Patterico's Pontifications

2/12/2005

L.A. Times on Eason Jordan Easin’ Down the Road

Filed under: Dog Trainer,Media Bias — Patterico @ 10:45 am



The L.A. Times reports on Eason Jordan’s resignation. Captain Ed kindly says that I will be “all over” the story, but in all honesty, I don’t have much to add to Captain Ed’s comments, as he has been all over the Eason Jordan story from the beginning. Captain Ed nails it when he quotes part of the L.A. Times article, and notes:

Ned Martel never delves any deeper into the story than that, only covering what we all knew more than ten days ago. Martel never mentions, for instance, that Eason Jordan sits on the World Economic Forum board and could have pressured the WEF to release that videotape. Martel makes Jordan look like a victim of the WEF instead. Martel even notes further that “the furor grew beyond the reported mild gasps at the Davos session into a wider media discussion,” in an attempt to make it sound like Jordan got caught up by mob hysteria.

One additional observation: the Times story says:

The announcement comes after a week when commentators and newspaper editorial writers joined the chorus of complaints among Internet bloggers that Jordan had made insupportable accusations.

Yes, it does — not that L.A. Times readers had any idea. As a search of the Times website shows, the first hint in the L.A. Times that there was any sort of controversy about Jordan came yesterday — after Jordan resigned. Those readers foolish enough to get all their news from the L.A. Times are no doubt scratching their heads today, wondering what all the fuss is about.

Time to branch out, L.A. Times readers. And there’s no better way to start than by checking out the Captain’s Quarters blog every day.

UPDATE: The Captain publishes this correction to his assertion that Eason Jordan sits on the World Economic Forum board. It still seems clear to me that Jordan “could have pressured the WEF to release that videotape” if he really wanted to. Apparently, with his resignation, it is now clear that the tape will never be released. Hmmmm.

9 Responses to “L.A. Times on Eason Jordan Easin’ Down the Road”

  1. What? You’re not even going to bust them for calling us “obscure”???

    *grin*

    A.L.

    Armed Liberal (8943f0)

  2. I’m actually starting to worry a bit. I’m concerned about the potential for blogger triumphalism — which I haven’t seen yet but which could still occur, since most of us are human — leading to blogswarms against those who really don’t deserve them.

    The blogosphere is not today a mob; but I can imagine it becoming one, drunk on the power that defeated a presidential candidate, ruined a broadcast career, and slew a news chief. In each case, I eagerly participated as best I could, and I still would defend each of these incidents as just and necessary. But what about tomorrow or next month?

    We should all bear in mind that unanimity doesn’t always imply accuracy. There are indeed times when fifty million Frenchmen may be wrong, or fifty different blogs. I hope when we swarm, we always ask the target to explain his actions — not demand he justify his existence.

    Dafydd

    Dafydd (df2f54)

  3. Dafydd, I’m somewhat less worried about that. Two weeks ago, the right side of the blogosphere could barely contain its glee over a Daily Telegraph article, German law that supposedly requires unemployed women to accept work as prostitutes or lose their benefits. A few days later, everything died down, and nearly every entry had a correction linking to my site, Snopes’s or Chicago Boyz, or some combination of the three. This is what would happened in Eason Jordan’s case, Trent Lott’s, and Dan Rather’s if there had been no there there.

    Xrlq (c51d0d)

  4. “Daily Telegraph article, German law” = “Daily Telegraph article on a German law”

    Xrlq (c51d0d)

  5. Well I hope you’re right, Xrlq, but the scenario I’m thinking of is not so easily refuted — well, actually the DT article was not “refuted” but rather cast into doubt; we don’t know if it’s happened, only that a German article suggested it could happen.

    Suppose that a person is generally disliked by some portion of the blogosphere for purely ideological reasons… for example, take Alberto Gonzales, who is hated and despised by virtually every lefty blogger I’ve seen. Now suppose he says or does something that could be interpreted to indicate some terrible violation of fundamental liberty, but also could be interpreted in a more benign way: let’s say, hypothetically, that another memo emerges; but this one is actually written by Gonzales (not the DoJ), and it’s somewhat more aggressive than the last… enough so that it makes even us a bit nervous. Perhaps this hypothetical second memo is justifiable — but it does require some justification.

    Might it not be possible that he winds up hounded from office, without any real opportunity to explain? If there is a “there” there, but the “there” is much more complex and (eek!) nuanced than the Eason Jordan thing, the meme of “Gonzales supports torture” might easily prove too powerful, brayed from a swarm of lefty bloggers, to resist, even if the hypothetical second memo is, in fact, reasonable… interpreted this way rather than that way.

    I don’t know if I’m communicating well, but on the opposite side of the coin from the MSM, which can force conformity by refusing to allow the opposition to confuse matters by participating in the discussion, a blogswarm could also force conformity by outshouting the opposition. Neither is helpful.

    As I said, I haven’t seen it happen yet; but I’m not sure it couldn’t.

    Dafydd

    Dafydd (df2f54)

  6. I don’t put it past the left hemisphere of the blogosphere to try something like that, but I do put it bast the right hemisphere to allow it. Take Josh Marshall, who almost immediately after bringing down Trent Lott, attempted something similar against on Bill Frist. If you remember “fristing,” you probably also remember that it didn’t exactly work. And if you don’t remember it, I rest my case.

    Xrlq (c51d0d)

  7. Dafydd,

    I actually was a little concerned that the Jordan blogswarm might be out of control. You might have noticed that I never really fully jumped on the bandwagon, mostly because I figured that, if there really was a tape out there, I’d like to see it.

    But if the tape would have exonerated him, I have to assume he would have called for it to be released, rather than simply resign. To me, his resignation is an admission that there was something there.

    Patterico (756436)

  8. There are some countries who believe that it is obvious that the US military targeted journalists, especially from countries that did not support the war.

    The uninvestigated case of Jose Couto (see link) is one that shows that Eason Jordan may have been right in his ‘speculations’.

    Kadoom (0e98ed)


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