Jackson Free Press

It's an open secret that here in the Jackson area and in the state at large we suffer from superficial, incomplete, unfactual and sometimes non-existent coverage of vital news stories. We all know this is true. But what we don't always know is the truth behind the sensationalist, corporate-biased headlines—the information that is important to you and me as citizens.

So in a time when mass media are listing lots of little pithy blurbs about the "top" stories of 2004, we thought we'd do what we do best and give you some alternatives to the drivel. While the following list is by no means exhaustive, it gives a good idea of the stories to watch out for—and the deeper coverage citizens should demand from local media.

1. Crime Hysteria: Even though 2003 was the year the Jackson media went hog-ass wild over crime hysteria and "perception"-gate, the game was still afoot in 2004. Why? Because scaring the hell out of people sells newspapers and raises TV ratings. However, as we've already seen, the issue was way, way over-hyped. Yes, Jackson has crime, but it is not out of control. And there is no reason to live in fear here. Lost in the hype was any attempt—present company excluded—at looking at how easily one can manipulate crime statistics up or down, and any substantive discussion over the best strategy behind fighting and preventing crime. Nowhere did we see a good discussion of community vs. traditional policing, and what criminal-justice experts find is most effective. Seldom have we seen discussion over whether tough-on-crime strategies such as three-strikes and sentencing youth as adults, much less the death penalty, actually deter crime and make communities safer. Instead, we were treated to a banal and unstudied parade of partial quotes, usually lifted far out of context and sometimes irresponsibly pieced together with missing parts, about crime "perception" and whether or not the mayor and police chief yell enough at criminals. Expert study, easily accessible on the Internet, shows that fighting perceptions and feelings of helplessness is a vital component of community policing and engaging local residents in the fight against crime, and keeping down lawsuits and police brutality. As statistics now show that, overall, crime is dropping in the area, the media have begun to swing to the other extreme, still doing little thoughtful analysis of the issue. Remember what Twain said about lies, damn lies and statistics. And, no, Orley, you don't wait to revitalize a city until all the crime is gone; you revitalize it to help reduce the crime. Duh.

2. Juvenile Justice: From political rhetoric in the Legislature about "bad kids" to the difficulty of getting consensus on a plan to reform the training schools to debates in recent years over "zero tolerance" policies in schools to unfair demonization of Lanier High School students, the Jackson media are far behind national media outlets and those in other cities that have been taken to task for over-hyping youth crime and, thus, leading to policies that are unfairly punitive to young people. It is as if local media have not gotten the memo from national corporate offices about the need not to make easy assumptions about young people. For instance, did you know that school—yes, public school—is the safest place for a young person? The most dangerous? Home. Did you also know that zero tolerance policies have been shown to be abject failures that are usually unfairly applied against young people of color? It's true. The answer? Believe in young people, mentor them, respect them. They might then respect you back.

3. "Lawsuit Abuse": Where do we start? This issue is one of the most poorly reported in the state of Mississippi, among a hefty pool of competitors. Congress' General Accounting Office called out the "jackpot justice"-obsessed media in a handful of states, including Mississippi, for helping create climates where the public is woefully unknowledgeable about lawsuit-reform issues and for turning a complex issue into a simplistic doctor-vs.-lawyer dogfight. Media coverage in Mississippi typically relies heavily on data produced by the U.S. Chamber and other corporate industry groups, while virtually ignoring any information distributed by the hated "trial lawyer lobby" or public interest groups such as Ralph Nader's Public Citizen (the man shouldn't run for president, but he is one hell of a consumer advocate). This occurs even as facts directly dispute much of what is reported about "lawsuit abuse"—such as the fact that medical malpractice rates in California did not drop after damage caps were instituted there until a public referendum capped all insurance rates in an "insurance reform" movement. Or that many of the top-publicized large payouts were dramatically decreased on appeal (including that McDonald's hot-coffee case). During Haley Barbour's May special session to get damage caps, The Clarion-Ledger stated that rates had fallen in other states where caps had been instituted, which is simply untrue. Interestingly, as more actual facts have surfaced on this issue, both tort-reformers and The Clarion-Ledger have shifted the rhetoric and started to say that legislation is needed to decrease the "perception" that the state is a lawsuit "hellhole" or some such. Ah, that word "perception" again. Ever wonder where the "perception" comes from?

4. Politics Before Issues: In the fall 2003 elections, sound bites and ugly politics dominated the coverage of the political races, rather than facts. Very little of the candidates' sound bites were dissected by the state media, as in, "Mr. Barbour, just what do you mean by putting discipline back into the classroom? What, specifically, would you do?" (When asked then by the JFP that very question, Barbour's spokesman did not have an answer. We suspect it has something to do with making it easier to expel special-ed kids.) Interestingly, this horse-race coverage—focused on campaign tricks and polls rather than issues—seems to irk everyone involved, and everyone points the finger at each other. For instance, candidates complained to us that the media don't ask hard questions, media blame the candidates, and everyone blames the people for not caring.

This same kind of superficial horse-race coverage dominated the 2004 elections. If one only consumed state media, one would likely never know the myths behind the Iraqi War and the need to rid Saddam of his WMD (of course, The New York Times screwed this one, too). Worse, The Clarion-Ledger's endorsement of both George W. Bush (so he could fix what he started, as more Mississippi soldiers die) and the state's gay marriage amendment (why not?) didn't exactly draw upon intelligent, fact-based arguments.

5. Gov. Barbour's Ideological Schemes: During and since his election, state media have often glossed Haley Barbour's stature as, arguably, the most successful lobbyist in the world. We got very little coverage of his corporate connections or in-depth lists of companies who had paid his company big money to do their bidding. The state's media seem afraid to emphasize that Barbour's ideological strategies in the state—from shrinking public education funds to privatizing health care to puncturing Medicaid to assisting big industry with corporate welfare to helping private prisons however he can—are strategies straight out of the GOP playbook. In fact, he wrote the book in 1995: "Agenda for America: A Republican Direction for the Future" (Regnery, $24.95). But the state's media treat him as if he has no history ... or ideological skeletons.

6. No Child Left Behind: We can't completely fault the state's media on education coverage: The Clarion-Ledger, for instance, regularly runs stories about the difficulties associated with President Bush's No Child Left Behind mandates. Our biggest beef with the state's media on education is the same we have with most national media on education. They don't connect the dots. Way too often, for instance, during the presidential election, we would hear from perfectly progressive sorts that "the only good thing" that Bush had done was the federal education bill. And that if only he wouldn't have underfunded the act that it would be a great thing. OK, we agree that it's an act of sheer meanness to pass a federal education mandate and then underfund it. However, this widely held belief obscures the real problem: No Child Left Behind is designed for failure. Don't believe us? OK, ponder this: Under the act, not only must individual schools not just pass—and show steady improvement year by year—but so must aggregated groups within the schools. This sounds groovy—the excuse is that too many minority kids are funneled into special ed, which is true. However, stay with us; the proof is in the details. Within an individual school, if one of the subgroups—a particular race, special ed kids, bilingual students, and so on—does not show improvement, then the whole school fails and could end up being closed if the problem doesn't fix itself. And "fix itself" are deliberate words, being that Bush administration is pulling back funds needed to help the schools and districts pay for remedial help to help the schools pass the tests. Schools that don't need the help get the rewards; the feds punish the "failing" schools where kids need the help most. Can we say lose-lose?

7. No Child Left Behind II: In case you're not convinced, yet, take the case of Morrison Academic Achievement Center—a school in Midtown set up to help kids who don't pass the tests. Guess what? The school is failing so far—because the students are having trouble passing the tests. Cycle, anyone? This is one of the most telling stories in the state.

8. Special Session Mania: The state's media have really screwed the pooch on its coverage of Haley Barbour's hidden ace this past year: calling special sessions to help special interests and then using them to convince the public that the House of Representatives is costing them thousands a day. This is a despicable ploy, and the media's acquiescence is appalling. Enough said on this one.

9. Corporate Welfare: The 800-pound catfish flapping about the state is the issue of just how far the state is willing to grovel, and spend taxpayer money, to lure corporations to a state where a Confederate flag still adorns the state flag and education spending and poverty are among the worst in the nation? We've been shocked to see how big media simply push the envelope when it comes to supporting corporate welfare—from Nissan (remember their logo on The Clarion-Ledger's Web site?) to the recent Northrup Grumman scam to try to get the state to borrow $70,000 per employee in their Coast plant. But do the words "corporate welfare" grace the keyboards of state scribes? Not often. Cheers to Bill Minor for calling out the Barbour scheme to pad Northrup Grumman's coffers with more tax money. Now, let's hear more about how well our past welfare pay-outs are working out for average Mississippians. Analysis, anyone?

10. Corporatization of Media: We know mass media aren't likely to detail Republican efforts to give them special privileges to go around and gobble up other media outlets, but we kind of think it's their responsibility. If it hadn't been for Sen. Trent Lott (cheers, dude, on this one) and, well, the JFP, very little would have been reported in the state about the efforts to loosen the FCC ownership rules, thus allowing Goliaths like the Gannett Corp. to buy up local television stations and, ultimately, control what's reported in the state's media. We're down with Lott on this issue. The junior senator wrote in a column we ran in the JFP: "Not surprisingly, some of the biggest proponents of scrapping the ban are huge media chains, including the metropolitan Washington, D.C.-based Gannett company, which already owns two of Mississippi's largest newspapers, including The Clarion-Ledger. Critics have long labeled Gannett as a company producing indistinguishable, cookie-cutter publications dictated by corporate formula, and I am among many Mississippians very uncomfortable with the prospect of Gannett or any other huge super-paper chains extending their ownership into the broadcast sectors of their existing markets. This could starve out smaller, more locally driven broadcast or print alternatives, leaving readers, listeners or viewers with a diminished, degraded or less locally reflective product." We fully realize that Lott might define "alternative" differently than we do, but here's to standing up for the little guy, whoever he is.

Previous Comments

ID

77944

Comment

donna i really liked this piece. it is coordinate with the mission of a free press paper - to catch the stories missed by the traditional media outlets. bravo john

Author

John Sawyer

Date

2005-01-07T22:51:45-06:00

ID

77945

Comment

Today's Clarion-Ledger story about No Child Left Behind results is probably the most straightforward one I've seen in that paper about the realities of this federal act. Go read the story and think about it. It sounds great to say that it's "unacceptable" that low-income students aren't learning -- but what about the logic of closing schools because a sub-group of students who live in poverty aren't passing the tests. And remember the context that the federal government passed a mandate and now is withholding a lot of the funding to help schools. All, please think about the motives here. The devil is in the details of the aggregating by sub-group part (which most people seem to understand). From the Ledge: Fifty-five Mississippi schools have failed to make adequate yearly progress with low-income student achievement, and those schools eventually could face closure or restructuring if they don't improve. State Education Superintendent Henry Johnson said federal officials won't accept states using poverty as an excuse for students not performing. "Excellent instruction and all the things that go along with excellent instruction can overcome poverty, but it's not easy. It even smacks of tilting at windmills to some people," he said. Based on data provided by the state Education Department, a Clarion-Ledger analysis showed some of Mississippi's 880 schools are not meeting standards in the percentages of low-income sudents who score proficient, or on grade level, on tests in reading and math. ... Part of the law also says schools must succeed with nine categories of students, including low income. That's defined by their participation in the federal free and reduced lunch program, which is based on family size and income.

Author

DonnaLadd

Date

2005-01-10T10:19:56-06:00