, and unionized jobs with good wages and benefits are being replaced by low-wage jobs with less training and higher turnover.

Afraid of the potential stifling of information to you? Good. Then go to Save The Internet and see what you can do to fight. There are literally only days left for you to get your voice heard.

Save the Internet:

According to The Register on Friday, John Kneuer, assistant secretary of commerce and head of the National Telecommunications & Information Administration (NTIA), "quickly lost his temper and began shouting" after an audience of technology experts pressed him to explain how the U.S. had fallen so far behind other developed countries in providing Internet access to citizens.

Kneuer claimed that free market competition was the reason for the Internet's "great success," dismissing the history of Net Neutrality protections that have fostered new innovations and public participation online.

Kneuer, who previously served as a top phone company lobbyist for Washington law firm Piper Rudnick, told the audience that the "free market" (by which he means the current duopoly of large phone and cable companies) should be unencumbered by consumer protections and basic Internet freedoms.

Kneuer is a member of the camp of neo-cons who categorically refuse to "even *think* about regulation to promote competition," writes Harold Feld of Media Access Project.

Variety: (h/t MS)

"Net neutrality" may sound like something only a Web geek could love, but at some point showbiz, largely indifferent to it so far, will have to start declaring an interest -- perhaps passionately.

Why? Because Net neutrality -- or, as some call it, Net regulation -- has the potential to affect content protection, otherwise known as Priority No. 1 of the entertainment industry.

Access to online content, itself no small concern, could also be at stake.[..]

But there's no rule that says it has to be that way. If you get your Internet from Time Warner Cable, for example, there's nothing to stop it from sending you content from Time Warner sites first and doling out content from the competition with whatever bandwidth happens to be left over.

Nor is there anything to keep an Internet service provider like Earthlink from taking fees from Disney or NBC Universal to give some sites priority -- and to block other sites altogether.

That would give Web sites with deep pockets behind them a new advantage in getting their content in front of Web users, while sites that can't afford those fees could be kicked to the virtual curb.

I'm of the belief that this should be in the "Good News/Bad News" category. The bad news is that it looks like the major obstacles blocking the merger of AT&T and BellSouth have been cleared, and history shows that these mergers do not benefits consumers. The good news is that one of those cleared obstacles has scored a victory for net neutrality and eliminated one of the anti-neutrality forces' biggest arguments.

FreePress/Save the Internet:

In a striking victory for Internet freedom advocates, AT&T officials agreed on Thursday night to adhere to strict Network Neutrality conditions if allowed to complete their proposed $85 billion merger with BellSouth.

The phone company filed a "letter of commitment" with the Federal Communications Commission in which it promises to observe Net Neutrality principles for at least 24 months. Now it's left to Congress to follow the FCC's lead and make Net Neutrality permanent under the law.

Continue reading »

This is very good news for all of us.

MyDD: I'm no fan of Chuck Schumer's political decision-making, as many of you know. As a legislator, though, he can be great sometimes. He did single-handedly keep the Bankrupcty Bill from passing for four years in the Senate. And now he's out on net neutrality...

"I believe that Internet access for consumers must be protected, and that's why I support net neutrality. As the Internet continues to grow and evolve, we must make sure that average consumers can still use the web to learn, shop, and communicate. The Internet has the power to enhance one of the most fundamental values of our democracy: freedom of speech. That's why I support the free flow of information on the Internet and enforceable network neutrality.

Continue reading »

Empire Burlesque: Diplomatic Deception...the calm before the firestorm

Loose Teeth: In the Orwellian reality we now inhabit, the flag is a 'marketing tool' and Ken Lay was a 'philanthropist.'

The Left Coaster: "Catapulting the Propaganda" (Italian Edition)

Tinsel Wing: G-Dub Signing Statements...the top ten

Drew Clark: How AT&T/SBC Chair Ed Whitacre ignited the furious Net Neutrality debate by threatening to slow down some websites.

Just Plain Bother: I pity the fool who doesn't like 'Mr. T'

If you haven't read Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Stevens' (R-Alaska) explanation for his opposition to net neutrality, you're missing out on a deeply disconcerting perspective. He asked, for example, "what happens to your own personal internet" when someone else tried to download 10 movies at the same time.

"I just the other day got, an internet was sent by my staff at 10 o'clock in the morning on Friday and I just got it yesterday. Why? Because it got tangled up with all these things going on the internet commercially. [...]

"They want to deliver vast amounts of information over the internet. And again, the internet is not something you just dump something on. It's not a truck. It's a series of tubes."

Now, Ted Stevens is 85 years old, so it stands to reason that he won't fully understand the Internet. But as Christy Hardin Smith noted, Stevens, as chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, "is in charge of the bills that, among other things, control the internet."

Stevens is not only commenting on key issues like net neutrality without understanding the issue, he's shaping the government's policy.

The audio is here. It ain't pretty.

-- Guest Post by Steve Benen, The Carpetbagger Report

It's time to get involved...
Christy:
It's time to hit the phones, everyone. I am told that the Senate Commerce Committee will be doing bill mark-up today, and that the net neutrality vote will be pushed off until probably Tuesday. And that we are one vote short at the moment for killing the Stevens bill in the Committee. Yep, that's right: one vote. So here are the Senators on the bubble:...read on"
Kos:
The NY Sun talks about presidential candidates and net nutrality. It notes that Hillary, Edwards, Kerry, and Warner have all pledged their support. Biden, on the other hand, is opposed. It doesn't look like McCurry is earning his keep. The piece ends with this "exchange"...read on"