Uh . . . what just happened to independent media?

Last week, if you follow independent media, may have been a very strange week for you. It was for us. It was for a reader who shared a copy of of a complaint he shared with KPFA:

I like the news department but I think they've done a very poor job addressing the House measure. I do not think they've addressed why many groups and many Congress members were against it. I think a toothless measure shouldn't be said to guarantee a withdrawal. I am very upset about the way this has been covered from the start. Not covered was the privatization of Iraqi oil, not covered was Military Families Speak Out's opposition to it, Antonia Juhasz's opposition to it. We got a soundbyte from Dennis Kucinich and a professor was interviewed. While that's better than the rest of the week, it doesn't change the fact that Mark and others have portrayed the bill as something it wasn't when delivering the news.I like KPFA and enjoy the news. (I'm a supporter and don't plan to stop pledging.) But I really believe that KPFA dropped the ball on this. The news has repeatedly presented the bill as something more powerful than it is. The "benchmarks" get mentioned but we never got told what they are or, most important, how George Bush can ignore them as written into the House measure.Thank you for listening.

He is a supporter, an out of area supporter (an out of state supporter), who pledges each pledge drive even though he's already on the plan where he pledges each month automatically. C.I. wrote him a personal apology because C.I. plugs KPFA at The Common Ills. (The core six -- Jim, Dona, Jess, Ty, Ava and C.I. plug it here as well.) C.I. opened that with, "I'm at a loss for words because I'm just as stunned as you are by what passed for news coverage." Kat says she was pissed and stunned (long time KPFA supporter) and the core five? We were more pissed than stunned. On Monday, the news seemed to exist (in newsbreak after newsbreak) just to plug MoveOn.org. MoveOn was not the place to go to find out about protests in the Bay Area. It was the place to go if you wanted to know about their Monday night candle light vigil that couldn't protest, only mourn the loss of lives -- as though a tsunami and not an illegal war caused the deaths. Why anyone news person (and this was the news staff, not hosts) would plug MoveOn was beyond us when it wasn't a resource for the Bay Area and John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton had already published their piece on MoveOn.

Stauber is a frequent guest on KPFA so we expected that, at some point during the week, he'd be invited on to discuss it. Didn't happen. Not only that, MoveOn got to frame the debate. The "liberal" organization MoveOn (mentioned by name over and over) supported the Pelosi measure. Those opposed? They were "critics." Unnamed, uncited critics. As the week drew to a close, Stephen Zunes was allowed to address some criticisms of the Pelosi measure (Dennis Kuccinich's soundbyte was edited in a such a way that many listeners might not have grasped how many problems a significant number of people saw with the Pelosi measure). But Zunes only got to speak after another story had already set up (as fact, mind you) the falsehood that troops will now be coming home, a deadline has been set. (The deadlines, the benchmarks, can all be waived by the Bully Boy -- it's written into the legislation.)

We started to feel like MoveOn was Chevron or Exxon Mobile the way it was being mentioned so much during the news -- it was like we were listening to NPR.

Now, despite what Stinking Sirota says, the opposition to the measure was very strong. And saying something to the effect of "the area's own Barbara Lee and Lynn Woolsey do not . . ." is not conveying that. Ray McGovern is a frequent guest on KPFA. His organization was opposed to the measure. Military Families Speak Out frequently has members interviewed on KPFA, yet no one was provided from that group. Antonia Juhasz is a frequent guest but she wasn't invited on to discuss the measure. CODEPINK wasn't invited on to discuss opposition. There's a long list of KPFA guests who suddenly couldn't be provided to the listening audience.

A report that aired on both Free Speech Radio News and KPFA focused on the Pelosi measure and the Senate measure. On the House measure, one person and only one person was allowed to speak -- a supporter of the measure (and he spoke longer than anyone in the report other than the reporter Leigh Ann Caldwell). Now we're not crying "conspiracy" or anything deliberate. We think some really bad reporting made it to air and we think that had to do, in part, with accepting the narrative set forth by the mainstream media (KPFA exists to question that narrative) and we fear that some of it resulted from fear of MoveOn.

That's the only reason we can think of that neither John Stauber nor Sheldon Rampton were featured on any program (not even the national Democracy Now! which KPFA airs twice each morning). We think that's appalling.

We think MoveOn's gotten more than enough promotion from KPFA last week and needs no more softball coverage -- or mentions unless the people rightly speaking out are the ones bringing it up.

C.I. apologized personally on the e-mail that came in to this site. That's because it was from a Common Ills community member and C.I. does push KPFA. There were 76 complaints about KPFA and we're (the rest of us) not going to write personal apologies to everyone who wrote in.
We will tell you that we are just as sad and pissed, as angry and outraged, as depressed and frustrated, as the 75 others who wrote in (we're assuming the personal apology from C.I. took care of one of the 76).

Here you had a measure in the House on the illegal war (something KPFA listeners are passionate about) and there was no debate offered the topic by any KPFA originated program. (We missed Flashpoints Friday because we weren't by the radio. Robert Knight regularly addressed the toothless measure "from exile" on the program. We believe Dennis Bernstein may have as well. "From exile" seems like it should be the slogan for Flashpoint period -- not just for Knight's segment -- and we're not too thrilled about that treatment of the program.)

KPFA has a strong, in house news team. In addition, it features strong reporting from those outside. With all of those voices, we're still shocked that listeners never heard the serious objections to the bill until after it passed the House (that's when Zune was brought on as a guest, after it passed).

However the ball got dropped (and it was dropped), KPFA needs to be addressing the situation to figure it out so that it doesn't happen again.

To the 75 who complained, we'll offer you this public apology: We're sorry because we do promote KPFA and we do praise their news department. In this instance, it wasn't worthy of praise. As 36 of you pointed out (echoing C.I.), Medea Benjamin could be heard speaking out against the measure . . . on NPR but not KPFA. We're as upset as you and we apologize that something we have praised so much let you down so much.