Mark Ames’ One-Man Mission to Get an Apology from the NYT

Mark Ames of Exiled Online and The Nation, not satisfied with his previous screed (that I posted about here), is continuing his assault upon the New York Times’ reporting on Georgia’s role in the South Ossetian conflict.  He is one of the primary resources I have been utilizing for my own understanding of the Georgian/South Ossetian war.  As a longtime Moscow resident and journalist in Russia, as well as an American citizen, I consider him exceptionally well situated to provide insight on the crisis that American reporting tends to miss.

Though I do not share the degree of his ire for the New York Times (still my morning paper), he correctly lambastes their lack of journalistic inquisitiveness and either docile manipulation by those who wish to continue painting Russia as the boogeyman or capitulation to the storyline easiest for its readership to digest (big bad Russia vs. little innocent Georgia).  I actually believe the New York Times was far quicker (which is still extremely slow) to question the dominant narrative and did so under very little pressure or duress that I noticed.  Very few in America were demanding a correction or review of the ‘facts’ in those early weeks of the war, and by the time questions were raised, the war had fallen off the American news platter to be replaced by the late innings of the US Elections.

His last article, doubly linked to above, chronicles his attacks on the New York Times (seemingly not targeted for the extent of its poor reporting, but for its importance as the paper of record), contrasting it to some far superior reporting from European news sources such as Der Spiegel (I link to that article, among others, in a post providing a situational update three months ago).  More importantly, Ames provides an insider’s look (sadly, with scant real evidence beyond his conjecture and assumptions) into the nuts and bolts of how an incorrect narrative and misrepresentation is created and fostered in the face of contrary evidence.  As a member of the press pool, traveling with other Western journalists who largely report in terms in exact opposition to his own reporting, he provides an insider’s perspective of the top-down content control that he believes trumped actual investigation in the dominant reporting on Georgia-South Ossetia.

Ames makes the valid comparisons — putting the New York Times’ feet to the fire — between their failed coverage in this war to their failed — and recanted — coverage leading up to the Iraq War.  I think he misses one notable point though:  The New York Times authored their mea culpa about the Iraq War long after a firestorm of outrage from those who felt the media failed.  In contrast, the New York Times has began to disseminate articles doubting Georgia’s claims of innocence, and the purity of their ruling government, long before any demands for that reporting came to my notice in America.  And they have continued to issue their subtle correction (not expressed in NYT standards editor Craig Whitney’s reply to Mark Ames, quoted at the end of Ames’ article) long after the crisis has fallen off America’s radar.

Perhaps my expectations for the New York Times and the American news media in general is too low, but I am frankly surprised that the New York Times has, in my view, voluntarily issued a correction on their reporting, albeit rather quietly.

… and the cow goes moo