{"id":65835,"date":"2004-01-04T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2004-01-04T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/2004\/01\/04\/un-cas-exemplaire-dindependance-journalistique\/"},"modified":"2004-01-04T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2004-01-04T00:00:00","slug":"un-cas-exemplaire-dindependance-journalistique","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/2004\/01\/04\/un-cas-exemplaire-dindependance-journalistique\/","title":{"rendered":"Un cas exemplaire d’ind\u00e9pendance journalistique<\/em><\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"

Un cas exemplaire d’ind\u00e9pendance journalistique<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\t4 janvier 2004 Le texte de Norman Salomon<\/a> que nous publions ci-dessous pr\u00e9sente un cas des plus int\u00e9ressants : celui du commentateur am\u00e9ricain George F. Will. (Will publie un peu partout, notamment dans le Washington Post<\/a> et dans une myriade d’autres publications am\u00e9ricaines.)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tWill est un chroniqueur c\u00e9l\u00e8bre aux USA, tr\u00e8s \u00e0 droite, tr\u00e8s am\u00e9ricaniste, soutien de l’administration GW Bush, de la politique n\u00e9o-imp\u00e9rialiste et ainsi de suite. Il fait partie de ces commentateurs am\u00e9ricains (Safire, Friedman, Krauthammer, etc) dont on a coutume de dire, et jusqu’ici de penser qu’ils repr\u00e9sentent une appr\u00e9ciation ind\u00e9pendante de la politique am\u00e9ricaine et de tout ce qui l’accompagne. Qu’ils aient des engagements parfois tr\u00e8s marqu\u00e9s, parfois insupportables, en g\u00e9n\u00e9ral dans le m\u00eame sens, constitue une \u00e9vidence qui ne retire rien au jugement qu’on mentionne ici. Le cas de George F. Will, que d\u00e9monte Norman Salomon, met en \u00e9vidence une autre dimension, celle de la corruption.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tC’est un ph\u00e9nom\u00e8ne qui commence \u00e0 devenir public, et cette publicit\u00e9, en g\u00e9n\u00e9ral accompagn\u00e9e de l’impudence compl\u00e8te des gens concern\u00e9s, fait penser que la profession, dans une large mesure, \u00e9volue \u00e0 ce rythme. On en tirera les conclusions qu’on veut quant \u00e0 la r\u00e9putation de la presse am\u00e9ricaine dont nos propres commentateurs et experts font des gorges chaudes. Il y a un professionnalisme \u00e0 l’am\u00e9ricaine qui sert de r\u00e9f\u00e9rence \u00e0 nos \u00e9lites ; lesquelles \u00e9lites devront, d\u00e9sormais, ajouter la corruption \u00e0 ciel ouvert dans l’\u00e9quation de cette r\u00e9f\u00e9rence.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tUn autre aspect que d\u00e9couvre le cas George F. Will, venant apr\u00e8s le cas Richard Perle<\/a>, inqui\u00e9t\u00e9 dans plusieurs affaires de corruption, est bien que cette corruption nouvellement apparue touche particuli\u00e8rement la droite conservatrice et ultra-dure de l’am\u00e9ricanisme. Cela indique une progression suppl\u00e9mentaire des USA vers un statut s’apparentant \u00e0 celui de l’Union Sovi\u00e9tique. Jusqu’ici, on avait l’habitude de consid\u00e9rer que cette droite ultra-dure US, s’il lui manquait parfois la qualit\u00e9 de la finesse, avait au moins la vertu de l’incorruptibilit\u00e9. Ces gens nous donnaient l’impression d’\u00eatre des Robespierre de droite. Il s’av\u00e8re que ce serait plut\u00f4t des Danton de droite, avec peut-\u00eatre certaines finesses politiques en moins. Cette corruption de la droite conservatrice ultra-dure implique une \u00e9volution \u00e9vidente : ces gens ne parlent plus, comme ils pouvaient encore l’affirmer dans les ann\u00e9es 1960 ou 1970, au nom d’une majorit\u00e9 silencieuse ultra-conservatrice. Ils parlent au nom du pouvoir, politique et m\u00e9diatique, et autres, et ils sont pay\u00e9s grassement pour cela. Dont acte.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tPar ailleurs, on notera combien on retrouve dans ces situations toujours les m\u00eames r\u00e9seaux, on veut parler ici du magnat de la presse Conrad Black. Effectivement, avec Black et son alter ego<\/em> un peu plus puissant Rupert Mordoch, on mesure la puissance de ces quelques patrons de presse qui ont d\u00e9cid\u00e9 de s’orienter vers une politique droitiste, d\u00e9lib\u00e9r\u00e9ment extr\u00e9miste, par les canaux d’influence des n\u00e9o-conservateurs am\u00e9ricains qu’ils financent pour l’essentiel, et au travers d’un maximum de commentateurs soi-disant ind\u00e9pendants, am\u00e9ricanistes, adeptes de la force et donneurs de morale, portrait non exclusif de George F. Will. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

George Will’s Ethics: None of Our Business?<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\tBy Norman Solomon, Antwar.com (FAIR), January 3, 2004<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tWe can argue about George Will’s political views. But there’s no need to debate his professional ethics.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tLate December brought to light a pair of self-inflicted wounds to the famous columnist’s ethical pretensions. He broke an elementary rule of journalism and then, when the New York Times called him on it, proclaimed the transgression to be no one’s business but his own.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tIt turns out that George Will was among a number of prominent individuals to receive $25,000 per day of conversation on a board of advisers for Hollinger International, a newspaper firm controlled by magnate Conrad Black. Although Will has often scorned the convenient forgetfulness of others, the Times reported that \u00a0\u00bbMr. Will could not recall how many meetings he attended.\u00a0\u00bb But an aide confirmed the annual $25,000 fee.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tEven for a wealthy commentator, that’s a hefty paycheck for one day of talk. But it didn’t stop Will from lavishing praise on Black in print without a word about their financial tie.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tIn early March, Will wrote a syndicated piece that blasted critics of President Bush’s plans to launch an all-out war on Iraq. Several paragraphs of the column featured quotations from a speech by Black. The laudatory treatment began high in the column as Will referred to some criticisms of Bush policies and then wrote: \u00a0\u00bbInto this welter of foolishness has waded Conrad Black.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tThe column did not contain the slightest hint that this wonderful foe of \u00a0\u00bbfoolishness\u00a0\u00bb had provided checks to fatten the columnist’s assets at $25,000 a pop.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tBut Will claimed in a December interview that nothing was amiss. \u00a0\u00bbAsked in the interview if he should have told his readers of the payments he had received from Hollinger,\u00a0\u00bb a New York Times article reported on Dec. 22, \u00a0\u00bbMr. Will said he saw no reason to do so.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tThe Times quoted Will as saying: \u00a0\u00bbMy business is my business. Got it?\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tYeah. We get it, George. The only question is whether the editors who keep printing your stuff will get it, too.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tAfter three decades as a superstar pundit, Will continues to flourish. Several hundred newspapers publish his syndicated column, Newsweek prints two-dozen essays per year, and he appears each Sunday on ABC’s \u00a0\u00bbThis Week\u00a0\u00bb television show.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tThe syndicate with a very big stake in George Will cannot be indifferent to the latest flap, but there’s obvious reticence to singe the right-winged golden goose. The man who’s the Washington Post Writers Group editorial director and general manager, Alan Shearer, said: \u00a0\u00bbI think I would have liked to have known.\u00a0\u00bb <\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tA week later, via a letter in the New York Times, a more forthright response came from Gilbert Cranberg, former chairman of the professional standards committee of the National Conference of Editorial Writers: \u00a0\u00bbWhen a syndicated journalist writes favorably about a benefactor, that is very much the business of Mr. Will’s editors and readers.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tCranberg quoted from the National Conference of Editorial Writers code of ethics, which includes provisions that \u00a0\u00bbthe writer should be constantly alert to conflicts of interest, real or apparent\u00a0\u00bb including \u00a0\u00bbthose that may arise from financial holdings\u00a0\u00bb and \u00a0\u00bbsecondary employment.\u00a0\u00bb Noting that \u00a0\u00bbtimely public disclosure can minimize suspicion,\u00a0\u00bb the code adds: \u00a0\u00bbEditors should seek to hold syndicates to these standards.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tBut will they? George Will is a syndicated powerhouse. And he has gotten away with hiding other big conflicts of interest over the last quarter-century.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tIn October 1980, Will appeared on the ABC television program \u00a0\u00bbNightline\u00a0\u00bb to praise Ronald Reagan’s \u00a0\u00bbthoroughbred performance\u00a0\u00bb in a debate with incumbent President Jimmy Carter. But Will did not disclose to viewers that he’d helped coach Reagan for the debate and, in the process, had read Carter briefing materials stolen from the White House.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tWhen, much later, Will’s \u00a0\u00bbdebategate\u00a0\u00bb duplicity came to light, his media colleagues let him off with a polite scolding. The incident faded from media memory. Thus, in autumn 1992, when Will reminisced on ABC’s \u00a0\u00bbThis Week\u00a0\u00bb about the 1980 Carter-Reagan debate, he didn’t mention his own devious role, and none of his journalistic buddies in the studio were impolite enough to say anything about it.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tWill has also played fast and loose with ethics in the midst of other contests for the presidency. At the media watch group FAIR (where I’m an associate), senior analyst Steve Rendall pointed out: \u00a0\u00bbDuring the 1996 campaign, Will caught some criticism for commenting on the presidential race while his second wife, Mari Maseng Will, was a senior staffer for the Dole presidential campaign. Defending a Dole speech on ABC News (1\/28\/96), Will, according to Washingtonian magazine (3\/96), ‘failed to mention … that his wife not only counseled Dole to give the speech but also helped write it.\u00a0\u00bb’<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tIn 2000, Will \u00a0\u00bbsuffered another ethical lapse,\u00a0\u00bb Rendall recounts in Extra!, FAIR’s magazine. The renowned columnist \u00a0\u00bbmet with George W. Bush just before the Republican candidate was to appear on ABC’s ‘This Week.’ Later, in a column (3\/4\/01), Will admitted that he’d met with Bush to preview questions, not wanting to ‘ambush him with unfamiliar material.’ In the meeting, Will provided Bush with a 3-by-5 card containing a crucial question he would later ask the candidate on the air.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tGeorge Will has long been fond of denouncing moral deficiencies. Typical was this fulmination in a March 1994 column: \u00a0\u00bbTaught that their sincerity legitimized their intentions, the children of the 1960s grew up convinced they could not do wrong. Hence the Clinton administration’s genuine bewilderment when accused of ethical lapses.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tIn what can be understood as a case of psychological projection, Will derisively added: \u00a0\u00bbIt is a theoretical impossibility for people in ‘the party of compassion’ to behave badly because good behavior is whatever they do.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tDuring the past three decades, Will who chose to become a syndicated Washington Post columnist in the early 1970s rather than continue as a speech writer for Sen. Jesse Helms has been fond of commenting on the moral failures of black people while depicting programs for equity as ripoff artistry. In February 1991, for instance, he wrote: \u00a0\u00bbThe rickety structure of affirmative action, quotas and the rest of the racial spoils system depends on victimology winning for certain groups the lucrative status of victim.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tIn subsequent years, not satisfied with his own very lucrative status, Will made a quiet pact with corporate wheeler-dealer Conrad Black. When exposed, Will compounded his malfeasance by declaring that it was only \u00a0\u00bbmy business.\u00a0\u00bb<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tWords that George Will wrote 10 years ago now aptly describe his own stance: \u00a0\u00bbIt is a theoretical impossibility\u00a0\u00bb that he behaved badly. \u00a0\u00bbGood behavior\u00a0\u00bb is whatever he does.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tNice work if he can get it. And he can.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tGot it?<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\tNorman Solomon’s weekly syndicated column is archived at www.fair.org\/media-beat. His latest book, co-authored with Reese Erlich, is Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn’t Tell You.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\t[Notre recommandation est que ce texte doit \u00eatre lu avec la mention classique \u00e0 l’esprit, Disclaimer: In accordance with 17 U.S.C. 107, this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only..]<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Un cas exemplaire d’ind\u00e9pendance journalistique 4 janvier 2004 Le texte de Norman Salomon que nous publions ci-dessous pr\u00e9sente un cas des plus int\u00e9ressants : celui du commentateur am\u00e9ricain George F. Will. (Will publie un peu partout, notamment dans le Washington Post et dans une myriade d’autres publications am\u00e9ricaines.) Will est un chroniqueur c\u00e9l\u00e8bre aux USA,… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[3126,4201,464,3035,4200],"class_list":["post-65835","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faits-et-commentaires","tag-black","tag-conrad","tag-f","tag-george","tag-will"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65835","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65835"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65835\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65835"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65835"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.dedefensa.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65835"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}