Freedom House: Postponing Dalai Lama Meeting Sends Wrong Message

U.S. President Barack Obama’s apparent decision to postpone a meeting with the Dalai Lama sends the wrong signal to the Chinese government at a time when the authorities in Beijing are intensifying efforts to silence peaceful critics at home and abroad, a US human rights organization, Freedom House, said in a statement released October 5. Obama reportedly delayed meeting the Tibetan spiritual leader this week to win favor from China’s leaders ahead of his first visit to Beijing as president next month. It will be the first time since 1991 that the Dalai Lama has not met with the U.S. president while visiting Washington.

“The doors of the White House should always be open to a globally-revered advocate for peaceful efforts to secure fundamental human rights,” said Jennifer Windsor, Freedom House executive director. READ MORE

Public Diplomacy 2.0 or Propaganda Museum Exhibits

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog Commentary by Ted Lipien, January 13, 2009, San Francisco – 

State Department videos embarrass the U.S. among audiences abroad while the Department’s top promoter of Public Diplomacy 2.0 pushes to eliminate Voice of America radio journalism in favor of TV and Internet propaganda advertising and broadcasting based on Cold War models.

While I was an elementary school student in Poland in the 1960s, we had to write compositions why communism was the world’s best political system and what made Lenin the greatest man who has ever lived. Communist media in Poland was full of similar propaganda, although admittedly it was not nearly as naive as what the Soviet media was offering at the time. Most people in Poland were both offended by and laughed at such crude efforts to promote communism. They listened instead to radio broadcasts by Radio Free Europe (RFE) and the Voice of America (VOA). Everybody knew that these two station, financed by the U.S. government, represented a particular political point of view against communism, but we appreciated the fact that they offered generally accurate news and sophisticated journalistic analysis rather than crude propaganda.

Since then, communism had collapsed and international consumers of media news have become even more skeptical and discerning. And yet a number of recent U.S. State Department political appointees responsible for public diplomacy and officials in charge of U.S. international broadcasting have enthusiastically embraced propaganda advertising  as the primary solution to the problems of how the Bush Administration and the United States are perceived abroad.

These efforts have been in line with the general desire of neoconservative Bush Administration officials to subcontract much of public diplomacy and international broadcasting to private corporations and institutions, thus limiting fiscal controls, transparency and input from professional State Department diplomats and Voice of America journalists who could question and possibly block outlandish and counterproductive ideas. Instead of responsible and balanced journalism by Voice of America, foreign audiences are now being offered short propaganda videos and entertainment-rich programs produced by private contractors.

A similar effort to replace journalism with questionable marketing and advertising concepts has been underway for a number of years at the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which is responsible for U.S. international broadcasts. Even though this is a bipartisan board, its Democratic members joined forces with neoconservative Republicans in slashing Voice of America journalistic programs and creating private broadcasting entities, such as Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television for the Middle East, with the stated goal of “marrying the mission to the market,” (BBG’s own slogan.)

BBG members and their private consultants had told these privatized entities to play music, offer programs that audiences agree with, and to make every other effort to attract more listeners and viewers. Not surprisingly, Muslim viewers dismissed Alhurra as an American propaganda station, even though in its misplaced desire to please the audience the station aired reports expressing sympathy with those who deny that six million Jews were exterminated by the Nazis during the World War II Holocaust.

Use this link to the ProPublica.org web site to view the Alhurra Holocaust report (with English subtitles) as an example of what the BBG’s marketing strategy has produced at these privatized U.S.-funded stations:  http://www.propublica.org/feature/alhurra-video 

Voice of America is the only U.S. Congress-funded international broadcaster that has tried to resist BBG’s marketing strategy, but “Marrying the Mission to the Market” and  Public Diplomacy 2.0, which in their current form can only be described as Propaganda 2.0, have largely replaced objective journalism in U.S. efforts to communicate with foreign audiences. One of the first Voice of America broadcasting units eliminated by the BBG was the VOA Arabic Service, which was highly-respected in the Middle East for independence and the quality of its radio programs.

More recently, the current public diplomacy chief at the State Department, James K. Glassman, the neoconservative co-author of the book DOW 36,000: The New Strategy for Profiting From the Coming Rise in the Stock Market, (Yes, in 1999 Glassman was just as enthusiastic in predicting that the U.S. stock market would soon reach this level as he is now about his vision of Public Diplomacy 2.0.) ordered the termination of VOA radio broadcasts to Russia just 12 days before the Russian military attacked Georgia in August 2008. Glassman had also wanted to eliminate all VOA radio programs to Georgia and Ukraine. He personally rejected pleas from VOA Russian Service journalists to allow them to resume radio broadcasts to the war zone in the Caucasus during the height of the Russian-Georgian conflict.

Glassman apparently became convinced that even war refugees and war combatants can get their news from the Internet, and if they can’t, they probably do not matter as an audience since more often than not these groups are not statistically significant. His other assumption was that the Internet requires vast sums of money (for private consultants and contractors), and therefore VOA cannot possibly do both radio and Internet to Russia at the same time, even though many other private and public broadcasters are combining the Internet with radio and TV without much difficulty.  It’s hard to tell what Mr. Glassman thinks about the people in Russia and elsewhere who cannot afford the Internet, but he definitely ignores the power of direct communication between American journalists and their  international audience that has always been crucial, especially in times of serious political crises, and he dismisses concerns about the documented ability of Russia’s secret services to block and sabotage the Internet.

At first, the BBG would not even consider restoring VOA radio to Russia, but after protests by FreeMediaOnline.org and others, it allowed the Russian Service to produce a much reduced 30 minute radio program Monday through Friday, which has no current newscasts but does offer more in-depth coverage of critical current issues than what is available from other formats.  Despite BBG’s decision to spend large sums of money on outside Internet consultants and contractors, the Russian radio program is difficult to find on the VOA web site and its audio is often not updated regularly, thus leaving site visitors to hear the same outdated program over a number of days.

Voice of America Russian radio program is made available for easier access and listening on the GovoritAmerika.us web site managed by FreeMediaOnline.org

ProPublica.org, a nonprofit investigative journalism web site, has uncovered major financial and editorial irregularities related to private contractors hired under the rules set up by the BBG. Some of them were confirmed by an independent study prepared by the Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School, University of Southern California. Commissioned by the U.S. government,  the study’s authors concluded that Alhurra, Arab-language television to the Middle East managed by the Broadcasting Board of Governors fails to meet basic journalistic standards and is seen by few.

It was beyond the scope of the USC study to point out that the money to operate Alhurra has been taken from VOA broadcasting to such strategic countries as Russia, China (including Tibet), and India.  As millions of dollars were being spent and wasted on Internet propaganda videos at the Department of State and on programs at scandal-ridden private broadcasting entities, such as Alhurra, the Broadcasting Board of Governors also made a decision to stop VOA Ukrainian radio broadcasts. This happened just hours before Russia shut off the flow of natural gas supplies to Ukraine and the rest of Europe.

Only five members serve currently on the Board: Joaquin F. Blaya, Blanquita Walsh Cullum, D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, Steven J. Simmons, and Condoleezza Rice (ex officio). One prominent former BBG member Edward E. Kaufman, recently appointed as a U.S. Senator from Delaware, (He had been Senator Biden’s chief of staff and replaces him in the Senate.) joined other Democrats and Republicans in voting to end VOA radio programs to Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, and India — each time shortly before a major news emergency affecting these countries, which included the recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai.

In making these cuts, the majority of BBG members completely disregarded warnings and requests from the U.S. Congress, human rights NGOs, and the union of journalists and broadcasting technicians working for the Agency. BBG members have also ignored advice from professional diplomats and media experts familiar with foreign cultures. Neither Kaufman nor Biden seemed concerned that silencing VOA radio while RFE/RL operations in Russia are vulnerable to intimidation by the Russian secret police presents a serious risk. RFE/RL is incorporated in Delaware.

Most BBG officials treat their jobs as giving them carte blanche to support their pet projects.  Democrats on the Board became enthusiastic supporters of the Bush Administration’s plans for privatized broadcasting to the Middle East. The chief architect and implementer of these plans at the BBG was a Democratic appointee, Norman Pattiz, founder of the U.S. radio syndicate Westwood One. According to FreeMediaOnline.org sources, only one BBG member, a Republican appointee, was reported to have opposed VOA programming cuts to media-at-risk countries, angering both former BBG Republican Chairman Glassman, and Ted Kaufman, former top Democratic member. Leaders of the union representing BBG employees have called for the Board to be eliminated as did the highly respected Public Diplomacy Council, whose members come from diplomacy, the armed forces, nonprofits and academia. Most BBG members are successful businessmen (often in domestic broadcasting industry) with strong political connections, but they lack substantive experience in foreign policy, public diplomacy, international broadcasting, or international human right advocacy.

This is a link to “I Am America” video in Russian on the State Department’s web site that truly qualifies as a historical exhibit in a propaganda museum. It is described on YouTube as a video “presented to the U.S. State Department by Business for Diplomatic Action” that “will be played in U.S. embassies and consulates.” The images of America  are spectacular, but the message is crudely propagandistic and naive. Anybody with even basic political education, which describes much of today’s world, knows that the people in the video do not run U.S. foreign policy and had elected George W. Bush twice as their president before changing their minds about the direction the country should take in dealing with the world. A one-sided view of America will be dismissed as propaganda regardless of how many dollars are spent on a clever advertising packaging.  

In fact, millions of taxpayers’ dollars have been spent on these highly embarrassing videos, which are prominently featured on the State Department web site. A single VOA radio or television report about President Elect Barack Obama’s family background and foreign policy plans could not only help repair some of the damage done by these propaganda videos but would also have a long-term positive impact on how America will now be perceived abroad. Unfortunately, for ideological and bureaucratic reasons, the BBG has put VOA on its chopping block, and the  Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy is still determined to replace a substantive dialogue with foreign audiences with short and clever video messages and apparently wants to hold on to his job after the Obama Administration takes over.

Another propaganda video commissioned from private contractors by the State Department public diplomacy 2.0 team announces a worldwide contest for submitting privatelly-produced videos about the meaning of the word ‘democracy.’ View it here. The prize is “an all-expense-paid trip to Washington, New York and Hollywood to attend special screenings of the winning videos, gain exposure to the U.S. film and television industry and meet with creative talent, democracy advocates and government leaders.” The contest has been prominently featured on the State Department’s official web site, but the YouTube page, where contest videos must be submitted, has received less than 160,000 views despite being available for several months. A popular Voice of America radio program can attract many more listeners in single day and offer a journalistic view of American democracy that is far more substantive and credible.

The Internet does offer enormous opportunities for U.S. public diplomacy and international broadcasting but not in the hands of propagandists, or  private contractors who have no journalistic and foreign policy experience and care primarily about their own profits. Most of the members of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (James K. Glassman was its most recent chairman) have done great harm to journalism and to the U.S. image abroad. The current Bush Administration’s public diplomacy chief at the Department of State does not seem to realize that many types of Internet activities are not appropriate or credible when done by government officials and are better left to truly independent NGOs and individual bloggers.

For people placed in charge of U.S.-funded journalistic entities, most BBG members have shown remarkable indifference to the concept of journalistic independence. In their misplaced desire to chase after higher audience ratings, they have allowed Russian-based Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) reporters to be intimidated by the Kremlin’s secret police and tolerate giving extensive airtime to Russian politicians known for their racist views. This is the same marketing-first/journalism-second approach advocated by the BBG that had encouraged Alhurra, another privatized broadcaster, to air comments by Holocaust denies.

Radio Liberty, which during the Cold War had played a highly effective role as a surrogate broadcaster, providing in-depth domestic news coverage for listeners in the Soviet Union, has become a virtual hostage of the BBG strategy of favoring privatized surrogate broadcasting. Mr. Putin’s repressive but sophisticated media policies call for an entirely different approach, and yet the BBG insists that RFE/RL should have a large presence in Russia and rejects VOA radio broadcasts from the United States as unnecessary. But the idea of keeping many private broadcasting entities fits well with the desire of individual BBG members, both Democrats and Republicans, to keep as much control over U.S. international broadcasting for themselves and to reward their friends with well-paid positions and lucrative contracts.  James K. Glassman was reported to have tried to hire Paula Zahn, formerly of CNN, as the BBG’s high profile spokesperson at about the same time when the BBG executive director Jeffrey Trimble, formerly acting president of RFE/RL, was implementing the plan to stop VOA radio broadcasts to Russia. Paula Zahn had wisely declined the offer perhaps after realizing that her job might be to explain why a group of Tibetan monks staged a silent protest on Capital Hill against the BBG’s plans to reduce U.S. radio broadcasts to Tibet. Thankfully, at least in this case the BBG backed down.

Contrary to what BBG members believe, including its most recent chairman, traditional independent radio and television journalism can be successfully merged with Web 2.0 concepts and can achieve high audience ratings without resorting to questionable management techniques, marketing practices and crude propaganda.

They could have learned much about the use of “soft power” from reading a recently published book by Ambassador Patricia Gates Lynch, Thanks for Listening: High Adventures in Journalism and Diplomacy, with the foreword by Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. For many years Ms. Gates had been a host of the highly popular VOA Breakfast Show. She made millions of friends for America around the world without resorting to propaganda simply by telling her audiences about America and broadcasting interviews with exceptional and ordinary Americans. Later named  by President Reagan as U.S. Ambassador to Madagascar and the Comoros Islands, Pat Gates also worked briefly as a public relations representative for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty at the time when that organization practiced truly independent surrogate journalism while Voice of America offered a mix of American news, American commentaries, as well as reports on political and human rights situation in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. There was no BBG at that time, and both VOA and RFE/RL were managed by journalistic professionals and distinguished Americans, people like NBC anchor John Chancellor and Malcolm Forbes, Jr. Political appointees serving now on the BBG do not want people with ideas and much greater accomplishments to tell them how to practice broadcast journalism.

Ironically, even as the Cold War ended, neoconservative Republicans and  internationally naive but politically ambitious Democrats serving on the BBG chose the very earliest surrogate broadcasting model developed when Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberation (later Radio Liberty) were still financed and run by the CIA. This model, which was completely outdated and inappropriate for skeptical and hostile audiences in the Middle East (audiences in Easter Europe during the Cold War were highly sympathetic to the message in American-funded radio broadcasts) nevertheless gave BBG members and the White House maximum control over truly uncooperative and potentially uncooperative journalists.

While surrogate broadcasting was effective during the Cold War, even then it faced some serious problems, which BBG members chose to ignore when they developed their grandiose broadcasting plans for the Middle East. They could have learned about these problems and how to avoid them from an exceptionally honest account by former RFE/RL manager James Critchlow. In his book, Radio Hole-in-the-Head: Radio Liberty: An Insider’s Story of Cold War Broadcasting, Critchlow describes some very serious policy and editorial errors committed by naive political operatives, incompetent bureaucrats, and uninformed journalists who had worked at RFE/RL between 1953 and the end of 1980s. 

At least during the Cold War, RFE/RL journalists were based in Munich, West Germany, and were relatively safe from intimidation by the KGB. Serious editorial problems were usually uncovered and corrected until the BBG took over. The BBG placed most of RFE/RL Russian Service reporters in Russia and kept them there even after former President Putin and the KGB’s successor agency, the FSB, nearly completely took control over the local broadcast media using force and intimidation.

Unwilling to give up or significantly scale down RFE/RL’s large bureau in Moscow, BBG members and their staff, some of whom had business and personal links to Russia, began negotiating with members of the Putin regime while BBG-hired consultants told RFE/RL journalists to make their programs less critical of the political and social realities in Russia.

Independent Russian Journalist Anna Politkovskaya Who Was Murdered in Moscow in 2006

Shortly after independent Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya was murdered in Moscow in an execution-style hit in 2006, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty managers made public statements strongly suggesting an attempt on their part to appease Mr. Putin. In an apparent effort to protect their presence in the country, the head of RFE/RL Moscow bureau, Elena Glushkova, said in an on-air discussion in October 2006 that the work of Radio Liberty journalists cannot cause Russia any harm. She insisted that RFE/RL reporters respect and love Russia. She also pointed out that all Radio Liberty reporters who work in Russia are Russian citizens and said that her optimism despite the murder of Ms. Politkovskaya is based in her belief in “the common sense of the current Russian leadership.” Maria Klain, Russian Service director at the RFE/RL home office in Prague, also expressed confidence that the radio’s future in Russia looks good. These comments surprised and offended pro-democracy activists in Russia who were still in mourning after Anna Politovskaya’s murder.

More recently, a Russian human rights organization, the Moscow Human Rights Bureau, has criticized Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) for giving an entire hour of airtime to a Russian politician known for his racist views and verbal attacks on Blacks and other ethnic and racial minorities.  For the new U.S. administration headed by the first African-American president, this is not a very encouraging sign that the BBG’s marketing and programming strategies have been successful. View FreeMediaOnline.org report: “U.S. Taxpayers Pay for Spreading Racist Views on Radio Liberty in Russia: What Would Barack Obama Say If He Knew…”   

One would think that in light of such developments and statements by RFE/RL managers in Russia, the BBG would want Washington-based Voice of America journalists to expand their Russian broadcasts. The BBG’s policy, however, has been not only to dismantle the Voice of America radio services but to make sure that  even the names of the privatized entities designed to replace them did not have any references to the U.S. in an naive belief that this would make them more credible with skeptical and hostile audiences.

By placing much of the work and operations of these privatized entities in countries like Russia and in the Middle East and relying on locally-hired staff, the BBG created no safeguards to make sure that local reporters would not be blackmailed by foreign security and intelligence services. At the same time, the BBG denied locally-hired employees the protection of U.S. labor laws, damaging U.S. reputation in countries like the Czech Republic and drawing attention and criticism from local politicians, including the highly respected former Czech President Vaclav Havel. Link to FreeMediaOnline.org report Radio Free Europe or Radio Free Putin? Did BBG End U.S. Surrogate Broadcasting in Russia on Radio Liberty in an Attempt to Appease Mr. Putin and Pursue Its Marketing Strategy?

The new Obama Administration has a chance to completely reform U.S. public diplomacy and international broadcasting. Millions of U.S. taxpayers’ money are still being wasted by the BBG in financing multiple privatized broadcasting entities — a veritable GM-like corporate model – with multiple executive positions and duplicate administrative structures. None of these entities is set up to present America’s story to the world.

The Voice of America, the only journalistic organization that knows how to do this job without propaganda and with some measure of credibility, desperately needs protection from the incompetent political appointees at the BBG and from the Bush Administration’s public diplomacy chief. If nothing is done, propaganda will triumph over journalism and America’s reputation abroad will be further diminished. Public Diplomacy 2.0 designed by ideologues, propagandists, and profit-seeking private contractors is an embarrassment. The Obama Administration would do well by sending these State Department videos to a museum as a warning to future government officials in charge of public diplomacy and U.S. international broadcasting who might again be tempted by the allure of propaganda.

Ted Lipien is a former Voice of America acting associate director. He was also a regional BBG media marketing manager responsible for placement of U.S. government-funded radio and TV programs on stations in Russia, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries in Eurasia. In the 1980’s he was in charge of VOA radio broadcasts to Poland during the communist regime’s crackdown on the Solidarity labor union and oversaw the development of VOA television news broadcasts to Russia and Ukraine.

In 2006, Ted Lipien founded FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based nonprofit which supports media freedom worldwide.  He is also author of “Wojtyla’s Women: How They Shaped the Life of Pope John Paul II and Changed the Catholic Church” (O-Books – June 2008). In his book he describes the efforts of the KGB and other communist intelligence services to place spies in the Vatican and to influence reporting by Western journalists.

In December 2008, FreeMediaOnline.org has launched a Russian-language web site — GovoritAmerika.us ГоворитАмерика.us  – which includes summaries of more serious  news and commentaries from multiple U.S. government and nongovernment sources. According to Ted Lipien, the web site is designed to compensate for the loss of information from the United States for Russian-speaking audiences due to program and budget cuts implemented by the Broadcasting Board of Governors. The web site, which includes links to VOA Russian Service news reports, is also designed to counter the BBG marketing strategy that has forced broadcasting entities to focus on entertainment programming and to avoid hard-hitting political reporting that might prevent local rebroadcasting or offend local officials. GovoritAmerika.us web site was developed without any public funding and is managed by volunteers. It is also hosted on LiveJournal.com.

The Obama Administration Has No Need for Private U.S. Propaganda Radio and TV

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog Commentary by Ted Lipien, December 16, 2008, San Francisco – In The Huffington Post article, “Alhurra TV: Uncle Sam’s Boondoggle“ Dr.  Nancy Snow has pointed out a number of serious problems with the  U.S. government-funded Alhurra Arabic-language television program for the Middle East and the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages Alhurra. Dr. Snow, an Associate Professor of Public Diplomacy in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, New York, and a Senior Fellow in the Center on Public Diplomacy at the University of Southern California’s Annenberg School for Communication, had predicted that this privatized propaganda enterprise based on outdated Cold War surrogate broadcasting models and mistaken marketing concepts, would result in a failure and would increase rather than reduce anti-Americanism abroad.  She and many other public diplomacy experts were right in advising against the creation of Alhurra and the dismantling of the Voice of America broadcasting to the Middle East.

In the process of privatizing U.S. public diplomacy and international broadcasting, both Republicans and Democrats serving on the BBG were eager to destroy the Voice of America (VOA) Arabic Service, which followed far stricter journalistic standards of accuracy and balance and was required by law to represent the entire spectrum of American opinions. Dr. Snow is right in pointing out that Alhurra was not just a creation of fabulously incompetent and ideologically-driven neoconservatives. Alhurra may be therefore difficult to get rid of precisely because Democrats were just as guilty of supporting this enterprise as were neoconservative Republicans.

But if the Obama Administration wants to have a fresh start in the Middle East, it should reverse the privatization of U.S. international broadcasting. Alhurra should be abolished or completly redesigned despite the leading role in supporting this failed experiment played by the staff of Senator Joe Biden and his former chief of staff, the newly appointed U.S. Senator from Delaware Edward E. Kaufman (one of Alhurra’s strongest supporters on the BBG).  Alhurra’s godfather on the BBG was Norman Pattiz, founder of the U.S. radio syndicate Westwood One. He is another prominent Democrat and one of Biden’s financial backers.

Mistakes by both Democrats and Republicans led to the current problems in U.S. international broadcasting and public diplomacy. The elimination of the United States Information Agency (USIA), which launched in earnest the privatization of U.S. public diplomacy, was the initiative of the Clinton Administration. At the time, the dismantling of USIA had strong bipartisan support. The creation of Alhurra was the Bush Administration’s initiative, which also received bipartisan Congressional approval. As with the Iraq war, the initial decisions were based on false analysis and empty promises and are now regretted by many who had supported them.

Unfortunately, the misguided privatization of U.S. international broadcasting has not been limited only to the Middle East. In an attempt to bring even more money for Alhurra, the BBG engaged in the process of eliminating or reducing Voice of America broadcasts to a number of strategically important countries and regions, including China, Tibet, Russia, and India. Jobs of U.S. journalists who could have stopped propaganda and bias were eliminated in favor of hiring private contractors who were not subject to the same rules as those followed by the Voice of America.

In a major public diplomacy and foreign policy blunder, Edward E. Kaufman and D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, another liberal Democrat, joined ranks with James K. Glassman, the BBG’s most recent neoconservative chairman, in voting earlier this year to terminate yet another  critical Voice of America program. The BBG ended VOA radio broadcasts to Russia while ignoring strong opposition from many concerned Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Congress who warned them not to proceed with these cuts.

VOA Russian radio broadcasts went off the air just 12 days before the Russian army attacked Georgia. The BBG refused to reverse its decision, ignoring desperate pleadings from VOA journalists to allow them to resume their job of broadcasting radio to the war zone. James K. Glassman personally told VOA employees that these broadcasts would not continue. Yet this incredible fiasco did not stop Glassman’s friends from calling on the Obama transition team to allow him to keep his current State Department post of Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs.

One of the reasons neoconservative Republicans joined forces with Democrats in an effort to silence VOA Russian radio was to help Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), another private broadcasting entity which is incorporated in Delaware. Shortly before the summer war in the Caucasus and the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, the same group of Democrats and Republicans on the BBG also voted to eliminate VOA radio broadcasts to Georgia, Ukraine, and India. When terrorists struck in Mumbai, VOA no longer produced radio programs in Hindi to India. By a miracle, VOA radio broadcasts to Georgia and Ukraine were temporarily saved because the BBG staff did not act fast enough to end them before the Russian attack on Georgia.

It should not be a surprise that privatization of U.S. international broadcasting would lead to decisions which harm U.S. national security interests and result in major journalistic failures. Some of these failures, which were highlighted in the study prepared the Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School, University of Southern California, are described at length by Dr. Snow. It’s also no surprise that the BBG wanted to keep the study secret even from members of Congress.

As Dr. Snow points out, there were plenty of earlier warnings which the Broadcasting Board of Governors chose to ignore.  Fortunately for media freedom and journalistic ethics, a news event — a conference in Teheran which gathered those who deny the reality of the Holocaust — became an unexpected test of the BBG’s privatization and marketing strategies and eventually led to investigations which exposed both journalistic and financial abuses.

Reporting by FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit, which had dealt with international media and NPR reporting on the conference in Teheran, was responsible for the initial inquiries on how Alhurra and other BBG-run entities covered various statements by Holocaust deniers.

According to ProPublica.org, another nonprofit investigative journalism website, one Alhurra Television report that had particularly upset lawmakers was from an Iranian reporter who told viewers that there was no proof that 6 million Jews were killed by the Nazis during World War II. Use this link to the ProPublica.org web site to view the Alhurra report with English subtitles:  http://www.propublica.org/feature/alhurra-video

View  FreeMediaOnline.org report:  “Holocaust conference in Iran: Al Jazeera offers more balance than National Public Radio (NPR) reporter; objective coverage from most other international media”     (In response to criticism, NPR later aired a number of reports to correct its initial reporting. The BBG has been silent about such mistakes and attempted to limit journalistic inquiries.)

Reports which violate basic U.S. journalistic standards became common on the U.S. broadcasting entities privatized by the BBG, as the Alhurra study demonstrates. The Voice of America could not provide a more balanced reporting to counter such abuses because its programs have been reduced or eliminated by the Board and the Bush Administration.

In addition to the effects of privatization and the lack of sufficient oversight, BBG’s marketing strategies, introduced by Norman Pattiz, also contributed significantly to biased reporting and journalistic failures. Political interference with journalistic program content was made part of the BBG’s strategy of “marrying the mission to the market.” Private consultants hired by the BBG were telling Alhurra and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) not to focus too much on human rights issues since such an emphasis might offend highly nationalistic audiences and lead to lower ratings. Norman Pattiz and his consultants also told BBG broadcasters that they can improve their audience reach through music and entertainment programming.

One reason privatization became a major focus for the BBG was the inability of the Board members to force VOA journalists to take orders and compromise their journalistic ethics. Saving jobs of private contractors overseas while eliminating U.S. positions at the Voice of America also became a priority for BBG members and their staff.

In the case of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, D. Jeffrey Hirschberg and BBG’s executive director Jeffrey Trimble wanted to maintain a large private contractor presence in Russia despite strong evidence that the Kremlin’s secret police has been busy intimidating and blackmailing RFE/RL journalists who are Russian citizens and are subject to Russian laws. (Russian law prevents these contract employees from disclosing to RFE/RL and the BBG that they might have been approached by the FSB, the successor agency of the KGB.) To protect their bureau in Moscow from being closed down, Radio Liberty managers put a positive spin on Putin’s comments about the murder of independent Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya.  View FreeMediaOnline.org report.

  
More recently, a Russian human rights organization, the Moscow Human Rights Bureau, has criticized Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) for giving an entire hour of airtime to a Russian politician known for his racist views and verbal attacks on Blacks and other ethnic and racial minorities. View FreeMediaOnline.org report: “U.S. Taxpayers Pay for Spreading Racist Views on Radio Liberty in Russia: What Would Barack Obama Say If He Knew…”   

Many independent experts and organizations, including the Public Diplomacy Council, have called for a major reform of U.S. public diplomacy. The Obama Administration should show that it wants U.S. public diplomacy to have a fresh start by abolishing the Broadcasting Board of Governors and un-privatizing Alhurra Television. The new Administration has no need for private  U.S. propaganda radio and TV operating without proper supervision and accountability. 

Ted Lipien is a former Voice of America acting associate director. He was also a regional BBG media marketing manager responsible for placement of U.S. government-funded radio and TV programs on stations in Russia, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries in Eurasia. He is founder and president of FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based nonprofit which support media freedom worldwide, and author of “Wojtyla’s Women: How They Shaped the Life of Pope John Paul II and Changed the Catholic Church” (O-Books – June 2008). In his book he describes the efforts of the KGB and other communist intelligence services to place spies in the Vatican and to influence reporting by Western journalists.

Voice of America Hindi Radio Silent in India during Terrorist Attacks

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog, November 28, 2008, San Francisco – Voice of America, a U.S. taxpayer-funded international broadcaster, was off the air with shortwave Hindi radio broadcasts to India during the terrorist attacks in Mumbai.

The decision to silence these radio broadcasts was made earlier this year by the Broadcasting Board of Governors, a U.S. Government agency.

The BBG had also stopped Voice of America radio broadcasts to Russia just 12 days before the Russian military attack on Georgia in August of this year and is refusing to resume shortwave transmission that could reach listeners in the conflict area.

Ending VOA shortwave radio broadcasts to India was not an isolated lapse of judgement. The Broadcasting Board of Governors has established a long record of silencing or reducing VOA radio programs to countries without free media as well as countries vulnerable to ethnic conflicts and terrorist attacks.

BBG members who are appointed by the White House and confirmed by the Senate had previously tried to reduce radio broadcasts to Tibet shortly before major pro-human rights demonstrations there. The BBG also wanted to end Voice of America radio broadcasts to Georgia but that decision has been put on hold after the Russian attack.

When given a chance to reconsider their decision, BBG officials ignored appeals from members of Congress who urged them not to terminate Voice of America radio broadcasts in Hindi to India. BBG officials insisted that short and infrequent TV reports and a VOA website will be sufficient for audiences in India.

Democrats selected for the Broadcasting Board of Governors, including Ted Kaufman who was recently appointed to be the US Senator from Delaware, joined forces with neoconservative Republicans to steer money away from Voice of America broadcasts and use them to finance highly controversial and scandal-ridden operations broadcasting to the Middle East, including Alhurra Television and Radio Sawa.

Kaufman and former BBG chairman James K. Glassman, a neoconservative Republican who is now the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy,  repeatedly voted to end VOA Hindi radio transmissions to India, Russia, and other countries. They were joined by other Democrat and Republican BBG members.

For years, both Democrats and neoconservative Republicans on the BBG have been in favor of privatizing US international broadcasting. Only one Republican voted against the cuts in VOA radio broadcasts, which also included reductions in Voice of America English programs.

Critics point out that the BBG has established a solid record of terminating and reducing programs to countries shortly before major wars, conflicts, demonstrations or terrorist attacks. Ted Lipien, president of a media freedom nonprofit, FreeMediaOnline.org, said that based on the BBG performance so far, the National Security Council, the CIA, the State Department, and the Department of Homeland Security can study BBG decisions on program cuts to reliably predict where the next international crisis will take place.

Voice of America radio broadcasts to Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, Tibet, China, Uzbekistan and India have all been at one point either completely terminated or targeted by the Broadcasting Board of Governors for cuts and reductions. The BBG was forced to abandon  or scale down some of these cuts due to outside criticism, but VOA Hindi radio programs were already off the air when the terrorists struck in Mumbai.

BBG Insists Congress Approved Its Decision to Terminate Voice of America Radio to Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, and Other Countries

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog, November 23, 2008, San Francisco – In a letter that takes exception to the scathing criticism from the Public Diplomacy Council, a Washington, D.C-based nonprofit NGO, the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages U.S. government-funded international broadcasts, insists that Congress had approved BBG’s decision to terminate Voice of America (VOA) radio broadcasts to several countries, including Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, and India. On orders from the BBG, VOA radio programs to Russia had ceased on July 26, just 12 days before the Russian military attack on Georgia.

Many foreign policy experts, members of Congress, and press freedom NGOs saw the BBG’s decision as a major public diplomacy blunder.  But the BBG continues to defend its actions and claims that it had a go ahead from Congress to end VOA radio programs.  After the start of the summer war in the Caucasus, the BBG suspended its orders to stop radio broadcasts to Georgia but refused to resume VOA shortwave broadcasts in Russian.

The Public Diplomacy Council members who have criticized the BBG come from diplomacy, the armed forces, nonprofits and academia.  The BBG has few if any defenders. FreeMediaOnline.org could not identify any member of Congress or a prominent public diplomacy expert who  would express approval for the BBG’s decision to terminate VOA radio broadcasts to Russia. 

In a reaction to widespread criticism, the BBG spokesperson Letitia King wrote to the Public Diplomacy Council that “it is false to claim that the BBG has acted in any way that contravenes Congress.” She also stated the BBG “received Congressional approval for all program changes that have been made, including language service reductions,” and she called on the PDC to correct its error.

Ms. King also took issue with the Public Diplomacy Council’s claim that “the Broadcasting Board of Governors has taken special aim at the Voice of America,” by abolishing the VOA Arabic Service and reducing its broadcasts in English to the Middle East and other regions. She argued that the BBG “has sought efficiencies throughout the organization in order to concentrate resources on language broadcasts.”

FreeMediaOnline.org reported that while planning to eliminate VOA radio broadcasts to  Russia and Georgia, the BBG and its most recent chairman James K. Glassman, the current Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, also planned to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to expand their public relations operations. Among other things, the BBG had made an unsuccessful attempt to hire Paula Zahn, formerly of CNN, as their high profile spokesperson. The funds that the BBG wanted to allocate to this project could have paid for continuing VOA radio broadcasts to a country like Georgia.

In a document titled “Reforming U.S. International Broadcasting for a New Era,” the Public Diplomacy Council makes a number of proposals to reform U.S. international broadcasting and blames the BBG for undermining the effectiveness of the Voice of America. The Council has urged the future Obama Administration to immediately restore all radio services reduced at the VOA in FY 08. 

From the Public Diplomacy Council’s “Reforming U.S. International Broadcasting
for a New Era,” November 17, 2008:
 

On July 26, 2008, twelve days before Russia invaded Georgia, the BBG silenced VOA Russian radio, and then ignored subsequent appeals to restore it.  On September 30, the Board abolished VOA radio services in Serbian, Bosnian, and Macedonian and in the Hindi service to India, provisionally retaining Ukrainian and Georgian.  This action directly contravened Congressional passage last December of an FY 08 appropriation prohibiting all cuts.  The impact: loss of nine million listeners on the eve of a landmark U.S. presidential election.

The BBG spokesperson is vague as to what specific Congressional approval the BBG had received to cut VOA radio programs to Russia and other countries. Although the BBG letter does not offer a proof of any Congressional approval, the BBG seems to be using a highly legalistic argument that Congress has agreed to all the VOA program cuts since it had passed the Administration’s FY09 budget. In fact, members of Congress and a Congressional committee had told the BBG not to proceed with the planned radio program cuts at VOA.

On July 17, 2008, Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT ) specifically warned the BBG not to stop or reduce broadcasts  to Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tibet and to the Balkans, saying that “freedom of speech remains restricted and broadcasting is still necessary”  in these countries. But, acting in great secrecy and without any public announcement for U.S. or foreign media, the BBG stopped all VOA Russian radio programs on July 26.

Letter to the Public Diplomacy Council from the Broadcasting Board of Governors’ Spokesperson
November 20, 2008

The Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) takes sharp exception to many points in “Reforming U.S. International Broadcasting for a New Era,” a statement issued by the Public Diplomacy Council (PDC) on November 17.

It is false to claim that the BBG has acted in any way that contravenes Congress. The BBG received Congressional approval for all program changes that have been made, including language service reductions. The PDC should correct its error.

The success or failure of the BBG should be judged on its broadcasting impact.

The post-9/11 public diplomacy charge was clear: to focus on Muslim audiences as an antidote to poisonous propaganda from Al Qaeda and other extremists. The challenge is how best to do that in specific countries, each with unique political factors, diverse media environments, and populations largely hostile to America.

The BBG has met this challenge by shaping broadcasts to fit the exigencies of each target audience. Since 2001, with support from the Administration and Congress, the BBG has launched six major communication channels – including 24/7 Dari and Pashto in Afghanistan, Radio Sawa and Alhurra TV for the Mi ddle East, Radio Farda and the Persian News Network for Iran, and Radio Aap ki Dunyaa for Pakistan — and ramped up daily broadcasting to Indonesia, Somalia, and other countries. These new initiatives have grown the BBG’s global weekly audience from 100 to over 175 million people. Broken out by country, this number includes: 27 million in Indonesia, 14 million in Iran, 13 million in Afghanistan, 12 million in Pakistan, 11.5 million in Iraq, 7 million in Egypt, 6 million in Syria, and 5 million in Morocco. Over 30 BBG language services now reach in excess of one million people weekly.

The PDC statement misrepresents the BBG’s work in other respects:

• PDC notes that VOA is chartered by statute to present international and U.S. news that is accurate, objective, and comprehensive; to represent America in all its diversity; and to present U.S. policies. But it fails to note that the statute governing broadcasting provides a similar mandate to all BBG broadcast entities. Each of the BBG’s broadcast entities maintains flexibility to tailor content to its audiences.

• Since FY 2000, VOA’s budget has increased over 47 percent, from $127 to $190 million in FY 2008. VOA has added television broadcasts to Afghanistan and Pakistan and increased programs in Persian, Urdu, Dari, Pashto, Korean, Somali, and several other languages.

• The BBG has sought efficiencies throughout the organization in order to concentrate resources on language broadcasts. Since FY 200 3, 78 percent of BBG budgetary reductions were to administrative, engineering, and support costs. It would not be possible to reinstate particular language broadcasts without additional cost.

• VOA audiences in Serbia, Bosnia and Macedonia continue to be served by high-quality VOA television and Internet programming, and by radio broadcasts from Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. VOA television and Internet broadcasts in Hindi also continue.

• To assert that the BBG needs “real strategy and analysis” ignores the BBG’s comprehensive strategic plan, available at http://www.bbg.gov/, which details specific actions to yield measurable outcomes. BBG spending on global audience research has increased from less than $3 million in FY 2001 to $9.1 million in FY 2008.
What matters to the BBG is reaching as many people as possible with accurate, balanced news and information that gains their trust and makes a difference in their lives. The focus of discussion needs to be on how U.S. international broadcasters are going to better serve more people with quality journalism to advance U.S. strategic interests in difficult-to-reach countries were democracy and freedom of speech are in short supply.

We share the commitment of the Public Diplomacy Council to excellence in our international broadcasting efforts and value forward-looking discussion of how t o maximize our effectiveness.

Sincerely,

Letitia M. King
Acting Director Office of Public Affairs

 

In a response to a Freedom of Information Act request, the BBG  Office of General Counsel conceded that it cannot produce a specific document which would have given the BBG Congressional approval for its decision to cut VOA radio programs to Russia and other countries.

The Public Diplomacy Council is not the only group that is highly critical of the BBG. A statement issued by the leadership of the Voice of America employees’ unions, AFGE Local 1812 and AFSCME Local 1418, said that the Broadcasting Board of Governors “has been responsible for one blunder after another — to the point that its actions have compromised U.S. strategic interests.” Saying that “the elimination of Russian and Georgian radio broadcasts should be the last straw,” the VOA employees’ union leaders called on Congress to act immediately to dissolve the Broadcasting Board of Governors.  Their letter also said that the BBG, “unilaterally and in contravention of the express language of the Congress, closed the Voice of America Russian Radio Service.”  “In effect, we are deaf, dumb and blind in Russia,” the union letter said.

Articles highly critical of the BBG’s actions in the Middle East and Russia have been published by the independent journalism web site ProPublica.org. They point out that despite many major editorial and financial scandals, the BBG still favors the privatized broadcasting entities, such as Alhurra, over VOA. Investigative journalists at ProPublica.org, a non-profit led by former Wall Street Journal managing editor Paul Steiger, reported that a guest invited to participate in an Alhurra program had called for killings of American soldiers in Iraq. The network also aired a report on a Holocaust deniers conference in Tehran. According to ProPublica.org, “the reporter who covered the conference told viewers that Jews had provided no scientific evidence of the Holocaust.”

FreeMediaOnline.org president Ted Lipien said that the responsibility for such broadcasts rests with the BBG’s blind trust in high audience ratings as reflected in its spokesperson’s statement that “what matters to the BBG is reaching as many people as possible.”  While the BBG claims that it wants ”accurate, balanced news and information” that gains the trust of audiences overseas, Lipien said that consultants hired by the BBG and its staff have been ordering BBG broadcasters to avoid airing views that audiences would strongly disagree with and to offer those that they like.  Even invited program guests have been told on occasion to moderate their pro-human rights opinions to meet the expectations of the audience.

Lipien said that in addition to airing views of Holocaust deniers, these policies have also led to canceling of VOA call-in radio programs on human rights in Russia and firing of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) editors who defended human rights programming.  Human rights activists overseas are also alarmed by BBG’s actions. Buddhist monks protested against BBG’s plans to reduce radio programs to Tibet. Earlier this year,  a Russian NGO, the Moscow Human Rights Bureau, criticized RFE/RL for giving an entire hour of airtime to a former Russian Parliament deputy Andrey Savel’yev. The Russian human rights organization said that Mr. Savel’yev’s “chauvinist and racist views are well-known.” The Moscow Human Rights Bureau said that the station was guilty not only  of enabling such people “to spread their poisonous views,” but also of legitimizing their ideas “in the minds of many impressionable radio listeners.” The appeal, written by the organization’s head Aleksandr Brod, argues that stations, which “in their pursuit of higher ratings” invite such “nationalist radicals,” are giving these enemies of democracy a larger audience and exacerbating ethnic tensions.

Henry Loomis, Voice of America Director Who Resisted White House Censorship at VOA, Dies at 89

 FreeMediaOnline.org and Free Media Online Blog  November 8, 2008, San Francisco – Henry Loomis, who died Nov. 2 in Jacksonville, Fla., at age 89, was director of the Voice of America (VOA) during the Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson administrations. During his tenure from 1958 to 1965, the VOA Charter was written, and technical facilities and programming for every part of the world were expanded. The VOA Charter, which protects the independence and integrity of VOA programming, was signed into law in 1976 by President Gerald Ford.

Loomis, a strong defender of independent journalism at the Voice of America, resigned in protest as VOA director in 1965 after the Johnson White House demanded that VOA keep quiet about American planes flying over Laos. He later served as president of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting during the Nixon administration.

As VOA director, Loomis was in firm control of the station’s strategic planning. In the 1990s, much of the authority of the VOA director had been transferred to the bipartisan Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which eliminated the VOA Arabic radio service and  earlier this year shut down VOA radio broadcasts to Russia shortly before the Russian military attack on Georgia. The BBG also had plans to reduce or terminate VOA radio broadcasts to Tibet, Uzbekistan, China, Georgia, Ukraine, and a number of other countries. Due to protests from Dalai Lama, Tibetan monks, members of Congress, and press freedom organizations, the BBG was forced to suspend some of these cuts, but VOA radio broadcasts to Russia remain off the air.

Many Voice of America employees, who have been marginalized and demoralized by the BBG’s actions, remember Henry Loomis as a relentless and effective defender of VOA’s independence and journalistic mission. He is also credited with persuading Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson and Lt. Gen. Leslie Groves, head of the Manhattan Project that developed the atomic bomb, to spare the ancient Japanese city of Kyoto from a nuclear attack. Loomis, a physicist by training,  had studied Japanese history and art at Harvard. During World War II, he enlisted in the navy and served as a radar officer. Before being named Voice of America director in 1958, Loomis worked for the CIA and the Pentagon. After he retired, Loomis continued to speak out in support of funding and independence for Voice of America broadcasters.

Broadcasting Board of Governors Shows Bipartisan Unity in Jamming Voice of America Radio in Russia

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog September 19, 2006, San Francisco — Both Republicans and Democrats on the Broadcasting Board of Governors showed remarkable bipartisanship in destroying Voice of America  Russian-language radio in late July, shortly before Russia attacked Georgia. BBG executive director Jeffrey Trimble then advised VOA to pursue Internet-only strategy in Russia. But this former Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty manager did not have the same advice for the semi-private broadcaster based in Moscow and Prague. RFE/RL has been so afraid to lose its Moscow bureau that its managers practice self-censorship and express confidence in Mr. Putin’s leadership. Trimble made sure, however, that while VOA would do nothing but the Internet, RFE/RL would continue radio broadcasts, their Internet presence, and even video production in Russian.

The attack on Georgia did not change the BBG’s plans for VOA in Russia. Granted, in the aftermath of the Russian military attack, the BBG sponsored a workshop designed to show that the Internet is subject to censorship and sabotage from authoritarian regimes. But apparently, the threat is not so great as to prevent their desire to limit the Voice of America to nothing but an Internet-only option in Russia.

Having destroyed VOA radio in Russia, they still somehow managed to get Under Secretary of State Paula J. Dobriansky to address their Internet censorship workshop. (I wonder if she knows that Governor Steven J. Simmons, who introduced her at the workshop, had voted earlier with most of his BBG coleagues to terminate VOA radio broadcasts to Ukraine.)

When the BBG members met the next day, September 11, they rejected an appeal from Governor Blanquita Cullum to resume VOA radio to Russia and to rescind permanently their decision to end VOA radio broadcasts to Ukraine and Georgia. (VOA Georgian radio will continue “for the foreseeable future,” according to a BBG press release, but their intention of eventually terminating VOA radio in Georgia apparently has not changed.)

You can view here our online presentationon the BBG’s actions in Russia.

Wrong Time to Give Up Voice of America Broadcasts to India

THIS POST CAN BE REPUBLISHED with attribution to FreeMediaOnline.org.

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog September 16, 2006, San Francisco — In a show of bipartisanship, two powerful members of Congress sent a letter to the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) demanding that the BBG reverse its decision to terminate Voice of America (VOA) radio programs in Hindi to India. The BBG is a bipartisan body which manages VOA and several other taxpayer-funded U.S. international broadcasters.

The two Co-Chairmen of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans, Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA) and Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC), stressed in their letter to the BBG that over 70% of the Indian population lives in rural villages, many with no access to TV or the Internet. They expressed surprise that the BBG wants to terminate VOA  Hindi radio at the time when the United States is expanding its strategic partnership with India. They asked the BBG to allow VOA Hindi radio broadcasts to continue.

Chances are slim, however, that the Broadcasting Board of Governors will reverse its decision on India or other countries, to which VOA programs have been terminated or will soon cease, unless the whole Congress acts to force the Board to give up these programming cuts.

Unfortunately for radio listeners in India and concerned Indian Americans, the BBG enjoys strong support on this issue from Senator Joe Biden, Jr. (D-DE), Senator Barak Obama’s vice presidential running mate and a powerful member of the U.S. Senate.

Edward “Ted” E. Kaufman, Senator Biden’s former chief of staff who now works on his vice presidential campaign, blocked attempts last week to resume Voice of America (VOA) radio programs to Russia and other countries, including India. As a Democratic member of the BBG, Ted Kaufman was responsible earlier with other Democrats and some Republican members for terminating VOA Russian-language broadcasts just 12 days before Russia attacked Georgia on August 8. He had also voted for ending VOA broadcasts to India and a number of other countries, including Georgia.

Last week, a Republican BBG member, radio journalist Blanquita Cullum, had requested a vote on resuming VOA broadcasts in Russian and suspending plans to stop broadcasts to other countries. India was one of the countries named in Cullum’s proposal. Ted Kaufman was one of the key BBG members who refused to put the proposal to a vote, rejecting arguments that the earlier decision to terminate the broadcasts was wrong and that their resumption would send a strong message to Mr. Putin.

Ted Kaufman and others on Senator Biden’s staff  seem to be hoping that the mainstream media will not pay attention to this issue during the presidential election campaign, thus allowing them to play politics with U.S. international broadcasting to the benefit of the senator’s constituents and longtime friends.

Taking away radio broadcasting to Russia from VOA benefits another BBG-managed broadcaster,  semi-private Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), which is incorporated in Delaware, Senator Biden’s home state.

Senator Biden has been a strong supporter of his billionaire backer Norman Pattiz. Founder and chairman of media empire Westwood One, Pattiz had served on the BBG from May 2006 until March 2006. He pushed for the elimination of many Voice of America services to fund his news and entertainment broadcasting projects for the Middle East: Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television, which have attracted much controversy.

Even after Norman Pattiz resigned from the Board in March 2006, Senator Biden’s former chief of staff continued to vote for eliminating or reducing VOA radio broadcasts to India, Russia, Tibet and other countries while supporting expanding broadcasts to the Middle East, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.

Indian Americans and other supporters of U.S. international broadcasting and media freedom can contact Ted Kaufman through the BBG executive director Jeff Trimble: jtrimble@ibb.gov. 330 Independence Avenue, SW, Washington, DC 20237, Tel: (202) 203-4400, Fax: (202) 203-4585.

Send a copy of your email to the BBG Public Affairs officer Tish King, publicaffairs@bbg.gov, and request specifically that it be forwarded to Mr. Kaufman.

You may also wish to contact the Obama-Biden campaign staff, Tel. (866) 675-2008, and the Senate offices of  Senator Biden, Tel: (202) 224-5042 Fax: (202) 224-0139, and Senator Obama, Tel: (202) 224-2854 Fax: (202) 228-4260.

THIS POST CAN BE REPUBLISHED with attribution to FreeMediaOnline.org.

FreeMediaOnline.org is a 501 (c) 3 media freedom nonprofit organization based in San Francisco, CA. Contributions to FreeMediaOnline.org are tax-deductible. Please support our work in defense of media freedom worldwide.

Model Interactive Website Touted As Replacement for Voice of America Radio to Russia Attracts No Comments from Users

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog Commentary by Ted Lipien. September 12, 2008, San Francisco — The model website, which the staff of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) says will be used to create a new interactive platform as replacement for broadcasting VOA radio programs to Russia, has solicited no comments from international users despite being up for a few weeks.  All VOA radio broadcasts to Russia were terminated on orders from the BBG on July 26. 12 days later Russia attacked Georgia.

FreeMediaOnline.org has obtained a copy of the “VOA Russian Options Paper,”  which claims that VOA Russian Service can have a successful Internet-only presence in Russia. This claim is astounding since no other major government broadcaster has dropped its radio programs and opted for Internet-only strategy in targeting an audience of another world power ruled by an authoritarian government. Prime Minister Putin’s government controls most of the domestic media and limits free speech. Its security services have been accused of sabotaging the Internet during the war in Georgia.

 The “VOA Russian Options Paper” is remarkable not only for its naive political assumptions, such as using Russian companies believed to be run by the Russian security services in charge of monitoring the Internet. The proposal is also remarkable for its underlying claim that the Voice of America cannot have both radio and Internet presence in Russia at the same time because there is no money for both. The BBG bureaucrats have discovered what nobody else knows: rather than being an engine for improving efficiency and providing an inexpensive forum for exchanging information, the Internet at the BBG can be just as expensive, if not more expensive than traditional broadcast media. 

For those like me who have worked in government, the BBG paper is a clear indication that the project would be vastly overpriced, duplicating already existing Internet initiatives, and designed largely for the benefit of government contractors. It does not answer the essential question why for a country that desperately needs uncensored American news and opinions, Internet-only strategy is better than radio-TV-and-Internet strategy. Some people may be fooled that it is all about the money when in fact it is all about bureaucratic politics, conflicts of interest, and well-paid government consultants.

A good indication of how this project might work, or rather how it will fail if the BBG staff remains in charge of its implementation, is the Voice of America’s new USAVotes2008.com interactive website. This is how it was touted in the BBG paper:

VOA Model
The site [new VOA Russian interactive site] would be modeled on VOA’s content-rich election Web site, USAVotes2008.com.  USAVotes2008.com provides a platform for social networking about the American election in November.

FreeMediaOnline.org has learned that the model site cost tens of thousands of dollars to develop. Users are encouraged to go to the “Issues” page and leave their comments. The page has been up for a few weeks with no comments from users even though it can be read by anybody in the world with access to the Internet who understands English. Readers of Free Media Online Blog may want to leave some comments on the model VOA site to spare the BBG and the U.S. government any further embarrassment. (Sorry, I could not resist making this comment.)

The great tragedy is, of course, that VOA radio broadcasts to Russia have been terminated at a critical time, as the recent events in Georgia have demonstrated. But on Thursday, when they had a chance to redeem themselves before Congress and the American public, several members of the Broadcasting Board of Governors refused to take a vote to restore these broadcasts, as well VOA radio programs to Georgia, Ukraine and other countries, which are also to be terminated.

These prominent Americans may have been too busy admiring their own new and flashy promotional website with a Home page picture of Buddhist monks, but  which has no permanent references to the BBG mission in support of human rights and democracy. The picture is ironic, because the BBG had tried earlier to reduce VOA and Radio Free Asia (RFA) broadcasts to Tibet. They had to back down after a group of Tibetan monks staged a peaceful protest on Capital Hill and the U.S. Congress forced the Board to rescind their decision.

According to FreeMediaOnline.org sources, during the BBG meeting in Washington, D.C. on Thursday, two Democratic Board members: Jeff Hirschberg and Edward Kaufman blocked the motion to have a vote on restoring VOA broadcasts, which was introduced by a Republican member, radio broadcaster Blanquita Cullum, the only working journalist on the current Board. (The others are political operatives and businessmen, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is an ex officio member.) Faced with the opposition from Hirschberg, Kaufman, and the BBG executive director Jeff Trimble, the remaining BBG members did not support Cullum’s request.

The Internet-only VOA project for Russia is spectacularly risky and depends strongly on the acquiescence of the Putin government. It guarantees that American news from Washington would not reach people in areas of conflict and poverty who have no access to the Internet.

This elitist, cynical and arrogant approach to international broadcasting taken by the BBG was indirectly exposed in a recent letter from the two Co-Chairmen of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans, Rep. Jim McDermott and Rep. Joe Wilson, who protested against the planned termination of VOA Hindi radio service to India. They stressed in their letter to the BBG that  over 70% of the Indian population lives in rural villages, many with no access to TV or the Internet.

Despite the serious risks and limitations of their plan, Hirschberg, Kaufman and Trimble are said to favor the Internet-only strategy for VOA in Russia largely because it serves their personal preferences and bureaucratic needs. They want all radio broadcasting to Russia to be done exclusively by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), a semi-private entity based in Prague and in Moscow, which is also funded by Congress through the BBG.

These three individuals all have strong personal or political links to this radio station, which has been steeped lately in controversy about its ability to maintain independence and support for democratic values while operating within a close reach of Russia’s security services. Human rights groups and media freedom activists have criticized RFE/RL for airing comments expressing confidence in Mr. Putin’s leadership and for giving airtime to local extremist politicians known for their racist views.

The BBG has already deprived the United States of the powerful symbol represented by VOA radio broadcasts to Russia from the nation’s capital, the center of the American government. Mr. Putin and other Russian officials are not likely to pay any attention to a website they can easily block if a major crisis erupted between the two countries. As to the Internet-only strategy, the example of the Voice of America USAVotes2008.com model website also does not bode well at all for the prospect of reaching large audiences in Russia with news and persuasive American commentary that is untainted by self-censorship and racist messages.

The BBG staff should have noted that Mr. Putin did not bother to go after such websites in Russia because he does not view them as threatening. He did go, however, after independent radio and TV stations and silenced many independent journalists. At least 292 journalists have been killed or have disappeared in Russia since 1990 with very few perpetrators being charged. In any case, the secret police is already sabotaging the Internet and can close down access to unwanted websites at any time.

Russian speakers in Russia and elsewhere already have access to a number of U.S. government  sponsored websites, which to a large extent duplicate each other’s work. The State Department’s Russian-language website has much of the same information and looks largely the same as the VOA website. One could suspect that both were designed by the same well-paid  outside consultant. There is also the RFE/RL Russian-language website.

The main reason behind the BBG initiative was not to develop yet another VOA Russian website but to deprive the Voice of America of the ability to reach the Russian people with on air radio that cannot be easily igored or completely jammed. We can only speculate why this insane plan succeeded, but the links between Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Senator Biden are well known, and his staff is said to have helped Jeff Trimble take VOA radio off the air in great secrecy in late July so that other members of Congress would not be alerted. Governor Kaufman was a former chief of staff to Senator Biden and is now helping him in his run for the White House. There are then business links between Governor Hirschberg and Russia and his contacts with Mr. Putin’s associates, as well as Jeff Trimble’s own links with RFE/RL and the Russian management of RFE/RL’s Moscow bureau.

But in addition to any larger political and bureaucratic reasons, it is almost certain that most of the money from dropping VOA radio programs would be spent not on  VOA Russian broadcasters but on BBG managers and inside Internet specialists, as well as outside consultants who are probably friends and acquaintances of BBG members and their staff. After all, one of the former BBG members — said to be the most recent BBG chairman James Glassman who is now Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs – had suggested that the Board should hire former ABC and CNN television newscaster Paula Zahn as their public relations guru. She had good sense to turn them down.

Congress should likewise refuse to accept the BBG’s termination of VOA radio programs to Russia, Georgia, Ukraine and other countries. VOA must expand its Internet outreach in Russia, but the BBG’s Internet-only strategy will not have any greater impact than the struggling USAVotes2008.com website.

This VOA model website developed under the guidance of the BBG staff is still waiting for you to post your first user comments. Go ahead and do it, but please note that you are a supporter of resuming VOA radio to Russia and to other countries without free media.

Reduce U.S. Radio To Tibet But Show A Picture of Buddhist Monks — A Tale of One Incredible Government Agency and Its New Website

A New Website Hides a Tale of Fewer Radio Programs to Tibet, China, Georgia, Russia, and Ukraine

FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog Commentary by Ted Lipien, September 10, 2008, San Francisco — Websites tell their tales, and the newly redesigned, flashy website of the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) tells a tale of hubris, waste, and reduced access to uncensored radio news for those who are the poorest and the most repressed by authoritarian regimes.

Why Buddhist Monks?

The BBG, which manages U.S. taxpayer-funded broadcasts to countries without free media, has just launched its new website, which shows on its “Home” page a picture of Buddhist monks, a flashy promotional video, and the slogan: “Bringing News and Information to People Around the World in 60 Languages.”

For those who are familiar with the BBG’s record of foreign policy blunders and are concerned about media freedom, the Buddhist monks picture tells a tale that is greatly at odds with the advertising look of the new government website. The same bipartisan body of two women and four men — three Democrats and three Republicans, including the Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice – had tried earlier to reduce the Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Asia (RFA) news radio programs to Tibet and China. These two stations are funded by the U.S. Congress and managed by the BBG.

These prominent, politically well-connected and business-oriented Americans — who, however, have no experience of living under a totalitarian regime, are not practicing journalists (with one exception), and have no record of significant activism in support of human rights –  had decided to reduce radio programs to Tibet about a year before the pro-autonomy demonstrations, which erupted there and were violently suppressed by the Chinese government in Beijing. They then refused to rescind their decision until a group of Tibetan monks went to the Capitol Hill and staged a peaceful protest. The U.S. Congress finally forced the BBG to back down on the program reductions to Tibet and China.

A Government Agency That Places A High Priority on Itself Tries to Hire Paula Zahn

The BBG claims that shortwave radio program cuts and reductions allow it to invest more in the development of their Internet program delivery strategy. They did use a picture of Buddhist monks, but to what purpose? The new expensive website does not offer any help to the impoverished Tibetans in cities and in rural areas, or to other groups around the world caught up in wars and conflicts and without access to the Internet. The same BBG also wanted to hire American television newscaster Paul Zahn, formerly of CNN and ABC, to be their public relations guru. She had turned them down.

Just 12 days before the Russian military attacked Georgia on August 8, the Broadcasting Board of Governors completely shut down all on-air Voice of America radio programs to Russia and to all other area were Russian is spoken. This included parts of the war zone in Georgia.

Senator Biden’s Staff Reportedly Helped to Kill VOA Radio to Russia

The Senate staff of the new Vice Presidential Democratic Party nominee, Senator Joe Biden, was said to have helped the BBG members implement this decision. It was carried out in great secrecy because of the widespread opposition to these program cuts among the rest of the members of Congress.

Extremists Invited by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Alhurra Television

Senator Biden was said to have favored program cuts at the Voice of America because they would benefit Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), a semi-private entity, which is incorporated in his state. RFE/RL, which is also managed by the BBG and broadcasts in Russia, was recently criticized by the Moscow Human Rights Bureau for giving extensive airtime to an extremist Russian politician who is known for “chauvinist and racist views,” including comments about dark-skinned immigrants. Another BBG-managed private broadcaster, Alhurra Television to the Middle East, gave air time to a militant who called for the death of American soldiers in Iraq. The BBG claims that  radio program cuts to Tibet, and countries like Georgia and Russia, help to pay for Alhurra television and the expansion of its new technology infrastructure, including the Internet.

When the Russian troops entered deeply into the Georgian territory on August 8, the BBG was also about to shut down all Voice of America radio programs to Georgia and to Ukraine — the two countries under pressure from Russia, which Vice President Dick Cheney visited last week. Also last week, President Bush announced a $1 billion aid package to Georgia. But even these developments have had little if any effect on the BBG. The Board announced that the Voice of America Georgian radio programs will continue, but only for “the foreseeable future,” and described demands from its own journalists for reversing the other program cuts, including those to Russia and Ukraine, as “a non-starter.”

A Great New Promotional Website at Taxpayers’ Expense With Not Too Much Emphasis on Human Rights

The new BBG website looks very much like a  combination of a news and promotional site, even though the BBG itself was not created by Congress as a news organization or told to promote its own work to the American public. As a body called to guide and oversee the work of real broadcasters, it has no reason to glorify itself at U.S. taxpayers’ expense, much less hire Paula Zahn to do its public relations. The U.S. government-funded news organizations, managed by the BBG, already have their own news sites and public affairs departments. 

The Broadcasting Board of Governors is required, however, to promote respect for human rights through U.S. international broadcasting.  Interestingly, there are no permanent references to human rights on the new website’s “Home” and “About the Agency” pages. One has to search deeper through the site to find any permanent direct mention of human rights and media freedom.

In a twist of irony, however, on September 10, barely a month after the Voice of America radio programs to Russia were cut, the BBG sponsored a workshop — “New Media vs New Censorship: The Authoritarian Assault on Information.” By announcing the workshop on its Home page, the BBG made  at least an indirect and temporary reference to its human rights mission.

For more information about FreeMediaOnline.org and articles dealing with the BBG and U.S. international broadcasting, go to: http://www.freemediaonline.org.

 Listen To The Last Voice of America Russian Radio Broadcast

Listen here to the last Voice of America on-air Russian radio broadcast delivered on July 26, 2008, just twelve days before Russia attacked Georgia.

 

The BBG members who have supported cutting VOA programs to Tibet, China, Georgia, Russia, and Ukraine are: Joaquin Balaya, chairman of Balaya Media Inc.; Jeff Hirschberg, a partner of in Kalorama Partners, a consulting firm that deals with corporate governance and risk assessment and a director of the U.S-Russia Business Council; Edward E. Kaufman, Senator Biden’s former chief of staff who is now president of Public Strategies, a political and management consulting firm based in Wilmington, Delaware; and Steven J. Simmons, chairman and CEO of Patriot Media and Communications, LLC.

 

Three seats on the Board currently are empty, after the recent departure of former BBG Chairman James K. Glassman, who also favored program cuts at VOA. Glassman is now the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. According to FreeMediaOnline.org sources, Glassman was responsible for proposing to hire Paula Zahn. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice does not attend the BBG meetings and is usually represented by  James Glassman.

 

FreeMediaOnline.org learned that only one BBG member, radio broadcaster Blanquita Cullum, questioned the decision to hire a media celebrity while radio programs to countries without free press were being cut. She was reported to have said that if the rest of the Board proceeded with hiring a new high profile spokesperson, “it would be over my dead body.” Cullum, who is a Republican, is also said to be the only member of the bipartisan Board who has consistently opposed  U.S. radio programming cuts to countries without free media.

View FreeMediaOnline.org Online Presentation SAVE VOICE OF AMERICA BROADCASTS

View FreeMediaOnline.org Online Presentation in support of saving Voice of America broadcasts to Georgia, Russia, Ukraine, Tibet and other media-at-risk countries.

 

 

Call or email the Broadcasting Board of Governors to register your protest: Tel: (202) 203-4400; Fax: (202) 203-4585; E-mail: publicaffairs@bbg.gov. CONTACT YOUR MEMBERS OF THE U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES AND THE U.S. SENATE and tell them about the BBG’s actions affecting U.S. support for freedom of the press and human rights and the use of your tax dollars. 

 

 

A statement issued recently by the leadership of the Voice of America employees’ unions, AFGE Local 1812 and AFSCME Local 1418, said that the Broadcasting Board of Governors “has been responsible for one blunder after another — to the point that its actions have compromised U.S. strategic interests.” Saying that “the elimination of Russian and Georgian radio broadcasts should be the last straw,” the VOA employees’ union leaders called on Congress to act immediately to dissolve the Broadcasting Board of Governors.

 

 

 

FreeMediaOnline.org is a 501(c)3 nonprofit media freedom organization based in San Francisco, CA.