^îortlanï» (Observer
March 9, 2011
Page 9
The Truth Will Eventually Set Us Free
Media flunks
WikiLeaks 101
by W illiam
A. C ollins
Maybe we were fortu­
nate that the U.S. press
ch o se to p rin t any
WikiLeaks disclosures at
all. Given the media’s
g e n erally su p p o rtiv e
stance of unilateral American for­
eign policy, it could have simply
said, "We're not interested."
Luckily it did better than that, but
not much. The media reported ar­
ticles of minor diplomatic embar­
rassment with glee, but let matters
revealing serious U.S. government
perfidy or brutality slide.
Take Honduras. There was al­
ways strong suspicion that the state
and defense departments had qui­
etly supported the military that over­
threw the populist president. Natu­
rally, our media never noticed. It has
always taken a dim view of liberal
presidents. But then WikiLeaks pro­
vided chapter and verse of our in­
volvement. Still no coverage.
An even deeper diplomatic
cesspool bubbles daily in the
Middle East and Pakistan.
The United States has con­
ducted illegal warfare in Yemen
and Pakistan for some time. Our
authoritarian allies there and else­
where have long engaged in brutal
repressions in the name of anti-ter­
rorism . M uch o f this calum ny
WikiLeaks has now revealed.
Yet the press considers it a non­
issue. Even the graphic video of an
American helicopter gunning down
Iraqi civilians in Baghdad gener­
ated little media investigation or
follow-up.
Unfortunately this ho-hum re­
sponse to the most significant dis­
closure of government impropriety
since the Pentagon Papers hardly
comes as a surprise. The press tends
to share Wall Street's perspective
and back Washington's interven­
tionist foreign policy.
To wit, my local paper just head­
lined an Associated Press story,
"More Positive Signs for Economy."
It's as though unemployment and
foreclosures simply don't exist in
the media's parallel universe.
The m essages behind the pro­
tests at last sum m er's arrogant G-
20 summit in Toronto received the
same "blind-eye" coverage. Much
ink was consum ed recounting
dam age to property, m ounting
arrests, and dism issive com m ents
by world leaders. Any parallel
analysis of the destructive wealth-
heavy econom ic policies prom ul­
gated by those leaders landed on
the cutting room floor.
Media support of our various
wars is equally plain.
Just before C hristm as, hun­
dreds of m ilitary veterans and
supporters gathered in the snow
in front o f the W hite House to
protest the war in A fghanistan.
More than 130 vets were arrested.
That probably wasn't as painful
an ordeal as their basic training.
But in our society, willingness to
risk jail time for one's beliefs marks'
a real com m itm ent. N onetheless
most of the m ainstream media,
including The New York Tim es,
didn’t report a word.
Conservatives are more blessed.
They don't need to get arrested.
They hold a rally and earn front
page coverage. Check out the tea
party. By contrast, a liberal coalition
convened last summer's U.S. Social
Forum in Detroit. More than 20,000
people debated issues and con­
ceived strategies. Som ehow, the
cat got jo u rn alists' tongues on
that one, too.
So don't expect WikiLeaks' dra­
matic revelations to lead to change
in the short run. Since the main­
stream media is a co-conspirator in
our nation’s corporate pro-war cul­
ture, the tide of domestic disgust
with wars rises very slowly. But
abroad, it ascends far faster, and
pressures are mounting internation­
ally for us to behave ourselves, as
we have recently been forced to do
in Egypt.
Don't hold your breath, but don't
give upeither. Just watch Al-Jazeera
English, which you can only view
on the Internet unless you live in
Toledo, Ohio, or Burlington, Ver­
mont, or Washington, D.C.
The truth will eventually set us
free. Meanwhile, I nominate Julian
Assange to be Man of the Year.
OtherWords columnist William
A. Collins is a form er state repre­
sentative and a form er mayor o f
Norwalk, Conn.
Black America’s True Religion: Optimism
Getting through
tough financial times
by L ee
A. D aniels
There they go again.
Don’t they know any better?
African Americans as a group
continue to be battered worse
than any other Americans by the nation’s
three-year-long-and-counting economic cri­
sis. In both stand-alone and comparative
terms, from the top to the bottom of the socio­
economic ladder, they’ve suffered a severe
loss of the little wealth they possessed and
have almost no protection against a future
economic shock.
For example, their unemployment rate, now
at 15.7 percent, has been in double digits
(nearly double that of whites) since the Great
Recession began three years ago. They’re
more likely than whites to be trapped among
the long-term unemployed; and the housing
and foreclosure crisis has pushed the black
homeownership rate down to its level of 15
years ago and left more than 20 percent of
African American homeowners in danger
of losing their homes.
And yet, in a survey re­
leased last month, blacks by
a large margin declared them­
selves - in sharp contrast to
w hites-full of optimism about
their financial standing for the
present and the future.
The survey, conducted by
the Washington Post, the Kai­
ser Family Foundation and
Harvard University, found that
85 percent of blacks are “opti­
mistic” about their future, com­
pared to 72 percent of whites; that 65 percent
feel “financially secure;” and that 59 percent
of blacks believe that “when it comes to the
availability of good jobs for American work­
ers ... the best times are yet to come. Only 40
percent of whites think that is so.
Latino Americans, though less confident
than blacks, are also markedly more optimis­
tic on most measures than whites.
some that blacks are simply misperceiving
the seriousness of their predicament. These
studies’ other findings indicate blacks are
fully aware of how unequal and precarious
their economic standing remains.
Further, the Pew survey of January 2010
reported that more than 80 per­
cent of blacks, compared with
about a third of whites, believe
that racism remains a significant
factor in American life. None­
theless, the surveys also found
that blacks, and to a lesser extent
Latino Americans, feel that un­
der a Democratic administration,
they have a chance for improve­
ment.
In other words, blacks aren’t
in a swoon now that the Presi­
dent of the United States is a black American.
Instead, I’ve explained it as a matter “equa­
nimity” bom of historical experience and
“faith.”
Those explanations apply to the findings
of the Washington Post-Kaiser-Harvard poll
as well. They stem from the most sustaining
root of black Americans’ society— their pro­
found religiosity.
The last finding of the Post-K aiser-
HarvarS poll revealed that 83 percent of blacks
(compared to 50 percent of whites and 61
percent of Latinos) count “religion or faith in
God as very important in helping them get
through tough financial times. They lead one
to conclude that, whatever their denomina­
tion, black Americans have an over-arching
common religion: optimism.
Lee A. Daniels is Director o f Communica­
tions fo r the NAACP Legal Defense and
Educational Fund, Inc.
The survey marks at least the fourth
time in the last year that a major study
has reached the same conclusion:
blacks (and Latinos), though
significantly worse off than whites, are
significantly more optimistic about the
country's future and their own.
I
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The survey marks at least the fourth time
in the last year that a major study has reached
the same conclusion: blacks (and Latinos),
though significantly worse off than whites,
are significantly more optimistic about the
country’s future and their own.
So said a study by Betsey Stevenson and
Justin W olfers, faculty members at the
Wharton School of the University of Penn­
sylvania. So stated a white paper on the
impact of the Great Recession released in
June by the Pew Research Center, and a
January 2010 report also released by Pew.
The title of the latter - “Blacks Upbeat
about Progress, Prospects” - accurately re­
flects the psychological state of the majority
of black Americans now, despite the eco­
nomic devastation they've endured and are
likely to face for years to come.
In articles on the findings of the previous
studies. I've dismissed assertions made by