FreeMediaOnline.org, Free Media Online Blog, GovoritAmerika.us, September 9, 2009, San Francisco — A former employee of Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) has asked the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg to look into charges that the US taxpayer-funded radio station broadcasting to countries without free media discriminates against foreign-born journalists and other workers by denying them the same legal protections available to American and Czech employees. Snjezana Pelivan, a Croatian citizen, had challenged her dismissal by RFE/RL and filed an unlawful discrimination suit in a court in the Czech Republic, where the American radio station has its headquarters and where she was employed by RFE/RL as a marketing specialist to help place its programs on local radio stations throughout Eurasia.

The Czech court sided with RFE/RL, ruling that the station’s non-Czech and non-American employees, including many journalists who fled persecution by authoritarian regimes in their native countries, can be treated differently under the Czech law than their Czech and American colleagues. Americans and Czechs working for RFE/RL are entitled to much greater legal protections and employment benefits than citizens of other countries. Ms. Pelivan and others at RFE/RL view this as a discriminatory measure used against journalists who come mostly from poorer nations, are not familiar with American legal system, and have few other options of working as journalists in their native languages.

The picture is far different for American citizens at RFE/RL. Under an arrangement worked out with the Czech government, they enjoy some of the same privileges as US diplomats although they are not Federal workers. One of the benefits reserved for American employees at the RFE/RL headquarters in Prague is being exempt from paying Czech income taxes. RFE/RL employees who are Czech citizens are protected by liberal Czech labor laws.

The US taxpayer-supported radio station is technically a private journalistic institution, incorporated in Delaware, and receives US government grants. Ms. Pelivan had asked the Czech court to request the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to appear as a witness in her case to explain how the US government can “allow journalists from countries without democracy and free media to be treated as ‘second class’ citizens when working abroad for an American radio station funded by the US Congress with a mission to promote democracy, human rights and the rule of law.” Secretary Clinton is a member of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, a US Federal agency, which provides grants to RFE/RL and is responsible for programming and management policies at the radio station. The Czech court did not respond to her request to submit questions to Secretary Clinton.

In her appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, Ms. Pelivan wrote that the Czech court ruling empowers American management of RFE/RL to practice in the Czech Republic arbitrary terminations of its foreign employees without a need to justify such actions in any court of law. She expects that the European Court of Human Rights will ask the government of Croatia, her native country, to support her suit against the Czech Republic and RFE/RL. Croatia is entitled to present to the court in Strasbourg written comments and participate in hearings concerning the rights of its citizens.

Anna Karapetian

A similar unlawful discrimination case filed by a former RFE/RL journalist Anna Karapetian, an Armenian citizen, is still pending before Czech courts. Both Snjezana Pelivan and Anna Karapetian have petitioned U.S. Attorney General Eric H. Holder to open a criminal civil rights investigation into RFE/RL employment practices in the Czech Republic. Their petition notes that “actions of RFE/RL, financed by U.S. taxpayers money as a tool of American public diplomacy, make a mockery of its Mission Statement… ‘to promote democratic values and institutions… strengthen[ing] civil societies by projecting democratic values… [and]provid[ing] a model for local media…”

Both women have received excellent performance evaluations prior to their dismissals. Both claim that the RFE/RL management has not provided them with a clear explanation for their firings and tried to get them to agree not to discuss publicly their treatment at the radio station in Prague. They were not charged with violations of any work rules and were considered model employees.

The employment policies promoted by the BBG at Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty in the Czech Republic are believed to be part of a larger effort to privatize US international broadcasting and to limit the role of the Washington, DC-based Voice of America (VOA), which is a Federal government international radio also managed by the BBG. Federal workers at the Voice of America told FreeMediaOnline.org that during the last two years they have noticed an alarming number of veteran VOA journalists, employed in areas which the BBG wants to downsize, being dismissed for minor disciplinary violations. They suspect that these personnel practices have been adopted by the BBG executive staff from employment policies at RFE/RL and at some of the other BBG-managed private broadcasting entities. VOA journalists also report continued attempts by the BBG to replace Federal VOA employees, who do have some job security protections, with private contractors who can be dismissed at any time without any explanation. These practices are common at most of the BBG’s privately-run broadcasting stations. The current BBG Executive Director Jeff Trimble came from RFE/RL, where his jobs included Acting President, Counselor to the President for Programs and Policy, Director of Policy and Strategic Planning, and Director of Broadcasting.

In a government-wide survey of employees conducted by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM), the BBG has been consistently rated as one of the worst-managed Federal agencies. In addition to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the bipartisan board currently has four other members: Joaquin F.Blaya, Blanquita Walsh Cullum, D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, and Steven J. Simmons. Despite its bipartisan membership, most of the Democrats serving on the board, including former members Norman Pattiz and now US Senator from Delaware Ted (Edward E.) Kaufman, strongly supported privatization of US international broadcasting and downsizing of the Voice of America.

Norman Pattiz, chairman and founder of radio industry giant Westwood One, and Ted Kaufman, who took over Vice President Biden’s Senate seat and was at one time his chief of staff, were the primary authors of the Bush Administration’s plans for Alhurra Television privatized broadcasting to the Middle East and were responsible for the elimination of the Voice of America’s highly-regarded Arabic Service. A study conducted by The University of Southern California’s Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School determined that Alhurra TV has been a journalistic failure and is unable to attract a wider audience. The BBG tried to keep the Center on Public Diplomacy report secret but was eventually forced by Congressional and media criticism to make it available on its website.(http://www.bbg.gov/reports/others/uscreport.pdf)

Kaufman and a former BBG Republican Chairman, James Glassman, who was President Bush’s last Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, were primarily responsible for terminating Voice of America radio broadcasts to Russia just 12 days before the Russian army attacked Georgia in August 2008. Only one board member, Blanquita Walsh Cullum, the only working journalist among the current BBG members, was reported to be opposed to programming cuts at VOA and was said to have criticized some of the controversial BBG decisions at closed board meetings. According to FreeMediaOnline.org sources, she was outvoted by other Republicans and all Democrats. There have been unconfirmed rumors that the Obama Administration wants to replace most of the current BBG members. Republican leaders in Congress would have to be consulted which Republican BBG members should stay or be replaced.

Link to unedited English translation of the ICCEE (Information Center Caucasus-Eastern Europe) Press Release, Prague, the Czech Republic September 9, 2009. ICCEE is a nonprofit organization which publishes in Europe Europe Orer (“Europe Days”), an Armenian news magazine.

ICCEE Press Release in Russian: Американское «Радио Свобода» и его страна пребывания Чехия обвиняются в Европейском суде по правам человека в национальной дискриминации

FreeMediaOnline.org,  Free Media Online Blog,  GovoritAmerika.us, Commentary by Ted Lipien, June 04, 2009, San Francisco – President Obama’s recent announcement of a new Global Engagement Directorate that will combine ”diplomacy, communications, international development and assistance” was short on specifics how this new structure might change the focus of U.S. public diplomacy and broadcasting initiatives. That’s hardly surprising, considering that the White House has to deal with many other seemingly more pressing problems. But when the Administration finally starts making hard decisions on global engagement, a greater appreciation of history and foreign cultures could help return some sanity and accountability to these programs. The President and the Senate also have to make better choices in selecting key officials responsible for international communications and avoid the temptation to use propaganda rather than dialogue and journalism in communicating with the Muslim world.  Such officials should be appointed and confirmed based on their qualifications as foreign policy analysts and international media experts rather than selected because of political loyalty or the size of their political contributions. Finally, there is no reason why American taxpayers should continue to fund many of the programs created during the Bush Administration that at best don’t work and often damage America’s image abroad. 

Propaganda Is Out, Journalism and Culture Is In – We Hope

If the White House is serious about avoiding past mistakes,  what’s clearly needed in communicating with the rest of the world is a more sophisticated approach that draws on what is best in American diplomacy, culture and objective journalism. Much will depend on what kind of people are put in charge of representing America to the world. They should appreciate what’s best in American culture.  The Administration should look for people who would be in the same league as Edward R. Murrow, who was President Kennedy’s choice to head the now defunct United States Information Agency (USIA), or John Chancellor, President Johnson’s choice to head the Voice of America (VOA) in the days when the White House appreciated the experience of professional journalists. 

The last thing America needs is leaving public diplomacy in the hands of obscure political loyalists who make private business deals on taxpayer-paid trips abroad and help their  business associates get hired as government consultants at the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which manages, or more accurately mismanages, U.S. international broadcasts. It’s hard to imagine that the late Armand Hammer, a U.S. business tycoon who made profitable trade deals with Lenin and Stalin, would have been put in charge of U.S. broadcasting during the Cold War, or that the late Edward E. Murrow would be discussing  private business deals with President Putin’s associates on a trip to Moscow if he were now in charge of these broadcasts. But such  apparent conflicts of interest and other abuses were common at the Broadcasting Board of Governors during the Bush Administration. The BBG has been consistently rated in government surveys as one of the worst managed Federal agencies. Read The Washington Post column by Joe Davidson: Employee Poll Makes VOA’s Parent the Worst Place to Work.

Under President Bush, political appointees selected to run State Department’s public diplomacy programs and U.S. international broadcasting were political operatives, advertising executives and mirror entrepreneurs who proved their value to the White House and the Democratic leadership in Congress with political contributions and loyal support. (The BBG is by law bipartisan and must include members of both parties, thus both the Bush White House and the Democratic leadership in Congress share the blame for selecting these individuals.) They were rewarded with jobs for which they were completely unsuited and unprepared.

It is not surprising, therefore, that during the past ten years, Under Secretaries of State for Public Diplomacy and members of the BBG have brought once sophisticated cultural and broadcasting programs to a new low level of simplistic and counterproductive propaganda. They promoted advertising and marketing campaigns that admittedly may sometimes produce desired results in a U.S. domestic business setting but turned out to be ineffective and outright offensive when applied to public diplomacy and international broadcasting. And that’s exactly what these political appointees who lacked any substantive experience in foreign policy, human rights and journalism, have done in trying to communicate America’s message to foreign audiences, especially in the Middle East.

Bring “American” Brand Back

BBG consultants declared “America” as a brand name not to be used in the Middle East and came up with a GM-like collection of new names and new private broadcasting initiatives, each one costing U.S. taxpayers millions of dollars. Since their creators lacked an even basic understanding of Arab culture and refused to listen to advice from area experts, there was no chance that they could be successful. And by all accounts, they were not. They should have asked themselves why the British, who after all perfected serious radio journalism for audiences abroad, did not feel the need to dilute the BBC World Service brand with new stations under many different names. 

Returning to a more sophisticated approach, using high-level cultural diplomacy and serious news broadcasts, may not be easy, as much of the knowledge and experience of previous decades has been destroyed and will take time to  rebuild. The only thing left of sophisticated news analysis and cultural programs once available on the Voice of America are old audio and text files of interviews with important cultural figures in the Arab world. They have been archived by the U.S. Embassy in Egypt, where some U.S. diplomats and local Egyptian employees still understand their value. It’s this kind of understanding and cultural sensitivity that needs to be brought back. Link to Egyptian Treasures from VOA on the U.S. Embassy Cairo website.

The BBG eliminated all VOA Arabic language programs to create privately-run Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television. The programming philosophy of these stations, developed by former BBG member Norman Pattiz, a Democrat  – who despite being then Senator Joe Biden’s protege worked closely with neoconservatives in the Bush Administration – specifically rejected anything cultural in U.S. international broadcasting above the level of Brittney Spears. BBG members claimed that their market research supported programming derived from Hollywood and popular culture. Their professional background, however, made it impossible for them to conduct a sophisticated analysis that would take into consideration Middle Eastern history, cultural sensitivities, and political implications of their programming choices.

The Obama Administration would do well by quickly reversing many of the BBG’s decisions of the past decade. Correcting these mistakes would greatly improve America’s image abroad and save U.S. taxpayers’ money. “American” brand  should be brought back by making the Voice of America again a primary U.S. international broadcaster. VOA broadcasts and Internet site in Arabic should be restored as soon as possible.

Sources of Failure

How did U.S. international broadcasting go from a series of great successes during the Cold War to disastrous results in the Middle East in the last decade? While the simplistic worldview adopted by the Bush Administration bears some of the blame, the BBG and its members have made a bad situation far worse than it had to be.  These well meaning but completely miscast individuals, most of them with backgrounds in small domestic U.S. businesses, took a Cold War concept of surrogate broadcasting — which in any case was totally unsuitable for the Middle East – and compounded their error by removing from it one element that had made the original surrogate broadcaster – Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty –  vastly successful in broadcasting to Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. That element was a high level intellectual and cultural program content developed by local journalists, writers, artists, and intellectuals — not  U.S. advertising experts and political loyalists based in Washington, D.C.

Not satisfied with silencing Voice of America broadcasts in Arabic, the BBG members and their private consultants destroyed cultural uniqueness and effectiveness of RFE/RL Russian broadcasts and terminated VOA radio to Russia just a few days before the Russian army invaded Georgia. FreeMediaOnline.org reported that only one BBG member, Blanquita Walsh Cullum — the only working journalist on the Board – had the courage to to oppose these cuts and spoke out against other abuses, including an ultimately unsuccessful effort by a former BBG chairman James K. Glassman to hire Paula Zahn as the Board’s high profile spokesperson while VOA broadcasts to critical countries were being eliminated. Paula Zahn declined the job offer as a private contractor that would have cost U.S. taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars. James K. Glassman, who ended up as President Bush’s last Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, refused to resume VOA Russian radio broadcasts during the Russian-Georgian conflict.

In the process of expanding their power, BBG members deprived  foreign journalists working for their surrogate broadcasters of any measure of independence and authority, which was one of the key elements of success of U.S. broadcasts during the Cold War. At the same time, they failed to provide clear editorial and policy guidelines — another key element that previous American management teams were usually able to put in place successfully by working in partnership with foreign journalists. Those who dared to oppose BBG’s misguided ideas were fired or found their programs eliminated. To cover up their mistakes, the BBG forced foreign employees to sign secrecy agreements and refused to make public independent studies showing the failure of their projects in the Middle East. Read  Report Calls Alhurra A Failure on ProPublica.org.

By all accounts, the broadcasting  Board has been an unmitigated disaster. Some of the abuses are only now beginning to come to light. BBG-approved personnel policies at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which discriminate against foreign-born journalists,  may soon come before the European Court of Human Rights. Close links between the BBG Democrats and neoconservatives in the Bush Administration have proven that the Board does not protect U.S. international broadcasters from political interference with program philosophy and program content.  

The Obama Administration has a choice of abolishing the Broadcasting Board of Governors and closing down Alhurra Television and other private broadcasting entities created during Bush years. Democrats and Republicans in Congress have a common interest in saving taxpayers money, which are now being wasted on ineffective and duplicate programs.

Alhurra Television and the BBG, however, has some powerful supporters, mostly among Democrats who helped to create Alhurra, including former BBG member Senator Edward E. Kaufman, D-DE, a protege of Vice President Biden.  Read ProPublica.org: Alhurra Bleeding Viewers, Poll Finds, But Spending is Up.

One of the key members of the Obama Administration who may have a say in what happens to the BBG and Alhurra is Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. She is an ex officio member of the BBG, although she does not attend its meetings. She is usually represented at these meetings by a senior State Department official. While President Obama wisely avoided giving interviews to Alhurra, Secretary Clinton was recently interviewed by the network. Secretary Clinton is a friend of BBG member D. Jeffrey Hirschberg. He was one of the Democrats who worked closely with the Bush White House to create Radio Sawa and Alhurra. Hirschberg, a director of the U.S.-Russia Business Council, was also said to be responsible for terminating VOA radio broadcasts to Russia shortly before the Russian invasion of Georgia.

Other than Senator Kaufman and perhaps also Secretary Clinton, Alhurra, which means “The Free One,” seems to have now far fewer supporters, especially among members of Congress. ProPublica.org reported that outraged members of Congress threatened to withhold funding after the network aired a report on a Holocaust deniers conference in Tehran. According to ProPulica.org, “the reporter who covered the conference told viewers that Jews had provided no scientific evidence of the Holocaust.”

As a former acting associate director of the Voice of America (VOA),  I am certain that VOA, the only American-brand broadcaster and a target of numerous BBG program cuts, is capable of providing news and representing America in a credible and responsible manner that will not embarrass the United States. It’s unlikely that VOA would give airtime to Holocaust deniers, as did Alhurra editors and anchors, who apparently felt they had no choice but to follow the BBG dictum of giving the audience what it wants based on market research. Although VOA has had various problems with its broadcasts over the years, it follows much more strict editorial and fiscal standards than the BBG’s favored private broadcasting entities and their contractors.

In some cases, private broadcasting entities and surrogate broadcasters can be effective if they have the right programming philosophy,  proper management and  sufficient autonomy combined with sufficient oversight.  Ultimately, much will depend on the quality and experience of the people the Obama Administration puts in charge of these programs. Their understanding how we can communicate with other nations by presenting what’s best in our culture and intellectual tradition will determine whether these programs will be successful in the future.

About Ted Lipien

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 programs to Ukraine and Russia. 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.

About FreeMediaOnline.org

FreeMediaOnline.org is a San Francisco-based nonprofit which supports media freedom worldwide. 

About GovoritAmerika.us

In December 2008, FreeMediaOnline.org launched a Russian-language web site — GovoritAmerika.us ГоворитАмерика.us  – which includes summaries of some of the 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.

BBG officials initially had told the VOA Russian Service that their requests to resume radio broadcasts were a “non-starter” even after Russia invaded Georgia. Only after weeks of protests, including reporting by FreeMediaOnline.org, the BBG finally allowed VOA to produce a short audio program for the Internet, updated only Monday through Friday. This program is rather difficult to find on the VOA website. We made it available for easier access and listening on the GovoritAmerika.us website managed by FreeMediaOnline.org.

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VOA Responds to Crisis in Georgia

On August 8, 2008, Russia’s military forces in Georgia’s breakaway region of South Ossetia began invading Georgian territory and moving toward its capital, Tbilisi. In response to the crisis, VOA increased its daily Georgian radio broadcasts from 30 to 60 minutes on shortwave and FM. VOA’s broadcast is also available live and on-demand on VOA Georgian’s website. VOA’s Russian Service also provided comprehensive coverage of Russia-Georgia conflict.

Even after the crisis started, former BBG members, Edward E. Kaufman (now a Democratic senator from Delaware) and James K. Glassman (former BBG chairman who was also President Bush’s Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy) rejected urgent pleas from Voice of America journalists to resume VOA Russian-language radio broadcasts to Russia and to the war zone in Georgia. According to FreeMediaOnline.org sources, Mr. Kaufman blocked a formal request from another BBG member Blanquita Walsh Cullum ( a Republican appointee and the only working journalist serving on the board) to have a new vote on resuming VOA Russian radio programs.

In another part of the budget request, the BBG admits that the Russian service “ceased its radio broadcasts on July 26, 2008,” and “is enhancing its website to appeal to burgeoning web audiences with targeted content.” The document fails to point out that largely as a result of ending VOA Russian radio and television programs, VOA’s annual reach in Russia dropped by 98% from 7.3% in 2007 to 0.2% (est.) in 2009 (another omission). No other international broadcaster, U.S. or foreign, has ever experienced a similarly dramatic fall in ratings. Even a 25% drop would have been a disaster, yet the BBG claims that despite a 98% audience loss VOA “improved its programming to such strategically important countries as… Russia.”

While advocating Internet-only strategy for Voice of America in Russia — rather than far more prudent and far more effective multiple platform program delivery  — the BBG admits in another part of its budget request that the Internet is vulnerable to blockage and censorship by unfriendly governments, ”Governments also target RFE/RL [a BBG-run private broadcaster] with technological disruption, including a global cyber attack in April 2008 which probably originated in Belarus, and Kazakhstan’s blockage of RFE/RL’s Kazakh-language website in the spring of 2008.” Another cyber attack, this time against Georgian websites, occurred during the Russian military intervention in Georgia. A recent article by Understanding Government, “Will America’s Voice Stay Silenced?“, reported on this issue and other problems at the BBG. 

The BBG’s budget request also states that “in response to the crisis, VOA increased its daily Georgian radio broadcasts from 30 to 60 minutes on shortwave and FM.” That statement is only technically correct. What the BBG does not mention is that the broadcasting board also had plans to eliminate all VOA radio programs to Georgia and that the VOA Georgian service was reduced to a handful of journalists who were not able to immediately increase airtime and had to work nonstop for many days just to produce a 30 minute radio program.

The BBG budget request to the U.S. Congress also includes another disingenuous and misleading statement:

VOA Covers Mumbai Terrorist Attacks

VOA’s South Asia Division language services provided wall-to-wall coverage of the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, including on-the-ground coverage from stringers, interviews in Pakistan and India, and live call-in shows. VOA Hindi provided its new affiliate Zee TV with reaction from President Bush, President-elect Obama, U.S. officials, experts and members of American-Indian communities.

In fact, shorty before the Mumbai terrorist attacks, the BBG terminated all Voice of America radio broadcasts in Hindi. While bragging and misleading the Congress about its response to the terrorist attacks in India, in another part of the budget request the BBG frankly admits that it plans to close down VOA Hindi service altogether:

BBG proposes to end VOA broadcasts in Croatian, Hindi, and Greek, and discontinue radio rebroadcasts of PNN television programming and one hour daily of original VOA Persian radio.

Another misleading omission in the BBG’s FY 2010 budget request deals with VOA broadcasts to Ukraine:

Ukrainian Language Broadcasting

VOA’s Ukrainian Service continues to have a major impact through its television programming. An October 2008 survey indicated that VOA Ukrainian’s weekly TV programs reach 11.9 percent of the population and that the combined weekly TV, radio, and Internet audience is 14.2 percent (5.7 million people).

In fact, the BBG terminated all VOA radio broadcasts to Ukraine on December 31, 2008, a day before Russia cut off deliveries of natural gas to Ukraine and Western Europe in a billing dispute with Kiev, as it had earlier terminated VOA radio to Russia. Yet the BBG describes both Russia and Ukraine as “strategically important countries” for VOA broadcasting and in another part of the FY 2010 budget request says that “Russia has effectively turned into a one-party dictatorship in the past few years.”

The Broadcasting Board of Governor ignored numerous requests from members of Congress not to end VOA radio programming to media-at-risk countries like Russia and Ukraine. The BBG also ignored requests from members of Congress not to end VOA radio programs in Hindi.

According to the BBG’s critics, including BBG employees and their union leaders, misleading and disingenuous statements in the FY 2010 budget request reflect a culture of mismanagement and arrogance that was captured in the OPM’s most recent Human Capital Survey designed to measure employee job satisfaction and confidence in the management. This is what the AFGE Local 1812 government employees union website says about the quality of the management at the Broadcasting Board of Governors:

BBG CLAIMS TITLE AS THE WORST PLACE TO WORK IN GOVERNMENT

DATELINE: Washington, D.C., 01/23/09. AFGE Local 1812 has obtained a copy of the Office of Personnel Management’s (OPM) ranking of government agencies which included the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) based on the results of the 2008 Human Capital Resources survey. The BBG ranked dead last on three of the four categories the OPM measures in its survey. Finishing second to last in one category prevented an atrocious clean sweep of the four categories measuring the effectiveness of management at the BBG.

The BBG’s management problems are not limited only to federal government workers at the Voice of America working in Washington, D.C. but extend to other BBG-managed  U.S.-funded broadcasting entities throughout the world. Foreign journalists working for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), a private broadcaster also supervised by the BBG, accuse the management of depriving them, based on national origin, of the same job security and labor protection rights which are available to both American and Czech employees. RFE/RL headquarters are based in Prague, the Czech Republic. RFE/RL’s former acting president, Jeffrey Trimble, is now the BBG’s executive director and was responsible for implementing personnel and other management decisions during the period covered by the Human Capital Survey. He was replaced at RFE/RL in Prague by another BBG-selected official, Dr. Jeffrey Gedmin, a former resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty journalists-at-risk are a group of the most vulnerable contract employees from countries like Russia, Uzbekistan,  Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Afghanistan, Iran and several others. These journalists charge that by taking advantage of the communist era laws still on the books in the Czech Republic, the BBG has restricted their right to challenge unlawful discrimination and employment termination in Czech and U.S. courts.

Two former RFE/RL employees plan to pursue their claims against RFE/RL and the BBG by challenging the communist era Czech laws in the European Court of Human Rights. They have also petitioned United States Attorney General Eric Holder to open a criminal investigation of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and its supervising Federal agency, the Broadcasting Board of Governors.

On May 6, the Czech news agency, CTK, and the largest Czech national daily Dnes (Today) reported that the two petitioners, former RFE/RL employees, a Croatian citizen Snjezana Pelivan and Anna Karapetian, an Armenian journalist, are charging BBG and the management of U.S. Congress-funded radio station with fraudulent deception intended to keep RFE/RL foreign personnel in a legal vacuum without court protection in the United States and the Czech Republic.

The BBG has also been severely criticized for imposing its programming and marketing strategy on journalists and forcing them to follow recommendations from uninformed consultants, some of them with links to BBG members, rather than allowing journalists and managers to use their own expert  knowledge of the audience. In an interview scheduled for publication this week, former head of RFE/RL Russian Service, Mario Corti, who was forced out in a programming dispute four years ago, charges that the BBG’s strategy and the American management of the station have destroyed the unique value of Radio Liberty broadcasts in Russia and made them nearly ineffective. Corti is now a manager at a private radio network in Russia. Since his departure, RFE/RL has been criticized by a Russian human rights organization for giving airtime to nationalist extremists known for promoting racist views and its Moscow-based bureau chief was downplaying the impact of the murder of a prominent human rights reporter Anna Politkovskaya.

But one of the most severely criticized BBG operations has been the Alhurra Television program for the Middle East.  According to KEBABfest blog, maintained by Arab-Americans, Alhurra viewers are subjected to “hours of mindless chatter interspersed with shallow assessments of selected current events and random feature stories (some of which are marginally entertaining). There is no depth in the news coverage, nor in the rest of the programming. Rather, there is a failed attempt at fast-paced US-style news that comes off as chaotic and incoherent.” Alhurra was also criticized for giving airtime to Holocaust deniers. A study by researchers for the University of Southern California, who conducted a review of Alhurra broadcasts, concluded that “the quality of Alhurra’s journalism is substandard on several levels“ and that the station has no significant audience in the Middle East.

Not surprisingly, the BBG is presenting Congress with a much rosier picture of Alhurra programming:

Expanding our reach.

The new three-hour daily show Al Youm launched on March 8, 2009 has redefined Alhurra’s voice in the region with an information mix unique in the Middle East today. The new show provides a platform for focusing on the news of the day, discussing compelling social issues, and a spectrum of information not presented anywhere else in the region’s media. The program broadcasts reports directly from the Middle East with hubs in Dubai, Beirut, Cairo, and Jerusalem. The mix from the region and America will continue to capitalize on Alhurra’s ability to provide the people of the Middle East with unique insight into America that will inform their views and opinions of the region, the world, and the United States.

While the original concept for Alhurra’s surrogate broadcasting, based on outdated Cold War models, came from neoconservatives in the Bush White House, programming and marketing strategy for Alhurra, Radio Sawa and other  U.S. broadcasting entities, which is still followed by the BBG, was introduced by former Democratic BBG member Norman Pattiz, founder of U.S. radio syndicate Westwood One and a protege of Vice President Joe Biden when he was a U.S. senator from Delaware.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors FY 2010 Budget Request to the U.S. Congress (link) provides for an interesting reading and is a good example of how government bureaucrats try to hide their mistakes and mismanagement of government resources while asking U.S. taxpayers for more money, said Ted Lipien, former VOA acting associate director, who is now president of FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit which supports independent journalism worldwide.

In response to the termination of VOA radio broadcasts to Russia, FreeMediaOnline.org has helped to launch a Russian-language news website, GovoritAmerika.us, which offers a wide selection of Russian-language news analysis from both U.S. government and nongovernment sources. GovoritAmerika.us is staffed by volunteers and receives no public funding.

WILL AMERICA’S VOICE STAY SILENCED?

07. May 2009
An Understanding Government report

By Mitchell Polman

Washington, D.C. — Since it was founded in 1942, the Voice of America has been just that – a radio voice for the American perspective on the issues of the day and a prime source of information about American society for its overseas audiences. VOA has also brought educational programs to overseas audiences on such issues as public health and business skills. In recent years, however, the broadcasting service has experienced staff cuts, service reductions, and politically-charged controversies.

At the center of the storm has been the Broadcasting Board of Governors, or BBG, which oversees U.S. government-funded media outlets. And these problems have arisen while – largely through emergency supplemental appropriations from Congress in the past couple of years – the Broadcasting Board of Governors has seen its budget actually increase. Critics say that the BBG has skewed priorities and has spent money that could have gone to its broadcasting services on wasteful administrative overhead and public relations efforts.

America’s voice in Russia fades to silence

Last year the BBG made the unpopular and unexpected decision to terminate all Russian language shortwave radio and television broadcasts of the Voice of America. It ordered VOA to shift its resources towards Internet-based broadcasting. The decision has been widely criticized, in large part because Internet penetration in Russia is too low – estimated at 20% by some pollsters – to justify ending radio and television broadcasts to the Russian public.

But critics see more than just a mistaken choice of media. Former VOA Deputy Director, and author of the book Voice of America: a History, Alan Heil, Jr., for example, said regarding radio service to Russia that “the Voice of America cannot continue to be silent. It would not only be contrary to the U.S. national interest. It would also be a distinctly untimely disservice to millions of listeners in Russia and the surrounding republics that had, until last July, depended on VOA Russian for more than sixty years as their reliable window on a turbulent world.”

Critics note that it is easier for governments to block websites and control Internet usage than it is to block shortwave radio, and that shortwave radio is more commonplace in conflict zones – where the need for independent media is most vital. The BBG’s decision has been called shortsighted for other reasons, in particular because the VOA could have continued producing shortwave and FM radio as well as television content using its seasoned Russian-language reporting staff – and used it on the Internet as well. Instead, the BBG ordered VOA to produce content only for the VOA website and terminate all Russian language radio and television programming.

And while some in the Broadcasting Board of Governors may consider shortwave radio to be a dying technology, the Russian government apparently does not. As the Voice of America fades as a radio source, Radio Moscow has been renamed the Voice of Russia, and it continues to broadcast in shortwave throughout both Russia and the entire world.

“Runet” – the Internet in Russia

Obviously, there is a vital role for the Internet in America’s information arsenal. In a December 2008 report, the media research group InterMedia said that television remains the dominant source of news coverage in Russia, but that the Internet is growing. 19% of the population, according to InterMedia, reported using the Internet to follow current events in Russia in 2008, up from 13% in 2007.

However, by some estimates only 2% of Russians have broadband service. Without broadband service, listening to radio programs or watching television programs over the Internet can be difficult. Broadband and DSL subscriptions are on the rise, but they are still mostly available in Moscow and St. Petersburg and other major cities. Several companies have large plans to expand their networks. However, as it stands now, many homes can not get even dial-up service for lack of a landline, and it is doubtful that Russian citizens will put up with or pay for watching or listening to a half hour long program on a painfully slow Internet connection. Overall, it seems clear that the share of the Russian population that is not thoroughly “wired” is now unable to be part of the VOA audience.

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty gains while VOA loses

The BBG shifted some of VOA’s resources, including radio frequencies, to a different radio broadcaster — Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL). RFE/RL – known simply as “Svoboda,” or “freedom,” in Russian, was a vital source of information for human rights activists inside the USSR during much of the Cold War. However, the two broadcast entities do not share the same mission or approach to broadcasting, so an expansion of Radio Free Europe cannot be seen as a substitute for what VOA has done in the past.

To begin with, RFE/RL focuses exclusively on news involving the country and region that is broadcasting to, whereas the VOA adds world news and reports on American policies and society. In addition, RFE/RL contracts with private companies overseas or surrogates in places like Moscow to reach its audience. The surrogate companies and their staffs and families are often subject to governmental pressure, intimidation, and threats. The Voice of America, on the other hand, broadcasts directly from Washington and avoids these direct pressures.

Historically, the Voice of America had a larger audience in Russia than RFE/RL has at present. According to InterMedia, VOA’s Russian language service had a cumulative annual audience for 2007 of 6,504,030 people (broadcasting for three hours of radio daily and one hour of TV) while RFE/RL had 3,613,350 people (broadcasting eighteen hours daily on radio). VOA radio had an average weekly listenership of 481,780 listeners, VOA TV had an average weekly viewership of 722,670 viewers and VOA had 120,445 visitors for its website from Russia. These statistics are for Russia only – they do not include Russian language speakers from Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan or other former Soviet republics, which are believed to be a substantial audience.

Finally, there is also some dispute about the methodologies being used to determine the number of visits to VOA’s Russian language website. Sources familiar with VOA’s numbers comment that roughly half of the visits to VOA’s Russian language site may actually be coming from inside the United States. Even if this estimate is exaggerated, there is no disputing the fact that the number of VOA website users is far below the audience that VOA TV and radio enjoyed in Russia. The most recent InterMedia study shows VOA’s annual audience reach in Russia dropped by 98% in just one year: from 7.3% in 2007 to an estimated 0.2% in 2009 (0.2% is the VOA Russian Internet reach.) This drop was experienced only by VOA, so it cannot be solely because of the Russian government’s restrictive media policies. Clearly the disappearance of VOA radio service has harmed America’s ability to reach out to Russian citizens.

Reaction from inside and outside Russia

The cutbacks in VOA service have drawn protests from many quarters. On July 31, 2008 a prominent group of human rights activists in St. Petersburg, Russia, including Aleksandr Nikitin, Anna Sharogradskaya, Olga Staravoitova, and lawyer Yuri Schmidt, sent a letter to Congress asking it to intervene with the BBG saying, “(The Russian) public is deprived of objective coverage of events inside the country and abroad. International radio stations broadcasting in Russian and Internet are the only sources of unbiased, balanced, and truthful information, especially analysis of global events. That is why we believe that it is premature to end VOA’s Russian Service broadcast.”

The bi-partisan Congressional Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, or CSCE, sent a letter to the Broadcasting Board of Governors in October 2008 protesting the Russian service cutbacks as well as planned reductions in VOA’s Ukrainian and Georgian services then-Chairman Alcee Hastings (D-FL) and Ranking Minority Christopher Smith (R-NJ) asked for VOA shortwave radio service to be restored saying, “Freedom of the media in Russia, especially on the airwaves, has been cut to the point that it is extremely difficult for people to hear views other than those espoused by the Kremlin.”

Problems with the BBG decision emerged in stark relief during the August 2008 conflict between Russia and Georgia. Russian language VOA programming went off the air on July 26, less than two weeks before the Russian army entered Georgia on August 7, 2008. Russian speakers in the region thus had one less source for coverage of the war and of the American government’s views. The Georgian language service had also been slated to go off the air, but was granted a reprieve and temporarily increased at the insistence of Congress.

VOA would suffer similar embarrassments in the months ahead as, for example, it terminated Ukrainian language radio service the day before Russia disrupted gas service to Ukraine on January 1, 2009, and when VOA’s highly popular Hindi language radio programs (with an audience of eight million listeners a week) went off the air shortly before the terrorist attacks on Mumbai. After protests from VOA supporters, VOA radio returned on a Moscow-based AM channel for only thirty minutes a day Monday through Friday, down from its previous three hours.

Former VOA Staff Calling for Service Restorations

One of the most prominent critics of the BBG is Ted Lipien, who spent 33 years with the VOA as a reporter and then as Associate Director for Central Programming. Retiring in 2006, Mr. Lipien soon after started the website FreeMediaOnline.org to assist independent broadcasters and journalists worldwide. Responding to the cutbacks at VOA, Mr. Lipien launched GovoritAmerika.us, a Russian language site containing news summaries from U.S. government and non-governmental sources.

Mr. Lipien’s criticisms of the BBG go beyond disagreements over planned cutbacks. He charges that BBG market research findings have led Voice of America to cut back on criticism of the Putin government. Mr. Lipien has similarly charged that market research was behind a Radio Liberty decision to carry a program featuring Russian extremists, which sparked protests from Russian human rights groups. Lipien says that most of the responsibility for the cutbacks in Russian language service is the responsibility of Ted Kaufman, a close confidante of Vice President Biden who replaced Biden as U.S. senator from Delaware.

Lipien is also critical of BBG member Jeffrey Hirschberg, charging that Hirschberg’s business interests in Russia are “an apparent conflict of interest” with his BBG responsibilities. Hirschberg, a former Director of the U.S.-Russia Business Council, is still on their board and is a partner and Managing Director of Kalorama Partners, LLC, a Washington, DC-based consulting and risk-management company. However, no specific conflict of interest has been documented and it is worth noting that Hirschberg is also a board member of the human rights group Freedom House. But according to Lipien, “in many ways, BBG’s business-connected members with conflicts of interest are more dangerous for journalistic independence at VOA and RFE/RL than the White House and State Department officials who in the past had also tried to interfere with programming for political reasons.”

James Glassman, Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy near the end of George W. Bush’s term, was previously the BBG Board Chairman and led the effort to abolish the Russian language services. The board members who voted to abolish the services cited the decline of shortwave and the rise of the Internet as part of their reasoning for the changes.

Voices of discord at VOA Russian service?

However, other VOA insiders speculate that the reorganization of the Russian service may in part have been due to a reputation that it developed in earlier times as having a myriad of internal personnel problems. Former USIA official William P. Kiehl, the Country Affairs Officer for the USSR and Baltic States from 1981-1983, said of the VOA Russian service,

Among those who worked with, but not in, the Russian Service of the VOA, it was known as ‘the snake pit’ because of the internecine warfare that was a constant among the staff. The Russian Service like many language services then and now reflected both the good and the bad of the societies that provided the native speakers–so in the case of the Russian Service you had Westernizers and Slavophiles, monarchists and socialists, Jews and anti-Semites, Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant Christians, people with all sorts of agendas, all working together in a high pressure situation under the supervision of a Russian speaking Foreign Service Officer from the ranks of the USIA or the State Department.

Clearly, the diverse staff of the VOA Russian-language service – a product of the Soviet Union’s own complicated legacy – must have been a difficult one to manage. But it produced programming that was listened to by millions of Soviet citizens during the Cold War, and remained popular after the breakup of the USSR. This legacy has been interrupted with the changes to VOA’s Russian service.

The future of the BBG

Currently there are four vacancies on the BBG Board out of a total of nine seats. Secretary of State Clinton holds one seat on the board, but generally speaking the Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy, currently designated to be Ms. Judith McHale, sits in for the Secretary. Board members can serve after their terms have expired until replacements are named. Currently, four members are serving in this status. While traditionally, four members have been named by the Senate Minority Leader, and four by the sitting president, it is now technically possible for President Obama to remake the Board in its entirety by himself.

The Obama Administration has not given any indication who it will appoint to the BBG or if it will even keep the BBG as an institution. In both 2007 and 2008 the Office of Personnel Management rated the BBG as having the worst employee satisfaction level of any government agency. So new appointees will have their hands full trying to fix it, and the abrupt decision taken in 2008 to end Russian-language service may be impossible to reverse. There continues to be a great deal of uncertainty surrounding much of VOA’s work. For example, the Uzbek language service was taken off the air, only to be switched back on in 2004-5. It is now again being threatened with closure.

It is quite possible that the Obama Administration views the BBG as an agency in need of an overhaul. The BBG was founded in the wake of the dismantling of the United States Information Agency (USIA) in 1999, a move which reshaped – not necessarily for the better – America’s public diplomacy. At that time, most of USIA’s programs were folded into the Department of State. But there was a fear that VOA, RFE/RL, and Radio Marti (which broadcasts to Cuba) would be unable to maintain their journalistic independence under the Department of State. The concept of a bi-partisan board with governors from both parties appointed by the president, with a spot reserved for a State Department official, arose as a solution to that problem.

Today, questions remain as to how international broadcasting operations should be managed. As a Senator, Vice President Biden was among those most involved in the discussion. How the Obama Administration will approach international broadcasting remains to be seen, but it is likely the BBG’s many perceived missteps are going to lead to some changes. In these challenging times, America can ill afford such tumult in its overseas broadcasting services.

No in-depth reports from the Voice of America or high-resolution photos from the State Department, but one can now find sexy images on the VOA Russian website. The Clinton-Lavrov meeting and the First Lady’s visit to the State Department revealed  a sorry state of U.S. public diplomacy and international broadcasting.

It took hours after Secretary Clinton and her Russian counterpart Foreign Minister Lavrov had finished their joint press conference in Geneva before the Voice of America (VOA) Russian and English websites posted  brief reports about the meeting.  These reports were not much longer than a summary of a wire service story that one may find in a local American newspaper. A foreign audience expecting detailed coverage and in-depth analysis with multiple viewpoints from Washington would be greatly disappointed.

The Voice of America is the primary U.S. international broadcaster charged with providing news and information about the United States in English and foreign languages, but its funding and programs to many parts of the world, including Russia, have been slashed by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). If foreign audiences turned to the State Department or the White House websites for timely information and analysis about the state of Russian-American relations and the Obama Administration’s support for human rights abroad, they would have been equally disappointed.

VOA’s English Service relied on a stringer in Switzerland to file her report on the Clinton-Lavrov meeting. VOA Russian Service apparently did not have money send a reporter to Geneva.  If the Russians wanted a different perspective — a view from Washington — there was no instant analysis from American experts on the VOA website after the Geneva meeting about the changing relationship between Washington and Moscow under President Obama. One also did not find any transcripts of post-meeting interviews with U.S. and Russian officials or independent experts, because none were conducted.

That Voice of America still exists and was able to report on the meeting at all is in itself a miracle. In its spearheading of costly and counterproductive propaganda initiatives for the Middle East and privatization of U.S. international broadcasting assets, the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which manages the Voice of America, terminated all VOA Arabic programs and slashed many other VOA broadcasts. It funded instead private entities, such as Radio Sawa and Alhurra Arabic television. Government and media investigations revealed that money moved from VOA to fund these initiatives provided more opportunities for employees of these private entities and for private contractors to engage in questionable journalism and financial fraud.

In supporting Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television, Democrats favoring private contractors joined forces with neoconservative Republican BBG members (the Board is by law bipartisan) to deprive more and more Voice of America services of their ability to accurately present American news and values to the world. Last summer, the BBG eliminated VOA radio programs to Russia, just 12 days before the Russian invasion of Georgia.

Drained of resources, the Voice of America is no longer able to practice journalism that would interest and satisfy  a seriously-minded audience in countries like Russia. VOA Russian Service journalists were instructed instead to develop their now miniscule Internet audience by learning from market research and marketing techniques outlined in documents provided to FreeMediaOnline.org by VOA officials who want to remain anonymous.

It’s no surprise, therefore, that  the BBG-commissioned market research in Russia — which showed that Russian focus groups like Mr. Putin, don’t like to hear stories about human rights violations, and are tired of political media reporting — is beginning to have an impact at VOA. A recent VOA Russian Service report, “What American women think about Sexx,” about an exhibit of American women-artists in Moscow, was not only full of titillating images but also far longer and far more detailed than the news report filed after the Clinton-Lavrov meeting.

Such misuse of market research is a prime example of the many failures of U.S. international broadcasting. But equally serious are public diplomacy mishaps at the State Department, which were also revealed during the Clinton-Lavrov meeting and at a later ceremony in Washington to honor women who fought for human rights.

Wanting to dramatize the Obama Administration’s desire to “push the reset button” on U.S.-Russian relations, at the Geneva meeting Secretary Clinton presented Foreign Minister Lavrov with a red plastic button with a Russian word “ПЕРЕГРУЗКА” printed on top. The wording turned out, however, to be an embarrassing mistake. Lavrov pointed out that the word used means “overload” or “overcharge,” not “reset.” The correct was ПЕРЕЗАГРУЗКА.

FreeMediaOnline.org has learned that Secretary Clinton hit on the “reset button” idea in Geneva with her team. According to one source, the translator hadn’t gotten there yet, and someone who said he spoke Russian well suggested what word to use.

If the State Department still had experienced and competent public diplomacy officers, they would have made sure that Secretary Clinton’s idea, which was not bad from a PR perspective, would not be mishandled. At the very least, they would have called the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, the official State Department translators section,  or any Russian journalist – but apparently no one did. One former VOA Russian Service broadcaster observed that she has never seen Lavrov, who usually looks very dour, smile so much as he made fun of the mistake in the presence of Mrs. Clinton and her team.

While VOA’s coverage of the Clinton-Lavrov’s meeting was minimal at best, for several days after the meeting the State Department website provided no information in text form on what was discussed and no usable photos. In yet another embarrassing mistake, the State Department posted a photo, which stayed on the site over the weekend, claiming to show Secretary Clinton greeting Foreign Minister Lavrov, when in fact the person with her on the photo was somebody else.

The State Department did, however, post a long video of the Clinton-Lavrov press conference rather promptly.  The Bush Administration public diplomacy team at State greatly favored the use of video, probably because it requires little additional effort to post on the website. But a long video of the press conference without a translated transcript is of little use to foreign journalists who work under tight deadlines, may have limited knowledge of English,  and may not have high-speed Internet access. They simply won’t bother to spend time reviewing the video, taking notes, and reporting.

In the past, the Voice of America might have carried such a bilateral press conference live in its Russian-language radio program and provide instant commentary on the event. Even without live shortwave radio delivery, which was eliminated by the BBG, VOA Russian Service could have put an audio transmission from the press conference on the Internet  and post a written transcript within minutes. But BBG officials made sure that VOA no longer has resources to send a Russian Service reporter abroad or to provide such coverage.

One of the functions of the now defunct United States Information Agency, which was responsible for public diplomacy, was to make sure that foreign media promptly received accurate U.S. government information about important meetings with foreign leaders, as well as copyright-free photographs, audio recordings and videos, which foreign journalists could then use at no cost and without any restrictions. After USIA was disbanded, no one at the State Department seems to want this responsibility or has a budget to carry out such functions, while the Broadcasting Board of Governors deprived VOA of resources to do serious journalistic work for countries like Russia. The State Department, which took over USIA’s public diplomacy functions, has not made arrangements for employees to work on weekends or at night to perform such trivial functions as taking photos, posting transcripts of press conferences, and uploading accurately identified, royalty-free images.

The vast majority of images on the State Department and Voice of America websites come from the Associated Press and cannot be reused by foreign media outlets unless they are also AP customers. They are useless to citizen journalists working for such websites as GovoritAmerika.us, which was launched by FreeMediaOnline.org– a San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit — to compensate for program cuts and restrictions imposed by the BBG on the Voice of America.  The website provides Russian-language information from multiple U.S. government and nongovernment sources and relies on copyright-free photos from U.S. government and other websites.

The meeting in Geneva took place Friday, March 6.  On Tuesday, March 10,  a single official photo showing Secretary Clinton presenting Foreign Minister Lavrov the red button with the embarrassing inscription  – this time Mr. Lavrov properly identified  – finally appeared on the State Department site. It also took four days for the transcript of the press conference to be posted by the State Department.

A similar problem reappeared a few days later during an important human rights event sponsored by the U.S. government. First Lady Michelle Obama went to the State Department to honor foreign women who risked their safety to defend human rights in their  native countries, including Russia and Uzbekistan. Despite the unprecedented nature of the First Lady’s participation in such an event, neither the State Department nor the White House website posted any good quality, high-resolution photos of Secretary Clinton and Michelle Obama presenting the 2009 Women of Courage Awards to these human rights activists. Yet another opportunity for effective public diplomacy was wasted by U.S. government officials. At least in this case, the Voice of America Russian Service deserves credit for finding enough resources to post a more detailed story.

The most recent mishaps show that the U.S. government no longer has the knowledge of how to manage U.S.-funded international broadcast journalism and public diplomacy. The Bush Administration’s Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, James K. Glassman,  was a great believer in using private Internet contractors to conduct public diplomacy on behalf of the U.S. government with the help of video and the latest interactive technology. He and other Bush appointees failed to understand, however, that technology cannot be a substitute for an in-depth understanding of foreign cultures and substantive experience in public diplomacy, journalism, and human rights issues.

As a former chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, Glassman was responsible for terminating VOA Russian radio and TV programs and refused to resume them even after the Russian attack on Georgia. He assured journalists in VOA’s Russian Service that his preferred Internet-only strategy  would work and was not concerned that no other major international broadcaster wanted to give up completely Russian-language radio and TV on-air programs.

All international broadcasters except VOA managed to maintain their audience reach in Russia in 2008 despite Mr. Putin’s continued efforts to restrict foreign and independent domestic media reporting. The British broadcaster BBC has reduced funding for its radio programs to Russia –   for which it has come under criticism, and there are calls for an investigation — but it has not completely eliminated live Russian-language radio broadcasting.  While relying more on the Internet and developing its Web-based reporting, BBC Russian Service has recently introduced a  weekend news program in its newly refreshed radio schedule. VOA is barely able to fund a skeleton Web team to work on weekends and  it no longer has funding for anything resembling regularly scheduled live radio and TV programming to Russia.

With the elimination of live Voice of America’s Russian-language radio and TV programs, VOA’s annual audience reach in Russia registered a dramatic 98% decline, from 10.3% to 0.2% (estimated based on 2008 data). Despite offering more sex and less politics, it was most likely the largest single audience decline in international broadcasting history for any major media outlet that has not completely left the market but merely changed its program content and program delivery strategy.

It seems that the legacy established by the officials eager to promote primitive propaganda and privatization of government functions still hangs over the State Department and the Voice of America.  These government bureaucrats know very little about journalism, public diplomacy, and effective use of the Internet. Instead of taking advantage of the latest innovations in interactive Internet technology to promote American views and ideas abroad, they tarnished America’s image by  leaving vital government PR functions in the hands of greedy and incompetent private contractors.

Several members of Congress, including Senator Richard Lugar (R-Indiana), are trying to revive support and funding for professionally conducted U.S. public diplomacy. Senator Lugar introduced S. Res. 49 on February 13, 2009, expressing the sense of the Senate regarding the importance of public diplomacy. He also wrote an oped for ForeignPolicy.com on this topic. Another U.S. Senator, Sam Brownback (R-Kansas),  has called for abolishing the Broadcasting Board of Governors. He introduced legislation that would establish the National Center for Strategic Communications, an agency similar to the now defunct U.S. Information Agency. Senator Patrick Leahy (D -Vermont) has tried to stop the BBG from eliminating U.S. broadcasts in foreign languages but his efforts have been ignored by the Board members and their executive staff.

Whether these and other calls for reforming U.S. public diplomacy and international broadcasting will be answered and result in meaningful legislative changes will depend on the cooperation from the Obama White House. Perhaps the mishandling of the meeting in Geneva and  the inability to take a full PR advantage of Michelle Obama’s presence at an important human rights event at the State Department will encourage the Administration to look seriously into this problem. If nothing is done to reform public diplomacy and international broadcasting, the job of explaining America to the world will remain in the hands of incompetent government officials and private contractors working without any guidance, coordination or supervision.

About Ted Lipien

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 programs to Ukraine and Russia.

About FreeMediaOnline.org

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.

About GovoritAmerika.us

In December 2008, FreeMediaOnline.org has launched a Russian-language web site — GovoritAmerika.us ГоворитАмерика.us  – which includes summaries of some of the 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.

But even the low figure of 2.5% does not reflect the whole severity of the decline since it represents VOA audience for the whole of 2008 and not VOA’s current reach in Russia. FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit,  estimates that the annual reach for VOA in Russia is now well below 1 percent.

According to FreeMediaOnline.org president Ted Lipien,  the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), the agency in charge of VOA, is to blame for causing a 98% loss of audience in just one year. Lipien said that BBG’s actions have caused hundreds of thousands of U.S. taxpayer dollars to be wasted at a time when audiences in Russia are faced with increased media censorship and need access to objective news and opinions from the United States. 

With the elimination by the BBG of on-air VOA radio and TV for Russia in the second half of last year, FreeMediaOnline.org estimates the total audience since August/September 2008 to be not much higher than 0.2 percent. InterMedia — the firm which conducted the survey – reported 0.2% as past year’s reach of VOA Russian Service website. InterMedia also reported that only a very small percentage of former VOA Russian radio listeners and TV viewers are visiting VOA website.

From the InterMedia market media report: “International Broadcasting in Russia,”  December 2008:

VOA Russian [Service] stopped airing radio and TV programs by September 2008 (video and audio segments are still aired by a small number of local stations); Internet is Golos Ameriki’s [VOA Russian Service] principal focus for reaching audiences in Russia. This caused a drop in total annual reach for Golos Ameriki from 10.3 percent in 2007 to 2.5 percent in 2008. Past-year reach for VOA’s golosameriki.us Internet site was 0.2 percent.[Emphasis added by FreeMediaOnline.org.] Other international broadcasters were able to maintain their reach, with Radio Svoboda [Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL)] reaching 1.0 percent of Russians weekly and 3.2 percent annually; BBC reaching 0.8 percent weekly and 3.3 percent annually; and DW [the German broadcaster] reaching 0.7 percent weekly and 2.0 annually. As with Golos Ameriki, [VOA Russian Service] only a very small portion of this reach can currently be attributed to the websites. 

In late July 2008, just twelve days before the Russian army invaded parts of Georgia in a territorial dispute,  the BBG took all VOA  Russian-language radio programs off the air and later canceled VOA Russian-language TV programs. These decisions were made without any public announcements and implemented despite protests from members of Congress, VOA journalists, and human rights organizations.

The subsequent tremendous drop in audience size (98% in just one year — an unprecedented loss of audience for an existing  media service in the history of international broadcasting) can be attributed almost entirely to decisions made by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a small group of presidentially-appointed officials representing both major political parties and their executive staff who manage U.S.-funded broadcasts for overseas audiences.  Critics of the BBG’s actions argue that these decisions have deprived VOA journalists of their ability to counter censorship in Russia by making it impossible for VOA to use multiple program delivery platforms and media products at a critical time.

VOA and other Western international broadcasters have experienced a steady loss of audience reach in Russia over a number of years as a result of the Kremlin’s restrictive media policies. But according to Ted Lipien, president of FreeMediaOnline.org, the sudden multifold  drop in 2008 was a direct result of actions taken by U.S. government officials and cannot be attributed to any new restrictions by the Russian authorities.  Also confirming that the BBG is to blame for the sudden loss of VOA audience in Russia  was an observation in the InterMedia report that ”other international broadcasters were able to maintain their reach” last year.

Former BBG chairman,  James K. Glassman – known for his neoconservative views, support for privatization of U.S. international broadcasting assets, and great enthusiasm for the use of Internet –  personally rejected urgent requests from VOA journalists who pleaded with him last August to allow them to resume radio broadcasts to Russia and the war zone in Georgia.

BBG officials justified their actions by claiming that VOA would be in a better position to overcome Russian government media censorship if it concentrated its programming efforts exclusively on the Internet. FreeMediaOnline.org and others repeatedly warned the BBG that this strategy was extremely naive and would reward Mr. Putin’s censorship of independent media. The same critics predicted a drastic drop in audience size for VOA if the BBG implemented its plan. They also pointed out that the BBG plan called for spending money on needless projects benefiting private Internet contractors while the Russian Service would be deprived of substantive Internet content previously generated from radio and TV programs.  Read FreeMediaOnline.org report “Model Interactive Website Touted As Replacement for Voice of America Radio to Russia Attracts No Comments from Users”

This is how in an internal memo “VOA Russian Options Paper,”  written in 2008, government bureaucrats inspired by the BBG’s marketing strategies, boasted about their ability to substantially increase VOA audience size in Russia using only the Internet:

Based on the situation in Georgia and the separatist territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, VOA has investigated options to reach audiences in Russia and neighboring countries. While options exists for reaching audiences through traditional broadcast methods — AM/FM, shortwave, and television — data indicate the growing market for reaching our target audience is in new media.

FreeMediaOnline.org sent a critique of the Internet-only strategy to the BBG, but a former BBG member, Edward E. Kaufman, who is now a Democratic Senator from Delaware, reportedly blocked an effort  by another Board member to hold a vote on resuming VOA radio broadcasts to Russia. Kaufman, another Board member Jeff Hirschberg, and the BBG executive director Jeffrey Trimble are believed to have initiated the move to deprive VOA of radio and TV presence in Russia in order to benefit Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Jeff Hirschberg and Jeffrey Trimble, who was formerly acting president of RFE/RL, have personal links with RFE/RL managers in Moscow and Prague, while Senator Kaufman may have supported the move because RFE/RL is incorporated in Delaware. His former boss, Vice President Biden, was also known to be a strong supporter of the private broadcaster during and after the Cold War. Trimble and most BBG members ignored warnings that by establishing a large presence in Russia after the Cold War, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has exposed its reporters, who are Russian citizens, to intimidation and blackmail by the Russian secret police. This was not seen as a problem immediately after the end of the Cold War but after Mr. Putin’s rise to power (he is a former KGB officer) is viewed as a serious threat to RFE/RL’s journalistic independence. Read FreeMediaOnline.org report Radio Liberty Russian managers put a positive spin on Putin’s comments about the murder of a pro-democracy journalist 

 VOA’s audience reach in Russia had been previously reduced over time due to the Russian secret police interference with the affiliate stations using VOA programs but never suffered a similar one-time loss, not even from major increases of jamming of shortwave radio signals during the Cold War.  FreeMediaOnline.org had warned that eliminating VOA radio and TV in Russia would be harmful to media freedom and would send a wrong signal to the Kremlin and human rights activists.

While all major Western international broadcasters have been increasing their Internet presence, none followed the BBG’s course on relying exclusively on the Internet in Russia and dropping both radio and TV. Ted Lipien said that a proper response to the growing media censorship in Russia should have been an expansion of the number of delivery platforms rather than their reduction to a single one. Before leaving public service, he was an acting associate director of the Voice of America. To compensate for restrictions and reductions in VOA output, FreeMediaOnline.org has launched a volunteer-run GovoritAmerica.us website, which compiles Russian-language news and analysis about the United States and U.S.-Russian relations.

Journalists working in the VOA Russian Service also don’t see BBG’s actions as designed to help them but rather as being part of the same strategy that resulted in the dismantling and eventual total elimination of VOA Arabic-language programs as well VOA broadcasts in other languages. After they had created Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television, BBG members made sure that VOA no longer had any Arabic-language programs. Some VOA Russian Service journalists suspect that the BBG executive staff purposely mislead the Board about the benefits of the Internet-only option in order to justify later a complete elimination of VOA broadcasts to Russia citing low audience ratings, which they knew would result from their actions.

One of many nonprofit foreign policy organizations, which believes the BBG has seriously mismanaged U.S. international broadcasting, is the highly-respected Public Diplomacy Council. The organization, which includes former diplomats, academics and other foreign policy experts, has called on President elect Obama and Congress to take urgent action in reforming publicly-funded U.S. international broadcasting. The Council blames the BBG for ignoring strategically important target areas such as Russia, the Balkans, India and the Western Hemisphere. The Council noted 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.  The Council also criticized the BBG’s decision to terminate all VOA radio broadcasts in Russian shortly before Russia’s military attack on Georgia last summer. Read FreeMediaOnline.org report: Public Diplomacy Experts Urge Obama to Stop the Broadcasting Board of Governors from Silencing the Voice of America

Many VOA journalists, NGO media freedom activists, and former U.S. diplomats believe that the BBG, dominated by an alliance of Republican neoconservatives and Democrats who joined forces in formulating and supporting ill-conceived outreach programs vis-a-vis the Muslim world such as Alhurra and Radio Sawa,  is determined to continue expanding privatization of U.S. broadcasting resources. The latest push, which affected Russia and Ukraine and threatened Georgia, came between July and December, in the waning months of the Bush Administration, and may have been purposely orchestrated and timed to present the Obama Administration with a fait accompli.

Not satisfied with killing VOA radio in Russia, on December 31, 2008, the BBG terminated VOA radio programs to Ukraine. This action was taken just hours before Russia stopped the flow of natural gas supplies through Ukraine when that country was on the verge of a major economic and political crisis. The Ukrainian crisis has since then gotten much worse and  now seriously threatens democratic gains and pro-Western foreign policy of the government in Kiev.

Critics have been warning for years that the Broadcasting Board of Governors is outsourcing vital journalistic and public diplomacy functions to private entities and contractors who – as a direct result of BBG’s marketing policies – are unable and unwilling to reflect American opinions and values and lack basic journalistic skills. (BBG-created private broadcaster Alhurra Television for the Middle East aired comments by Holocaust deniers and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty gave extensive airtime to extremist Russian politicians known for their racist views.)  A study by researchers for the University of Southern California, who conducted a review of Alhurra broadcasts, concluded that “The quality of Alhurra’s journalism is substandard on several levels.“

Critics also accuse the BBG of ignoring such problems with these private broadcasters and of deliberately trying to dismantle the Voice of America, which operates under strict U.S. government fiscal controls and enjoys journalistic independence under a Congressional Charter. The Charter requires VOA to adhere to high journalistic standards and to accurately and objectively represent a broad spectrum of American views. According to critics, BBG officials prefer to steer money to private broadcasters, such as Alhurra and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, because these stations can be more easily controlled. They can also be used to benefit their friends and supporters with high-paying positions and private contracts.

According to these critics, the BBG executive staff knew from previous market research that  VOA’s annual reach on the Internet for its Russian-language programs in Russia was well below one percent. (Weekly reach for VOA Russian website is far lower: 0.03%.) Despite of this data, BBG officials made widely exaggerated predictions and ignored obvious warnings that the Russian security services are fully capable of blocking and manipulating the Internet. RFE/RL was not ordered by the BBG to drop its shortwave radio broadcasts and managed to hold on to its radio audience, as did the BBC  and Deutsche Welle Russian-language services — another proof that the sudden 98% drop in VOA’s reach in Russia was orchestrated by the BBG and its executive staff.

Ted Lipien of FreeMediaOnline.org said that the actions of BBG officials that have obliterated VOA audience in Russia not only harm media freedom but represent  a monumental waste of U.S. taxpayers’ money. “In just one year, these BBG officials and their staff have completely wasted 98% of a VOA broadcasting service budget,  making a free gift of  hundreds of thousands of U.S. tax dollars to Mr. Putin and other enemies of democracy and free media in Russia,” Lipien said. Even if the BBG managed to increase VOA Russian-language website’s reach by 100% each year for the next few years,  — a highly unlikely prospect — it would take about a decade to go from 0.2 percent to the 2007/2008 level registered before the BBG’s single program delivery platform strategy was put into place.

As many critics have feared, there is also evidence that the BBG’s marketing policies may have started  a process of promoting censorship and self-censorship at the Voice of America, which would be a violation of the VOA Charter and U.S. law. In an apparent attempt to increase ratings similar to what seemed to have encouraged airing of statements by Holocaust deniers on Alhurra and giving airtime to racist politicians on RFE/RL broadcasts, VOA Russian Service journalists were reportedly confronted with the BBG-commissioned market research analysis and told to avoid topics that are “confrontational” to the Russian audience. They were also reportedly ”berated” for their “hostile” and “in your face” blogging and urged  not to express their opinions in blogs.

“They want VOA’s Russian Service toothless,” was the conclusion of one VOA journalist who remains defiant but is afraid that the BBG will succeed in destroying VOA Russian-language programs as they did earlier with VOA Arabic broadcasts and many other VOA vernacular and English services. “That is the only way to characterize their demands,” this VOA Russian Service journalist wrote, ”because most of our materials will not be liked by [the] Kremlin and its agents (how do we know that [market research] monitors are not Kremlin’s loyal servers?). Welcome to the new era at VOA’ Russian Service!”

The VOA journalist did not want to be identified for fear of retaliation. VOA employees have no confidence in the BBG’s ability to manage international broadcasting.  In a recent government-wide survey, they rated their employer as one of the very worst among U.S. government agencies. Read FreeMediaOnline.org report Broadcasting Board of Governors Rated Worst Than Ever By Its Employees and As One of The Worst Federal Agencies

More comments from a VOA Russian Service journalist:

I am reading the program review materials [annual evaluation of a VOA program] now and can’t help laughing at some things. For instance, it states that “given the unfavorable media climate in Russia today, characterized by increasingly strict government control, VOA Russian has embarked on a project to develop a multi-media, interactive web site that will allow the Service to circumvent the problem of government pressures which have led to the loss of most of its affiliates.”

Translation: VOA and IBB [IBB -- the International Broadcasting Bureau] is a technical arm of the BBG] closed Russian radio and TV programs and put all eggs in one basket at a time when Kremlin is following China’s steps to establish full control of Internet.

All VOA’s independent evaluators “related concerns about ongoing difficulties associates with the functionality of video files (on our site). One suggested that incompatibility between site formats and available local technologies ( in Russia and other former Soviet states) might exacerbate this problem.”

Translation: VOA management is clueless about media infrastructure in countries other then the U.S. and wastes money, resources and talent without achieving the goals of U.S. international broadcasting.

Senator Richard Lugar is right about past mistakes that had crippled U.S. public diplomacy, but new actions by the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors also continue to silence America’s voice abroad

Closed Down American Centers and Crippled Voice of America

In an insightful and candid article posted on the Foreign Policy magazine blog, Senator Richard R. Lugar, argues that the United States can only blame itself for not being able to properly explain America to the world. He pointed out that “reaching out to the man or woman on the streets of Jakarta or Caracas or Cairo is the practice of public diplomacy,” which, unfortunately — according to Senator Lugar — the U.S. government has not done very effectively in recent years. The closing down of American information and cultural centers abroad — the subject of Senator Lugar’s article — is, however, only one example of an American institution destroyed or severely crippled by political expediency and naivete of Washington bureaucrats. The Voice of America (VOA)  — international broadcasting service funded by the U.S. Government  — is another institution being dismantled by the very agency — the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) – set up to strengthen U.S. broadcasts to the world and to represent America abroad.  

In his article, the Republican senator from Indiana noted the continued existence of various U.S. public diplomacy initiatives, including the Peace Corps and the Fulbright academic exchange program. He also mentioned the Voice of America without offering any further comments about VOA. His overall conclusion, however, after analyzing other public diplomacy programs, was that the United States has been “waging the battle of ideas with one hand tied behind its back.”

Lugar’s criticism is focused on the dismantling of the United States Information Agency (USIA) by a joint action, taken by the Clinton Administration and the U.S. Congress, and the subsequent closing down of American information and cultural enters around the world. Senator Lugar wrote that the United States no longer has “a worldwide equivalent to what Britain and France have, namely, facilities in major world cities with libraries, reading rooms, outreach programs, unfiltered Internet access, film series, lectures, and English classes that enable people to meet with Americans of all walks of life and hold two-way conversations on issues of mutual interest.”

The central point of Senator Lugar’s article is that the U.S. government’s own actions and inactions have contributed to its inability to conduct effective public diplomacy overseas. But the closing down of American centers has not been the only action that was damaging to America’s image abroad in recent years. While Senator Lugar noted that the Voice of America still exists, many of VOA radio programs for overseas audiences have in fact been terminated by the Broadcasting Board of Governors.

BBG Ends VOA Radio to Russia Less than Two Weeks before Russia Invades Georgia

In an incredible show of bad judgment, this bipartisan board had taken VOA radio programs to Russia off the air just 12 days before the Russian invasion of Georgia last summer. The BBG also ended VOA radio broadcasts to Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania just as Mr. Putin started to increase pressure on Russia’s neighboring states to make them follow the Kremlin’s foreign policy objectives. BBG members even wanted to terminate VOA radio broadcasts to the Republic of Georgia — one of the most vulnerable of the former Soviet republics – but the Russian invasion forced them to suspend their decision, at least temporarily. Earlier, the BBG also tried to reduce radio broadcasts to Tibet.  The Board only backed off when pro-independence demonstrations in Tibet were bloodily suppressed and a group of Tibetan monks staged a silent protest on Capital Hill.

In yet another show of incredibly poor judgment combined with bad timing and ulterior bureaucratic motives resulting in a major waste of U.S. tax dollars, the BBG had silenced Voice of America radio programs to Ukraine on December 31, 2008, just one day before Russia halted natural gas deliveries to Europe. Since then, Ukraine has sunk further into a major economic and political crisis, which is threatening its pro-Western foreign policy and democratic changes won during the Orange Revolution.

As a supporter of American Centers abroad who appreciates the value of teaching English and sharing American culture, Senator Lugar would probably also appreciate the damage of the BBG’s persistent efforts to reduce funding for Voice of America English broadcasts. (BBG claims that some of these VOA programs have small audiences and therefore should be terminated. But the BBG has done close to nothing to help market and distribute such programs. The agency instead poured millions of dollars into private entities and their contractors. As it turns out, the results in terms of audience size in many cases are not statistically significantly any better than what traditional VOA broadcasting was able to deliver at a much lower cost and with much greater credibility in representing America.)

Responding to these decisions, a union representing the Voice of America employees said on its website that the BBG has made “at least a half dozen mistakes in the past few months.” One of them resulted in the silencing of the Voice of America Hindi radio broadcasts just a few weeks before the terrorists attacks in Mumbai. ProPublica.org, a nonprofit investigative journalism website, and FreeMediaOnline.org, another nonprofit organization which supports media freedom worldwide, have also reported extensively on journalistic scandals and mismanagement at the BBG.

“America” As a Bad Word — Market Research without Political and Human Rights Context

BBG officials argue that their actions are based on solid market research. Theirs is the same argument used previously to justify the closing down of American information and cultural centers around the world, namely that radio — which comes as close to providing similar people-to-people contact with real Americans as American centers had done before they were eliminated — is not nearly as effective as the Internet, short video clips, and other impersonal but highly technological solutions.

The real story behind the BBG’s actions is a combination of incredible incompetence and the desire of BBG members to subcontract Voice of America work to private entities which can benefit their U.S.-based friends, supporters and constituents. Several years ago, BBG bureaucrats spent countless hours discussing names for  their new privatized broadcasting stations for the Middle East, making sure above all that no word “American” was used. Their market research showed that Muslim audiences did not approve of such verbal associations with America. We can only imagine what the Voice of America would have been named if the BBG had existed during World War II and had been able to conduct market research in Hitler’s Germany. Presumably, at that time most Germans also did not like the word “American.”

Dubious Market Research in Russia Results in Attempts at Censorship

More recently, BBG-commissioned market research in Russia revealed that panels of Russian media users don’t like to hear criticism of Mr. Putin’s authoritarian rule. Based on the previous BBG logic and actions, VOA journalists — who had been told to start blogging after the BBG eliminated their radio programs to Russia — are likely to be urged now to go easy on criticizing Mr. Putin and to hold back on expressing in their blogs their personal opinions about human rights abuses. Inside sources told FreeMediaOnline.org that such instructions have in fact been issued to the VOA Russian Service staff, although it’s unclear where within the BBG hierarchy they have originated. What’s quite clear, however, is that the BBG is responsible for creating a culture in which bureaucratic interests and poorly-understood and often patently compromised market research data take precedence over journalistic values, human rights concerns, and plain common sense.

It is unlikely that VOA Russian Service journalists, who are committed to journalistic freedom and objectivity and protected by the Congressionally approved VOA Charter, would comply with censorship orders. “They want VOA’s Russian Service toothless,” was a conclusion of one VOA journalist who remains defiant. Ultimately, however, their jobs as journalists are not protected if the BBG wants to get rid of those who do not play ball. Since VOA employees cannot be fired directly for their criticism, the way the BBG had dealt with such internal opposition it in the past was by eliminating programs which these employees produce and making them subject to reduction-in-force separation from government employment.

One of the reasons the BBG favors privatized broadcast entities over VOA is the ability to fire their journalists at will. The BBG even denies some foreign-based journalists basic protections of U.S. labor laws. BBG members may not even realize that this has serious implications for America’s image abroad and journalistic freedom. These abhorrent, un-American, and undemocratic BBG policies also make these foreign journalists insecure about their employment more vulnerable to intimidation and recruitment by the intelligence services of dictatorial regimes.

The Russian Service journalists, who were completely demoralized when the former BBG Chairman James K. Glassman personally refused their urgent pleas to allow them to resume radio broadcasts to the war zone in Georgia, have recovered much of their fighting spirit and seem unafraid to offer highly critical comments about Mr. Putin’s rule in Russia and the suppression of local independent media. BBG-ordered program cuts, however, severely limit their ability to provide in-depth multimedia coverage of human rights abuses and other critical issues.

BBG Market Research Encourages Airing of Racist Views on RFE/RL

A few years earlier, BBG-hired private consultants also cited market research to force programming changes at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) — a surrogate broadcaster with a splendid Cold War record completely mismanaged and set adrift by the BBG. Based on market research, RFE/RL journalists were strongly discouraged from sounding too critical about human rights abuses in Mr. Putin’s Russia. Those who resisted were silenced, fired or forced to resign. BBG consultants told RFE/RL reporters that Russian audiences want a more positive view of Russian society and politics and a more critical view of the West. 

About the same time, BBG member Jeff Hirschberg (D. Jeffrey Hirschberg), who has business links in Russia, and the Board’s executive director Jeffrey Trimble conducted secret negotiations with Russian officials to assure them that RFE/RL would practice only ”responsible” journalism. When human rights journalist Anna Politkovskaya was brutally murdered in 2006, their hand-picked managers in charge of RFE/RL operations Moscow and Prague expressed confidence in Mr. Putin’s leadership. Another change resulting from BBG market research in Russia was to allow Russian nationalists and other extremists access to Radio Liberty airwaves, causing a Russian human rights organization to issue a warning that comments by these individuals on a U.S. taxpayer-funded station promote acts of violence against immigrants, Blacks, and other minorities.

In criticizing Radio Liberty, the Moscow Human Rights Bureau said 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.

BBG Eliminated Voice of America Arabic Broadcasts

Because most VOA journalists would not blindly accept BBG’s directives, former and current BBG members had made sure earlier that the Voice of America would no longer have any Arabic-language broadcasts that would be immune to BBG-desired changes based on short-term trends identified by dubious market research. With strong encouragement and support from the Bush White House, BBG officials created instead Alhurra Television for the Middle East, making sure it has no cumbersome journalistic and financial standards used by VOA and no mandate to present a broad spectrum of American views and values that some Middle Eastern audiences might find objectionable.

While I’m not an expert on the Middle East and the Islamic world, I have studied propaganda and written extensively on this subject. My media contacts throughout Eurasia have been quite clear that they are not fooled by clever names for broadcasting entities thought up by the BBG and would prefer to receive American news and views from an authoritative American source clearly identified for what it is. BBG officials and the Bush White House should have known that propaganda techniques used during World War II and even during the Cold War — one of which was to try to obscure the identity of the originator of news and information — have no chance of success in the era of instant communications and the Internet.

Denying the Holocaust at U.S. Taxpayers’ Expense

BBG members acted surprised when Alhurra reporters gave extensive coverage to statements from a Holocaust deniers’ conference, held in Tehran, with absolutely no attempt to present balancing views. Yet these Alhurra reporters and TV anchors were not doing anything in this case that BBG’s own market research would not support.
Use this link to the ProPublica.org web site to view the Alhurra report with English subtitles: http://www.propublica.org/feature/alhurra-video

Misleading Administration and Congress

In answers to written questions from Senator Richard Lugar submitted during her Senate confirmation process, Hillary Clinton said that “the BBG has learned that it must rely on the best market analysis to understand the unique listening habits and attitudes of the populations we seek to inform.” The BBG indeed spends tremendous amount of taxpayer money on market research. Unfortunately, most BBG members have demonstrated that they lack both experience and judgment to apply research results to political realities in countries without free media.

Before being confirmed as the Secretary of State, Senator Clinton obviously had no time to study closely U.S. international broadcasting or the BBG (of which she is now an ex officio member). In her answers to Senator Lugar, she most likely repeated information provided by the BBG staff. She also told Senator Lugar that “performance of America’s international broadcast entities has been quite successful in telling America’s story (largely the task of the VOA).”

I believe Secretary Clinton, along with most Americans, would be surprised to learn that the Voice of America does not have a single Arabic-language program. Neither does any other U.S. government-supported entity that has “American” in its name — thanks to the BBG’s strategy of privatizing U.S.  international broadcasting and using market research to make decisions that ultimately belong in the political rather than commercial sphere.

In carrying out its privatization of U.S. international broadcasting, the BBG has ignored and mislead Congress and high Administration officials and has tried to keep secret its mistakes and actions designed to weaken the Voice of America. BBG officials had refused to make public an independent study, which was highly critical of Alhurra, until they were forced to make it available on the Internet by the Obama transition team. The termination of VOA radio broadcasts to Russia was also done without any public announcement.  

Supporting Privatized Entities More Important to BBG than Representing America

Senator Lugar is right that, from the U.S. public diplomacy perspective, the elimination of American centers abroad was a damage self-inflicted by the U.S. Government (the Clinton Administration and the U.S. Congress). Also a self-inflicted damage was the elimination of the VOA Arabic Service by the BBG and the termination of VOA on-air radio programs to Russia, Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and many other countries.

The governments of most of these countries would have gladly allowed VOA to continue these radio broadcasts on local stations, thus assuring VOA access to a wide audience. The situation in Russia is drastically different, with the secret police actively prohibiting VOA rebroadcasts by private stations and keeping a close eye on the work of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) journalists in Russia who are Russian citizens and thus subject to Kremlin’s laws.

The intimidation of RFE/RL reporters in Russia makes the continuation of VOA radio programs from the safety of Washington even more necessary as a powerful political signal to the Kremlin’s secret security services, and equally to the segment of the Russian population that cares about democracy and human rights. BBG officials, however, refuse to admit that there is a security problem, since they justified the termination of Voice of America radio broadcasts to Russia by claiming that RFE/RL radio broadcasts would be sufficient. They also don’t want scrutiny of their earlier decisions to place significant RFE/RL facilities and other U.S. international broadcasting resources in Moscow within easy reach of Russia’s security services.

Naive About Mr. Putin’s Secret Police and Internet in Russia

According to information and documents obtained by FreeMediaOnline.org, BBG staff shows a high level of cluelessness about the ability of the new, post-Soviet KGB, now known as the FSB (Mr. Putin’s former employer), to control the Internet in Russia. Despite obvious signs that the Internet is great but not safe in times of serious crisis and not sufficient to reach the most vulnerable audiences, BBG bureaucrats remain widely enthusiastic about their Internet-only strategy for VOA’s Russian Service. With their American-only mindset, they assume that war zone victims, refugees, and the poorest and most repressed segments of world’s populations have high-speed  and uncensored access to the Internet just like they do in their Washington suburban homes.

It may have not even occurred to these BBG officials that the audience panels they commissioned in Russia at great expense to U.S. taxpayers are most likely controlled by the Russian FSB. Based on my own experience working for many years with owners of pro-democracy private radio and TV stations in Russia who had been harassed into silence by the FSB,  the Kremlin’s spy agency almost certainly has tried to skew BBG’s market research and RFE/RL reporting from Russia.

BBG Deserves Greater Scrutiny

While he did not address these problems, Senator Lugar should be applauded for speaking out candidly about past U.S. mistakes when it comes to public diplomacy. He, along with other members of Congress and the new Obama Administration, however,  now has a chance to save U.S. public diplomacy not only from past disasters but also the ones being currently perpetrated by the Broadcasting Board of Governors and its staff.

At the very least, the BBG members and senior officials deserve a much closer scrutiny of their decisions than they had received during the Bush Administration. During the past eight years, BBG members — both Democrats and Republicans — enthusiastically supported any ill-conceived public diplomacy initiative for the Middle East and came up with a few disastrous ideas of their own at a cost of millions of dollars to U.S. taxpayers. Only one BBG member, Blaquita Walsh Cullum, the only working journalist sitting on the Board, was said to have opposed program cuts to countries without free media and objected to hiring expensive consultants to beef up BBG’s public image in the United States.

Cullum is a Republican and was otherwise a strong supporter of the Bush foreign policy. Other Republican members, including the former BBG chairman James K. Glassman, unquestionably backed cutting of VOA radio broadcasts and privatizing U.S. international broadcasting. Ironically, all Democratic BBG members were just as enthusiastic in their support for the ill-conceived broadcasting initiatives for the Middle East as their Republican colleagues, if not more so.

In fact, the main architect of Alhurra and Radio Sawa was Norman Pattiz, a Democratic appointee and a personal friend and supporter of former Senator and now Vice President Joe Biden. Pattiz — whose company, America’s largest radio network Westwood One, is now in serious financial trouble — introduced commercial market research and commercial music formats at the BBG and pushed hard for eliminating Voice of America broadcasts to the Middle East and other regions. Pattiz worked closely with another former BBG member, Edward E. Kaufman, who is now a Democratic U.S. Senator from Delaware.

Other members of Congress, however, have taken notice of the waste and mismanagement at the BBG. One of the most severe critics of the BBG’s performance during the Bush Administration years was a Republican Senator from Oklahoma Tom Coburn, M.D.

Another U.S. Senator, Sam Brownback (R-KA),  has called for abolishing the Broadcasting Board of Governors. He introduced legislation that would establish the National Center for Strategic Communications, an agency similar to the now defunct U.S. Information Agency. 

Also, Patrick Leahy, a Democratic Senator from Vermont, has tried to stop the BBG from eliminating U.S. broadcasts in foreign languages. His request to the BBG not to end VOA radio Russia and other  media-at-risk countries was ignored. The BBG executive director Jeffrey Trimble, a former acting president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty,  implemented the cuts, reportedly after requesting and receiving advice and help from Senator Biden’s staff.

VOA employees, including journalists in the Russian Service, are hopeful that the Obama Administration, with its new message about America’s intentions around the world, will understand the public diplomacy value of the Voice of America news broadcasts and will not want to engage in deceptive marketing of news using privatized entities with purposely ambiguous names. Their optimism is tempered, however, by the knowledge that Senator and now Vice President Biden was a strong supporter of former BBG members, Norman Pattiz and Edward Kaufman.  Kaufman, who was at one time Biden’s chief of staff in the Senate, was described by a union leader at the BBG  as “no friend of Voice of America employees.” Biden’s support for the privatization of U.S. international broadcasting may be partly explained by the fact that some of the BBG’s private entities, including Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, are incorporated in Delaware, Biden’s home state.

Federal Human Capital 2008 Survey (FHCS)

One of the Worst Among U.S. Government Agencies Needs Reform

The BBG, which was rated by its own employees as being among the very worst U.S. government agencies, should be abolished — an action recommended by the highly-respected Public Diplomacy Council, a nonprofit organization which includes former diplomats, academics and other foreign policy experts. The PDC has called on President Obama and Congress to take urgent action in reforming publicly-funded U.S. international broadcasting.

The hundreds of millions of dollars that the BBG spends on the discredited and scandal-ridden Alhurra Television could not only pay for re-opening of some U.S. centers abroad and for restoring VOA radio broadcasts to the Middle East and to Russia. Some funds might even be left to offset the record budget deficit and to help with economic recovery. In any case, most Arabs view Alhurra as the Bush Administration’s propaganda tool.

President Obama apparently understands the credibility issue with Alhurra and probably would not want his name to be associated with a television station that welcomed comments from Holocaust deniers. Rather than going to Alhurra, President Obama gave his first televised message to the Arab world in an interview with the Al Arabiya television network.

The United States should be honest with its potential Middle Eastern audiences. Rather than hide behind ambiguous names like Alhurra and Sawa, it should restore Voice of America Arabic broadcasts and offer programs that truly reflect America’s diversity and values. Some of the privatized entities managed by the BBG have proven again and again that they are incapable of applying high journalistic standards. In their current setup under BBG’s marketing rules, they are also incapable of representing America to the Muslim world.

Another reason for urgent action are the financial scandals that have been a constant occurrence among the privatized broadcasting entities so strongly favored by the BBG. The agency has been largely left unsupervised during the previous two administrations. If Senator Lugar can get his Democratic and Republican colleagues in the Senate to support him and get the Obama White House and Secretary Clinton to go along, he may have a good chance of not only repairing U.S. public diplomacy but of making U.S. government more fiscally responsible and more efficient.

The BBG’s organizational chart looks even worse than the GM corporate structure with multiple non-American brands, multiple physical facilities, and multiple executive positions costing U.S. taxpayers millions of dollars in completely unnecessary and duplicative expenses. (BBG members should have asked themselves why the British Government was not trying to dilute the BBC’s brandname by hiding it under multiple non-British names.) Eliminating the BBG and consolidating almost all U.S. international broadcasting under one American brand, as proposed by the Public Diplomacy Council and others, could make America’s voice abroad once again strong, credible, effective and fiscally justifiable to American taxpayers.

…after the Cold War, the United States prematurely declared victory in the battle for hearts and minds, terminating the U.S. Information Agency, which ran the centers, and cutting the State Department’s public diplomacy budget. Many thought the Internet and global satellite TV would render irrelevant the people-to-people exchanges fostered by the centers. — Senator Richard R. Lugar

About Ted Lipien

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 programs to Ukraine and Russia.

Wojtyla's Women by Ted Lipien

About FreeMediaOnline.org

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.

About GovoritAmerika.us

In December 2008, FreeMediaOnline.org has launched a Russian-language web site — GovoritAmerika.us ГоворитАмерика.us  – which includes summaries of some of the 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.

BBG officials initially had told the VOA Russian Service that their requests to resume radio broadcasts were a “non-starter” even after Russia invaded Georgia. Only after weeks of protests, including reporting by FreeMediaOnline.org, the BBG finally allowed VOA to produce a short audio program for the Internet, updated only Monday through Friday. This program is rather difficult to find on the VOA website. We made it available for easier access and listening on the GovoritAmerika.us website managed by FreeMediaOnline.org.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://govoritamerika.us/zpod/voaradio.swf" height="250" width="520" base="http://govoritamerika.us/zpod/" /]

President Obama may have been surprised to find out that the Voice of America, which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton described as largely responsible for “telling America’s story” to the world, no longer has programs in Arabic of any kind due to actions taken by the Bush Administration and the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG).

The lack of a trusted Arabic-language broadcast channel originating in the United States may explain why President Obama had to give a TV interview targeted for a Middle Eastern audience to a Saudi broadcaster. While there is one U.S. broadcaster, Alhurra Television, this particular network lacks credibility in the Middle East and has been mired in controversy.

FreeMediaOnline.org reprints the latest article by ProPublica.org writer Dafna Linzer about the U.S. government-funded Alhurra television network for the Middle East set up and managed by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG). The article provides an in-depth analysis as to some of the reasons that may be behind President Obama’s decision to use a Saudi network for his first television interview. First, some comments from FreeMediaOnline.org president, Ted Lipien:

What? – No Voice of America in Arabic? – President Obama and U.S. Broadcasting in the Middle East

by Ted Lipien

There is no big mystery as to why President Obama would choose a Saudi-funded television network Al Arabiya over Alhurra. As surprising as this may be to many Americans, if one goes to the official web site of the primary U.S. international broadcaster, the Voice of America (VOA),  it no longer has any kind of news content in Arabic thanks to the BBG’s earlier decisions, which blocked VOA from communicating with Arab audiences in their own language. The BBG has also silenced VOA radio to Russia (12 days before Russia invaded Georgia) and to many other countries.

The Voice of America used to be a credible source of news and information from the United States for Arab speakers even if, due to the neglect from the BBG, it did not have transmission facilities to reach a wider audience. Instead of improving and strengthening America’s voice to the world, the BBG shut down VOA’s Arabic service and subcontracted U.S. broadcasting to private entities. They are widely seen in the Middle East as tools of the Bush White House propaganda. Since VOA journalists did not want to participate in propaganda experiments controlled by the White House and the BBG, VOA Arabic programs were silenced.

Both Republicans and Democrats (political allies and big business supporters of former Senator, now Vice President Joe Biden) were responsible for making these decisions. Even though the overall agenda was set by the neoconservatives in the Bush White House, BBG members representing the Democratic Party – Norman Pattiz of Westwood One and the recently appointed Senator from Delaware Edward E. Kaufman — helped to dismantle VOA programs and created Alhurra and Radio Sawa. 

Sawa and Alhurra not only did not have official credibility and American friendliness enjoyed by VOA radio hosts – perhaps the only attributes an American station can use to establish itself in the Middle East — but they also failed to achieve any kind of purpose and journalistic balance. They have been alternating between airing comments from apologists for the Bush Administration policies and  — to the great surprise of their neoconservative backers – airing unchallenged comments by Holocaust deniers and Islamist extremists. What they fail to tell their audience with any kind of credibility – something that Voice of America had done when it had Arabic programs – is what Americans of all political views and different social backgrounds think about the Middle East and the rest of the world. It would be inconceivable for the Voice of America to air unchallenged comments from Holocaust deniers as Alhurra had done. 

Considering  Alhurra’s journalistic performance and the fact that it has no real credibility with Arab audiences, it’s no wonder that President Obama did not want to be interviewed by the privatized American Middle East TV network.  Had he granted an interview to Alhurra, it would be a signal that the Obama White House wants to continue President Bush’s failed propaganda policies. This is one message President Obama did not want to send.

Working with Congress, the Obama  Administration should restore Voice of America Arabic programs and put an end to the waste of public money on supporting  Alhurra and Sawa. These station lack both identity and credibility,  and they are firmly associated with the Bush Administration propaganda. If the United States had one credible broadcaster reaching the Arab world, President Obama would not have to be ashamed of granting an interview to a radio or TV network supported by U.S. taxpayers, which I assume was his reason for going with Al Arabiya in addition to that station’s wide reach in the Arab world. Ted Lipien, FreeMediaOnline.org

Does Obama Snub of Alhurra Signal a Shift?

Left: Alhurra anchors on air Dec. 23, 2008, before the conflict in Gaza. Right: Anchors wore black after the fighting broke out on Dec. 27, 2008.

President Obama chose a Saudi-funded television network today for his first interview aimed at an Arab audience, passing over the U.S. government’s own heavily-funded Alhurra station.

Obama’s predecessor pumped more than $500 million into Alhurra, which has been plagued [1] by serious staff problems, financial mismanagement and long-standing concerns inside the U.S. government and Congress regarding its content.

The president’s decision to go with Al Arabiya [2]led several media watchers to wonder whether Alhurrawouldcontinue to receive the same kind of cash flow from the Obama administration as it enjoyed under former president Bush.

“I am curious whether the choice of Al Arabiya signals the administration’s abandonment of the U.S.-funded Alhurra satellite channel,” wrote Michael Rubin, in National Review Online [3].

Marc Lynch, a professor at George Washington University, wrote on Foreign Policy magazine’s Web site [4]that “Obama’s choice to give his ground-breaking interview to the Saudi Al Arabiya and not to the American Alhurra is as clear a statement as it is possible to make of Alhurra’s failure. It’s time to face the facts and clean house to recoup some of that investment,” he wrote.

The Bush Administration’s public diplomacy efforts have long drawn criticism from Democrats, and Obama signaled shortly after his election that he was contemplating major changes in that arena. “I think we’ve got a unique opportunity to reboot America’s image around the world and also in the Muslim world in particular,’’ Obama told reporters in early December.

Alhurra, and its sister radio station, Radio Sawa, were meant to showcase U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and compete with Al Jazeera and other networks such as Al Arabiya, which interviewed Obama Tuesday.

But Alhurra has come under Congressional scrutiny and has been unable to win a desired audience share.

Last month, news anchors at Alhurra swapped out brightly-colored outfits for black suits as a demonstration of solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza who were under Israeli fire during weeks of fighting there. Alhurra broadcasts to the Middle East, but its Web site carried streaming video of the anchors, wearing black suits on air at their news desk and during reports on the fighting.

Two people with direct knowledge of the incident said Alhurra managers had instructed anchors to halt the practice at the beginning of the new year and were conducting an informal review of the incident.

Deirdre Kline, a spokeswoman for Alhurra, did not return phone messages or e-mails seeking comment. She also did not respond to requests for comment regarding a nascent inquiry by the State Department’s inspector general’s office regarding several complaints of financial mismanagement at Radio Sawa. Two people involved in the inquiry said it began after concerns were raised that money was missing from the station’s Baghdad bureau.

 Alhurra has cost U.S. taxpayers more than half a billion dollars in five years and has been the subject of an ongoing ProPublica investigation [1] that began in partnership with CBS News’ 60 Minutes last June. It sparked several Congressional inquiries and a State Department investigation of Alhurra’s parent company, The Middle East Broadcasting Networks.

Since then, a study commissioned by the U.S. government concluded that Alhurra has failed to meet basic journalistic standards.

The study by researchers connected to the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Southern California [5]was based on a review of a full month’s broadcasts by Alhurra, the 24-hour news network.

“The quality of Alhurra’s journalism is substandard on several levels,” the researchers wrote. Its broadcasts “lack appropriate balance and sourcing,” and “relied on unsubstantiated information too often, allowed on-air expressions of personal judgments too frequently and failed to present opposing views in over 60 percent of its news stories.”

“Our diagnosis is that Alhurra is not performing at the level that it needs to reach to be successful,” the authors said.

After the study was completed, Obama chose the Dean of the Annenberg School, Ernest J. Wilson III [6], to review Alhurra and other U.S. government broadcasting efforts for the new administration.

Al-Jazeera, which the Bush administration publicly blamed for inflaming anti-American sentiment in the Arab world, remains the most popular news network in the Arab world. Al Arabiya is No. 2 for audience share. Viewership polls, including one conducted last year by the University of Maryland [7] found that Alhurra’s pan-Arab broadcast is one of the least viewed in the Middle East, with an audience share of just 2 percent across the region.

the performance of America’s international broadcast entities has been quite successful in telling America’s story (largely the task of the VOA) — Hillary Clinton

The dismantling of VOA as America’s voice to the world became an ideological and bureaucratic goal of both the Bush Administration and of the BBG, despite the latter’s bipartisan status. After the decision to invade Iraq had been made,  the Board worked closely with neoconservatives Bush White House staffers to privatize U.S. international broadcasting by subcontracting this vital government function. The idea was to make U.S. international broadcasting more responsive in supporting the Bush Administration’s policies — something that VOA journalists, protected by their Congressional charter and committed to journalistic independence, were unwilling to offer, neither to the White House nor the BBG.

In their push to give themselves maximum control, the BBG not only eliminated jobs of  U.S.-based VOA journalists, most of them American citizens, but at the same time denied foreign journalists hired abroad job security and basic protections of American labor laws. These protections were available to VOA journalists, which made them more independent but annoyed the Bush White House and the BBG because they were unable to control them.

In carrying out its privatization plan, the BBG closed down many VOA language services, including the VOA Arabic Service, and created private entities such as Radio Sawa and Alhurra, with new multiple executive positions and contracting opportunities for favorites of BBG officials. (Some of the former Democratic BBG members, including Norman Pattiz and Senator Edward E. Kaufman, were in the forefront of implementing the neoconservative privatization agenda and the Bush White House propaganda goals in the Middle East; they were in fact more enthusiastic supporters than some of the conservative Republican members, but in the end most Republicans and Democrats supported the  Bush Administration’s plans.)

Other major international broadcasters felt no similar need to create new broadcasting entities with new names and new missions. The British Broadcasting Corporation also expanded its media coverage in the Middle East and recently launched a Persian TV channel, but it is proudly and consistently promoting the BBC brand.

Focused on privatization and advertising schemes in international broadcasting and public diplomacy, the Bush Administration and the BBG worked together to destroy the Voice of America as an internationally recognized American broadcaster and went on to create multiple brands, such as Sawa and Alhurra, with no solid journalistic traditions or clearly defined goals. The BBG corporate structure is now very similar to the multi-brand corporate structure of General Motors.

The Public Diplomacy Council, a nonprofit organization which includes former diplomats, academics and other foreign policy experts, agrees that the BBG’s policies are designed to waste U.S. taxpayers’ money.  The PDC has called on President Elect Obama and Congress to take urgent action in reforming publicly-funded U.S. international broadcasting and is proposing consolidation of all five broadcast entities into a single international network. The PDC believes that the proposed consolidation and replacing the Broadcasting Board of Governors by a new nonpartisan oversight commission would result in “cost savings aimed at making U.S. global broadcasting unmatched on the airwaves and in cyberspace.”

As it is customary during the confirmation process, Hillary Clinton’s answers to Senator Lugar’s questions were quite vague and may very well have been written based on information provided by the BBG staff. She made no reference to numerous reports about major editorial and financial scandals at Radio Sawa and Alhurra, such as airing of unchallenged statements by Holocaust deniers and giving extensive airtime to Islamist extremists and racist Russian politicians. ( These decisions were made by untrained and unmanaged contract employees in support of the BBG’s goal to achieve a mass audience in Iran and Russia. Their effort to gain higher ratings by playing up to the presumed worst prejudices of their audience was in any case unsuccessful, but it created a distorted impression of American values and damaged America’s reputation as a supporter of freedom.) 

 A study prepared by the Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School, University of Southern California, which was commissioned by the U.S. government, concluded that Alhurra, Arab-language television to the Middle East managed by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) fails to meet basic journalistic standards and is seen by few.  Read FreeMediaOnline.org report: “U.S. Taxpayers Pay for Spreading Racist Views on Radio Liberty in Russia: What Would Barack Obama Say If He Knew…”   

Use the following 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

One statement that deserves further analysis was Clinton’s assertion that “the BBG has learned that it must rely on the best market analysis to understand the unique listening habits and attitudes of the populations we seek to inform.” The BBG indeed spends tremendous amount of taxpayer money on market research, and BBG members often make claims that their decisions are driven by research.

Unfortunately, most BBG members have demonstrated that they lack both experience and judgment to apply research results to political realities in countries without free media. Senator Lugar asked a very good question whether the U.S. should try to reach a mass audience in the Middle East through entertainment programming. Perhaps understandably at this point, Hillary Clinton could not provide a clear answer.

While still working for the BBG, I became aware that BBG members and staffers were spending countless hours pouring over research data showing that the word “American” was unpopular in the Middle East and trying to come up with new names for their Middle East privatized broadcasting enterprise. They lacked knowledge, experience, and sophistication to realize that the problem was not with the word “American,” American society, or the Voice of America, but with the Bush Administration Middle East policies and their own preoccupation with marketing and advertising.

Making outdated Cold War-like assumptions about the Arab and Islamic culture, they named their TV station (Alhurra) ”The Free One.” It was utterly naive of them to believe that their audiences would be fooled by the lack of the word “American” in the name selected for the new network.

In the process of trying to disassociate their new broadcasting outlets from America, the BBG insulted Arab pride by implying that Middle East audiences were uniformly lacking basic freedoms.  It did not occur to them that this was not an East European-like audience, which truly lacked basic freedoms during the Cold War and looked to the West for help. Those in the Middle East who do not want to hear American news or the word “American” are not going to become viewers and listeners anyway, but most would rather have access to authentic American news and culture from a clearly identified source rather than rely on light-weight news and entertainment hiding behind propagandistic names from another era and another part of the world.

The new Secretary of State should inquire about some of the decisions made by the BBG during the last weeks of the Bush Administration. They included the shutting down of VOA radio broadcasts to Russia just 12 days before the Russian military invasion of Georgia and the Board’s refusal to resume them during the crisis. The BBG also ended VOA radio broadcasts to Ukraine just hours before Russia cut off the flow of natural gas supplies to that country and the rest of Europe. The BBG also wanted to end VOA radio broadcasts to Georgia.

The BBG staff claims that each one of these blunders was justified by solid market research. As someone who as a former BBG employee has placed U.S.-supported programming on stations in Bosnia, Afghanistan, Russia, and Iraq, I known that some of the research results obtained in closed and repressed societies are questionable ( for example, WMD intelligence research in Iraq, another closed and repressed society). But the main problem is not the quality of the research but the inability of the BBG members and their staff to interpret the data in light of political realities on the ground.

Most political loyalists serving on the BBG lack journalistic and human rights advocacy experience and know very little what it means to live in a country without free media. They nearly always have failed to understand what American broadcasting means to both dictators and victims of human rights abuses. Unfortunately, this is not something that reading audience research reports on countries without free media can teach them.

QUESTIONS FOR THE RECORD, SENATOR RICHARD G. LUGAR: Many have criticized the Bush Administration’s decision to try to reach broader audiences in the Middle East through efforts such as Radio Sawa and Al Hurra TV. Critics argue that Sawa – which relies primarily on a pop-radio format with a smattering of news – fails to deliver sufficient information to serious listeners who desire to hear unfiltered news about their country and the rest of the world. Opponents of AL Hurra – which attempts to serve as a counter to Al Jazeera – claim that it often fails to provide sufficient counterpoints to radical and inaccurate claims made by participants on many of its programs.

141. Does the Obama Administration intend to continue funding Radio Sawa in its current, mostly music, format? Similarly, what changes does the Administration intend for Al Hurra?

142. Does the Obama Administration believe that the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which oversees both Al Hurra and Radio Sawa as well as Voice of America, Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia, is the appropriate vehicle to provide managerial and policy guidance to the disparate broadcasting entities? Does the Administration seek to alter or even replace the BBG?

HILLARY CLINTON: Let me answer these two questions together. For the most part, the performance of America’s international broadcast entities has been quite successful in telling America’s story (largely the task of the VOA), and in serving as important surrogates for missing independent media in countries where a free press and independent media have been repressed, such as Afghanistan and Burma, where RFE/RL and Radio Free Asia respectively operate. Beyond the precise content of the news, our international broadcast services demonstrate an essential lesson of free societies – the requirement of an independent media for a robust democracy.

A robust and effective BBG in turn requires a strong and unambiguous fire wall between the professional journalists and editors at BBG, and others in the U.S. government whether at the White House or the State
Department. I recognize this to be a fundamental requirement of effective international broadcasting.

The BBG is an independent agency but the Secretary of State holds a seat on the Board, through which the Department can express its views. State also clears editorials for the VOA broadcasts. But the most
effective BBG will be one at arms length from these and other government agencies.

Now is the time to review the Arab language services – they have grown in listenership in recent years, and we should review their performance and impact to determine whether Al Hurra and Radio Sawa are achieving their full potential.

We recognize that our biggest challenge is to ensure that our messages are listened to, considered and, we hope, acted upon by people in the Middle East, and Muslim societies around the world. To do this effectively, the BBG has learned that it must rely on the best market analysis to understand the unique listening habits and attitudes of the populations we seek to inform, and these conditions differ substantially from one country to its neighbor. So we must start with the market, and then devise our message accordingly, which more and more will include new digital platforms.

 

This commentary can be republished with attribution to FreeMediaOnline.org

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 programs to Ukraine and Russia.

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.

This report was first published by  FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog Commentary by Ted Lipien, January 25, 2009, San Francisco.

the performance of America’s international broadcast entities has been quite successful in telling America’s story (largely the task of the VOA) — Hillary Clinton

The dismantling of VOA as America’s voice to the world became an ideological and bureaucratic goal of both the Bush Administration and of the BBG, despite the latter’s bipartisan status. After the decision to invade Iraq had been made,  the Board worked closely with neoconservatives Bush White House staffers to privatize U.S. international broadcasting by subcontracting this vital government function. The idea was to make U.S. international broadcasting more responsive in supporting the Bush Administration’s policies — something that VOA journalists, protected by their Congressional charter and committed to journalistic independence, were unwilling to offer, neither to the White House nor the BBG.

In their push to give themselves maximum control, the BBG not only eliminated jobs of  U.S.-based VOA journalists, most of them American citizens, but at the same time denied foreign journalists hired abroad job security and basic protections of American labor laws. These protections were available to VOA journalists, which made them more independent but annoyed the Bush White House and the BBG because they were unable to control them.

In carrying out its privatization plan, the BBG closed down many VOA language services, including the VOA Arabic Service, and created private entities such as Radio Sawa and Alhurra, with new multiple executive positions and contracting opportunities for favorites of BBG officials. (Some of the former Democratic BBG members, including Norman Pattiz and Senator Edward E. Kaufman, were in the forefront of implementing the neoconservative privatization agenda and the Bush White House propaganda goals in the Middle East; they were in fact more enthusiastic supporters than some of the conservative Republican members, but in the end most Republicans and Democrats supported the  Bush Administration’s plans.)

Other major international broadcasters felt no similar need to create new broadcasting entities with new names and new missions. The British Broadcasting Corporation also expanded its media coverage in the Middle East and recently launched a Persian TV channel, but it is proudly and consistently promoting the BBC brand.

Focused on privatization and advertising schemes in international broadcasting and public diplomacy, the Bush Administration and the BBG worked together to destroy the Voice of America as an internationally recognized American broadcaster and went on to create multiple brands, such as Sawa and Alhurra, with no solid journalistic traditions or clearly defined goals. The BBG corporate structure is now very similar to the multi-brand corporate structure of General Motors.

The Public Diplomacy Council, a nonprofit organization which includes former diplomats, academics and other foreign policy experts, agrees that the BBG’s policies are designed to waste U.S. taxpayers’ money.  The PDC has called on President Elect Obama and Congress to take urgent action in reforming publicly-funded U.S. international broadcasting and is proposing consolidation of all five broadcast entities into a single international network. The PDC believes that the proposed consolidation and replacing the Broadcasting Board of Governors by a new nonpartisan oversight commission would result in “cost savings aimed at making U.S. global broadcasting unmatched on the airwaves and in cyberspace.”

As it is customary during the confirmation process, Hillary Clinton’s answers to Senator Lugar’s questions were quite vague and may very well have been written based on information provided by the BBG staff. She made no reference to numerous reports about major editorial and financial scandals at Radio Sawa and Alhurra, such as airing of unchallenged statements by Holocaust deniers and giving extensive airtime to Islamist extremists and racist Russian politicians. ( These decisions were made by untrained and unmanaged contract employees in support of the BBG’s goal to achieve a mass audience in Iran and Russia. Their effort to gain higher ratings by playing up to the presumed worst prejudices of their audience was in any case unsuccessful, but it created a distorted impression of American values and damaged America’s reputation as a supporter of freedom.) 

 A study prepared by the Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School, University of Southern California, which was commissioned by the U.S. government, concluded that Alhurra, Arab-language television to the Middle East managed by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) fails to meet basic journalistic standards and is seen by few.  Read FreeMediaOnline.org report: “U.S. Taxpayers Pay for Spreading Racist Views on Radio Liberty in Russia: What Would Barack Obama Say If He Knew…”   

Use the following 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

One statement that deserves further analysis was Clinton’s assertion that “the BBG has learned that it must rely on the best market analysis to understand the unique listening habits and attitudes of the populations we seek to inform.” The BBG indeed spends tremendous amount of taxpayer money on market research, and BBG members often make claims that their decisions are driven by research.

Unfortunately, most BBG members have demonstrated that they lack both experience and judgment to apply research results to political realities in countries without free media. Senator Lugar asked a very good question whether the U.S. should try to reach a mass audience in the Middle East through entertainment programming. Perhaps understandably at this point, Hillary Clinton could not provide a clear answer.

While still working for the BBG, I became aware that BBG members and staffers were spending countless hours pouring over research data showing that the word “American” was unpopular in the Middle East and trying to come up with new names for their Middle East privatized broadcasting enterprise. They lacked knowledge, experience, and sophistication to realize that the problem was not with the word “American,” American society, or the Voice of America, but with the Bush Administration Middle East policies and their own preoccupation with marketing and advertising.

Making outdated Cold War-like assumptions about the Arab and Islamic culture, they named their TV station (Alhurra) ”The Free One.” It was utterly naive of them to believe that their audiences would be fooled by the lack of the word “American” in the name selected for the new network.

In the process of trying to disassociate their new broadcasting outlets from America, the BBG insulted Arab pride by implying that Middle East audiences were uniformly lacking basic freedoms.  It did not occur to them that this was not an East European-like audience, which truly lacked basic freedoms during the Cold War and looked to the West for help. Those in the Middle East who do not want to hear American news or the word “American” are not going to become viewers and listeners anyway, but most would rather have access to authentic American news and culture from a clearly identified source rather than rely on light-weight news and entertainment hiding behind propagandistic names from another era and another part of the world.

The new Secretary of State should inquire about some of the decisions made by the BBG during the last weeks of the Bush Administration. They included the shutting down of VOA radio broadcasts to Russia just 12 days before the Russian military invasion of Georgia and the Board’s refusal to resume them during the crisis. The BBG also ended VOA radio broadcasts to Ukraine just hours before Russia cut off the flow of natural gas supplies to that country and the rest of Europe. The BBG also wanted to end VOA radio broadcasts to Georgia.

The BBG staff claims that each one of these blunders was justified by solid market research. As someone who as a former BBG employee has placed U.S.-supported programming on stations in Bosnia, Afghanistan, Russia, and Iraq, I known that some of the research results obtained in closed and repressed societies are questionable ( for example, WMD intelligence research in Iraq, another closed and repressed society). But the main problem is not the quality of the research but the inability of the BBG members and their staff to interpret the data in light of political realities on the ground.

Most political loyalists serving on the BBG lack journalistic and human rights advocacy experience and know very little what it means to live in a country without free media. They nearly always have failed to understand what American broadcasting means to both dictators and victims of human rights abuses. Unfortunately, this is not something that reading audience research reports on countries without free media can teach them.

QUESTIONS FOR THE RECORD, SENATOR RICHARD G. LUGAR: Many have criticized the Bush Administration’s decision to try to reach broader audiences in the Middle East through efforts such as Radio Sawa and Al Hurra TV. Critics argue that Sawa – which relies primarily on a pop-radio format with a smattering of news – fails to deliver sufficient information to serious listeners who desire to hear unfiltered news about their country and the rest of the world. Opponents of AL Hurra – which attempts to serve as a
counter to Al Jazeera – claim that it often fails to provide sufficient counterpoints to radical and inaccurate claims made by participants on many of its programs.

141. Does the Obama Administration intend to continue funding Radio
Sawa in its current, mostly music, format? Similarly, what changes does the
Administration intend for Al Hurra?

142. Does the Obama Administration believe that the Broadcasting Board
of Governors, which oversees both Al Hurra and Radio Sawa as well as
Voice of America, Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia, is the
appropriate vehicle to provide managerial and policy guidance to the
disparate broadcasting entities? Does the Administration seek to alter or
even replace the BBG?

HILLARY CLINTON: Let me answer these two questions together. For the most part, the performance of America’s international broadcast entities has been quite successful in telling America’s story (largely the task of the VOA), and in serving as important surrogates for missing independent media in countries where a free press and independent media have been repressed, such as Afghanistan and Burma, where RFE/RL and Radio Free Asia respectively operate. Beyond the precise content of the news, our international broadcast services demonstrate an essential lesson of free societies – the requirement of an independent media for a robust democracy.

A robust and effective BBG in turn requires a strong and unambiguous
fire wall between the professional journalists and editors at BBG, and
others in the U.S. government whether at the White House or the State
Department. I recognize this to be a fundamental requirement of
effective international broadcasting.

The BBG is an independent agency but the Secretary of State holds a
seat on the Board, through which the Department can express its views.
State also clears editorials for the VOA broadcasts. But the most
effective BBG will be one at arms length from these and other
government agencies.

Now is the time to review the Arab language services – they have grown
in listenership in recent years, and we should review their performance
and impact to determine whether Al Hurra and Radio Sawa are
achieving their full potential.

We recognize that our biggest challenge is to ensure that our messages
are listened to, considered and, we hope, acted upon by people in the
Middle East, and Muslim societies around the world. To do this
effectively, the BBG has learned that it must rely on the best market
analysis to understand the unique listening habits and attitudes of the
populations we seek to inform, and these conditions differ substantially
from one country to its neighbor. So we must start with the market, and
then devise our message accordingly, which more and more will include
new digital platforms.

 

This commentary can be republished with attribution to FreeMediaOnline.org

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 programs to Ukraine and Russia.

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.

FreeMediaOnline.org bloggers described the “Democracy Video Challenge” contest as crude propaganda. One blogger, who grew up in Eastern Europe under communism and later worked as a journalist in the United States, wrote that asking young people to produce videos about democracy and offering them a free trip to the United States as a prize seems reminiscent of similar contests about the virtues of communism that school students behind the Iron Curtain had to enter to meet propaganda goals.

Ted Lipien, president of FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit, commented that this particular contest has been part of a much larger effort by the Bush Administration’s political appointees who tried to privatize the conduct of public diplomacy by granting lucrative contracts to advertising firms and web development companies. “They generally know very little about foreign policy and foreign cultures. Many of their ideas and programs have embarrassed the United States and contributed to the growth of anti-Americanism abroad,” Lipien said.

FreeMediaOnline.org bloggers also pointed out that these experiments in propaganda advertising were undertaken at the expense of traditional public diplomacy programs supported by American taxpayers, such as exchanges for foreign journalists and serious international news broadcasting by the Voice of America (VOA). These programs have been effective over many decades but were reduced during the Bush Administration to pay for various advertising schemes and the use of private contractors.

The Department of State was not the only U.S. government entity affected by experiments in advertising and privatization. The Bush Administration’s last Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, James K. Glassman, supported a privatization effort  at the Voice of America, the official but journalistically independent U.S. government supported international broadcaster,  that resulted in weakening and in some cases ending substantive American radio and web journalism directed at audiences abroad.

While he was the chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages U.S. international broadcasting, Glassman and other BBG members voted to end VOA radio news programs to many countries, including Russia, Georgia, and Ukraine. Glassman ordered instead more Internet video production, which requires high speed Internet access in areas usually known for poverty, corruption and conflict. He refused to allow VOA Russian Service journalists to resume emergency radio broadcasts to the war zone during the Russian-Georgian conflict last summer.

But in a move that may signal change under Secretary Clinton, the State Department web site, which has been partially and quickly redesigned after President Obama took office, no longer shows on the home page a prominently displayed image announcing the “Democracy Video Challenge” contest. It now shows under the heading of “FOREIGN POLICY HIGHLIGHTS” a link to  a different online video contest, “My Culture + Your Culture,” which seems more in line with traditional public diplomacy programs carried out by American diplomats as opposed to content developed by advertisers and private contractors.

But to participate in the “My Culture + Your Culture”  contest, visitors are taken to ExchangesConnect web site, which — as in the case of the “Democracy Video Challenge” web site –  also does not look at all like a U.S. government official site but rather like a site run by a nongovernmental enterprise. ExchangesConnect is copyrighted (unlike official U.S. government web sites, which are not copyrighted) and has all the indications of  being operated by a private contractor. There is a small notice, however, that ExchangesConnect is administered by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, U.S. Department of State. Much of the propaganda effort during the Bush Administration, both at State and at the BBG, was designed to hide any connection to the U.S. government in a naive belief that foreign audiences would not notice.

In the same area of the State Department web site’s home page with information about the cultural video contest, visitors are also informed about the “Ask The Ambassador” online forum that lets them interact with U.S. Ambassadors around the world. It tells visitors that when a chat is announced, questions submitted online are answered by State Department officials and posted to the website so that others many benefit from the discussion. Unfortunately, there was no announcement of any new online discussions.

To get to the “Democracy Video Challenge” contest, site visitors can still stay on the State Department’s home page, but they now have to navigate under “FOREIGN POLICY HIGHLIGHTS” to a next slide.  In addition to the video contest, that slide also features a link to the “Policy Podcast,” where State Department officials discuss upcoming events and foreign policy issues.

The U.S. certainly needs more Public Diplomacy 2.0 programs that promote online discussions with American officials and use other interactive forms of communicating with foreign audiences.  The new Obama Administration has to be careful, however, what content goes into these programs.  Secretary Clinton should not allow advertising and propaganda to replace serious journalism. She should not discard well-tested public diplomacy tools in favor of gimmicks developed by private contractors whose only qualification are connections to high government officials.

Ted Lipien of FreeMediaOnline.org pointed out that one result of privatizing experiments during the Bush Administration was the airing of unchallenged statements from Holocaust deniers on the U.S.-funded Alhurra television network for the Middle East. Before that happened, the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which is responsible for these broadcasts, eliminated Voice of America Arabic radio programs, which had accurate and balanced news prepared by well-trained journalists. The BBG re-directed resources, previously used for serious journalism at VOA, to develop Alhurra as a private entity. It could more easily control  Alhurra as a private entity and force it to accept advertising and marketing concepts rejected by VOA journalists as incompatible with objective and balanced reporting.

FreeMediaOnline.org bloggers described the “Democracy Video Challenge” contest as crude propaganda. One blogger, who grew up in Eastern Europe under communism and later worked as a journalist in the United States, wrote that asking young people to produce videos about democracy and offering them a free trip to the United States as a prize seems reminiscent of similar contests about the virtues of communism that school students behind the Iron Curtain had to enter to meet propaganda goals.

Ted Lipien, president of FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit, commented that this particular contest has been part of a much larger effort by the Bush Administration’s political appointees who tried to privatize the conduct of public diplomacy by granting lucrative contracts to advertising firms and web development companies. “They generally know very little about foreign policy and foreign cultures. Many of their ideas and programs have embarrassed the United States and contributed to the growth of anti-Americanism abroad,” Lipien said.

FreeMediaOnline.org bloggers also pointed out that these experiments in propaganda advertising were undertaken at the expense of traditional public diplomacy programs supported by American taxpayers, such as exchanges for foreign journalists and serious international news broadcasting by the Voice of America (VOA). These programs have been effective over many decades but were reduced during the Bush Administration to pay for various advertising schemes and the use of private contractors.

The Department of State was not the only U.S. government entity affected by experiments in advertising and privatization. The Bush Administration’s last Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, James K. Glassman, supported a privatization effort  at the Voice of America, the official but journalistically independent U.S. government supported international broadcaster,  that resulted in weakening and in some cases ending substantive American radio and web journalism directed at audiences abroad.

While he was the chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages U.S. international broadcasting, Glassman and other BBG members voted to end VOA radio news programs to many countries, including Russia, Georgia, and Ukraine. Glassman ordered instead more Internet video production, which requires high speed Internet access in areas usually known for poverty, corruption and conflict. He refused to allow VOA Russian Service journalists to resume emergency radio broadcasts to the war zone during the Russian-Georgian conflict last summer.

But in a move that may signal change under Secretary Clinton, the State Department web site, which has been partially and quickly redesigned after President Obama took office, no longer shows on the home page a prominently displayed image announcing the “Democracy Video Challenge” contest. It now shows under the heading of “FOREIGN POLICY HIGHLIGHTS” a link to  a different online video contest, “My Culture + Your Culture,” which seems more in line with traditional public diplomacy programs carried out by American diplomats as opposed to content developed by advertisers and private contractors.

But to participate in the “My Culture + Your Culture”  contest, visitors are taken to ExchangesConnect web site, which — as in the case of the “Democracy Video Challenge” web site –  also does not look at all like a U.S. government official site but rather like a site run by a nongovernmental enterprise. ExchangesConnect is copyrighted (unlike official U.S. government web sites, which are not copyrighted) and has all the indications of  being operated by a private contractor. There is a small notice, however, that ExchangesConnect is administered by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, U.S. Department of State. Much of the propaganda effort during the Bush Administration, both at State and at the BBG, was designed to hide any connection to the U.S. government in a naive belief that foreign audiences would not notice.

In the same area of the State Department web site’s home page with information about the cultural video contest, visitors are also informed about the “Ask The Ambassador” online forum that lets them interact with U.S. Ambassadors around the world. It tells visitors that when a chat is announced, questions submitted online are answered by State Department officials and posted to the website so that others many benefit from the discussion. Unfortunately, there was no announcement of any new online discussions.

To get to the “Democracy Video Challenge” contest, site visitors can still stay on the State Department’s home page, but they now have to navigate under “FOREIGN POLICY HIGHLIGHTS” to a next slide.  In addition to the video contest, that slide also features a link to the “Policy Podcast,” where State Department officials discuss upcoming events and foreign policy issues.

The U.S. certainly needs more Public Diplomacy 2.0 programs that promote online discussions with American officials and use other interactive forms of communicating with foreign audiences.  The new Obama Administration has to be careful, however, what content goes into these programs.  Secretary Clinton should not allow advertising and propaganda to replace serious journalism. She should not discard well-tested public diplomacy tools in favor of gimmicks developed by private contractors whose only qualification are connections to high government officials.

Ted Lipien of FreeMediaOnline.org pointed out that one result of privatizing experiments during the Bush Administration was the airing of unchallenged statements from Holocaust deniers on the U.S.-funded Alhurra television network for the Middle East. Before that happened, the Broadcasting Board of Governors, which is responsible for these broadcasts, eliminated Voice of America Arabic radio programs, which had accurate and balanced news prepared by well-trained journalists. The BBG re-directed resources, previously used for serious journalism at VOA, to develop Alhurra as a private entity. It could more easily control  Alhurra as a private entity and force it to accept advertising and marketing concepts rejected by VOA journalists as incompatible with objective and balanced reporting.

The policy in question was instituted by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), the Federal government agency which manages privatized U.S.-funded international broadcasting stations, such as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) and Alhurra Television. Ms. Karapetian became one of the victims of the policy when she was fired from her broadcasting job at RFE/RL in the Czech Republic after almost 12 years of employment, which she describes as “impeccable,” with “very good” and “excellent” performance reviews.

Legal cases against RFE/RL’s employment practices have been filed by the dismissed employees with the Czech Supreme Court,  the Czech Constitutional Court, and the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Reports critical of their treatment have appeared in Czech media and included statements of support from Czech politicians. In yet another major embarrassment for the BBG, one of the most respected world statesmen, former Czech president and human rights activist Vaclav Havel, promised to personally monitor the cases of the fired employees. 

The PR problem created by these cases and the damage to America’s image abroad can be traced back to the actions of a relatively small group of unelected U.S. government officials. Less than ten men and women, selected by the leadership of their political parties, appointed by the President and confirmed by the U.S. Senate, serve at any one time on the bipartisan Broadcasting Board of Governors. Most of them are political loyalists and private businessmen without much foreign policy and human rights advocacy experience.

During the eight years of the Bush Administration, the BBG, which is responsible for RFE/RL’s personnel policies, greatly intensified its efforts to subcontract U.S. international broadcasting operations to privatized institutions. One of the major attractions of subcontracting was the realization by BBG members that unlike U.S. government employees, foreign workers hired abroad can be easily dismissed at any time and for any reason, or no reason at all, under the so-called “employment-at-will” doctrine. At the same time, the BBG was eliminating programs and terminating employment of American journalists working at the Washington-based Voice of America, which it also manages, while transferring Federal funding to these privatized stations.

After her employment was terminated by RFE/RL, Anna Karapetian, mother of three minor children, found out that unlike VOA journalists employed in Washington, D.C., and unlike her American colleagues working at the RFE/RL headquarters in the Czech Republic, she did not have the protection of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the Federal Civil Rights Act, and many other U.S. anti-discrimination laws. The Czech government made sure that locally-hired Czech employees would have the full protection of the Czech labor law, but at the insistence of the BBG it allowed RFE/RL to exempt foreign journalists working for RFE/RL in Prague. They were placed under the Communist-era law, still on the books, which was used to facilitate the Soviet domination of Czechoslovakia after 1968.

The influential Czech, quite pro-American newspaper, “Lidove noviny” wrote in an editorial:

“Prague headquarters of RFE/RL, which pretends to be a messenger of freedom, democracy and the rule of law, behaves as an employer in such a way as if the principles it heralds are relevant “just” for the whole planet but not for what is going on inside that estimable organization itself.” Read Anna Karapetian’s Open Letter.

This legal limbo was specifically sought by the BBG and RFE/RL to prevent court challenges by foreign-based journalists against adverse personnel actions. Shocked and angered by how she was treated by her U.S. taxpayer-supported American employer, Anna Karapetian wrote in an open letter to freedom of the press and human rights organizations that non-American and non-Czech RFE/RL employees working in the Czech Republic, who often come from semi-dictatorial countries of the former Soviet Union, have “about as much legal protection as the inhabitants of Guantanamo: not in the country of their origin, not in the place of their presence, nor in the United States.”

While the BBG’s actions now appear to many as wrong and hypocritical, during the Bush Administration, both Republicans and Democrats serving on the BBG, became convinced that it would be easier for them and better for the White House’s war on terror to manage U.S. international broadcasting as a series of private businesses exempt from many U.S. government laws and regulations. These political appointees consistently eliminated programs at the Voice of America, where journalists enjoy significant independence and strong legal protections against arbitrary actions by management and were viewed as being opposed to the BBG’s and Bush Administration’s plans to transform U.S. international broadcasting. While BBG members claimed that their strategy would result in greater effectiveness and savings of taxpayers’ money, they have created multiple broadcasting units with multiple executive and administrative positions, which independent studies and media reports described as wasteful and lacking proper programming and fiscal accountability. ProPublica.org: Report Calls Alhurra a Failure

The fact that the neoconservative privatization agenda was led and implemented by a number of prominent Democrats on the BBG, including at least two  former members with close links to Vice President Biden, may not bode well for Ms. Karapetian’s hopes for significant reforms at the BBG and at RFE/RL during the Obama Administration. As a U.S. Senator, Vice President Biden was a major patron of a former BBG member, Norman Pattiz, founder of the now failing U.S. radio syndicate Westwood One, who pushed hard for the elimination of VOA broadcasting services, including its Arabic Service, and was the primary force behind the establishment of privatized stations, such as Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television for the Middle East. Many RFE/RL and VOA journalists still hope, however, that President Obama and his close advisors will pay attention to media reports of mismanagement at the BBG. According to the latest Federal Human Capital Survey (FHCS), the employees of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) have recently given the BBG Board members and the officials of the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB) the worst ever rating for good management and placed the BBG at the very bottom of Federal agencies. Broadcasting Board of Governors Rated Worst Than Ever By Its Employees and As One of The Worst Federal Agencies

During the last months of the Bush Administration,  Edward E. Kaufman, another former Democratic BBG member who is now a U.S. Senator from Delaware and was previously Joe Biden’s chief of staff, worked closely with BBG’s former Republican chairman, neoconservative Bush appointee, James K. Glassman, who later became the U.S. Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy. They agreed to terminate VOA radio broadcasts to Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, and India. Thanks to highly effective coordination behind the scenes by the BBG executive director, Jeffrey Trimble, who was formerly acting president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the Board succeeded in taking VOA radio programs to Russia off the air just 12 days before the Russian military forces attacked Georgia last summer and then refused to resume them.

On December 31, 2008, the BBG also ended VOA radio program to Ukraine just hours before Russia cut off the flow of natural gas supplies to Ukraine and the rest of Europe. Only one BBG member, Blanquita Walsh Cullum, the only working journalist serving on the Board, was reported to have voted against these program cuts and reportedly also opposed many of the management practices supported by other BBG members. The other current BBG members are: Joaquin F. Blaya, D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, and Steven J. Simmons. The BBG web site still lists Condoleezza Rice as an ex-officio member, even though she is no longer the Secretary of State and therefore no longer sits on the Board.

Ted Lipien, president of San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit FreeMediaOnline.org, said that while privatized U.S.-funded broadcasting to Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union was highly effective at times during the Cold War, “this so-called ‘surrogate’ broadcasting model turned out to be totally outdated and inappropriate for providing news to the Middle East and the former Soviet republics under drastically different conditions.” Lipien pointed out that for most of the Cold War, RFE/RL journalists, who were based in West Germany, enjoyed far greater legal protections, as well as being protected from intimidation by communist security services, than the current RFE/RL journalists based in Prague and elsewhere behind the former Iron Curtain.

In addition to eliminating U.S. jobs and severely limiting the rights of overseas-based foreign journalists, the privatization of U.S. international broadcasting during the Bush Administration also produced major fiscal and editorial scandals at the newly established private stations and at RFE/RL. Both Republican and Democratic BBG members hoped that these private entities would be far more effective than the Voice of America in delivering programs against Islamist extremism. But the loosening of programming and fiscal controls and employment protections for journalists combined with the BBG’s marketing policy designed to maximize audience size regardless of local media conditions led to numerous editorial failures at the privatized entities. At the same time,  as a result of BBG’s actions, some of them taken within the last few weeks, the Obama Administration found itself without radio broadcasts by the Voice of America from the United States to many countries around the world.

Unlike VOA journalists,  many broadcasters at the privatized stations do not have extensive experience in reporting news about the United States and American politics. Some broadcasters, especially at Alhurra Television and Radio Sawa, have been accused of lacking basic journalistic training. U.S. and international media outlets reported that Alhurra aired unchallenged statements by Holocaust deniers and RFE/RL was criticized by a Russian human rights organization for giving extensive airtime to a Russian politician known for his racist comments about ethnic minorities, Jews, and Blacks. FreeMediaOnline.org reported that the BBG also failed to protect RFE/RL journalists and other employees who are Russian citizens and work in Russia. There is strong evidence that these employees are subject to blackmail and other forms of intimidation by the Kremlin’s secret police. “U.S. Taxpayers Pay for Spreading Racist Views on Radio Liberty in Russia: What Would Barack Obama Say If He Knew…”   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

Ms. Karapetian points out in her open letter that foreign journalists employed by RFE/RL face serious risks from security services of local dictators when they work in their own countries and lack legal protections if they work at RFE/RL headquarters in the Czech Republic. But despite her accusations of mistreatment, she defends RFE/RL as a journalistic organization with a distinguished history that is still much needed by audiences in countries without free media. She also expressed concern that the personnel policies applied to foreign journalists at RFE/RL are damaging U.S. reputation abroad and give encouragement to authoritarian leaders in the former Soviet republics. According to Ted Lipien, the lack of basic job security and legal protections makes foreign journalists employed by RFE/RL far more vulnerable to threats from the security services of the countries to which they broadcast. Their family members who live in those countries are also subject to intimidation.

Ms. Karapetian ended her letter with an appeal to press freedom and human rights advocates to contact the current RFE/RL president, Jeffrey Gedmin, and urge him to put into action a statement from his recent speech that “We have as RFE/RL our intellectual and moral compass… We also need to lead by example…”. Anna Karapetian is hoping that being true to President Obama’s promise of change,  his administration will show greater respect for the rights of foreign journalists employed by U.S.-funded international broadcasters. (Some media reports use “Karapetyan” as the spelling of her last name.)

Despite the reported failures on the part of the BBG, RFE/RL continues to play a vital role in many countries and, according to Ted Lipien of FreeMediaOnline.org, can be more effective in other countries if some of the failed policies of the Board of Broadcasting Governors are reversed. The ability to tell America’s story to the world in Voice of America broadcasts, however, has been largely destroyed by the privatization policies of the BBG during the past eight years. Journalists at VOA and RFE/RL hope that the Obama Administration will institute quick reforms in the use of “soft power” in communicating with the world. America’s image abroad would be improved by restoring Voice of America broadcasts and by putting an end to the shameful practice of restricting rights of foreign journalists who work on behalf of the United States, Lipien said.

The Obama Transition Team official responsible for international broadcasting is Ernest J. Wilson III, Dean of the USC Annenberg School for Communication. His email address is: ernest.wilson@usc.edu.

If you wish to protest or comment on the treatment of foreign journalists working for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and the Broadcasting Board of Governors, you may also send emails to:

Jeffrey Gedmin, RFE/RL President,  addressed to Mr. Martins Zvaners, Associate Director of Communications: zvanersm@rferl.org

Jeffrey N. Trimble, BBG Executive Director,  addressed to the BBG Office of Public Affairs, publicaffairs@bbg.gov

This report was first published by  FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog, January 22, 2009, San Francisco.

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog, January 22, 2009, San Francisco — Anna Karapetian, a journalist from Armenia who in radio broadcasts funded by the U.S. government reported on human rights abuses in her country, is one of many people around the world who see Barack Obama’s inauguration as a hopeful beginning of a new era of change in Washington.  Ms. Karapetian hopes that with Mr. Obama’s strong commitment to protecting workers’ rights, the new administration will end the policy of a U.S. government agency which can arbitrarily fire its foreign journalists working abroad and denies them many of the basic labor law protections available to Americans citizens and residents of other democratic countries.

The policy in question was instituted by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), the Federal government agency which manages privatized U.S.-funded international broadcasting stations, such as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) and Alhurra Television. Ms. Karapetian became one of the victims of the policy when she was fired from her broadcasting job at RFE/RL in the Czech Republic after almost 12 years of employment, which she describes as “impeccable,” with “very good” and “excellent” performance reviews.

Legal cases against RFE/RL’s employment practices have been filed by the dismissed employees with the Czech Supreme Court,  the Czech Constitutional Court, and the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Reports critical of their treatment have appeared in Czech media and included statements of support from Czech politicians. In yet another major embarrassment for the BBG, one of the most respected world statesmen, former Czech president and human rights activist Vaclav Havel, promised to personally monitor the cases of the fired employees. 

The PR problem created by these cases and the damage to America’s image abroad can be traced back to the actions of a relatively small group of unelected U.S. government officials. Less than ten men and women, selected by the leadership of their political parties, appointed by the President and confirmed by the U.S. Senate, serve at any one time on the bipartisan Broadcasting Board of Governors. Most of them are political loyalists and private businessmen without much foreign policy and human rights advocacy experience.

During the eight years of the Bush Administration, the BBG, which is responsible for RFE/RL’s personnel policies, greatly intensified its efforts to subcontract U.S. international broadcasting operations to privatized institutions. One of the major attractions of subcontracting was the realization by BBG members that unlike U.S. government employees, foreign workers hired abroad can be easily dismissed at any time and for any reason, or no reason at all, under the so-called “employment-at-will” doctrine. At the same time, the BBG was eliminating programs and terminating employment of American journalists working at the Washington-based Voice of America, which it also manages, while transferring Federal funding to these privatized stations.

After her employment was terminated by RFE/RL, Anna Karapetian, mother of three minor children, found out that unlike VOA journalists employed in Washington, D.C., and unlike her American colleagues working at the RFE/RL headquarters in the Czech Republic, she did not have the protection of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the Federal Civil Rights Act, and many other U.S. anti-discrimination laws. The Czech government made sure that locally-hired Czech employees would have the full protection of the Czech labor law, but at the insistence of the BBG it allowed RFE/RL to exempt foreign journalists working for RFE/RL in Prague. They were placed under the Communist-era law, still on the books, which was used to facilitate the Soviet domination of Czechoslovakia after 1968.

The influential Czech, quite pro-American newspaper, “Lidove noviny” wrote in an editorial:

“Prague headquarters of RFE/RL, which pretends to be a messenger of freedom, democracy and the rule of law, behaves as an employer in such a way as if the principles it heralds are relevant “just” for the whole planet but not for what is going on inside that estimable organization itself.” Read Anna Karapetian’s Open Letter.

This legal limbo was specifically sought by the BBG and RFE/RL to prevent court challenges by foreign-based journalists against adverse personnel actions. Shocked and angered by how she was treated by her U.S. taxpayer-supported American employer, Anna Karapetian wrote in an open letter to freedom of the press and human rights organizations that non-American and non-Czech RFE/RL employees working in the Czech Republic, who often come from semi-dictatorial countries of the former Soviet Union, have “about as much legal protection as the inhabitants of Guantanamo: not in the country of their origin, not in the place of their presence, nor in the United States.”

While the BBG’s actions now appear to many as wrong and hypocritical, during the Bush Administration, both Republicans and Democrats serving on the BBG, became convinced that it would be easier for them and better for the White House’s war on terror to manage U.S. international broadcasting as a series of private businesses exempt from many U.S. government laws and regulations. These political appointees consistently eliminated programs at the Voice of America, where journalists enjoy significant independence and strong legal protections against arbitrary actions by management and were viewed as being opposed to the BBG’s and Bush Administration’s plans to transform U.S. international broadcasting. While BBG members claimed that their strategy would result in greater effectiveness and savings of taxpayers’ money, they have created multiple broadcasting units with multiple executive and administrative positions, which independent studies and media reports described as wasteful and lacking proper programming and fiscal accountability. ProPublica.org: Report Calls Alhurra a Failure

The fact that the neoconservative privatization agenda was led and implemented by a number of prominent Democrats on the BBG, including at least two  former members with close links to Vice President Biden, may not bode well for Ms. Karapetian’s hopes for significant reforms at the BBG and at RFE/RL during the Obama Administration. As a U.S. Senator, Vice President Biden was a major patron of a former BBG member, Norman Pattiz, founder of the now failing U.S. radio syndicate Westwood One, who pushed hard for the elimination of VOA broadcasting services, including its Arabic Service, and was the primary force behind the establishment of privatized stations, such as Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television for the Middle East. Many RFE/RL and VOA journalists still hope, however, that President Obama and his close advisors will pay attention to media reports of mismanagement at the BBG. According to the latest Federal Human Capital Survey (FHCS), the employees of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) have recently given the BBG Board members and the officials of the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB) the worst ever rating for good management and placed the BBG at the very bottom of Federal agencies. Broadcasting Board of Governors Rated Worst Than Ever By Its Employees and As One of The Worst Federal Agencies

During the last months of the Bush Administration,  Edward E. Kaufman, another former Democratic BBG member who is now a U.S. Senator from Delaware and was previously Joe Biden’s chief of staff, worked closely with BBG’s former Republican chairman, neoconservative Bush appointee, James K. Glassman, who later became the U.S. Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy. They agreed to terminate VOA radio broadcasts to Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, and India. Thanks to highly effective coordination behind the scenes by the BBG executive director, Jeffrey Trimble, who was formerly acting president of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the Board succeeded in taking VOA radio programs to Russia off the air just 12 days before the Russian military forces attacked Georgia last summer and then refused to resume them.

On December 31, 2008, the BBG also ended VOA radio program to Ukraine just hours before Russia cut off the flow of natural gas supplies to Ukraine and the rest of Europe. Only one BBG member, Blanquita Walsh Cullum, the only working journalist serving on the Board, was reported to have voted against these program cuts and reportedly also opposed many of the management practices supported by other BBG members. The other current BBG members are: Joaquin F. Blaya, D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, and Steven J. Simmons. The BBG web site still lists Condoleezza Rice as an ex-officio member, even though she is no longer the Secretary of State and therefore no longer sits on the Board.

Ted Lipien, president of San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit FreeMediaOnline.org, said that while privatized U.S.-funded broadcasting to Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union was highly effective at times during the Cold War, “this so-called ‘surrogate’ broadcasting model turned out to be totally outdated and inappropriate for providing news to the Middle East and the former Soviet republics under drastically different conditions.” Lipien pointed out that for most of the Cold War, RFE/RL journalists, who were based in West Germany, enjoyed far greater legal protections, as well as being protected from intimidation by communist security services, than the current RFE/RL journalists based in Prague and elsewhere behind the former Iron Curtain.

In addition to eliminating U.S. jobs and severely limiting the rights of overseas-based foreign journalists, the privatization of U.S. international broadcasting during the Bush Administration also produced major fiscal and editorial scandals at the newly established private stations and at RFE/RL. Both Republican and Democratic BBG members hoped that these private entities would be far more effective than the Voice of America in delivering programs against Islamist extremism. But the loosening of programming and fiscal controls and employment protections for journalists combined with the BBG’s marketing policy designed to maximize audience size regardless of local media conditions led to numerous editorial failures at the privatized entities. At the same time,  as a result of BBG’s actions, some of them taken within the last few weeks, the Obama Administration found itself without radio broadcasts by the Voice of America from the United States to many countries around the world.

Unlike VOA journalists,  many broadcasters at the privatized stations do not have extensive experience in reporting news about the United States and American politics. Some broadcasters, especially at Alhurra Television and Radio Sawa, have been accused of lacking basic journalistic training. U.S. and international media outlets reported that Alhurra aired unchallenged statements by Holocaust deniers and RFE/RL was criticized by a Russian human rights organization for giving extensive airtime to a Russian politician known for his racist comments about ethnic minorities, Jews, and Blacks. FreeMediaOnline.org reported that the BBG also failed to protect RFE/RL journalists and other employees who are Russian citizens and work in Russia. There is strong evidence that these employees are subject to blackmail and other forms of intimidation by the Kremlin’s secret police. “U.S. Taxpayers Pay for Spreading Racist Views on Radio Liberty in Russia: What Would Barack Obama Say If He Knew…”   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

Ms. Karapetian points out in her open letter that foreign journalists employed by RFE/RL face serious risks from security services of local dictators when they work in their own countries and lack legal protections if they work at RFE/RL headquarters in the Czech Republic. But despite her accusations of mistreatment, she defends RFE/RL as a journalistic organization with a distinguished history that is still much needed by audiences in countries without free media. She also expressed concern that the personnel policies applied to foreign journalists at RFE/RL are damaging U.S. reputation abroad and give encouragement to authoritarian leaders in the former Soviet republics. According to Ted Lipien, the lack of basic job security and legal protections makes foreign journalists employed by RFE/RL far more vulnerable to threats from the security services of the countries to which they broadcast. Their family members who live in those countries are also subject to intimidation.

Ms. Karapetian ended her letter with an appeal to press freedom and human rights advocates to contact the current RFE/RL president, Jeffrey Gedmin, and urge him to put into action a statement from his recent speech that “We have as RFE/RL our intellectual and moral compass… We also need to lead by example…”. Anna Karapetian is hoping that being true to President Obama’s promise of change,  his administration will show greater respect for the rights of foreign journalists employed by U.S.-funded international broadcasters. (Some media reports use “Karapetyan” as the spelling of her last name.)

Despite the reported failures on the part of the BBG, RFE/RL continues to play a vital role in many countries and, according to Ted Lipien of FreeMediaOnline.org, can be more effective in other countries if some of the failed policies of the Board of Broadcasting Governors are reversed. The ability to tell America’s story to the world in Voice of America broadcasts, however, has been largely destroyed by the privatization policies of the BBG during the past eight years. Journalists at VOA and RFE/RL hope that the Obama Administration will institute quick reforms in the use of “soft power” in communicating with the world. America’s image abroad would be improved by restoring Voice of America broadcasts and by putting an end to the shameful practice of restricting rights of foreign journalists who work on behalf of the United States, Lipien said.

The Obama Transition Team official responsible for international broadcasting is Ernest J. Wilson III, Dean of the USC Annenberg School for Communication. His email address is: ernest.wilson@usc.edu.

If you wish to protest or comment on the treatment of foreign journalists working for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and the Broadcasting Board of Governors, you may also send emails to:

Jeffrey Gedmin, RFE/RL President,  addressed to Mr. Martins Zvaners, Associate Director of Communications: zvanersm@rferl.org

Jeffrey N. Trimble, BBG Executive Director,  addressed to the BBG Office of Public Affairs, publicaffairs@bbg.gov

 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 Worst of Times

by The Federalist

“US international broadcasting is being led by people not interested in its mission or in sustaining its programs.”

This applies to all levels of US international broadcasting, from the Office of the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs down to managers within the broadcasting entities, the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB), and the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG).  When it comes to public diplomacy, the greatest detriment to the national and public Interest may, in fact, be these officials.

Time and again, they have demonstrated an extraordinary disregard for the power, consequence, and significance of silence.  In public diplomacy and in international broadcasting, silence equates with failure, abandonment, and a loss of international power and prestige.

These officials have systematically engaged in silencing US international broadcasting assets: in Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, India and Pakistan…all flashpoints for much larger conflicts.  Worse, they do so with extreme arrogance, without regard to painful realities around the world.  They do not understand the necessity of a strategic triad of broadcast mediums that allow for a flexible and fluid response to changing situations.  In their decision-making, they have repeatedly demonstrated that they are shortsighted, unimaginative, and inflexible…the perfect faults to exploit by forces intent upon defeating the reach of US international broadcasting assets and the US public diplomacy effort.  Discrediting the United States is made a whole lot easier by the ineptitude exhibited in these processes.

In the face of deteriorating circumstances, these officials have embraced an all-or-nothing strategy based on using the Internet as their sole source for audio, video and text.

Let us disabuse the notion that this strategy is groundbreaking, trendsetting or staying ahead of the technological curve.  US government computer systems are vulnerable to cyber warfare.  Recently, a high level briefing was provided the outgoing Bush and incoming Obama administrations regarding the vulnerabilities of and threats to US government computer systems.  The threat is real and substantial.

No doubt, those responsible for Internet security for US international broadcasting would claim that its systems are secure.  However, it should be remembered that a culture of deceit permeates many levels of the US international broadcasting entities…the same kind of deceit that attempts to cover up embarrassing failures of its operations, such as with alHurra television, until the cover-up effort was trumped by  the release of the Annenberg Report on alHurra credited to the Obama transition team.  Claims of cyber security for US international broadcasting systems should be met with great skepticism.  Be mindful of the admonition: consider the source.

One more point: the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, James Glassman, thinks that “we’re Coke and they’re Pepsi.”  Perhaps Mr. Glassman doesn’t have a television and hasn’t had the opportunity to watch footage of the current round of conflict between Hamas and the Israeli military in the Gaza Strip, or the widening of the conflict by rocket fire now coming from southern Lebanon into Israel.  Or perhaps Mr. Glassman can inquire of Hamas or Hezbollah if they think they are Coke or Pepsi. 

The point is this: the analogy is idiotic…under almost any circumstances but especially those of the present.

These are not the best of times for US international broadcasting.  Maintaining the status quo, through the twits and tweets of a fairy tale world view pontificated by inept political appointees or senior officials covering up the multi-million dollar failures of its high profile projects like alHurra, is the short march to the worst of times.

The Federalist 2009

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog, January 7, 2009, San Francisco – In yet another show of incredibly poor judgement combined with bad timing and ulterior bureaucratic motives resulting in a major waste of U.S. tax dollars, the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a bipartisan body responsible for U.S. international broadcasts, had silenced Voice of America (VOA) radio programs to Ukraine one day before Russia halted natural gas deliveries to Europe.  In a similar move just a few months earlier, the BBG had terminated VOA radio programs to Russia and had stopped VOA Hindi radio to India shortly before the recent deadly terrorist attacks in Mumbai.

As a major energy and political crisis was about to hit Eastern and Western Europe, the last Voice of America Ukrainian radio program aired on December 31. The BBG was aware of the Kremlin’s threat to cut off gas supplies to Ukraine as of January 1, 2009 but decided to eliminate the VOA Ukranian program anyway and leave the Obama Administration with another fait accompli.

Listen to the last Voice of America  (VOA) radio broadcast to Ukraine. These radio programs were eliminated by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) on Dec. 31, 2008, one day before Russia halted natural gas deliveries to Ukraine and Western Europe, precipitating a major crisis. Earlier, the BBG  had eliminated VOA radio to Russia 12 days before the Russian military attack on Georgia and took VOA Hindi programs off the air shortly before the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India. The BBG also wanted to reduce radio programs to Tibet, also shortly before major pro-independence demonstrations in the region, which were brutally suppressed by the Chinese authorities. 

[kml_flashembed movie="http://freemediaonline.org/zpod2/voaukraine.swf" height="125" width="260" base="http://freemediaonline.org/zpod2/" /]

In July 2008, the BBG had halted Voice of America radio programs to Russia just 12 days before the Russian military forces attacked Georgia. The former BBG chairman, neoconservative Republican  James K. Glassman, who now serves as the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, ignored urgent requests from the Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy (VT) who on behalf of the Senate Appropriations Committee had directed the BBG not to terminate broadcasts to Russia and other countries without free media.

Glassman formed an alliance with the BBG’s liberal Democratic members, including Edward E. Kaufman and D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, who were equally eager to dismantle Voice of America radio programs to Russia, Georgia, and Ukraine in order to bolster privatized broadcasting by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), which is based in Prague and  Moscow. The closing down of VOA Russian radio was implemented by the BBG executive director Jeffrey Trimble, a former RFE/RL acting president, who worked closely with Glassman, Kaufman and Hirschberg and reportedly received advice from Senator Biden’s staff. Only one BBG member was reported to have voted against cutting VOA radio programs.

BBG officials claim that VOA Ukrainian TV programs and the VOA Ukrainian web site, which have not been eliminated, are sufficient to present American news and opinions. They made the same claim with regard to Russia even though many people in the region, especially in the conflict areas, do not have access to the Internet. There is also overwhelming evidence of the ability of the Russian security services to block and sabotage Western news and human rights web sites.  

The most recent BBG chairman, James K. Glassman, however, is well known for his boundless enthusiasm for the Internet and pro-democracy online video contests, which he describes as Public Diplomacy 2.0. He is equally enthusiastic about the use of private consultants to carry out U.S. government operations, including public diplomacy,  and several years ago he co-authored a book “DOW 36,000,” predicting that the U.S. stock market would be at that level by now.  Glassman ignored warnings from both Democrats and Republicans on the Hill who urged him not to discontinue Voice of America radio broadcasts.  U.S. lawmakers were especially concerned about countries without free media and countries subject to pressure from aggressive neighbors and vulnerable to attacks from terrorist groups.

Another former BBG member, Senator Kaufman (D-DE), who had previously served as Senator Biden’s chief of staff and was appointed to replace him in the U.S. Senate, has been a strong supporter of steering money to RFE/RL, which is incorporated in Delaware. Both Kaufman and Vice President elect Biden were supporters of the Bush Administration’s Middle East broadcasting policy focused on marginalizing the Voice of America and  using privatized entities and private consultants rather than U.S. government employees.

Despite the BBG’s bipartisan structure, moving forward with the privatization of US international broadcasting has been part of the strategy of the Board’s Democratic members and their neoconservative Republican colleagues ever since the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The BBG has enthusiastically embraced the Bush Administration’s plan to outsource  broadcasting to private entities, many of them based overseas. Their strategy also called for the elimination of Voice of America services based in Washington, D.C. These VOA broadcasting services provided more balanced news with an American perspective and were subject to much stricter editorial and fiscal controls than the new privatized stations.

Acting on advice of the BBG’s most prominent former Democratic member Norman Pattiz, founder of the now seriously ailing U.S. radio syndicate Westwood One, and with strong encouragement from the White House and the Vice President Cheney’s office, the bipartisan Board shut down VOA’s highly-respected Arabic radio service and created two privatized Middle East broadcasting entities,  Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television. Both are increasingly viewed by U.S. diplomats, foreign policy experts and NGOs as a major propaganda blunder, contributing to the growth of anti-Americanism rather than improving U.S. image in the region.

Privatized broadcasting entities managed by the BBG have been plagued with financial and editorial scandals. The nonprofit investigative journalism web site ProPublica.org has uncovered  major financial irregularities at Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television and reported on the lack of editorial controls that have resulted in giving airtime to Ismalist extremists and Holocaust deniers.  A study prepared by the Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School, University of Southern California, which was commissioned by the U.S. government, concluded that Alhurra, Arab-language television to the Middle East managed by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) fails to meet basic journalistic standards and is seen by few.

The BBG’s privatized corporate structure looks very similar to the General Motor’s panoply of automotive brands, but — except for the rapidly disappearing Voice of America — it does not offer any sign of representing the United States. As with the ailing U.S. automotive firms, the structure created by the BBG includes multiple and duplicate executive positions. It offers BBG members, their staff, contractors and employees of the privatized entities plenty of opportunities for international travel at taxpayers’ expense between Washington and such desirable overseas locations as Prague, Dubai, and Hong Kong.

In a major waste of taxpayer resources, the BBG spends millions of dollars on separate office facilities for each station, even in Washington, D.C. Ted Lipien, president of media freedom nonprofit FreeMediaOnline.org, whose reporting on the Holocaust deniers conference in Teheran led to the investigations of Alhurra Television’s programming, suggested that another investigation, this time of the Broadcasting Board of Governors’ management practices, should become a priority for Nancy Killefer, President Elect Barack Obama’s appointee as the White House Chief Performance Officer.

The Public Diplomacy Council, a nonprofit organization which includes former diplomats, academics and other foreign policy experts, has also called on President Elect Obama and Congress to take urgent action in reforming publicly-funded U.S. international broadcasting. The PDC is proposing consolidation of all five broadcast entities into a single international network. The PDC believes that the proposed consolidation and replacing the Broadcasting Board of Governors by a new nonpartisan oversight commission would result in “cost savings aimed at making U.S. global broadcasting unmatched on the airwaves and in cyberspace.”

There is also growing evidence of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s inability to carry out its journalistic mission in Russia and in other countries where free media is at risk. FreeMediaOnline.org has been reporting that as a result of strategic decisions made by the BBG,  RFE/RL journalists based in Russia are subject to blackmail by the Kremlin’s secret police. The BBG not only ignored these warnings but also prevented VOA journalists based in the relative safety of Washington, D.C. to broadcast radio news to the war zone during the height of the Russian-Georgian conflict last summer. A Russian human rights organization has accused RFE/RL of giving extensive airtime to an extremist Russian politician known for making racist comments about Jews, Blacks and other racial and ethnic minorities.

FreeMediaOnline.org president Ted Lipien has urged the Obama transition team to restore Voice of America radio broadcasts to Russia and Ukraine. Lipien said that VOA journalists should be allowed to serve as a credible voice of the American people and be able to give overseas audiences a responsible, accurate and objective view of American values and the goals of the new Obama Administration. Otherwise, radio and TV audiences in the Middle East may think that the U.S. agrees with Holocaust deniers and Russians may believe that Americans, who have elected the first African-American U.S. president, are happy to pay for giving airtime to racist Russian politicians on a U.S. taxpayer-funded radio station, Lipien said.

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, first introduced by former BBG member Norman Pattiz. The marketing approach imposed by the BBG and its private consultants 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 or private funding and is managed by volunteers. It is also hosted on LiveJournal.com.

Thinking About The Unthinkable

by The Federalist

If you think about the above phrase coined by the late nuclear war theorist, Herman Kahn, you might find it  both unusually appropriate and alarming when applied to US public diplomacy.

There is a fundamental flaw in the current US thinking about this subject.  We seem to believe that the strategies of the Cold War can be updated to successfully deal with our current adversaries.  Such thinking is wrong and, if it continues, it can have fatal consequences for our future.

In facing Islamic extremism, we are not dealing with a “war of ideas”  typical of the Cold War. Neither are we going to impress our adversaries with “Public Diplomacy 2.0.”

The “war of ideas” terminology aptly described the competition between two economic and political systems, capitalism and communism.  Both were products of Western thought and resulted in a public diplomacy strategy that was successful during the Cold War but is not likely to work against Islamist extremists.

“Public Diplomacy 2.0” describes an approach to public diplomacy that seemingly is more focused on a technological medium (and being social gadflies) and less focused on the underlying issues.

Neither term accurately describes the current world environment.  We are faced not with a war of ideas but a war of beliefs — the worst kind of conflict.  The war of beliefs deals in terms of finality and absolutes.

Americans have become too wrapped around the babble of our own point of view.  We are not listening to our adversaries.  This is a serious lapse that, if not corrected, could prove more disastrous than some of our already well-publicized public diplomacy flops.

Our public diplomacy apparatus still believes we are dealing with a competition between two ideologies.  The current Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, James K. Glassman, even talks in analogies of Coca-Cola versus Pepsi.  In doing so, Mr. Glassman makes a good case that he should be replaced.

Al-Qaeda, radical fundamentalists, jihadists and terrorists often use the same technological tools as we do.  However, their message is entirely different from what Mr. Glassman’s analogy seems to suggest.

If one listens carefully to the message of these groups, it’s clear that they do not talk using the terminology of “Coke versus Pepsi.”  Their language is one of annihilation and total war against those they see as a threat to their way of life and their interests.  Americans and other Westerners are seen as nonbelievers or infidels.  We are portrayed as being driven by vice, greed and corruption.  These groups are determined to destroy the Western way of life by any means possible and available.  Generally speaking, they are not interested in talking with us or engaging in a polite discussion over our differences.

When it comes to launching a war, the jihadists have done the math, both on a tactical and strategic level. In responding, we need to reflect on the events of September 11, 2001.  We seem to have forgotten but should remind ourselves that a small number of operatives commandeered four commercial airliners and used them to attack three known sites and a probable fourth.  Three of the four aircraft reached their targets.  Of the three targets, two were completely destroyed and the third damaged.  In each case,  there was a substantial loss of life.  Billions of dollars have been spent in the aftermath of the attacks, both domestically and abroad, to improve defenses against further attacks and presumably to take the fight directly to the terrorists.

Still, the jihadists have done the math…use the smallest number of operatives to inflict the maximum amount of damage, destruction and loss of life. They are likely to use the same tactics again.

Part of the billions of dollars spent has been to upgrade US military and intelligence capabilities to deal with the threat.  Our defense and intelligence agencies point with some pride to the increased level of security we have enjoyed up to this moment.  However, as any analyst knows, understanding the jihadists’ math and developing effective countermeasures is the key to achieving victory or suffering another serious, catastrophic attack.  It is a constantly evolving set of circumstances, until the core threat and its offshoots are completely eliminated.  It requires constant vigilance.

On the tactical level, the concept of  using the smallest number of operatives to inflict the maximum amount of damage is being acted out over and over again.  Witness the recent terrorist attack in Mumbai, India.  A small group of operatives attacked a soft target and inflicted the maximum amount of death and destruction proportionate to their numbers.

Witness also the more recent rocket attacks by Hamas against Israel.  This is another form of the same tactical process.  The Israeli response and the attendant casualties among the Palestinian civilian population are seen as validation of the jihadists’ belief that nothing short of annihilation of the enemy will resolve the situation.

On the strategic level, the jihadists have not deviated from their purpose to bring about the total destruction of the United States.  Destruction of civil society is an acceptable part of this strategy.  The vision that the jihadists have of the United States is not unlike the recently released video game, “Fallout 3.”  This is the America the jihadists want to see.  Acquiring the technology and a deliverable weapon to accomplish this goal is high on the jihadists’ list of priorities.

Seen in this light, the threat from Iran becomes much more real.  It is not merely high-handed volatile rhetoric coming from the Iranian leadership.  That leadership believes in and embraces the jihadists’ strategic concept of annihilation.

We have difficulty in being able to rationally understand this level of rage toward the United States, Israel or other Western societies.  However, we need to see and understand what factors into the jihadists’ calculations as they act upon their sense of rage.  These extremists profess to be Islamists.  Islam is the largest world religion.  Knowing this, the jihadists have drawn the conclusion that, even if they precipitate Armageddon, there is a high likelihood that the group most likely to survive are people who identify with these religious beliefs.  The condition of a post-Apocalyptic world is not a matter of great concern.  The only thing that matters is winning at all costs.

In the United States, most people live in relative comfort.  Many who identify with the religion of Islam comprise some of the poorest of the global poor.  We have a lot to lose.  From the jihadists’ perspective, there is little left to lose in this life.  This is a very appealing message to those whose lives are filled with desperation and who see themselves as exploited by and victims of Western affluence.  The jihadists do not hesitate to draw on examples of over a thousand years of history to point out examples of Western acts against their theology and people.  The jihadists’ philosophy makes heroes out of all those who sacrifice their lives in achieving victory.  Victory is its own reward.

We need to take this threat very seriously.  Up to this point, certain aspects of US public diplomacy, such as “Public Diplomacy 2.0,” have demonstrated that the threat is not being taken seriously.  We have tailored a public diplomacy strategy that seems more like a media advertising campaign during a major sporting event.

In overview, the incoming Obama administration needs to consider several issues:

First, we need to be realistic as to the nature of this threat and its intended outcomes.  This means paying close attention to the message of the jihadists and taking it literally.

Second, the primary objective of US public diplomacy is to deprive jihadists and international terrorism of its most important resource: human capital.  The task is daunting.  The jihadists promise restoring the power of Islam as a global political, social and cultural force to be reckoned with.  The jihadists promise removing the oppressors of downtrodden Muslim people around the world.  The jihadists reinforce this message with action.  Seven years after the attacks of September 11, 2001 the architect of these attacks, Osama bin Laden, remains at-large.  This increases the power of the jihadist message.  If all we have to offer in our public diplomacy effort is the status quo or trite techno-babble, the advantage will remain with the radical fundamentalists.

Third, we need to speak boldly with the international community, our allies, neighbors and those warily watching world events from the sidelines.  We need to appeal to a sense of common purpose to defeat those who intend to bring about the destruction of civilization as we know it.

Fourth, we need to get the Russians back to being fully on board with this effort.  Rather than allow themselves to be distracted by armed or verbal conflict with its neighbors, the Russian leadership faces a much more genuine threat to Russia’s interests.  The United States needs to speak directly to the Russian leadership and to the Russian people through our international broadcasting assets.  It is a serious mistake to be dismissive of the Russian people, their history and their sacrifices…a mistake compounded by the termination of direct Russian radio broadcasts by the Voice of America.  This fatal decision was implemented by the Broadcasting Board of Governors in 2008.

Fifth, we need a thorough rehabilitation of our public diplomacy effort in the Arab and Muslim world.  Current projects such as Radio Sawa and alHurra television are not getting the job done.

Finally, “Public Diplomacy 2.0” should be relegated to the category of fantasy fiction…in much the same way as “Dow 36,000” ( a book co-authored by James K. Glassman).

The Federalist 2008

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog, December 30, 2008, San Francisco – FreeMediaOnline.org has been reporting in recent months on the intimidation of Radio Liberty (Radio Svoboda) journalists in Russia and the unwillingness of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) to address this issue. Years after Mr. Putin has destroyed nearly all independent broadcast media in Russia, the BBG, which manages Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), still insists that the station is a surrogate broadcaster and its journalists based in Russia can do their jobs without being subject to blackmail by the Russian security services. The bipartisan Broadcasting Board of Governors controls all U.S. civilian international broadcasting, including the Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), Radio Free Asia (RFA), Radio and TV Martí, and the Middle East Broadcasting Networks (MBN)—Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television. Its current members are: Joaquin F. Blaya, Blanquita Walsh Cullum, D. Jeffrey Hirschberg, Steven J. Simmons, and Condoleezza Rice.

Comments by Radio Liberty managers in Russia and current program content suggest, however, that the station tries to stay on the good side of Mr. Putin in order to protect its bureau in Moscow and a large team of local reporters who are Russian citizens. It is difficult to determine exactly how widespread this problem has become for RFE/RL journalists based in Russia. Local RFE/RL employees must observe Russian laws regarding internal security, including a ban on revealing that they may be victims of intimidation by the secret police.

As Radio Liberty’s Russian radio programs were becoming more innocuous in recent years due to pressures from the BBG to make them sound more acceptable to anti-Western Russians in the interest of pursuing the questionable marketing goal of “marrying the mission to the market,” Voice of America journalists based in Washington have tried to offer more hard-hitting news and comments and thus serve the role of a surrogate radio broadcaster that RFE/RL is no longer able to play in Russia. This year, however, the BBG made good on its threat to end all VOA Russian radio broadcasts and implemented its decision just 12 days before the Russian military attack on Georgia last summer. When the war started, the Voice of America was prevented by the BBG from broadcasting Russian radio programs. The two now former BBG members who were most responsible for this public diplomacy and foreign policy blunder were James K. Glassman, the BBG’s most recent neoconservative chairman who is now the U.S. Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, and liberal Democrat, Edward E. Kaufman, who was subsequently appointed to succeed Vice President elect Joe Biden as a U.S. Senator from Delaware.

The original BBG marketing strategy was developed in the early years of the George W. Bush Administration by another liberal Democrat Norman Pattiz, founder of the U.S. radio syndicate Westwood One, who was the architect of privatizing U.S. broadcasting to the Middle East and terminating Voice of America radio services. His vision produced similar programming scandals at Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television. Only one BBG member was reported to have voted against ending VOA radio broadcasts to Russia.

In a letter to U.S. Senator Sam Brownback, Lev Roitman, a former Radio Liberty Russian service broadcaster, has described a recent example of how Radio Liberty continues to fail in its mission to expose Mr. Putin’s anti-democratic rule. Mr. Roitman’s wife, Snjezana Pelivan, is one of the two two foreign RFE/RL female employees (the other employee, Anna Karapetyan, is the mother of three minors) who are suing RFE/RL for violations of their labor, civil and human (national equality) rights when their were dismissed from their jobs in the Czech Republic, where RFE/RL has its headquarters.

A national Czech newspaper described the RFE/RL’s treatment of its foreign employees as offering them “equality with preconditions” and engaging in a practice that “contradicts ideals” of American democracy. Former Czech president Vaclav Havel has promised to follow this case as a human rights issue. RFE/RL has its headquarters in the Czech Republic. Senator Brownback has sponsored a bill that would reform U.S. public diplomacy and eliminate the Broadcasting Board of Governors. The BBG is ultimately responsible for RFE/RL’s policies with regard to its employees in the Czech Republic and in Russia and for the content of Radio Liberty’s Russian broadcasts.

From Lev Roitman’s letter to U.S. Senator Sam Brownback:

In 1973 I emigrated from the Soviet Union to the United States. I worked for RFE/RL over thirty years in New York, Munich and Prague until my retirement as a senior commentator four years ago. I was with this Radio when the Soviets and their satellites jammed our broadcasts without having a lunch break, and I lived through the heady days when the Soviet jazz stopped and WE effectively contributed to the fall of that indeed evil empire.

I was always proud to contribute to RFE/RL mission of furthering the goals of American foreign policy. However, when five years ago BBG came up with the idea “to marry mission to the market”, I stopped being proud.

Step dancing on air still goes on. The results in the remaining traditional target areas of RFE/RL, in Russia, Ukraine and other countries of the former Soviet Union, are devastating:

shrinking disinterested audiences;

loss of disappointed rebroadcasting affiliates

(do not be mistaken or mislead: this loss is only partially attributable to the attitudes of local officialdoms);

loss of human rights emphasis (“unmarketable”);

lip service to U.S. foreign affairs (“unpopular”);

fear of sustained critical analysis of local politics (“unpatriotic”), etc.

Just to give you one (but not the only one) example of the level where the married to the market RFE/RL is today. On November 17, its Russian service polled the audience with the following questions posted on its site Svobodanews.ru (I translate from Russian):

“Why the democratic parties in Russia had fallen into decay?

They simply finished their life cycle,

They lost competition against the adepts of power politics,

Their leaders suffered [from] moral bankruptcy,

Western leaders defamed in the eyes of Russians the very idea of democracy,

All of the above” Period.

No other actionable choices were offered. Say,

 “They were barred from access to mass media”,

“They were stripped of financial resources”,

“Their leaders and members were harassed by authorities”,

“Media that was to them sympathetic, had been silenced by physical and/or political repression”, etc.

One is left to wonder if it is Radio Free Europe or Radio Free Putin — at the U.S. tax[payer's ]expense.

Size 10 – US Public Diplomacy Disaster

by The Federalist

In recent weeks, we have had a moment of convergence…seemingly unconnected events coming together in an act with a much larger significance.

The Annenberg School of the University of Southern California recently completed a study of alHurra television for the Middle East at the request of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) and paid for with taxpayer funds. The Board attempted to withhold its release, citing a bar under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) on making such reports public. Later, with the establishment of an Obama transition team unit to assess the BBG and the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB), a member of the team made copies of the Annenberg Report available to other transition team members. At about the same time or shortly thereafter, the BBG posted a press release that included a link to the Annenberg Report and another study prepared separately by the University of Missouri.

When queried earlier by the media watchdog group ProPublica, an attorney for the General Counsel’s Office at the BBG remarked that the report may never be released. No one on the transition team, however, appears to have been aware of the FOIA bar cited by the BBG’s Office of the General Counsel. As the Obama transition team started to look into the BBG operations, the report that might have never been released earlier suddenly saw the light of day.

It came as no great surprise once the Annenberg Report was made public that it was particularly critical of alHurra’s operations and the lack and/or ineffectiveness of management or journalistic controls and standards.

Next, some opinion writers have urged that James Glassman, the current Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, be retained by the incoming Obama Administration.

Third, on a recent surprise visit to Iraq, President Bush was caught by surprise when an Iraqi journalist hurled a barrage of epithets and a pair of shoes at him, an act that is considered to be a major insult in the Arab world. Quick reactions by the president allowed him to avoid being struck by the shoes.

With this act, the point of convergence was reached:

At considerable expense to the American taxpayer, the Bush Administration established and continues to fund alHurra television broadcasts to the Middle East. By all accounts, this station has never been able to seize the moment and change the paradigm of anti-US public opinion in the Arab and Muslim world.

The act of hurling shoes at the President of the United States captures the cumulative anger and hatred felt toward not only the man but also US policies in the Middle East. Instead of being seen as a champion of elevating the human condition, the US is seen as a malevolent and violent force set loose by the Bush Administration upon the face of the earth.

AlHurra has made its own contribution to this dark moment.

This station, for which US taxpayers continue to pay millions of dollars each month, has had no measurable positive impact in the Middle East. Its message has been widely rejected. It has failed to create a broad understanding of US policies. In a failed effort to win audience approval, it has allowed for moments of uninterrupted anti-US rhetoric without balanced editorial counterpoint. It provided an unchallenged platform for Holocaust deniers. One can argue that indirectly alHurra has put the chief US policymaker at risk of physical harm.

US policymakers — the BBG, some State Department officials, and the White House — have failed to grasp that alHurra symbolizes a daily taunt in the face of the Arab public. Given the intensity of the anger that is reflected in Arab public opinion, the station represents a severe liability for the United States. The public, physical assault on Mr. Bush underscores how vulnerable we have become to public outrage toward our policies.

The transition period is a sensitive time in the federal bureaucracy. It is a time when known mistakes and liabilities become targets of opportunity for the incoming administration to address. The Annenberg Report requires from the Obama Administration more than just words of concern. The report has to be followed up with action. Characteristically for the current Broadcasting Board of Governors, the first action to come out of this report was an attempt by the BBG and its IBB staff to bury it.

This was nothing less than an effort to preserve “business as usual,” to avoid acting decisively to correct known problems and/or replace inept senior managers responsible for an ineffective response to the serious problems detailed in the document.

Prior to becoming Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, James Glassman was appointed chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors. Mr. Glassman occupied a key position in overseeing all aspects of US international broadcasting, including alHurra television. To all appearances, while still a BBG member Mr. Glassman supported alHurra’s operations and did not address the known criticisms of the station’s management and programming.

Warnings about alHurra have been around ever since the Bush Administration officials started talking about its creation. US media reporting on alHurra’s failures reached a significant mark earlier this year with a report on the station by ProPublica.org, a companion piece by the “60 Minutes” unit of CBS News on June 22, 2008, and an extensive article by the Washington Post following the “60 Minutes” broadcast. The BBG was hoping, however, that the interest in and scrutiny of alHurra would wane and things would return to “business as usual.”

Unfortunately for Mr. Glassman’s reputation as the person in charge of US public diplomacy, the news accounts by ProPublica.org, “60 Minutes,” and the Washington Post, the release of the Annenberg Report on alHurra, and the shoe-throwing incident in Baghdad have all occurred on his watch. They all demonstrate a failure of the Bush Administration’s efforts to win public approval abroad for its policies. The shoe-thrower, Muntadar al-Zaidi, has been elevated to celebrity status throughout the Arab and Muslim world. Ironically, his act represents a public diplomacy triumph of sorts for those who oppose US interests in the Middle East.

Thus, it is left for the incoming Obama administration to sort through the debris of US public diplomacy in general, and in the Middle East in particular, to determine what is salvageable.

Without question, it is imperative that the United States maintain an ability to explain its policies in the Middle East. It is too dangerous from the perspective of US interests to be silent in that part of the world. However, a question should be asked whether alHurra has a place in presenting US policies and American opinions in the new political environment created by Barack Obama’s historic electoral victory? In my view, alHurra is so tainted with shortcomings and failures of the past, and is such a demonstrable lightning rod for anti-American sentiment, that the most sensible course of action from the perspective of US interests would be to shut it down. At this juncture, keeping alHurra on-the-air serves only as a constant reminder of things gone wrong with US foreign policy and public diplomacy in the Middle East.

In the interim, the US Government should reestablish the Voice of America (VOA) Arabic service on radio and a companion VOA Arabic Internet website. These services were eliminated by the BBG. Current BBG thinking is to go all-Internet and eliminate other VOA radio operations. This is a new monumental mistake by the BBG, which the Obama Administration should quickly reverse. Successful international broadcasting is based upon a flexible triad of radio, Internet and — when possible — television.

Unfortunately, the BBG has soured the Arab world on American government-funded Middle East TV programs. Until the new Obama Administration has a chance to decide what to do with the BBG and alHurra, it might want to have US policymakers appear on Arab television networks, particularly those with bureaus in Washington and New York, and begin the process of reconstructing US credibility with the Arab “street.” If the new public diplomacy approach is successfully put in place and shows positive results, the new administration can then start deciding how to reconstitute a television product for the Middle East.

It would be tragic and counterproductive for the Obama Administration to adopt the BBG’s strategy of “business as usual.” New thinking, new direction and new leadership should be the top priorities for the new administration’s public diplomacy effort. What we need is a new Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy, a forward-thinking and open-minded body to oversee U.S. international broadcasting (if the BBG is to be retained in some form) and a management restructuring within the IBB to weed out inept and self-serving bureaucrats.

Finally, some have suggested that the shoe-throwing incident represents somehow a victory for the principles of freedom of expression or freedom of the press. It does not. This incident was an expression of rage and a physical assault upon the individual seen as responsible for misery and suffering among the Iraqi people. There is some hope, however, in the fact that Barack Obama’s electoral victory forced the Broadcasting Board of Governors to release the Annenberg report on alHurra that the BBG wanted desperately to suppress. Hopefully, the next step will be a complete overhauling of US public diplomacy and giving America a new voice in the Middle East.

The Federalist 2008

Use this link to the ProPublica.org web site to view the Alhurra report with English subtitles about a Holocaust deniers conference in Teheran:  http://www.propublica.org/feature/alhurra-video

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.

The White House statement issued to commemorate Human Rights Day and the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations General Assembly in 1948 included a claim that “U.S. international broadcasters funded by the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) are overcoming censorship by gathering news from citizen journalists with cell phones, reporting the facts via SMS feeds and targeted e-mails, and encouraging citizens living in repressive regimes to join the information revolution with open discussions on radio and TV call-in shows and blogs. The BBG now offers diverse Internet products in all 60 broadcast languages, ranging from basic text to complex video and audio and live streaming.” The wording of the White House statement may suggest to some that the BBG is paying for these initiatives when in fact U.S. taxpayers’ money appropriated by Congress is being used.

Such self-serving statements are more interesting not for what they include but for what they leave out. For nearly eight years, the BBG has supported the neoconservative agenda of privatizing and outsourcing U.S. international broadcasting, resulting in  an unprecedented failure and a waste of U.S. taxpayers’ dollars. Incredibly,  some of the biggest supporters of this privatization effort have been liberal Democrats serving on the bipartisan Board, including Edward E. Kaufman, the newly appointed U.S. Senator from Delaware, and Norman Pattiz, founder of the U.S. radio syndicate Westwood One.

One of their staunchest neoconservative allies has been James K. Glassman, the BBG’s most recent chairman who is now the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. The record of the failed public diplomacy policies under his leadership has not prevented the BBG or the White House from claiming success. Glassman’s allies have even launched a campaign to help him hold on to his position in the new Obama Administration. His friend of 30 years, syndicated columnist Morton Kondracke, wrote recently in Roll Call, the Capital Hill newspaper, that “keeping on a conservative Republican like Glassman – formerly based at the American Enterprise Institute – may be a hard swallow for Democrats eager to occupy plum jobs. … But before they oust him, they ought to listen to him, take his recommendations for beefing up the U.S. global communications infrastructure and – for sure – maintain his innovations.”

Privatization of U.S. international broadcasting produced this report by the BBG-funded Alhurra Television for the Middle East. To pay for Alhurra, the BBG terminated all Voice of America Arabic broadcasts, which were produced by American-trained editors and were subject to strict editorial oversight.

Glassman, Kaufman and Pattiz may try to present themselves as experts who have uncovered the benefits of privatization of U.S. international broadcasting and the use of the Internet, but most outside experts agree that their innovations have been responsible for the steepest decline in the positive indicators of U.S. image abroad in recent history.

The core of the BBG strategy has been the dismantling of the Voice of America (VOA), the official yet journalistically independent U.S. broadcasting organization, which is subject to U.S. laws and strict fiscal accountability, and replacing it with a number of private broadcasters and contractors, some of them based overseas. Neoconservatives like Glassman were engaged in this effort primarily for ideological reasons, while liberal Democrats like Pattiz and Kaufman who unquestionably supported these ideas also saw benefits accruing to private consultants and contractors who have been linked to them through their business and political connections. As international public opinion surveys, U.S. government audits and reports by investigative journalists show, their efforts were a fiscal and editorial fiasco which turned overseas audiences against the United States.

• Glassman and Kaufman were among the majority of the BBG members responsible for shutting down Voice of America radio broadcasts to Russia just 12 days before the Russian army attacked Georgia. They also voted to terminate VOA radio broadcasts to Georgia and Ukraine.
• The BBG ignored appeals from the U.S. Congress not to eliminate radio broadcasting to countries without free media. 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.
• Glassman, Kaufman and other BBG members voted to end VOA radio broadcasts in Hindi to India. These broadcasts went off the air just a few weeks before the terrorist attacks in Mumbai.
• The American Federation of Government Employees, Local 1812, which represents VOA broadcasters, said after the Mumbai attacks that it would take at least a half dozen eggs “to cover the faces of those BBG Board members who voted in favor of ending the VOA shortwave radio broadcasts in Hindi.”
• Despite Putin’s crackdown on independent media in Russia, the BBG removed Voice of America Russian radio program from an AM frequency in Moscow. They restored a much shortened broadcast only after protests from FreeMediaOnline.org and other media freedom organizations.
• After the Russian attack on Georgia, Kaufman and Glassman refused to allow VOA to resume radio broadcasts in Russian that could be heard on shortwave in the war zone. Under Secretary Glassman personally rejected appeals from VOA Russian Service journalists to allow them to restart radio broadcasts during the Russian-Georgian conflict.
• The BBG eliminated a call-in radio show by the Voice of America Russian Service which was popular with independent journalists and human rights activists in Russia and in other former Soviet republics.
• 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.
• The Public Diplomacy Council, a nonprofit organization which includes former diplomats, academics and other foreign policy experts, blamed the BBG for ignoring strategically important target areas such as Russia, the Balkans, India and the Western Hemisphere. The Council noted 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. The Council also criticized the BBG’s decision to terminate all VOA radio broadcasts in Russian shortly before Russia’s military attack on Georgia last summer.
• At the urging of James Glassman, the BBG unsuccessfully tried to hire Paula Zahn, formerly of CNN, as its high-profile spokesperson while cutting or reducing programs to countries like Tibet and Russia.
• In its push for privatization, the BBG ignored warnings that Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty journalists who are Russian citizens and are based in Russia are subject to intimidation and blackmail by the Kremlin’s secret police. View FreeMediaOnline.org report: Radio Liberty managers put a positive spin on Putin’s comments about the murder of independent Russian journalist
•  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: U.S. Taxpayers Pay for Spreading Racist Views on Radio Liberty in Russia
• The BBG spent millions of U.S. taxpayer dollars on private foreign contractors and building construction in the Czech Republic, Russia, and the Middle East while cutting U.S. based jobs and denying U.S. labor law protections to its overseas based employees. View The Herald News: New administration must undue RFE/RL’s anti-diplomacy abroad
• 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.”
• ProPublica.org uncovered major financial abuses at Radio Sawa and Alhurra.
• The BBG has refused to make public an independent study commissioned last year from the University of Southern California’s Center on Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School to review the network’s content because the study is reportedly highly critical of Alhurra and the BBG.

The privatization of U.S. international broadcasting was based on a naive premise that overseas audiences will not associate such names as Alhurra and Radio Sawa with the U.S. government.  The surrogate broadcasting model from the Cold War, embraced by both neoconservatives like Glassman and liberal Democrats like Kaufman, is neither effective nor forward-looking. Their current strategy is to present themselves as innovators of the Internet age. In reality, their neoconservative surrogate propaganda broadcasting policies are responsible for destroying the credibility of the U.S. message abroad have delayed new media innovation by at least eight years.

Under Secretary Glassman is still pushing for further cuts in radio broadcasting by the Voice of America to pay for his latest ideas such as using online contests to promote democracy. He and his former and current colleagues on the BBG fail to see that overseas audiences want serious news that reflect rather than advertise American policies and values — something unlikely to be generated by private contractors working without proper supervision. The Obama Administration should not be fooled by the BBG’s and Under Secretary Glassman’s newly-found enthusiasm for new media.

It might be worth remembering that not too long ago this neo-conservative Republican was just as enthusiastic about the U.S. stock market. Glassman co-authored a book DOW 36,000,  confidently predicting that the stock index would soon reach that level. He now believes that Internet solutions, which bloggers have been successfully using for a long time at practically no cost, require millions of dollars in spending on private consultants and contractors.  Norman Pattiz, whose business ideas and entertainment-based programming for Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television delighted the fabulously incompetent neoconservative BBG members, is now trying to save his own radio company Westwood One from bankruptcy. Westwood One announced on Nov. 18 that it will be suspended from trading on the NYSE as a result of its failure to maintain a minimum $25 million market capitalization level. Its stock now trades at about 5 cents a share.

Unfortunately for the American people and the cause of press freedom abroad, the BBG has been a refuge for political loyalists, U.S. businessmen lacking international sophistication, and ideologues of both parties with no  real experience in foreign policy, human rights activism, and new media journalism. The Obama Administration would be  well-advised to ignore the BBG-generated propaganda and take advice from independent experts with no link to political appointees, consultants and contractors who have exposed U.S. public diplomacy to international ridicule.  Almost all independent experts, including those connected with the well-respected Public Diplomacy Council, have called for reversing the unregulated and completely misguided privatization of U.S. international broadcasting.

This commentary may be republished on the web or in print with attribution to FreeMediaOnline.org.  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).

VOA Hindi radio broadcasts became the victim of a highly unusual political alliance. James K. Glassman, the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs – a neoconservative Republican who was the BBG’s most recent chairman – joined forces with liberal Democrats led by  Edward E. Kaufman, newly appointed  to the U.S. Senate from Delaware, in an attempt to terminate VOA radio programs to countries from Russia to India.  They succeeded in silencing VOA radio in Russia just 12 days before the Russian army attacked Georgia and have refused to restore Russian radio programs to the previous levels. The BBG also wanted to terminate VOA radio to Georgia and Ukraine, but the events in Georgia forced them to temporarily suspend those plans.  They did, however, put an end to VOA Hindi radio in India, brushing aside appeals and protests from members of Congress and press freedom organizations.

Members of Congress, human rights organizations, and foreign policy experts have condemned the BBG actions as major public diplomacy blunders. The American Federation of Government Employees, Local 1812, which represents VOA broadcasters, said after the Mumbai attacks that it would take at least a half dozen eggs “to cover the faces of those BBG Board members who voted in favor of ending the VOA shortwave radio broadcasts in Hindi.”

No more proof of their keystone cops-like decisions was necessary but the tragic events in Mumbai this past weekend highlight once again the failed policy of the BBG.  That policy -the elimination of VOA shortwave radio broadcasts  and their stubborn refusal to admit their mistakes- is once again demonstrable.

The situation between India and Pakistan is not likely to result in a handholding kumbaya songfest any time soon and the United States claims both as allies.  In this situation the U.S. needs a trusted voice to clearly articulate its policies.  The only solution is to reinstate the VOA Hindi shortwave radio broadcasts.

The VOA employees’ union was one of the many groups and individuals who had earlier warned the BBG not to terminate VOA radio broadcasts to countries like Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, and India. Most Republicans and Democrats serving on the BBG were united, however, in their desire to privatize U.S. international broadcasting, which meant dismantling the official Voice of America broadcasts while steering money to Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television.

Despite being supported by neoconservatives, these two privatized stations were a brainchild of Norman Pattiz, a liberal Democrat who is the founder of U.S. radio syndicate Westwood One and a financial supporter of Vice President elect Joe Biden.  Edward E. Kaufman was also an ethusiastic advocate for Sawa and Alhurra. He once served as Senator Biden’s chief of staff and will be taking his place in the U.S. Senate. Some of the privatized broadcasting entities are incorporated in Delaware, which is Biden’s and Kaufman’s home state.

James Glassman, their neoconservative ally and author of the book DOW 36,000, which forecast an unstoppable growth of the U.S. stock market, believes not only in the privatization of U.S. international broadcasting but has also become an enthusiastic proponent of the Internet. His actions while serving with the BBG have deprived radio listeners in war zones and in impoverished regions of access to American news from Washington. Prior to Glassman’s appointment to the BBG,  Kaufman voted with other neoconservative Republicans to eliminate VOA Arabic radio service. They created Radio Sawa and Alhurra Television, the  two scandal-ridden privatized broadcasting entities which lack VOA’s strict fiscal and editorial controls and are not viewed in the Middle East as a credible and authoritative voice of the U.S. government and the American people.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors had been warned repeatedly not to cut VOA radio broadcasts to countries like Russia and India. Shortly before the BBG implemented some of the program cuts, FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based nonprofit, published an article arguing that it was a wrong time to give up Hindi broadcasts to India.

In September 2008, the two Co-Chairmen of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans, Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA) and Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC), wrote a letter to the BBG , in which they pointed out 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. The BBG ignored their appeal to allow VOA Hindi radio broadcasts to continue just as they had ignored Congressional warnings not to terminate Voice of America radio broadcasts to Russia.

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.

Reporters Without Borders said in its November 3rd letter that it was “dismayed” by these “shocking statements” by the council’s chairman, Nushirvan Magerramli, announcing the bans on October 31st.

Reporters Without Borders believes that if the Azeri government carries out its threat, BBC, RFE/RL, and VOA will continue to broadcast on short wave. The organization pointed out that these international broadcasters ”would be able to broadcast on short wave as happened during the Soviet era. It would only have the effect of lowering the quality of reception for listeners,” but the radios would not disappear, Reporters Without Borders said in its statement.

Voice of America journalists and media freedom organizations are concerned, however, that the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a bipartisan body which oversees VOA and RFE/RL, will use the excuse of the crackdown on FM rebroadcasting in Azerbaijan to shut down the production in Washington of  all VOA Azeri radio programs.

There is a precedent for such an action on the part of the BBG, which now has six members split between Democrats and Republicans. The former BBG chairman James K. Glassman,  a Republican who is now the Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs,  had justified the recent termination of VOA Russian-language radio broadcasts by claiming that Mr. Putin’s campaign of closing down VOA FM affiliates made all  VOA radio vernacular language broadcasting to Russia ineffective, including short wave radio. For various political and bureaucratic reasons, most other Republican members and all Democrats serving on the BBG have supported Glassman’s position. This view has been widely rejected, however, by members of Congress of both parties, foreign policy experts, and media freedom organizations.

FreeMediaOnline.org, a media freedom nonprofit based in San Francisco, had reported that several BBG members and the BBG staff led by its executive director Jeff Trimble, a former acting president of RFE/RL, have been working behind the scenes to divert money from Voice of America broadcasts to Russia, Georgia, and Ukraine to fund  the scandal-ridden Alhurra television for the Middle East and to strengthen Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty broadcasting to Russia and other countries of the former Soviet Union. In cutting VOA Russian radio Trimble was said to have received support from the Senate staff of the vice-president elect Joe Biden. RFE/RL is a semi-private entity incorporated in Delaware and based in Prague, the Czech Republic. It has a large bureau in Moscow whose employees according to reports are subject to pressure and intimidation from the Russian secret police. Voice of America is based in Washington, D.C. and most of its employees work in the United States. BBG member Ted Kaufman is a former chief of staff to Senator Biden.

Read: ProPublica.org article USC Study of Alhurra Withheld From Public; Inquiries of Network’s Operation Deepen

 Despite warnings from Congress and human rights organizations, the BBG terminated VOA Russian-language radio broadcasts just 12 days before the Russian military attack on Georgia and also wanted to end VOA radio broadcasts to Georgia and Ukraine. VOA employees are concerned that the BBG staff will respond the same way to the most recent crisis in Azerbaijan.

The BBG has temporarily suspended its plans to end VOA radio broadcasts to Georgia and Ukraine but VOA radio programs to Russia have not resumed as they were before the Russian invasion to Georgia. The BBG staff had also prevented VOA from producing Russian-language radio programs for the web, but relented after strong criticism from Congress and media freedom organizations. Last month a half-hour radio program was placed on the VOA Russian-language website as a Monday-through-Friday broadcast.
 

Listen to the Voice of America Russian radio program for the web.

However, the audio of the VOA radio program for the Internet has not been updated for nearly a week. The day after the U.S. presidential elections it still featured a number of reports on pre-election campaign and polls. At the urgings of the former BBG chairman James Glassman and the BBG staff, the VOA Russian service is now producing short video clips for placement on its website and blogs. It is now difficult to find on the Russian-language VOA website any  in-depth analysis or even a summary of President-elect Obama’s views on Mr. Putin’s and Mr. Medvedev’s Russia and U.S.-Russian relations. There are, however, plenty of short video reports, which include brief and superficial interviews with individual American voters giving their overall impressions of the two candidates. In one of them, the service featured a young African-American voter who was a McCain supporter without explaining that the African-American community was overwhelmingly supporting Senator Obama. Glassman, an enthusiast of web contests and  other short-format for-web-video, is perhaps best known for co-writing the book Dow 36,000, published in 1999, which predicted that the stock market was greatly undervalued and would at least triple within a few years.

The production of serious analysis of U.S. politics and foreign policy had largely ended with the termination of  VOA Russian radio broadcasts in late July. Critics of the BBG strategy as pursued by Glassman and Trimble have argued that it has dangerously undermined the U.S. ability to communicate with audiences in Russia and in the former Soviet republics on serious political issues. FreeMediaOnline.org president Ted Lipien has called on the BBG to restore VOA radio broadcasts to Russia, to expand political reporting, and to refrain from any cuts in VOA and RFE/RL radio programs to Georgia, Ukraine, and Azerbaijan.

No one knows with certainty if this proverb is a famous Chinese curse or not.  However, one can certainly accept the fact that these times are indeed interesting…meaning troubled…in many spheres including economics and international broadcasting.  While the fine points of U.S. international broadcasting are debated among a fairly small circle of interested participants and observers, the globalized financial markets appear to be poised on the brink of collapse.

What’s the connection?

Not long ago, a book was published with the title “Dow 36,000.”  This book was authored by James K. Glassman, the most recent chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors and now the current Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs.

Depending on your point of view, you may want to laugh or cry.  If you are heavily invested in the stock market, other financial instruments or a disintegrating 401(k) retirement plan, it is likely to be the latter.

A book with an impressive title like Dow 36,000 is indicative of an outlook that goes beyond plain optimism and approaches the realm of fantasy.  It assumes a perfect trajectory of unbounded growth.  It does not take into account, the unknown, the unpredictable, weaknesses of human nature for greed and miscalculation or political and fundamentalist movements which specifically intend to topple our economic system and weaken our ability to project global power.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) seems to embrace the Dow 36,000 philosophy.  Similarly, the BBG makes assumptions based on best case scenarios; for example, rolling the dice on an all-or-nothing Internet-based platform for all BBG media: audio, video and text.  The opening gambit of this wildly optimistic strategic plan is seen in the Board’s unilateral decision to end direct broadcasting by the VOA Russian service.  The plan clearly requires that large costs be passed to the potential “consumers” of the BBG media offerings…a Russian population with presently limited exposure to the Internet except in its major metropolitan centers…a Russian population roiling with the rest of the world in the present global financial crisis…a resurgent nationalistic Russia which has engaged in armed conflict with the nation of Georgia…a Russia whose military campaign against Georgia was assisted by Internet countermeasures employed against Georgian and other Internet websites.

A rosy Dow 36,000 outlook dismisses the importance of history.  History repeats itself.  It is not linear.  It is cyclical.  There have been other economic downturns since the Great Depression of 1929, though not as severe…until now.  The interconnectivity of global economic systems and markets has reached a new pinnacle…meaning, in part, that a severe economic downturn is less likely to be localized and is rather more likely to be globalized.  Such are the circumstances today.

The same holds true for the euphoric, best case scenario model of BBG strategic planning for international broadcasting.  The Board is equally dismissive of historical antecedents, ignores the fact that democracy, capitalism and various other “isms” are evolutionary processes heavily influenced by circumstances specific to the experiences of certain cultures.  For example, anyone with a fundamental understanding of Russian history and the Russian psyche would be aware of the importance Russians hold for strength and leadership.  The Board lacks this form of “fortunate awareness” and clings to the arrogant and misshapen belief that the Russians will naturally embrace our perspective without regard to Russian experiences and interests.

Similar costly errors in judgment can be seen in the BBG programs to the Middle East, especially the Alhurra television project created as the result of an erroneous, superfluous vision of certain Board members regarding the depth of feelings among Arabs and Muslims regarding the substance of Middle East conflict.

In all its component parts, the BBG has become a symbol of the “ugly American,” syndrome, an assumption that the Board and only the Board knows what is best for U.S. international broadcasting.

The BBG is anything but a hallmark of U.S. government functioning at its best.  It is in many ways not much different in philosophy and action from the corporate entities and officers who have propelled US financial interests over a cliff with their own brand of arrogance and hubris.  Like those involved in the financial crisis, the Board no longer functions in the National or Public Interest and imperils both.

The Dow has fallen through “support” at 10,000.  Yes, we do live in interesting times…realities that are far from the market fiction of “Dow 36,000.”

The Federalist 2008/2

 FreeMediaOnline.org and Free Media Online Blog October 9, 2008, San Francisco – A little over two months after the Voice of America (VOA), the official U.S. international broadcaster,  had eliminated its radio programs to Russia to focus resources on its Russian-language website, the BBC Russian Service has announced an ambitious plan aimed at enhancing its Internet presence and expanding radio programming, taking both actions at the same time. In July, the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), a bipartisan body which manages the Voice of America, had forced VOA Russian Service journalists to abandon all radio broadcasts, both on-air and even online. It also mandated cuts in regularly scheduled VOA television programs and told VOA broadcasters to pursue a no-radio, Internet-only strategy for reaching audiences in Russia.

Facing a similar set of challenges in the Russian media market brought on by the Kremlin’s crackdown on independent journalists, the BBC World Service took a different approach and has now announced a new multiplatform and multimedia strategy for Russia, which includes the expansion of both Internet and radio programming, as well as increasing the production of video for use on the Web. According to a BBC press release,  resources will be redirected to enhance a 24/7 news coverage on its Russian-language website. At the same time, the BBC World Service announced that the flagship morning weekday news and current affairs Russian-language radio program, Utro na BBC, will be increased by half an hour, to three-and-a-half hours each day. The afternoon weekday drive time news and current affairs radio program, Vecher na BBC, will be increased, by one hour, to four hours each day. 

As the political appointees at the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors contemplated ending VOA radio broadcasts  to Russia, independent experts warned them that expanding Internet programming not only does not require the elimination of radio and TV production but heavily depends on both to provide content needed to attract more Web users.  Ignoring such advice, the BBG took VOA Russian-language radio programs off the air just 12 days before Russian troops invaded Georgia and so far has rejected pleas from Congressmen, journalists and NGOs to resume them. The VOA Russian Service broadcasters in Washington, who until recently were producing several hours of radio and television programming daily, are now underemployed but still prevented by the BBG from producing regularly scheduled radio programs even for those who would like to listen to them online.

FreeMediaOnline.org, a San Francisco-based media freedom nonprofit,  reported that bureaucratic politics are playing a major role in the U.S. broadcasting board’s decisions on Russia and may explain why VOA is forced to pursue a no-radio, Internet-only strategy when most experts agree that the multiplatform and multimedia approach adopted by the BBC is far more prudent and more effective. According to FreeMediaOnline.org sources, several BBG members as well as the BBG executive director Jeff Trimble prefer to steer money to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), a semi-private radio station, which is also managed and funded by the BBG and broadcasts from Prague and Moscow.

These Washington officials are believed to want to secure RFE/RL’s position as the only radio voice in Russia funded by the American taxpayers. Their actions appear designed to achieve this goal even though, unlike VOA, RFE/RL does not specialize in explaining U.S. foreign policy and American culture, and its ability to operate independently within close reach of Mr. Putin’s secret police has come under question. FreeMediaOnline.org president Ted Lipien has called on the BBG to offer RFE/RL journalists in Russia greater protection from the Russian security services and to allow Voice of America to resume its role as the Washington-based broadcaster offering authoritative U.S. news and analysis to on-air and online radio listeners in Russia.

FreeMediaOnline.org sources report that a BBG member, Ted Kaufman, a former chief of staff to Senator Joe Biden, has a special interest in RFE/RL since the station is incorporated in Delaware, Senator Biden’s home state. Biden’s Senate staff was said to have advised the BBG officials on how to take VOA Russian radio off the air despite strong opposition to this move among many members of Congress. The BBG also wanted to eliminate VOA radio broadcasts to Georgia and Ukraine. It was forced to suspend its decision only after strong pressure from Congress, Georgian-American and Ukrainian-American groups. To avoid such protests, the BBG staff took steps to terminate VOA Russian radio broadcasts without making any public announcements. They did not know at the time that Russian troops would soon enter Georgia, but even afterwards they continued to resist resuming programs to Russia.

Conservative radio talk show host Blanquita Cullum, a Republican BBG member, has consistently opposed these radio cuts, but she has been outvoted each time by her Democratic and Republican colleagues. BBG’s most recent chairman, James K. Glassman, a Republican appointed by President Bush, had allied himself with Ted Kaufman and another Democratic BBG member, Jeff Hirschberg, who was a director of the U.S.-Russia Business Council.  Kaufman, Hirschberg, and Glassman, who is now the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, have been the strongest opponents of resuming VOA radio broadcasts to Russia. 

Press Releases

BBC reinforces its Russian online output

 

BBC World Service has announced changes which will further reinforce its Russian-language output. 

The main thrust of the reprioritised investment is placed on strengthening the website, bbcrussian.com, which has become the key method for delivery of all BBC content in Russian. 

The website is having a significant impact in Russia where it is easier to access than the BBC radio services, and where demand for online news is growing and becoming increasingly sophisticated.

In August 2008, at the height of the conflict between Russia and Georgia, the number of unique users of the website increased dramatically to nearly three million, and many of these new users have remained with the site in September.

The audience is also accessing other platforms online: in August 2008, traffic to online audio content doubled while demand for video jumped six-fold to nearly 2,300,000 views.

Use of news from BBC Russian via wireless handheld devices also more than doubled.

Use of forums and interactive traffic has also grown and during the recent conflict was at record levels.

Head of BBC Russian, Sarah Gibson, explains that the BBC wanted to improve its Russian-language offer to serve audiences whose media consumption habits are changing rapidly.

She says: “Our aim is to deliver a fresher, more relevant service for our audiences in Russia and the wider post-Soviet market – a trusted, high quality website with the kinds of features the audience expects, and news and current affairs programmes at key times of day, available online as well as through more traditional radio platforms.

“It’s clear that audiences like our multiplatform offer more and more, and our challenge now is to improve this offer and to give audiences more formats that they enjoy and engage with.

“That is why we are focusing resources where they will have most impact.”

Resources are being focused to enable the BBC to improve its rolling 24/7 news offer on bbcrussian.com.

The BBC will also increase the number of high-quality video reports, underpinned with original journalism from Russia. These, too, will be updated 24/7.

The BBC is also strengthening resources for bbcrussian.com during the morning peak periods and is increasing the resources for interactivity round the clock.

Reprioritisation also means boosting the Learn English section of bbcrussian.com – a tool which helps millions of Russian-speakers to master English in a simple and engaging manner.

The BBC Russian radio also changes, with re-focusing of resources on peak listening times and with more investment in flagship news and current affairs programmes.

Key daily radio programmes on short and medium wave will be expanded to make up a simpler schedule tailored for peak morning and evening drive-time audiences.

The flagship morning weekday news and current affairs programme, Utro na BBC, will be increased by half an hour, to three-and-a-half hours each day.

The afternoon weekday drive time news and current affairs sequence, Vecher na BBC – which includes the hour-long BBSeva hosted by Seva Novgorodsev – will be increased, by one hour, to four hours each day.

New weekend editions of Vecher na BBC will be launched, on both Saturday and Sunday, to take the place of current short updates.

There will be changes elsewhere in the radio schedule to fund these improvements.

The production of some short news bulletins, which were designed for Russian FM partners, will cease as the BBC no longer has these agreements.

Longer format feature programming will cease; their themes and issues will be incorporated into mainstream news and current affairs content. 

The reprioritisation also enables the BBC to develop extra newsgathering resources in Russia, resulting in increased reporting and analysis of Russian affairs.

The BBC will also increase the current affairs reporting of British cultural and social affairs, as well as reporting on the former Soviet Union, for all programmes and platforms.

Sarah Gibson sums up: “We believe that a fuller multimedia news offer will strengthen the impact of BBC Russian and that, as a result of these changes, BBC Russian will become the most trusted and influential international news provider in Russia, serving audiences in the global Russian-speaking community, across borders and platforms.”

BBC World Service Publicity

 

 FreeMediaOnline.org and Free Media Online Blog Commentary by Ted Lipien, October 7, 2008, San Francisco – U.S. public diplomacy is in crisis, as is U.S. international broadcasting. Officials in charge of both, including James K. Glassman, the current Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, put their hope in the Internet, other new media platforms, and heavy marketing to help them reach foreign audiences and create a more positive image of the United States. Wanting to promote democracy to young Internet users abroad, the State Department launched a global video contest about democracy, which the officials hope will attract a large number of participants who are used to uploading their  home-produced videos to platforms such as YouTube. As a sign of the importance that Under Secretary Glassman attaches to this new media video initiative, an image link to a special web page promoting the contest was placed on the home page of the official U.S. State Department  web site.

The officials, who designed the “Democracy Video Challenge” with the help from well-paid outside contractors, ask potential contestants around the world to create a video short that completes the phrase “Democracy is…” The main prize is an all-expense-paid trip to Washington, D.C., New York, and Hollywood. The eight winners from different parts of the world will have their videos screened and will meet with leaders of the U.S. film and television industry. They are also promised meetings with democracy advocates from government, the media and civil society. The submission deadline is January 31, 2009.

Before being appointed to the public diplomacy position at the State Department by President Bush, James K. Glassman, was the chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which manages U.S. international broadcasts. In that position, he voted to eliminate the Voice of America radio broadcasts to Russia, Georgia and Ukraine in favor of more Internet-based programming. Despite strong opposition in Congress to this move, VOA Russian-language broadcasts were taken off the air 12 days before Russian troops entered Georgia thanks to advice and support from the Senate staff of Senator Joe Biden.  Even after the Russian invasion, Glassman said that these broadcasts would not resume, although under pressure from Congress, human organizations and Voice of America journalists he agreed to let VOA continue radio broadcasts to Georgia and Ukraine for the time being. When the Voice of America Russian Service journalists pleaded with him to let them counter the Kremlin’s propaganda using multiple media, including radio, he told them they would not be allowed to do any more radio programs and confirmed last week that “we are effectively starting to shift our Russia strategy to the Internet.”

In pushing the Internet-only strategy, the BBG staff is now preventing VOA from producing regularly scheduled political radio programs to Russia that could be broadcast on shortwave, a still available medium wave transmitter in Moscow, or even put on the Web. The Broadcasting Board of Governors under Glassman’s chairmanship continued a policy initiated by a former BBG member, media mogul Norman Pattiz, that placed a high premium on expanding audience reach through broadcasting music and making programming less political, less controversial, and less intellectual. Pattiz has been Senator Biden’s friend and supporter.

Neither the State Department officials nor BBG bureaucrats understand how new media works, which has resulted in programming initiatives that foreign audiences are likely to view as embarrassing the United States. What works well for independent NGO-driven media is rarely effective when new media strategies are employed by government bureaucrats working with outside marketing consultants.

The “Democracy Video Challenge” is likely to be no exception, although a much more limited and more focused program could produce some benefits if it were designed and implemented by NGOs or even by diplomats with area expertise who know what  kind of Internet promotion is appropriate for a given target audience.

The State Department is not the only victim of marketing experiments favored by its public diplomacy chief. Strictly journalistic organizations, such as the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, were significantly more effective in the past when they could produce programming according to the real news needs of their audiences rather than be forced by the BBG and its former chairman to dumb down their message, use flashy marketing schemes, and limit their program delivery options.

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog Commentary by Ted Lipien, October 4, 2008, San Francisco – James Glassman, Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, gave incomplete and misleading answers when asked Friday whether the elimination of vernacular broadcasts to Georgia, Russia, and India is going to hurt his “war of ideas” effort. Speaking in Washington at a National Press Club luncheon on “The New Age of Public Diplomacy,” Glassman seemed surprised and annoyed by the question.

His answer that the U.S. is not eliminating but increasing broadcasts to Georgia was clearly misleading since as a former chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) he had voted earlier to eliminate Voice of America (VOA) Georgian and Ukrainian radio broadcasts and was forced to reverse his position only after Russia attacked Georgia. 

Glassman also gave an incomplete, convoluted and misleading answer on the elimination of VOA radio broadcasts to Russia. He failed to mention that he had approved the ending of VOA radio to Russia just 12 days before Russian troops entered Georgia. He continues to oppose their resumption.

Glassman also failed to mention that the BBG staff working under his guidance and with the support from the Senate staff of Senator Biden acted with great urgency and in great secrecy to take VOA Russian radio broadcasts off the air in late July. The secrecy was needed to prevent alerting other members of Congress and human rights and press freedom organizations who have been overwhelmingly opposed to this move and have warned him not to proceed. He ignored these warnings.

Glassman was also disingenuous in saying that the Voice of America is now pursuing a program delivery strategy using the Internet because only about 2 percent of Russians listen to shortwave broadcasts and Mr. Putin has closed down most of the affiliates who were rebroadcasting VOA and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty programs on FM. While his comment about shortwave listenership and FM affiliates is essentially accurate, Glassman failed to mention that the BBG staff, headed by former RFE/RL acting president Jeff Trimble, is preventing the VOA Russian Service from producing any kind of radio broadcasts, even for the Internet. Glassman was Executive Vice President of U.S. News & World Report, which also employed Jeff Trimble. Glassman and Trimble have worked together and with Senator Biden’s former chief of staff Ted Kaufman, a BBG member, to eliminate VOA’s ability to produce radio broadcasts to Russia. Glassman, who is a Republican, was a Bush Administration appointee to the BBG.

While making the point of the importance of reaching a target audience in Russia, Glassman also failed to mention that when he had voted to cut VOA radio broadcasts in Russian the service was still able to use an AM transmitter in Moscow.  The AM transmitter continues to be available and can utilized to reach decision makers in the Russian capital. RFE/RL still uses an AM transmitter in Moscow.

Glassman also failed to mention that while he is preventing the Voice of America from broadcasting radio to Russia on shortwave, he together with Senator Biden supports such broadcasts by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. RFE/RL is incorporated in Delaware, Senator Biden’s home state.

Human rights and media freedom organizations have been raising questions whether RFE/RL, which has a large staff of local reporters in Russia, can be effective and independent while the Kremlin’s security services are monitoring and intimidating Russian journalists. A Russian human rights organization has also criticized RFE/RL for giving extensive airtime to an extremist Russian politician known for his racist views.

In giving his superficial and misleading answers Friday at a National Press Club luncheon, Glassman was clearly counting that the audience does not have the necessary background information to evaluate his facts and analysis. The Voice of America and the BBG  employees’ union described Glassman as unwilling to admit a mistake. Here is what the AFGE Local 1812 reported on its website:

DATELINE: Washington, 08/13/08.  James Glassman, the former Chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) and the current surrogate for the Secretary of State on the BBG, visited the Voice of America (VOA) Russian and Georgian Services late in the afternoon on Tuesday, August 12th.  Both Services assumed that he was coming to announce that the BBG had acted rashly when it announced in July that it was going to end the Russian and Georgian radio broadcasts, among others.  The BBG had ended the VOA Russian radio broadcasts on July 26th.  The VOA Georgian radio broadcasts are as yet still on the air.

The employees had misinterpreted the reason for his visit.  Glassman announced that he was visiting them just to thank them for all their hard work.  Both Services informed him that the Russian media were broadcasting old Soviet style propaganda.  The VOA Russian Service members announced that they were ready and eager to begin broadcasts again in order to counter the Russian propaganda. They were told that a reallocation of funds had taken place and that would not change. When asked if the Georgian Service would continue broadcasts after September 30th, he told the employees that he didn’t want to get anyone’s hopes up.

Watch Video:

Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs James K. Glassman at the National Press Club luncheon, September 3, 2008. Comments about China and  U.S. broadcasting to Russia, Georgia, and India start about 39 min. into the video.

 FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Blog September 30, 2008, San Francisco – Sources say that the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) tried to recruit John Cochran of NBC, then ABC News, as their high profile public relations guru. According to earlier reports, the BBG also tried to recruit Paula Zahn, who turned them down.

The yearly cost of such a position is well over $100,000. The same bipartisan Board, which manages U.S. government-funded international broadcasts, terminated the Voice of America radio programs to Russia and wanted to end broadcasts to Ukraine and Georgia. Most members of Congress are strongly opposed to these cuts.

Despite Russia’s attack on Georgia in early August, the BBG continues to oppose the resumption of VOA Russian-language radio broadcasts, but its plan to cut radio programs to Ukraine and Georgia has been put temporarily on hold due to strong protests from foreign policy and human rights groups. Earlier, the BBG had tried to reduce radio broadcasts to Tibet and China but was forced by Congress to cancel these plans.

The money which the Board proposes to spend on its new public relations initiative would pay for  VOA radio broadcasts to at least one country near Russia’s borders. The Voice of America Russian Service already has sufficient resources to produce radio programs, but the BBG prevents it from resuming radio broadcasting to Russia. The Board keeps VOA Russian staff underemployed and wants to limit their work to producing a website in order to save money for its other projects.

Ted Lipien, president of media freedom nonprofit FreeMediaOnline.org, criticized the BBG’s decision saying that a VOA website will not have any significant impact on the Russian government leaders or the Russian public opinion. Only one of the current six BBG members, radio broadcaster Blanquita Cullum, was reported to have voted against program cuts to Russia, Georgia, and Ukraine.

The program cuts and the hiring of a new spokesperson were supported by the former BBG chairman, James Glassman, who is now the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. Cullum was reported to have strongly objected to spending money on public relations campaigns while programs to countries without free media were being cut. Both Cullum and Glassman are Republicans.

All Democrats on the Board have supported program cuts. One of the strongest advocates of ending VOA radio programs to Russia was Ted Kaufman, Senator Joe Biden’s former chief of staff who now works on his vice presidential campaign. Voice of America radio to Russia has been off the air for over two months. Last week, Senator Sam Brownback (R-KA) proposed legislation that would abolish both the Broadcasting Board of Governors and the position of the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs and create a new agency in charge of U.S. public diplomacy.

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.

FreeMediaOnline.org & Free Media Online Bl