Let's Define "Mistake"
Maybe I'm just a little bit too sensitive about words and what they mean. Maybe I should just lighten up and allow such obvious understatements go unmentioned because most times I seem to be the only one making a fuss about something in the media that is astronomically stupid. Maybe that's what I should do, and maybe that's what I'll actually do some day. But not today.
Earlier this week, it was reported in the media that an Air Force Squadron Crew Commander was under investigation for making a mistake and allowing 6 nuclear warheads to be flown on a B52 from North Dakota to Louisiana.
Here is just one of the startling revelations in the USA Today article:
"It was originally reported that five nuclear warheads were transported, but officers who tipped Military Times to the incident who have asked to remain anonymous since they are not authorized to discuss the incident, have since updated that number to six."
There is so much wrong with that paragraph it's hard to know where to begin!
First, and this is key as far as I'm concerned, why is a media outlet accepting the word of a source that requires anonymity because said source is not authorized to discuss the incident that's being reported. Especially since this source got it wrong and had to correct the information leaked to the media. There was a time when, if information was disseminated incorrectly, that cast doubt upon the report of the, and you'll have to forgive my choice of words here, but I maintain it's accurate... squealer. Since when is "news" dependent upon sources who are freely given anonymity so they cannot be held accountable for spilling their guts about matters that they have no business discussing in the first place.
And I don't want to hear one single word about the public's right to know here either. If the information being passed along is such that it needs to be shrouded in the secrecy of an anonymous source, how am I supposed to be sure it's accurate at all. Because the reporter says so? Puhleeeeze. I'm sick of hearsay being delivered to me as credible news. I thought after the Dan Rather and Jayson Blair debacles we were through accepting unnamed sources. Or at least that's what we were told. The real result is that we still get anonymous sources; it's just that now the reporter has to spell it out for us that the source will not be identified for some reason satisfactory to the reporter and the squealer, but definitely not satisfactory to me.
To re-enforce my point, the article goes on to say,
"Air Force and defense officials would not confirm the missiles were armed with nuclear warheads Wednesday, citing longstanding policy, but they did confirm the Air Force was "investigating an error made last Thursday during the transfer of munitions" from Minot to Barksdale."
So, all we know for sure is that there was an incident on August 30 involving something being flown over the United States. Non-nuclear Advanced Missiles were supposed to be transported, but it looks like that's not what happened. So, in effect, the Air Force committed a blunder we have been assured could never happen and then once word got out about the event, it became known as a "mistake".
A mistake is when you reach for the salt and get the pepper instead. It only takes one shake to realize the error and correct it.
A mistake is what I did last week when grocery shopping. I meant to get a can of peas, which I did. The only problem was when I opened the can I discovered that I'd mistakenly picked up peas with mushrooms and miniature pearl onions. No harm done. I gave the garbage disposal a healthy dinner, and I made another vegetable instead while vowing to check more closely when I buy peas next time.
Transporting nuclear warheads from North Dakota to Louisiana via a B52 is NOT a mistake. That is what's called an PFC -- Possible Fucking Catastrophy. And when PFC's are involved, no one is allowed to say "ooops" and have the whole matter disappear.
I particularly liked the response of Philip Coyle, a senior advisor on nuclear weapons at the Center For Defense Information. Phil said,
"I just can't imagine how all of this happened. The procedures are so rigid; this is the last thing that's supposed to happen."
Coyle went on to say, "This is really shocking, the Air Force can't tolerate it, and the Pentagon can't tolerate it, either."
Well, that helps a lot. I feel so much safer knowing that Phil cannot even imagine how all this happened AND that he believes the Air Force and the Pentagon can't tolerate it. Mark Twain had some very good advice for men like Phil Coyle: "It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt."
The thing is, I didn't have to know anything about this at all. And frankly, I cannot begin to see how I or any of the rest of the American People are better off for knowing it. It was a PFC that fortunately produced no adverse consequences to anyone but the morons who allowed it to happen in the first place. Measures have been put in place to investigate incidents such as this, and while that may not be terribly comforting either, it is the best we can hope for. As far as I'm concerned, all that was accomplished by making sure this story got the attention it did was to scare more people and showcase the fact that we have no such thing as security in the work place any more. People no longer feel an ounce of respect or loyalty for the positions they hold in their jobs as is evidenced by the increasing number of "anonymous sources" we read about in the media.
But that's material for a different rant. Maybe I'll do that one after the one I've been working on about the Post Office. Now that's a place that could practically redefine PFC.
Stay tuned.
5 comments:
I'm a volunteer with our police department. Over and over we have been told what happens in dispatch stays in dispatch. But (some) men, being men, one couldn't resist making himself seem important.Of course he didn't have the total picture of the situation. He was quoted several times as "an informed source in the police department" before it became clear who it was.
Your analogy with a can of peas is actually very good. This situation is exactly like that. Someone moved the wrong thing. That part of the story is actually not that big of a deal. You could have probably shot down the plane and not set off the nukes.
The real issue was nuclear weapons being unaccounted for. The danger was not that they could explode, that was extremely unlikely. The problem here is protocol and accountability. If nukes can go unaccounted for, then they could get into the hands of unauthorized people.
News has always depended on unnamed sources. Without them, the public would not get very much information. If the officer disclosed his/her identity, he/she would be discharged. The fact that this officer was unauthorized doesn't mean he/she doesn't know what he/she is saying. It means the military hasn't authorized this person to be a spokesperson for them. Organizations have spokespeople in order to convey information in a way to make them look good. Truth is often not a consideration. The public is much better off having people willing to come forward and give information despite their organization telling them otherwise.
The issue you mentioned with Dan Rather et al, is that the reporters gathering the information did not exercise due diligence in fact checking. They didn't ensure the information they were being given was reasonable or factual, or if could easily be invalidated.
There is a difference from reporting as fact and reporting as a lead. Journalists say they have an anonymous source, for example an officer in the military, to distinguish this from an anonymous source working in a bakery telling us about nukes.
It is reasonable to report something about the military when the lead comes from an officer in the military or someone closely involved. Just as it is reasonable to report something about police department matters when it comes from a police officer. A good journalist would approach the organization and let them know about the information they have and give them opportunity to present their side of the story.
Reporting information from this unnamed source has allowed Congress to question the poor procedures in place where otherwise the story could have been about a third party using one of our nukes to kill a bunch of people.
Greg: I know that the news has always relied upon unnamed sources. Without such sources, there'd have been no Watergate and a multitude of other crimes exposed. My point is that the unnamed source has been overused to death; that assertions are being made with no proof of fact except the word of unnamed sources. And frankly, I'm sick of people in positions of responsbility flapping their gums whenever and to whomever they choose with impunity. It has always been my belief that there are some things we do not need to know.
These days all a journalist (and I use that term very loosely) needs to do to get anything in print is to claim unnamed sources for his assertions. That's not good enough for me, and it shouldn't be good enough for anyone else either particularly in light of the Jayson Blair and Dan Rather debacles. I thought various media outlets had come up with a plan to reduce the amount of unnamed sources used or referred to in their articles. Apparently that's not true because I haven't seen a decline in any of the reporting where facts are called into question because of who released them. If the plan is to scare people with more evidence of ineptitude, then it seems to me we deserve more than anonymous voices giving journalists all that ammunition.
I enjoy reading articles like the one I've cited here to point out the inconsistencies in media coverage. I also love to showcase yet another moron who opens his mouth and either jams his foot into it or obviously has no idea what he's talking about. I care about the language people use and how they slaughter it to make vacuous points. That's what my rant was mainly about. That and the fact that even with something as serious as losing track of nuclear warheads, the media still can't get it right. This should have been an important story. Instead it got messed up with unnamed sources who were wrong about their assertions, and blithering idiots representing those who should have known what they were talking about.
Unnamed sources will not stop and they should not. In this story they told the reader enough, it was an officer in the military and not just a person off the street.
What the public expects is a level of trust with the newsgroup. They are supposed to do the fact checking. You are lumping three different events together that were totally different.
The case of Jayson Blair was someone just making stuff up. This could happen regardless of sources. The case of Dan Rather was sloppy journalism. Rather was overeager to release his story before checking his facts fully. In both of these cases the journalists left the newsgroups in a cloud of shame.
The story you criticize is very different. There was no invention, and there was no issue with fact checking. The informer conveyed information known, and later corrected that information to be more accurate. The underlying issue of the story did not change. This is a similar situation of a reporter stating that 3 people have died, and then later updating this report to say 4 people had died.
The weakness of your argument is that this "problem" doesn't happen as often as it seems. This is similar to airline safety. Every time a passenger jet crashes and kills people, it is national news, so people think it happens a lot. But it doesn't.
Another weakness of your argument is that in this particular case, this information really is critical to the public. If we didn't get this information then a real danger could have continued to exist for our national security.
So while I understand your frustration, I have to completely disagree with you on this.
"What the public expects is a level of trust with the newsgroup. They are supposed to do the fact checking. You are lumping three different events together that were totally different."
While the public may expect a level of trust with a newsgroup, I haven't seen evidence that our expectations are met. And I certainly cannot vouch for the fact checking part either. We do not deal in facts with the media any longer... we deal in spin, supposition, and a greatly exaggerated sense of what constitutes a lie.
Nothing about news reporting these days is objective. It entirely depends upon which newspaper is read or which news channel is tuned in as to what spin is put on any incident whatsoever. My understanding was, as a result of a huge loss of confidence in the media thanks to Blair and Rather, that news sources were going to demand higher standards from reporters in how the news is presented. There were no longer supposed to be so many incidents of unnamed sources because the information resulting from those interviews was not reliable.
While I may be using different examples to illustrate the deplorable state of news reporting, all that means is that sloppy journalism, incorrect information, and unreliable sources are crossing over into every area of news. If you want more complete evidence of that, try looking at Joe Wilson's story. First he was lauded, then he was discredited and termed a media whore, and then he started climbing back up to being lauded again. And what I get from following that story is that no one really knew what the hell Joe Wilson was talking about, and they were too busy printing it to fact check it thoroughly. Media sources have changed their minds more often than some folks change underwear where Joe Wilson is concerned, and no one ever calls them on it.
If we want to get technical about this, the story I cited in this rant still does not have anyone willing to speak on the record about what exactly took place. Once again, the public at large is left to decide for themselves what is factual and what isn't. That's not the standard of news reporting we were supposed to be receiving in this country. I said the source for this story gave inaccurate information with what was originally released about the nuclear warheads, and I don't see how I misrepresented any facts in asserting that. It seems to me if some unnamed source is going to go shooting off his or her mouth, then the least that person should be required to do is get it right. No going back and making corrections. That person was not authorized to discuss the incident with anyone, but that didn't stop the person from spilling his/her guts to a reporter. So essentially this was all about leaking faulty information. And that's a fact. If I'm supposed to believe a source that refuses to be identified to me, than that person had better be 100% correct about the assertions he or she is making. I don't see why that is expecting too much.
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