Taxpayer-Funded Propaganda from California Governor

LA Times (reg req): "News" Video Extols Gov.'s Plan. Using taxpayer money, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's administration has sent television stations statewide a mock news story extolling a proposal that would benefit political boosters in the business community by ending mandatory lunch breaks for many hourly workers. The tape looks like a news report and is narrated by a former television reporter who now works for the state. But unlike an actual news report, it does not provide views critical of the proposed changes. Democrats have denounced it as propaganda. Snippets aired on as many as 18 stations earlier this month, the administration said.

So it spreads. California's show-biz governor is mimicking the Bush adminisration's misuse of taxpayers' funds to pay for propaganda.

There are any number of villains in this story. But I want to single out the TV stations that are playing this garbage and pretending it's news. They are party to deception, and they aid the crowd that wants to debunk all journalism as part of a campaign to turn news into whatever the people in power say it is.

I'm a passionate partisan for citizen journalism. But it is not, anytime soon, going to be a replacement for the valuable work done by the pros -- and the more people like Bush and Schwarzenegger and their allies try to devalue honorable journalism, the more they're devaluing democracy itself.

Comments

[Owen]

If "honorable journalism" wasn't considered such an oxymoron and if the mainstream media did their jobs, episodes like the Bush and Schwartznegger captive journalists, the Gannons and Fox "News" and the Jayson Blairs and Rathergate would be shocking anomalies, not cause for shrugs and smirks.

[Mungojelly]

Are you quite sure that the "valuable work done by the pros" hasn't been a complete sham for years? After all, VNRs weren't invented recently by the republican party. They've been a standard way television "news" is produced for a long time now.

I think that any "news" outlet which ever plays one of these propoganda pieces-- regardless of whether it's government propaganda or "just" corporate propaganda-- has completely sacrificed any & all claim to being a trustworthy & independent source of information.

<3

[Scote]

Up, VNRs are a corporate invention and the Bush and Schwarzenegger Administrations have never seen a corporate tactic they couldn't use to their advantage. But VNRs are merely a follow up to standard Press Releases, which drive so much of what we call "journalism" today.

I'd love to hear more on Dan's take on this, as an industry veteran. As audience members, we shouldn't stand for the inclusion of Press Release information or VNRS without conspicuous attribution and independent fact checking by the news organization that repeats it.

In defense of repeating the Bush Administration's falsehoods, the press says, "We have to report what the president says--it is news." But they don't have to do it uncritically. Just as I shouldn't forward an internet hoax, the press has an obligation not to forward false information put forth by the Bush Administration, or from anyone else, for that matter.

[Bob Rosenberg]

1984 lives....

[Owen]

In the interest of fairness and profitability at the networks, they should begin charge advertising fees at commercial rates for playing administration PR stuff. There's not much difference between ads for male enhancement and Bush's program marketing, except that testing the former is more fun.

[Aine]

If the PR's and VNR's contain political messages either for or against any sort of political "plan," you can consider them to be political campaigns... and they should fall under campaign finance laws and accountability. If not, then I guess the IRS is obsolete and we should quit financing all this clownery.