In "Kremlin Reasserts Hold on Russia's Oil and Gas" (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/17/business/worldbusiness/17yukos.html?hp&ex=1103346000&en=cad95aa6acc68c40&ei=5094&partner=homepage) Erin E. Arvedlund & Simon Romero trace the latest developments of Yukos Oil. This is largely about Vladimir Putin's plans to auction off Yukos and a federal judge in the United States, Lettia Z. Clark, issuing "a temporary injunction intended to block Sunday's auction."
Reading this front page story (which is continued inside the business section) you'll learn about how the company came to be and how Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky "took oil assets won at a state auction in 1993 and developed Yukos into the country's most prominent and profitable enterprise." This is a good overview to the story (and the Times' business section has covered developments in Yukos, including the imprisonment of Khodorkovsky, very well for some time) but there's another part of the story that's not getting focused on, I'd argue.
Yukos' story isn't that different from TV-6, a non-state owned television channel in Russia that Putin went after. This is part of a larger story and, if there's a fault in this front page story, that's left unsaid.
I agree with Kara regarding William Neuman's "Murdoch Set to Pay Record $44 million for 5gh Ave. Triplex" -- what's this doing on the front page? (Kara calls it "real estate porn.)
Charlie LeDuff's "Parked in a Desert, Waiting Out the Winter Life" (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/17/national/17slab.html?oref=login) offers a snapshot of a sad story that, Ben writes, "Does more to make me want to donate to a charity than the dopey story yesterday about buying braclets at the Gap."
Keesha points out that the carrots being "waved and dangled" in Steven R. Weisman's "Donors Consider Large Rise in Aid to Palestinians" (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/17/international/middleeast/17diplo.html?hp&ex=1103346000&en=4627d678caf1c086&ei=5094&partner=homepage). Read it and see if you share Keesha's belief that the carrot "will soon turn into a stick our administration uses to bash with."
Inside the paper, Richard W. Stevenson's "Bush Says Social Security Plan Would Reassure Markets" (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/17/politics/17econ.html?hp&ex=1103259600&en=025981bf94adb0de&ei=5094&partner=homepage) already has some very vocal e-mails coming in to this site. (common_ills@yahoo.com)
I feel their frustration and share it when I read something like this paragraph:
President Bush said on Thursday that addressing the long-term problems in Social Security would reassure the financial markets, offering a rationale to offset criticism that his plan to add personal investment accounts to the retirement system would require up to $2 trillion in new government borrowing.
Guess what else would reassure the markets? A sound economic policy. Neither Bush or the Congress has felt the need to address that. But now they want to take a social service, a public good, and revamp it to "reassure the markets?"
We're not, in our most basic form, a nation of markets. We are a nation of people. The president of the United States is supposed to serve the people.
But let's trash social security, let's gut it, just so the markets can be reassured? Not even to save the markets, mind you, just to reassure them.
Stevenson notes:
As he did throughout his re-election campaign, Mr. Bush largely avoided talking about the specific steps to assure the long-term solvency of Social Security. Social Security trustees estimate that if no changes are made, the system will start running short of money to pay full benefits to retirees in 38 years.
Yeah, the press gave him a pass then, they let him off the hook, and they continue to let him off the hook.
The Daily Howler:
According to that recent CBO report, the shortfall begins in the year 2052; at that point, SS will only be able to pay 81 percent of promised benefits. Using gloomier assumptions about economic growth, the SS trustees say the shortfall will begin in 2042.
( http://www.dailyhowler.com/dh121404.shtml)
Stevenson notes:
Sitting with him at a panel discussion on Social Security and other budget questions, Liz Ann Sonders, chief investment strategist at the Charles Schwab brokerage firm, said a plan to address long-term fiscal imbalances was "absolutely what the market wants to see."
Well you know Liz Ann, it's all about you and what you, Charles Schwab and the markets want. Robert e-mails: "Liz Ann, thanks to your comments, no monies here go to Charles Schwab while you remain at the firm." Shondra wonders: "What kind of a name is 'Liz Ann?' She didn't want to be 'Elizabeth' but felt just 'Liz' wasn't professional enough? 'Liz Ann' sounds like a beauty contestant, not a broker!"
When the story continues, Stevenson does begin raising issues and that deserves to be noted. However, why is the section on the front page so void of serious discussions when it comes to social security?
Too often, there's a pattern that allows any dissent to be absent from the top of the story and, if it's there, it's to be found inside the paper where the story is continued.
Stevenson's inside the paper story follows the general pattern on dealing with "issues."
Start with Bush's remarks. Throw out someone (often a woman) (apparently the administration thinks it humanizes the "issue") who supports Bush for a paragraph or two. Then maybe move on to what a right wing or right leaning for a quote or "figure." After that, we may get into facts.
(The Daily Howler, www.dailyhowler.com, has demonstrated that the press either lacks the ability or the desire to grasp the basic concepts when it comes to social security.)
Stevenson does try to address the facts . . . in the usual pattern. Well after we've heard the spin, heard the spin, heard the spin. At that point, how many readers are still around?
Why would most readers still be around? You've heard:
a) Bush, first paragraph
b) Bush, second paragraph
c) Bush, third paragraph
d) fourth paragraph? "As he did throughout his re-election campaign, Mr. Bush largely avoided talking about the specific steps to assure the long-term solvency" and the estimates by trustees of SS that with no changes full benefits will cause the program to run short (in 38 years).
e) no mention by Bush that without a tax hike social security will "include a reduction in the guaranteed retirement benefit", fifth paragraph (if that's correct)
f) Bush aides say "no guaranteed benefit in the long run" and the program "not be able to afford to meet its promises," sixth paragraph
g) Bush is using the event to build public support for his program that will "require borrowing hundreds of billions or even trillions of dollars," seventh paragraph
h) Bush & company argue dealing with this now may mean new confidence for the markets, eighth paragraph
i) the administration's argument that borrowing now helps in the long run, ninth paragraph
j) administration claims this is way to deal with fiscal responsibility, tenth paragraph
k) how this will bring about fiscal responsibilty is not known, eleventh paragraph
l) Bush says his program sends a message to the markets, twelveth paragraph
m) the unpopular (with readers of this site) Liz Ann Sonders shows up to with an "absolutely" -- speaking for the "markets," thirteenth paragraph
m) Bush mouthpiece is brought in to back up Liz Ann, fourteenth paragraph
n) Gary Gensler, the first voice of dissent, is brought in, fifteenth paragraph
Get the picture?
A reader has to wade through fourteen paragraphs before a dissenting voice is heard. This is journalism? This is informing the readers?
This is the pattern we get on a serious issue. Bush makes claims, Bush's claims are backed up with individuals (named and unnamed) and only in the fifteenth paragraph can a journalist for the New York Times get around to addressing these claims?
This is reporting? This is informing?
Stevenson and his immediate editor are pleased with this? The Times is pleased with it?
I want you to picture yourself getting through the day with the various demands upon you. You're reading an article in the Times that basically repeats the same thing over and over for fourteen paragraphs. Do you think you make it to the fifteenth paragraph?
Some of us do. Most of us don't. Most of us have already felt "I get the point" and moved on.
Reporters (and editors) know this. That's why they pack what they consider the important information up front.
By running with fourteen paragraphs that softball the issue what message is the Times sending to the readers?
If Bush is making a claim, drop the fan club right away. This isn't Teen Beat. Bush is making a claim. You've printed the claim so now start dealing with it -- third paragraph at the latest.
Am I missing something here or is the actual news the social security program and not what Bully Boy Bush or his cheerleaders want? The issues raised later on in the story should have made it into the front of the story much sooner.
For instance, skimmers and most readers miss this:
Gary Gensler, a former top executive at the Goldman Sachs investment firm and the official in the Clinton administration who oversaw government borrowing, said Mr. Bush and his team were wrong in saying the markets would forgive additional borrowing in the short run to ease the need for borrowing in the long run.
"Their politics are overwhelming their economic reason," Mr. Gensler said in a phone interview, referring to the Bush administration. "They have to diffuse the issue of the $2 trillion. So they're saying that we already have this obligation and we're just changing it from an actuarial imbalance into a legal debt."
That's paragraph fifteen and sixteen of a twenty-three paragraph story. It belongs near the top, not buried after the mid-point.
Lizette Alvarez's "Britain's Highest Court Overturns Anti-Terrorism Law"
(http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/16/international/europe/16cnd-britain.html?hp&ex=1103259600&en=ea1bd8ae1938921c&ei=5094&partner=homepage)
is a must read. Our strongest European ally just found cracks in the foundation.
In its powerfully worded decision, the court said that the government's "draconian" measures unjustly discriminate against foreigners since they do not apply to British citizens and constitute a lopsided response to the threat of a terrorist attack.
The judges deemed it a clear violation of the European Convention on Human Rights, a declaration that complicates the British government's strategy on combating terrorism.
The ruling by the Law Lords, a panel of senior judges who sit in the House of Lords and act as the country's highest court, parallels a June decision by the United States Supreme Court that said "a state of war is not a blank check for the president."
And don't miss:
In the latest signs of strains on the military from the war in Iraq, the Army National Guard announced on Thursday that it had fallen 30 percent below its recruiting goals in the last two months and would offer new incentives, including enlistment bonuses of up to $15,000.
Which begins "Guard Reports Serious Decline in New Recruits" (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/17/politics/17reserves.html?hp&ex=1103259600&en=ba6801121d30fa22&ei=5094&partner=homepage) by Eric Schmitt.
The sharp decline in recruiting is significant because National Guard and Army Reserve soldiers now make up nearly 40 percent of the 148,000 troops in Iraq, and are a vital source for filling the ranks, particularly those who perform essential support tasks, like truck drivers and military police.
General Blum said the main reason for the Army National Guard's recruiting shortfall was a sharp reduction in the number of recruits joining the Guard and Reserve when they leave active duty. In peacetime the commitment means maintaining their ties to the military with a weekend of service a month and two weeks in the summer.
Over the last 30 years, General Blum said, the Guard has counted on these soldiers with prior military service for about half of its recruits. Since the Sept. 11 attacks, however, many of these soldiers have been hesitant to join the Guard because of the increasing likelihood that America's citizen-soldiers will be activated and sent to Iraq or Afghanistan for up to 12 months. Indeed, many of the active-duty soldiers the Army would like to enlist in the Reserves have recently fought in Afghanistan or Iraq, and some have no inclination to do so again.
Do you have prior military experience and, if so, will you gamble your life for $15,000? The Army National Guard is hoping you will. $6,000 signing bonus not enough? How about $4,000 more? The Army National Guard is willing to offer you that.
[Note: This post has been added to. Thanks to Shirley for, as always, pointing out where further clarification was needed. "Kremlin" has also been corrected from the earlier wrong spelling of "Rkemlin!"]
