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Don't Trust The News Media? That's Good

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Approach with caution, advises a journalism scholar. simon kr/E+/Getty Images

Everyone seems to hate what they call “the media.”

Attacking journalism – even accurate and verified reporting – provides a quick lift for politicians.

It’s not just Donald Trump. Trump’s rival for the 2024 Republican nomination, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, recently criticized “the Lefty media” for telling “lies” and broadcasting “a hoax” about his policies.

Criticizing the media emerged as an effective bipartisan political tactic in the 1960s. GOP Sen. Barry Goldwater’s 1964 presidential campaign got the ball rolling by needling the so-called “Eastern liberal press.”

Democratic President Lyndon Johnson’s lies about the Vietnam War clashed with accurate reporting, and a “credibility gap” arose – the growing public skepticism about the administration’s truthfulness – to the obvious irritation of the president. Johnson complained CBS News and NBC News were so biased he thought their reporting seemed “controlled by the Vietcong.”

Democrats like Chicago’s Mayor Richard J. Daley, who complained bitterly about news coverage of the 1968 Democratic convention – labeling it “propaganda” – and Federal Communications Commissioner Nicholas Johnson, who published “How to Talk Back to Your Television Set” in 1970, argued that “Eastern,” “commercial” and “corporate” media interests warped or “censored” the news.

In 1969, Republican President Richard Nixon’s vice president, Spiro Agnew, launched a public campaign against news corporations that instantly made him a conservative celebrity.

Agnew warned that increased concentration in news media ownership ensured control over public opinion by a “tiny and closed fraternity of privileged men, elected by no one.” Similar criticism emerged from leftists, including MIT linguist Noam Chomsky.

A man with a receding hairline and gray hair talking into a microphone.
Vice President Spiro Agnew said in 1969 that concentrated news media ownership ensured control over public opinion by a ‘tiny and closed fraternity of privileged men, elected by no one.’
David Hume Kennerly/Getty Images

The bipartisan popularity of news media criticism continued to grow as politicians found attacking the messengers the fastest way to avoid engaging in discussion of unpleasant realities. Turning the spotlight back on the media also helped political figures portray themselves as victims, while focusing partisan anger at specific villains.

Now, only 26% of Americans have a favorable opinion of the news media, according to a poll published in February 2023 by Gallup and the Knight Foundation. Americans across the political spectrum share a growing disdain for journalism – no matter how accurate, verified, professional or ethical.

Yet open debate over journalism ethics signals healthy governance. Such argumentation might amplify polarization, but it also facilitates the exchange of diverse opinions and encourages critical analyses of reality.

Journalistic failures damaged trust

Americans grew to distrust even the best news reporting because their political leadership encouraged it. But multiple failures exposed over the past several decades also further eroded journalistic credibility.

Long before bloggers ended Dan Rather’s CBS News career in 2005, congressional investigations, civil lawsuits and scandals revealing unethical and unprofessional behavior within even the most respected journalism outlets doomed the profession’s public reputation.

In 1971, CBS News aired “The Selling of the Pentagon,” an investigation that revealed the government spent tax dollars to produce pro-military domestic propaganda during the Vietnam War.

The program infuriated U.S. Rep. Harley Staggers, who accused CBS of using “the nation’s airwaves … to deliberately deceive the public.”

Staggers launched an investigation and subpoenaed CBS News’ unpublished, confidential materials. CBS News President Frank Stanton defied the subpoena and was eventually vindicated by a vote of Congress. But Staggers, a West Virginia Democrat, publicly portrayed CBS News as biased by insinuating the network had much to hide. Many Americans agreed with him.

“The Selling of the Pentagon” was the first of many investigations and lawsuits that damaged the credibility of journalism by exposing – or threatening to expose – the messy process of assembling news. As with the recent embarrassing revelations about Fox News exposed by the Dominion lawsuit, whenever the public gets access to the backstage behavior, private opinions and hypocritical actions of professional journalists, reputations will suffer.

But even the remarkable Fox News revelations shouldn’t be considered unique.

Repeated lying

Numerous respected news organizations have been caught lying to their audiences. Though such episodes are rare, they can be enormously damaging.

In 1993, General Motors sued NBC News, accusing the network of deceiving the public by secretly attaching explosives to General Motors trucks, and then blowing them up to exaggerate a danger.

NBC News admitted it, settled the lawsuit and news division President Michael Gartner resigned. The case, concluded The Washington Post’s media critic, “will surely be remembered as one of the most embarrassing episodes in modern television history.”

Additional examples abound. Intentional deception – knowingly lying by consciously publishing or broadcasting fiction as fact – occurs often enough in professional journalism to cyclically embarrass the industry.

A screenshot of a clipping from the New York Times, July 2, 1971, about a contempt vote against CBS and its top executive.
A front page story in The New York Times on July 2, 1971, with details about the conflict in Congress over the CBS documentary ‘The Selling of the Pentagon.’
New York Times archive

In cases such as Janet Cooke and The Washington Post, Stephen Glass and the New Republic, Jayson Blair and Michael Finkel of The New York Times, and Ruth Shalit Barrett and The Atlantic, the publication of actual fabrications was exposed.

These episodes of reportorial fraudulence were not simply errors caused by sloppy fact-checking or journalists being deceived by lying sources. In each case, journalists lied to improve their careers while trying to help their employers attract larger audiences with sensational stories.

This self-inflicted damage to journalism is every bit equal to the attacks launched by politicians.

Such malfeasance undermines confidence in the news media’s ability to fulfill its constitutionally protected responsibilities. If few Americans are willing to believe even the most verified and factual reporting, then the ideal of debate grounded in shared facts may become anachronistic. It may already be.

Media criticism as democratic participation

The pervasive amount of news media criticism in the U.S. has intensified the erosion of trust in American journalism.

But such discussion can be seen as a sign of democratic health.

“Everyone in a democracy is a certified media critic, which is as it should be,” media sociologist Michael Schudson once wrote. Imagine how intimidated citizens would respond to pollsters in Russia, China or North Korea if asked whether they trusted their media. To question official media “truth” in these nations is to risk incarceration or worse.

Just look at Russia. As Putin’s regime censored independent media and pumped out propaganda, the nation’s least skeptical citizens became the war’s foremost supporters.

As a media scholar and former journalist, I believe more reporting on the media, and criticism of journalism, is always better than less.

Even that Gallup-Knight Foundation report chronicling lost trust in the media concluded that “distrust of information or [media] institutions is not necessarily bad,” and that “some skepticism may be beneficial in today’s media environment.”

People choose the media they trust and criticize the media they consider less credible. Intentional deception scandals have been exposed at outlets as different as The New York Times, Fox News and NBC News. Just as the effort to demean the media has long been bipartisan, revelations of malfeasance have historically plagued media across the political spectrum. Nobody can yet know the long-term effect the Dominion lawsuit will have on the credibility of Fox News specifically, but media scholars know the scandal will justifiably further erode the public’s trust in the media.

An enduring democracy will encourage rather than discourage media criticism. Attacks by politicians and exposure of unethical acts clearly lower public trust in journalism. But measured skepticism can be healthy and media criticism comprises an essential component of media literacy – and a vibrant democracy.

The Conversation

Michael J. Socolow does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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Moscow Terror Attack Showed Growing Reach Of ISIS-K – Could The US Be Next?

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More than 140 people died in the Crocus City Hall assualt in Moscow on March 22, 2023. AFP via Getty Images

A deadly attack in Moscow on March 22, 2024, exposed the vulnerability of the Russian capital to the threat of the Islamic State group and its affiliate ISIS-K. But it also displayed the reach of the network, leading some terror experts to ponder: Could a U.S. city be next?

There has not been a mass casualty assault in the U.S. carried out in the name of the Islamic State group since 2017, when a truck mowed down cyclists and pedestrians on a New York City bikeway, leaving eight dead.

Yet five years after the Islamic State group’s territorial defeat in Baghuz, Syria, had prompted hopes that the terrorist network was in terminal decline, a recent spate of attacks has thrust the group back into the spotlight. On the same day as the Moscow atrocity, an ISIS-K suicide bombing in Kandahar, Afghanistan, resulted in the deaths of at least 21 people.

As a terrorism expert and a scholar specializing in radical Islamist militant groups and the geographical scope of their attacks, I believe these incidents underscore the growing threat of ISIS-K both within the region it draws support from and on an international scale.

Amplifying influence

A successful terror attack on a Western capital is certainly something ISIS-K, or Islamic State Khorasan Province, aspires to. The intent behind the group’s activities is to bolster its position among jihadist factions by means of audacious and sophisticated attacks.

A man sits looking at screens with Tome, Madrid and London on.
An image released by pro-Islamic State media outlet Al Battar Foundation reads ‘After Moscow, who is next?’
Al-Battar Foundation

It is a strategy that showcases ISIS-K’s capabilities for spectacular operations, distinguishing it from potential rival groups. But it also enhances ISIS-K’s appeal, attracting both supporters and resources in the shape of funding and fighters.

By establishing a unique identity in a crowded extremist landscape, ISIS-K aims to undercut its competitors’ influence and assert its dominance in the jihadist sphere of the Khorasan region it targets, including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran and other Central Asian countries.

ISIS-K’s ambition extends beyond territorial control, engaging in a broader contest for ideological supremacy and resource acquisition globally.

An expanding threat

This global reach and ambition are evident in ISIS-K’s recent planned operations.

These include a suicide bombing in Iran in January 2024 and thwarted attacks across Europe, notably the foiled plots in Germany and the Netherlands in July 2023.

And without a doubt, a successful attack in the United States is seen within ISIS-K’s hierarchy as a major goal.

Since the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan in 2021, officials in the Biden administration have repeatedly warned of ISIS-K’s escalating danger to American interests, both at home and abroad.

ISIS-K’s propaganda has persistently framed the U.S. as its principal enemy – a narrative that is fueled by America’s extensive military and economic efforts to dismantle Islamic State operations since 2014.

The United States’ involvement, especially in collaboration with the Taliban — ISIS-K’s primary regional adversary — has placed America firmly in the group’s crosshairs.

Employing tactics refined during the period that the Islamic State group was most active, ISIS-K seeks to inspire lone-wolf attacks and radicalize individuals in the U.S.

The 2015 mass shooting in San Bernardino, California, which left 14 dead, and the 2016 shooting at a nightclub in Orlando, Florida, that resulted in at least 49 deaths, were both attacks inspired by the Islamic State group.

Targeting major powers

Taking its lead from the Islamic State group, ISIS-K in 2022 publicly condemned America, calling it an enemy of Islam.

Of course, ISIS-K had by then already demonstrated its intention to harm U.S. interests, notably in a 2021 Kabul airport attack in which 13 U.S. service members and 170 Afghans were killed.

ISIS-K views the U.S. in much the same way as it does Russia: both as a military and an ideological foe.

Russia became a prime target due in part to its partnering with the Bashar al-Assad government in Syria in operations against Islamic State group affiliates. Similarly, Washington has worked with the Taliban in Afghanistan in countering ISIS-K operations.

While it is easier for ISIS-K to penetrate Russian territory, given the country’s geographical proximity to major Islamist recruitment centers, such as Tajikistan, the potential for strikes in the United States remains significant.

In 2023, U.S. authorities investigated a group of Uzbek nationals suspected of entering the country from Mexico with the assistance of traffickers linked to the Islamic State group, underscoring the group’s threat.

The wreckage of a truck under a blue sheet is seen being towed away.
Eight people died in a truck attack in New York City in 2017.
AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews

Targeting American interests serve multiple purposes for ISIS-K. By striking against the U.S., ISIS-K not only retaliates against Washington’s counterterrorism efforts but also aims to deter U.S. involvement in regions of interest to ISIS-K.

It also taps into historical grievances against the U.S. and Western interventions in Muslim countries – from the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq to the stationing of U.S. troops in significant Islamic centers in the Middle East, notably Saudi Arabia.

Countering a persistent threat

In response to the growing threat of Islamic State group affiliates, the United States has adopted a comprehensive strategy combining military, intelligence and law enforcement efforts.

Military operations have targeted ISIS-K leaders and infrastructure in Afghanistan, while security cooperation with regional and international partners such as Uzbekistan continues to monitor and counter the group’s activities.

On the home front, law enforcement and homeland security agencies remain vigilant, working to identify and thwart potential ISIS-K plots.

But as many experts had warned, the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 has posed new challenges, inadvertently transforming that country once again into a safe haven and operational base for terrorist groups.

This retreat has also resulted in a significant loss of on-the-ground intelligence amid doubts over the efficacy of relying on the Taliban for counterterrorism operations.

Meanwhile, the Taliban are struggling to prevent or counteract ISIS-K attacks within their own borders.

The successful ISIS-K plots against Iran and Russia also reveal another vulnerability: When a country is distracted or preoccupied with other security concerns or conflicts, it can potentially compromise the effectiveness of its counterterrorism efforts.

Recent years have witnessed a decrease in high-profile attacks by groups like the Islamic State, leading many to conclude that the threat was waning. As a result, global attention — and with it, intelligence and security resources — has shifted toward escalating power rivalries and conflicts across the Pacific, Eastern Europe and the Middle East.

Yet, this shift risks underestimating the enduring threat terrorist groups pose, laying bare the dangers of complacency.

The Moscow attack emphasizes ISIS-K’s resolve to expand its influence, raising concerns about the potential threat to Western nations, including the United States. Considering ISIS-K’s track record and clear aspirations, it would be naive to dismiss the possibility of an attack on American soil.

The Conversation

Sara Harmouch does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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Tweaking US Trade Policy Could Hold The Key To Reducing Migration From Central America

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Employees at the K.P. Textil textile plant in Guatemala City. Johan Ordonez/AFP via Getty Images)

Small changes to U.S. trade policy could significantly reduce the number of migrants arriving at the southern border, according to our peer-reviewed study, which was recently published in The World Economy.

Our research delved into the effectiveness of existing trade agreements in creating jobs in migrant-sending countries, with a focus on Central America. We analyzed the impact that the Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA-DR, has had on apparel exports and jobs since being ratified by the U.S. and six countries – Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic – from 2005 to 2009.

CAFTA-DR was aimed at encouraging trade and investment ties. But restrictive provisions, particularly its rules of origin, have hindered the region’s ability to benefit fully from the agreement. Under a “triple transformation” clause, only garments assembled in one of the countries from fabrics and constituent fibers originating from the region qualify for free-trade benefits.

This significantly limits the scope for trade expansion because of the limited range of fabrics produced in the region compared with the global market. For example, it means that many modern fabrics, like the kinds used in some stretchy jeans, do not qualify.

Loosening the rules to allow for new fabrics would not only attract investment and create more jobs for Central Americans, it could also reduce immigration from the region by as much as 67%, according to our estimates.

At present, about 500,000 people work in the apparel industry in Central America. It is labor-intensive, and expanding exports would increase employment. Our research shows that loosening the rules of origin to include new fabrics from outside the region would create about 120,000 direct jobs.

If a stronger relationship between exports and employment is assumed, this figure could even rise to about 257,500 jobs, our figures show.

And these jobs would be boosted by additional indirect employment around the expanding factories in Central America needed to accommodate the increased trade.

If would-be migrants in Central America instead chose the new apparel jobs in their home countries, we estimate that migration from Central America to the U.S. could fall by 30% to 67%.

Why it matters

The migration crisis has taken center stage in U.S. political discourse, with Republicans in Congress holding up legislation, including aid to Ukraine, over their demands that tougher border security measures be included as part of any package.

In December 2023, the number of U.S. Border Patrol encounters with migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border hit a record high of almost 250,000, and it remained high during the first few months of 2024.

While human rights violations, security issues and corruption in migrant-sending countries are often cited as driving factors, in many cases, immigrants are seeking job opportunities that are unavailable in their home countries.

But despite the increased political attention on immigration, trade policy – which could be used to address the scarcity of secure, well-paying jobs in Central American countries with heavy migrant outflows – has largely been absent from either party’s strategy to address the “root causes” of migration.

We believe addressing the root causes of the current border crisis requires creating good jobs in migrant-sending countries.

What still isn’t known

We looked only at one industry – apparel – in Central America and the Dominican Republic, a Caribbean nation.

Academic reviews suggest that as many as half of all trade agreements have no significant effect on trade flows, and only about one-quarter of them increase trade. In fact, trade agreements may even create barriers to trade by adding additional clauses that are complicated or too restrictive.

The key question is how to make all trade agreements more effective at creating jobs in migrant-sending countries. Identifying and relaxing barriers within trade agreements is, we believe, an important first step toward reducing emigration.

The Research Brief is a short take on interesting academic work.

The Conversation

In 2021, the Mosbacher Institute received funding for Bush School student research from the American Apparel and Footwear Association while Raymond Robertson was the director. The AAFA provided neither funding nor any other form of support, including any direct or indirect support, for the research described in this article.

Kaleb Girma Abreha does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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The Amazing Story Of The Man Who Created The Latest Narco-State In The Americas, And How The United States Helped Him Every Step Of The Way − Until Now

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When Juan Orlando Hernández was convicted by a federal jury in Manhattan in early March 2024, it marked a spectacular fall from grace: from being courted in the U.S. as a friendly head of state to facing the rest of his life behind bars, convicted of cocaine importation and weapons offenses.

“Juan Orlando Hernández abused his position as President of Honduras to operate the country as a narco-state where violent drug traffickers were allowed with virtual impunity,” said U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland following the jury conviction. Anne Milgram, administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration, added: “When the leader of Honduras and the leader of the Sinaloa Cartel work hand-in-hand to send deadly drugs into the United States, both deserve to be accountable.”

The conviction was a victory for the Justice Department and the DEA. During Hernández’s two terms in office, from 2014 to 2022, he and his acolytes transported more than 400 tons of cocaine into the United States, according to U.S. prosecutors. The former head of state now faces a mandatory sentence of up to 40 years in prison; sentencing is scheduled for June 26.

But there’s more to this story.

As I explore in the book “21st Century Democracy Promotion in the Americas: Standing Up for the Polity,” written in collaboration with the Open University’s Britta Weiffen, Honduras is a tragic example of what happens when a country becomes a narco-state. While its people suffer the consequences – the World Bank reports that about half the country currently lives under poverty – its leaders grow rich through the drugs trade.

Furthermore, the way Hernández came to power and maintained that position for so long could provide “Exhibit A” in any indictment of U.S. policy toward Central America – and Latin America more generally – over the past few decades.

Growing ties with cartels

Up to Hernández’s arrest in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, and extradition to the United States in January 2022, his biggest enabler had been none other than the U.S. government itself.

Presidents Barack Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden all backed Hernández and allowed him to inflict enormous harm to Honduras and to the United States in the process.

How so? To answer this question, some background is needed.

On June 28, 2009, a classic military coup took place in Honduras. In the wee hours of the morning, while still in his pajamas, President Manuel “Mel” Zelaya was unceremoniously escorted by armed soldiers from his home and flown to a neighboring country. The coup leaders alleged that, by calling for a referendum on reforming the Honduran Constitution, the government was moving toward removing the one-term presidential term limit enshrined in the country’s charter and opening the door to authoritarianism.

Initially, then-President Barack Obama protested the coup and took measures against those responsible – the right-wing opponents of Zelaya.

But the administration eventually relented and allowed the coup leaders to prevail, largely due to pressure from Republicans, who saw Zelaya as being too close to Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez, whose leftist agenda was deemed by the GOP as a threat to U.S. interests.

The coup-makers simply ran the clock against the upcoming election date and installed their own candidate in the presidency, Porfirio Lobo of the National party, whose son Fabio was also later convicted of cocaine trafficking.

Washington looks the other way

Lobo laid the foundations of Honduras as the new century’s first narco-state, allowing drug cartels to infiltrate the highest echelons of government and the security apparatus as cocaine trade became an increasingly central plank of the country’s economy.

All the while, the U.S. pumped tens of millions of dollars into building up Honduras’ police and military, despite widespread allegations of being engaged in corruption, complicit in the drugs trade and engaged in human rights abuses.

The dollars continued to flow when Lobo was succeeded in 2013 by his buddy and fellow National party member, Juan Orlando Hernández.

In 2017, Hernández – an ardent supporter of the 2009 coup – ran for a second term after the Supreme Court of Honduras pronounced this to be perfectly legal.

Many Hondurans believe Hernández stole the November 2017 elections. The vote count was suspended in the middle of the night as Hernández was running behind, and when the polls opened in the morning, he miraculously emerged as a winner.

Despite widespread allegations of election fraud, the U.S. quickly recognized the result, congratulating Hernández on his win.

Emboldened by his success, Hernández continued to build up Honduras as the new century’s first narco-state of the Americas.

In 2018, the president’s brother, Juan Antonio “Tony” Hernández, a former member of the Honduran Parliament, was arrested in the United States for his association with the Cartel de Sinaloa, the Mexican drug cartel. This entity valued his services so much that they named a particular strain of cocaine after him, stamping the bags as “TH.” Tony Hernández was convicted on four charges in 2019, sentenced to 30 years in prison, and has been in U.S. federal prison ever since.

President Hernández denied any association with the cartel, but the evidence pointed to the contrary. As reported in The Economist, in a New York City trial, one accused drug trafficker alleged that Hernández took bribes for “helping cocaine reach the United States.” Another witness testified that the president had taken two bribes in 2013, before being elected; a former cartel leader testified that the president had been paid $250,000 to protect him from being arrested.

‘Complicit or gullible’

Given Hernández’s history in Honduras, the repeated claims of U.S. government officials that they simply didn’t know of his crimes ring hollow.

Honduras became a narco-state, in part, because U.S. policymakers looked the other way as it did so. They embraced Hernández because he was ideologically more palatable and subservient to Washington’s wishes compared with his rival, Zelaya. But as the trial verdict in Manhattan makes clear, it was a decision with disastrous consequences.

As one State Department official put it, “Today’s verdict makes all of us who collaborated with (Hernández) look either complicit or gullible.”

The latter may be the more charitable assessment. But the truth is more uncomfortable.

The Conversation

I am a member of the Party for Democracy in Chile and and affiliated with the Foro de Political Exterior, a Chilean foreign policy think tank.

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