Radio/TV Marti Director Calls for National Debate on Conflicts of Interest

Office of Cuba Broadcasting Director Pedro Roig, who oversees TV and Radio Martí, said Thursday that he runs his operation ethically and wants to start a national debate on whether journalists who work for news companies and also freelance for the government have a conflict of interest.

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/15578390.htm

Comments

[a different thought]

The Herald has a concflict of interest for prentending to be a member of the "free press" while exercising censorship on this blog. We have become what we criticize....

[Walter Lippmann]

Both the HERALD and Pedro Roig really can't have it both ways, though they try hard.

What makes a journalist "independent", anyway?

Since the MIAMI HERALD believes its fine for the United States government to pay Cubans INSIDE CUBA to write anti-Castro propaganda at the behest of the U.S. government from inside the island, it came as no surprise, when it was revealed that journalists at the oh-so-sanctimonious Herald were also being paid by Washington, just as their Cuban counterparts were being paid by Washington, and presumably out of the very same accounts.

He who pays the piper calls the tune. Right?

You get what you pay for, don't you? Right?

The Cuban government, and the social system which it represents and defends, has a political point of view. It's one the HERALD and Washington reject and want to overthrow, but it IS a point of view.

Washington also has a point of view ("overthrow the Castro regime and bring back democracy") which it has been trying to carry out for many decades. U.S. legislation authorizes payment to Cuban journalists who support Washington's goals, and so there are some Cubans who want Washington to succeed.

And there are clearly some in Cuba who are willing to accept funding from the United States government in support of these purposes.

Such people can't possibly be called "independent", because Washington would only pay them if they produced messages Washington wanted to hear: anti-Castro messages.

Cuba has PLENTY of problems. But NONE of Cuba's problems can be solved by turning the country back to such paragons of virtue as currently run the government of the United States, or the MIAMI HERALD, for that matter.

Walter Lippmann
http://www.walterlippmann.com
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews/

[Manuel A. Tellechea]

A lynching plagued by good intentions

by SOREN TRIFF
El Nuevo Herald
Saturday, Sept. 23

Cuban-Americans should thank the heavens for the fervor The Miami Herald exhibited in innvestigating how our tax dollars are spent, but the story 10 Miami journalists take U.S. pay, by Oscar Corral, did not live up to that billing because it was badly investigated, badly written and badly edited. On the contrary, it put the independence of the newspaper in danger and offered justification to those who reacted angrily, because it's easy to read the article as a lynching of ten journalists before public opinion.

A basic error made by Corral and his editors is that there are two news items here, related but incorrectly mixed together. The first is that ''ten journalists received regular payments from the federal government for programs'' on radio and television as result of an investigation of Radio and TV Martí by The Miami Herald. The second news item is that El Nuevo Herald dismissed two journalists and broke ties with a third journalist because they collaborated with the federal agency. The three journalists are part of the group of ten. The news did not have to be together because eight [sic] of the ten journalists are not subject to The Herald's code of ethics, therefore The Herald cannot impose its regulations on them.

In the first news item, an investigation discovered that some journalists working in the news media also collaborate with the federal agency, but the story failed to mention that the collaboration between press and government is not new, that it is not a crime and that there is no universal code of journalistic ethics by which the American newspapers are governed.

Corral could not demonstrate that receiving payment from the government necessarily equals a violation of a journalistic ethics code. Corral relied on certain information to make a moral judgment on the journalists. That is a respectable opinion, but as a news story its a defamation.

The independence of the press is not guaranteed by simply rejecting payment from the government. That is an ideological dogma and a fallacy of logic. For that reason most of the ethical codes, like The Herald's, recommend a case by case analysis.

Every day the American press collaborates with the government without receiving money, like for example, journalists assigned to military units (embedded) in Iraq and Afghanistan. These journalists are not independent because the army provides material aid and censors the news; nevertheless, the press accepts that situation.

On the other hand, journalists remunerated by agencies of government can maintain their independence, like when a pro-abortion journalist appears on a federal program that promotes the right of woman a to choose the abortion. No conflict ot interest exists.

The second news item, that the Herald cut its ties with three of the ten journalists, could be the truly informative piece because the Herald's employees are subject to the norms of the company. But Corral did not explain how the paper's supervisors never observed the supposed ethical violation during five years until a news team discovered the "violation'', nor did he cite the violated portion of the code. Jesus Diaz, Jr, the publisher, presented that information seven days later. These elementary omissions raise reasonable doubts about the role of the institution in the supposed violation.

The independence of the press is preserved through good journalism. The Corral article violated journalistic ethics and placed the independence of the newspaper in danger, the same independence that the newspaper thought it was protecting when it dismissed the three journalists. If the news been well written, it would not have been necessary for reasonable people to lend their ears to speculation and rumors, and it would have prevented evildoers from taking advantage of the situation to advance their liberal and conservative agendas.

[roberto escarpenter]

You can not serve two publishers unless you free lance, even if both employers think along the same lines. I agree

The Big three (ABC,NBC,CBS) and most major print media
reporters since the 1960's
traditionally would hide their party affinity to the public while promoting their party's point of view and continually diminishing contrary views to their own
while claiming to be objective journalists

Dan Rather's last Hurrah at CBS being a case in point, and in today's Cable age,he finally got his comeupance

as most of these so called journalists have become multi MIllionaries
doing so I guess they did not need part time jobs at Govt. Media during a Republican or Democratic administration

Not everyone can get a huge beautiful priceless antique chandelier stolen from a Private Home and given to one as a gift from Fidel Castro like BAH WAH Walters did after her first interview of the Dictator.
Its still hanging in her NY residence
Ask around
also when you are ready to take on corruption,conflict of interest and incompetence in Coral Gables contact George Valdosky at the CG Gazzete for a start ,
you report on City of Miami and TheHerald does pieces on many towns in Dade and Broward
but never on CG..I wonder why
Our credit rating has dropped from A+ to BBB debt and tax millage rate soaring proposed debt ceiling literally thru the roof and plenty of special favors,
officials getting a pass from local police for DUI,our city manager brown denounced in ads by the police and fire dept's, and of course a pension scandal,commisioners owning banks,real estate together
and other sweet stuff.. come on down!!!!!

[a thought...]

I repeat, this used to be fun....

Censorship is Unamerican....

[nonee moose]

"Comments are moderated, and will not appear on this weblog until the author has approved them."

I, the author, hereby approve this post...

[leftside]

For background on Pedro Roig, the Herald's prior knowledge of these issues", and details about this story check out the piece by Jean Guy Allard, yes in today's Granma.cu.

Anyone who is paying attention knows Roig does not want a "national debate" - as the ethical issue has already been settled. Any journnalism or ethics expert knew without thinking that getting paid by the USG for your opinion is a problem, esp. when your "straight" articles don't mention that and your work is filled with distortion and bias... No, Roig wants a good old Miami "debate" - meaning Ileana and Lincoln and the rest should chime in about now.

But his backers might consider Roig's interesting position on terrorism, held for decades as a member of the CORU organisation, which the FBI described as "an anti-Castro terrorist umbrella organization." Another FBI doc. found Roig at a meeting with convicted terrorist Gasper Jimenez (arrested with Carriles in Panama). Roig has since been embraced by the Bush clan, and groups like Reporters Sans Fronteires for running what our own Govt. call "propoganda."

My question for the Herald is what about Mr. C.A. Montaner?Why didn't the Herald sever their relationship with him? Instead you print him. What ethical line did he not cross the others did? What about this one:

December 26 1960, 17 terrorists were arrested in Havana in the midst of a wave of attacks on stores and cinemas around the Cuban capital.

Carlos Alberto Montaner Suris was among these extremists. Sentenced to several years in prison, he escaped a few months later a...by the CIA through a South American embassy.

...in an interview with journalist Angel de Jesús Piñera, published April 27, 1962 by the Miami magazine Avance, Montaner confirmed that he directed the terrorist activities of his group.

[a different thought]

A.T.

Apparently, you and I are the only ones up in arms over this censorship thing....

[Manuel A. Tellechea]

A.T. and D.T.:

"Moderation" — Newspeak for censorship" — is a desperate expedient by someone who is under siege and is trying to exert what little control he still has over the spin on his much-lambasted article of Sept. 8. It is not a policy adopted from a position of strength but of weakness. In turning his blog into a "moderated" forum, Oscar has stripped it of its immediacy and spontaneity. There is no more give and take here because you can't debate a blank screen; and by the time Oscar — who must not be very busy these days — gets around to approving comments, they are already stale and easily passed over. I do not know what pride he ever took in having the most successful Cuban-themed blog on the net, but it could not have been much, since his indifference nearly killed it during his days in the "underground." But if his indifference was dangerous, his "moderation" is lethal.

[Manuel A. Tellechea]

I do not think that Carlos Alberto Montaner has acted correctly in this matter. He has been too much concerned with his own reputation and far too prone to put himself and his plight at the center of this controversy. In fact, he continues as a columnist for both the Herald and El Herald and his name is emblazoned on the editorial page of both papers alongside those responsible for this injustice. If the magnitude of the injustice to himself in particular is as great as he claims, Montaner should have immediately severed all connections to the Herald. Real solidarity with the fired journalists demanded that he stand with them even if his situation was not identical to theirs (he being more powerful). Instead, he is remains in the camp of the defamers. Indignation should be made of sterner stuff. Loyalty certainly is.

[Robert Canon]

Osacar,
You should think about resigns right away... All your lies are surfacing to our knowledge and yours godfhaters are falling down... Call Havana, maybe Castro has something to effer you... Or still better, call Max Lesnik at radio Miami, after all you passed him information about your infamus article. Now is time foe him to show you his friendship.