Re: MD Quality and Bias In Commercial Media

From: Chuck Roghair (ctr@pacificpartssales.com)
Date: Fri Jan 28 2005 - 17:49:02 GMT

  • Next message: Platt Holden: "Re: MD Understanding Quality and Power"

    liberal media?
     
    Third columnist caught with hand in the Bush till
    Michael McManus, conservative author of the syndicated column "Ethics &
    Religion," received $10,000 to promote a marriage initiative.

      - - - - - - - - - - - -
    By Eric Boehlert

    Jan. 27, 2005  |  And three makes a trend.

      One day after President Bush ordered his Cabinet secretaries to stop
    hiring commentators to help promote administration initiatives, and one
    day after the second high-profile conservative pundit was found to be
    on the federal payroll, a third embarrassing hire has emerged. Salon
    has confirmed that Michael McManus, a marriage advocate whose
    syndicated column, "Ethics & Religion," appears in 50 newspapers, was
    hired as a subcontractor by the Department of Health and Human Services
    to foster a Bush-approved marriage initiative. McManus championed the
    plan in his columns without disclosing to readers he was being paid to
    help it succeed.

      

    Responding to the latest revelation, Dr. Wade Horn, assistant secretary
    for children and families at HHS, announced Thursday that HHS would
    institute a new policy that forbids the agency from hiring any outside
    expert or consultant who has any working affiliation with the media. "I
    needed to draw this bright line," Horn tells Salon. "The policy is
    being implemented and we're moving forward."

      Horn's move came on the heels of Wednesday's report in the Washington
    Post that HHS had paid syndicated columnist and marriage advocate
    Maggie Gallagher $21,000 to write brochures and essays and to brief
    government employees on the president's marriage initiative. Gallagher
    later wrote in her column that she would have revealed the $21,000
    payment to readers had she recalled receiving it.

      The Gallagher revelation came just three weeks after USA Today
    reported that the Education Department, through a contract with the
    Ketchum public relations firm, paid $240,000 to Armstrong Williams, a
    conservative African-American print, radio and television pundit, to
    help promote Bush's No Child Left Behind program to minority audiences.

      To date, the Bush administration has paid public relation firms $250
    million to help push proposals, according to a report Thursday in USA
    Today. That's double what the Clinton administration spent on P.R. from
    1997 to 2000. Shortly after Williams' contract came to light, the
    Democrats on the Committee on Government Reform wrote a letter to
    President Bush demanding that he "immediately provide to us all past
    and ongoing efforts to engage in covert propaganda, whether through
    contracts with commentators, the distribution of video news releases,
    or other means." As of Thursday, a staffer on the committee told Salon,
    there had been no response.

      Horn says McManus, who could not be reached for comment, was paid
    approximately $10,000 for his work as a subcontractor to the Lewin
    Group, a health care consultancy hired by HHS to implement the
    Community Healthy Marriage Initiative, which encourages communities to
    combat divorce through education and counseling. McManus provided
    training during two-day conferences in Chattanooga, Tenn., and also
    made presentations at HHS-sponsored conferences. His syndicated column
    has appeared in such papers as the Washington Times, the Dallas Morning
    News and the Charlotte Observer.

      Horn, who has known McManus for years, says he first learned about the
    payment on Thursday. In the wake of the Gallagher story, he asked his
    staff to review all outside contracts and determine if there were any
    other columnists being paid by HHS. They informed him about McManus.
    Horn says the review for similar contracts continues.

      Horn insists that HHS was not paying Gallagher and McManus to write
    about Bush administration initiatives but for their expertise as
    marriage advocates. "We live in a complicated world and people wear
    many different hats," he says. "People who have expertise might also be
    writing columns. The line has become increasingly blurred between who's
    a member of the media and who is not. Thirty years ago if you were a
    columnist, then you were a full-time employee of a newspaper.
    Columnists today are different."

      The problem springs from the failure of both Gallagher and McManus to
    disclose their government payments when writing about the Bush
    proposals. But one HHS critic says another dynamic has led to the
    controversy, and a blurring of ethical and journalistic lines: Horn and
    HHS are hiring advocates -- not scholars -- from the pro-marriage
    movement. "They're ideological sympathizers who propagandize," says Tim
    Casey, attorney for Legal Momentum, a women's rights organization. He
    describes McManus as being a member of the "extreme religious right."

      Horn denies the charge: "It's not true that we have just been
    selectively working with conservatives." According to news accounts,
    the administration seeks to spend $1.5 billion promoting marriage
    through marriage-enrichment courses, counseling and public-awareness
    campaigns.

      In 1996, McManus co-founded Marriage Savers, a conservative advocacy
    group, which, among other things, urges clergy not to conduct a
    marriage ceremony unless the couple has had lengthy counseling first.
    "The church should not be a 'wedding factory,' but a training ground
    for strong marriages to go the distance -- for life," McManus wrote.

      In his April 3, 2004, column, McManus wrote, "The Healthy Marriage
    Initiative would provide funds to help those couples improve their
    skills of conflict resolution so they might actually marry -- and be
    equipped to build a healthy marriage. Those skills can be taught by
    mentor couples in churches for free. But for the non-religious,
    counselors would be paid."

      A year earlier, McManus assured readers that funds provided for the
    Healthy Marriage Initiative "could be used to teach skills to improve
    communication and resolve conflict that would make the relationship
    happier and lead to a healthy marriage." He based that assessment on
    comments made by HHS's Horn, who, indirectly, served as McManus' boss
    -- although that relationship was never revealed to readers.
    On Jan 28, 2005, at 1:23 AM, Ian Glendinning wrote:

    > Poot,
    > Agreed, see my response to Arlo.
    > Ian
    > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Matt poot" <mattpoot@hotmail.com>
    > To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
    > Sent: Friday, January 28, 2005 2:14 AM
    > Subject: Re: MD Quality and Bias In Commercial Media
    >
    >
    >>
    >> I think a major block against making any headway in this discussion,
    >> is the use of quotes and out-sources as proof of verification.
    >> Whether it is quoting pirsig, the MRC, a newspaper, or whatever, it
    >> basically serves no point.
    >>
    >>
    >> How about a discussion composed entirely of every individuals own
    >> thoughts, un-complicated/misconstrued by quotes. I Think we could
    >> all benefit from such discussion, and otherwise will continue in to
    >> talk circles around each other.
    >>
    >>
    >> POOT
    >>
    >>
    >>
    >>
    >> MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
    >> Mail Archives:
    >> Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
    >> Nov '02 Onward -
    >> http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
    >> MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
    >>
    >> To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
    >> http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
    >
    >
    >
    > MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
    > Mail Archives:
    > Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
    > Nov '02 Onward -
    > http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
    > MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
    >
    > To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
    > http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
    >

    MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
    Mail Archives:
    Aug '98 - Oct '02 - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
    Nov '02 Onward - http://www.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/summary.html
    MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net

    To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
    http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html

    print_new.gif
    email_new.gif
    transparent.gif

    This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Fri Jan 28 2005 - 20:35:21 GMT