(CHICAGO) — One has pom-poms and is dressed in team colors; the other may have a whistle and may be dressed in black and white stripes. One shouts the praises and virtues of their team; the other stands, hopefully, as the one who calls foul on anyone that commits it.
The partisan-cheerleader muddies the waters of true debate; the referee-journalist/citizen brings clarity to an issue. The partisan-cheerleader lives, exclusively, in their own reaffirming echo-chamber; the referee-journalist/citizen is driven to know the other side of an argument even if they, in the end, disagree with it.
Let me be clear, I believe in advocacy journalism. I believe in news organizations stating what their core principles are and why. Nevertheless, advocacy should never supersede honesty; facts are never to be replaced with sentiment.
We live in a time where we have an abundance of cheerleaders and very few referees. Polarization of opinion and ideology is, regretfully, at an all-time high according to many polls. Those who will throw the flag, so to speak, against those who violate and break the rules of the game are at minimum.
Whistleblowers and NDAA
A cursory view of the programming on the major cable news networks (such as MSNBC, Fox and CNN) is sufficient in revealing that we are awash in cheerleaders; saturated with pundits and their talking points. A key component of the cable-news network-cheerleader is to quell and delegitimize legitimate dissent — many times, even against those who share their political or ideological world-view.
For an example, let’s turn our attention to whistleblowers and the unprecedented attack they’ve come under during the Obama administration. Evoking the Espionage Act of 1917, the administration has pressed criminal charges against no fewer than six government employees, more than all previous presidential administrations combined. And what was their crime? Leaking classified information to reporters (or information that would later be considered classified).
Recently, a group of journalists, academics and activists gave testimony in federal court, in a suit challenging the National Defense Authorization Act (an act which includes controversial provisions authorizing the military to jail anyone it considers a terrorism suspect anywhere in the world without charge or trial). Sections of the bill are written so broadly that critics say they could encompass journalists who report on terror-related issues for supporting enemy forces.
This is extremely disturbing in light of the statement on the then president-elect Obama’s official website: “We need to empower federal employees as watchdogs of wrongdoing and partners in performance. Barack Obama will strengthen whistleblower laws to protect federal workers who expose waste, fraud, and abuse of authority in government.”
There was significant outrage against what many on the left called a shadow government clothed in secrecy during the Bush-Cheney years. Indeed, the cries for more transparency and protections for whistleblowers were absolutely deafening. And now, what is the response in light of President Obama’s indiscretions? The dissent of the partisan progressive and liberal cheerleader is conspicuous only by its absence.
Yes, there were a few pockets here and there in progressive circles that challenged the president’s policy and agenda against whistleblowers, but, by and large … silence. No shouts of strong-armed tactics in regard to silencing dissent that was heard during the Bush administration; neither were there any accusations of witch-hunts aimed at intimidating those who dared to speak truth to power.
Is suspension of habeas corpus more appealing under a Democratic president than it is under a Republican one? Is the violation of one’s civil rights more attractive when the guilty party is a liberal or conservative? These are the questions that the liberal and/or progressive cheerleader must answer.
The referee-citizen and the referee-journalist may be engaged in the political process, but they arrive at their conclusions in a politically-transcendent manner — they are in politics, but they are not of politics.
Obama, Bush and socialism
Conversely, there have been many charges of socialism aimed at President Obama. However, when President Bush actually began his experiment into socialism, there was not this personal demonization of him that we see now with our current president. Bush’s $700 billion bailout plan, the partial nationalization of the nation’s biggest banks, the federal takeover of insurance giant AIG and mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, did not elicit this present level of outrage and disdain.
Even U.S. Congress members, who voted for the Bush bailout plan, were accusing President Obama of socialism. I am aware that there were those in opposition to President Obama’s plan, who were also in opposition to President Bush’s plan, but where were the crowds of angry citizens wanting their America back?
What these illogical arguments have exposed, however, is that we Americans are all quasi-socialists — some reluctantly, some hypocritically and some proudly, but nevertheless, quasi-socialists. Who has seriously called for the dismantling of the FDIC protection in our banking system, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and the VA? On the contrary, “hands off” is the cry in regard to these government-run and controlled programs.
On the day President Bush took office, the national debt stood at $5.727 trillion; a few months before he left it was more than $10.549 trillion —- that’s a 71.9 percent increase on Bush’s watch. Without any fanfare, protest and little notice, the national debt grew by close to $5 trillion during George W. Bush’s presidency. Now, buried deep in the hundred pages of bailout legislation was a provision that would raise the statutory ceiling on the national debt to $11.315 trillion. It was the seventh time the debt limit had been raised during his administration. In fact, it was just on July 30, 2008 that President Bush signed the Housing and Economic Recovery Act, which contained a provision raising the debt ceiling to $10.615 trillion.
Additionally, President Bush’s last budget, covering fiscal year 2009, was criticized by Democrats and Republicans alike because they believed he achieved his goals through fiscal trickery by not fully accounting for war spending and by assuming, for example, that domestic spending would hold steady from 2009 to 2013. Further, most of the Bush administration’s budget deficit was accomplished with the help of a Republican-led congress.
Allegiances to people, not principles
Yet, no significant howls about bankrupting our children and grandchildren; no serious drive to look behind the numbers of the “fuzzy math” contained in those budgets. Fast-forward to 2009 and a great deal of those who were silent are now up in arms. Granted, this could be accepted as an argument: “I wasn’t paying attention then like I should have, but I am now.” But that’s not what was being heard. What was heard was the vilification of someone who was nine months into an inherited mess. So if the federal deficit was a major concern to those who protest now … where were they then?
And so the conservative partisan-cheerleader is exposed as being a “team player” whose allegiance is to party and not to principle — the mask of a fiscal purist falls and reveals a standardless devotee to the company line.
The referee journalist and the referee citizen sincerely ask: Upon what do my arguments and protestations rest? Have I been consistent, in tone and reason, (across the political board) in my criticisms of policies and actions?
We should not discourage honest disagreement, dissent or debate, but honest discussion only takes place when you remove the dishonest and the duplicitous barriers to that discussion
We all stand revealed as hypocrites if we only show indignation when the transgression of a stated, deeply-held principle is infringed upon by someone on the other team. We have become so consumed, as a nation of fans, that we care more about our girl, our guy or our team not losing, than we do about our society, our country or our nation winning.