( – promoted by Clark)

We all know that this should be a Democratic year, but it is a fact that we could still loose the White House.  How could this happen?  Racism, petulant Hillary supporters, you name it.  But one of the most important reasons could be the efforts of our corrupt, corporate media to prevent a Democratic victory that could cost them big.

Clark, in his Aug. 23 diary on the selection of Joe Biden as Obama’s new running mate, notes the comments of the AP Washington Bureau Chief, Ron Fournier, who provided a “craptacular AP “analysis” … on why this is a terrible pick for Obama.”  But Fournier’s awfulness goes far deeper than even the rather alarming examples Clark provides.

Mother Jones‘ Mojo Blog describes Fournier’s journalistic philosophy as:

…enthusiasm for what he calls “accountability journalism”-a more aggressive style of writing and reporting intended to hold the rich and powerful closer to the fire. “The AP’s hard-earned reputation for fairness and nonpartisanship must not be used as an excuse for fuzzy language when a clear voice is demanded,” Fournier wrote last summer, in an internal newsletter to AP employees. “Nor should it force us to give both sides of a story equal play when one side is plainly wrong.”

At first blush this does not seem too different from what many progressives claim to want journalists to do:  play an active role in getting to the truth rather than reporting in a “he said, she said” manner.  However, Media Matters’ Eric Boehlert provides a detailed analysis that shows Fournier’s practice of “accountability journalism” to be riddled with unsubstantiated attack rhetoric directed exclusively at Democrats.

More below the flip – Clark.

Boehlert further asserts that:

That ethos seems to have been adopted by the larger AP political team, which, honestly, writes as if it’s completely in the tank for McCain. “Atrocious” is how Talking Points Memo blogger Josh Marshall has classified the wire service’s campaign performance this year …

Why, you ask, would an old and venerable news service like the AP lend itself to such abuses? And Julia of Firedoglake provides the likely answer:  

… The question is, why does the AP have a Ron Fournier problem? Could it be because William Dean Singleton, the Chairman of the AP Board and a man who owns a lot of newspapers, has a Democrat problem?

…

See, Mr. Singleton has a bit of a Cause. He’s a big fan of relaxing the FCC regulations banning cross-media ownership.

We all know that many Democrats have, up to this point, successfully stymied Mr. Singleton in his pursuit of this cause.  Specifically,

The Senate measure [to prohibit cross-media ownership] drew 27 cosponsors, including Democrats Hillary Clinton of New York and Barack Obama of Illinois.

Boehlert’s Media Matters piece demonstrates that Clinton, Edwards and Obama were special targets of Fournier’s spleen during the primary.  

But what about John McCain?  Boehlert notes that:

Republican John McCain of Arizona, another presidential hopeful, was not a cosponsor.

In fact:

It was McCain who personally and aggressively promoted Michael Powell to serve as FCC chair, and who defended Powell’s attempts in 2003 to rewrite media ownership rules according to a script written by industry lobbyists.

And–wouldn’t you know–Boehlert continues:

I simply cannot find any evidence that Fournier has ever written about McCain in the way he has when he personally attacked Clinton and Obama this year.

So, in summary, we have a big media outlet that is determined to use its power to control information to defeat Democratic politicians who threaten its profits.  More significantly, this media outlet, the AP, has found the perfect tool to engineer its hit on the Democratic party in Ron Fournier.  

So, once again, what can we do?  Well, MoveOn.org is gearing up to take Fournier on.  They are trying to organize an email campaign to protest his practices to AP at the following addresses.

Michael Oreskes, AP Managing Editor, mOreskes@ap.org

Ron Fournier, AP reporter and Washington D.C. Bureau Chief, rfournier@ap.org

I think this may be useful only as a way to generate publicity about the AP abuses since the narrative above suggests that the rot goes deep in the organization.  But I would also suggest writing to your local paper (in my case the St. Louis Post-Dispatch) and complaining about their use of AP stories.

UPDATE:  This dailykos blogger also thinks that contacting your local paper and complaining about their use of the AP service is a good idea–but he/she has a lot more good information about why this is so.

Update II.  I noticed that I had omitted a link to the Firedoglake posting referenced above so I added it as well as fixing a non sequiter I noticed in the text.