UNITED
NATIONS, July
5 -- Just
after
Independence
Day we ask
again, why
does
the US
government
need a
propaganda
network, and
why turn it
loose
inside the US?
On July 2,
Inner City
Press published
a short
critique
of Voice of
America and
its Broadcast
Board of
Governors,
here.
In
the three days
since, mail
has poured in
providing yet
more detailed
accounts of
BBG and Voice
of America
incompetence
and assaults
on the
principles
they
supposedly
uphold.
(Beyond this
new
communication,
just for
example today
Voice of
America
mis-identified
Nyala, the
capital of
South Darfur
in Sudan, as
“Nyla,” here
and here for
now.)
The
union that
represents
workers there,
AFGE Local
1812, has written
that
“poor
morale was
made markedly
worse by a
decision in
2010 to
re-appoint
the present
newsroom
director
[Sonja Pace].
A
correspondent
since the
1980’s, she
had been
reassigned
from the
position of
news chief
more than a
decade
earlier. Fast
forward to
2010: An audio
recording
of an open
meeting in
VOA’s newsroom
shows that
strong
protests
against the
reappointment
of the former
news director
were dismissed
by VOA's
Executive
Editor [Steve
Redisch] a
former CNN
employee. In
the recording,
the Executive
Editor
rejected staff
concerns,
saying
'you’re
responsible
for your own
morale.'
Though he has
known of
the morale
crisis in
VOA’s Central
News Division
created by the
2010 decision,
current VOA
director David
Ensor has
allowed this
situation to
continue.”
Inner
City Press in
2012 had its
own experience
of these three
individuals. VOA's
Executive
Editor Steve
Redisch wrote
to the UN
asking that
Inner City
Press' accreditation
be “reviewed.”
The
only
communication
Inner City
Press had
received from
VOA or BBG in
Washington
prior to this
was from Sonja
Pace, that
“regarding
VOA’s
Charter and
Code, we
absolutely
stand by those
mandates and
guidelines,
without
exception.”
Apparently
Voice
of America's
principles
don't include
the First
Amendment.
Subsquent
inquiring
under the
Freedom of
Information
Act found
David
Ensor involved
in the
decision to
try to get
Inner City
Press thrown
out of the UN.
Ensor served
the US State
Department in
Afghanistan
and perhaps
re-formed his
view of press
freedom there.
Interestingly,
the
Obama
administration
has nominated
former
Afghanistan
envoy Ryan
Crocker to
join the
half-empty
Broadcasting
Board of
Governors,
along
with John
Kerry,
while claiming
that the
output under
the BBG is
entirely
independent
from the US
government.
This is not
credible.
The
Colombia
Journalism
Review, with
its own
conflicts, has
made
this
point, and
BBG has
belatedly
responded.
Will any of
this finally
bring
accountability?
Watch this
site.
, 
