Edward S. Herman
Studying
the recent history of Pacifica over the past several weeks, I have been once
again impressed with how important a role censorship has played in the tactics
and apparent strategy of the Pacifica management. Censorship by the use of gag
rules has been used for years now to quiet dissent from management policies–but
while it has reduced discussion of Pacifica policies on the air, it has
certainly not quelled dissent; on the contrary, it has intensified protest by
angering both people who oppose management policies and want them discussed
openly as well as those who oppose censorship on principle.
But
this failure to quell dissent has been serviceable to the deeper management
strategy of weeding out leftists and those unduly wedded to principles like
freedom of expression. Such individuals will tend to violate the gag rules or
sign petitions and speak out against them, and this can then be used as the
basis of firing people–this has been done to dozens of Pacifica workers. Most
recently, George Reiter, a professor of physics at the University of Houston,
producer of the new program, Thresholds, on Houston’s station KPFT, was ousted
for participating in a protest supporting Democracy Now! KPFT station chief
Garland Ganter, who did the firing, is a favorite of the Pacifica management,
who rushed him up to KPFA to handle matters during the KPFA lockout.
It
is amazing that this structured violation of principles of freedom of expression
has not unduly upset the ACLU or editors of The Nation magazine, and was not
viewed as justifying any "management bashing" by the signers of Saul
Landau’s letter of last year. This despite the fact that, in addition to
violating free speech rights, the censorship system was being used
systematically to get rid of quality people. Of course it was being done
nominally because these folks were violating management orders and rules
established for everyone equally. So they were merely "personnel"
decisions. But how this could fool anyone who didn’t want to be fooled escapes
me.
The
ability to rationalize censorship is also striking–the spirit of the commissar
is widespread among those with a bit of power. When PNN News Director Dan
Coughlin ran a 20-second report on a boycott of Pacifica by 16 affiliated
stations protesting censorhip, he was denounced by Marc Cooper: "What the
hell was this doing on a news broadcast?" And Cooper also expressed
discomfort at some of the "global conflict reporting by Jeremy Scahill"
(who worked for Amy Goodman). Three days after this outburst and Cooper’s
complaint to the Pacifica management, Dan Coughlin was deposed (and without a
hearing). (See Ed Pearl, "Cloak and Dagger! Out of the Mouth of Marc
Cooper," Los Angeles Free Press, February 19, 2000
[http://www.radio4all.org/2000/0219cloakdagger.htm]). And just a few days ago,
Cliff Tasner, a member of the board of the Southern California Americans for
Democratic Action, was called on the phone by Cooper after he had participated
in a rally and protest for Goodman and Democracy Now!, and was told, after
considerable vituperation, "Don’t expect us to broadcast anything you
do."
Several
days later Tasner found that he had indeed been barred from access to the
station. As chair of the ADA’s campaign finance reform committee and a
spokesperson for ADA on a phony campaign finance reform measure on the
California ballot, he had been planning a presentation on that proposition on
KPFK’s morning show. While discussing the arrangements with the show’s producer,
however, he was told that he could not expect them to put him on after his
involvement in the protest. In the event, another speaker was found to discuss
the measure. In an e-mail exchange with Marc Cooper, Cooper had explained to
Tasner that the first rule of politics is that you reward your friends and
punish your enemies, adding further that actions have consequences and that
Tasner should be aware of that when he makes his choices. In short, the gag rule
and censorship extends beyond Pacifica personnel to anybody who crosses the
local Pacifica commissars.
In
the "new Pacifica" tradition, Amy Goodman is being set up for ouster
as a "personnel" decision based on her failure to follow orders. But
the censorship element is overwhelmingly strong. Cooper didn’t like that
"global conflict reporting" by Scahill–but read Amy Goodman for
Scahill–Mary Frances Berry referred to her in public as
"troublesome," and the Censorship Management clearly wants to drive
her out or fire her for reasons of hostility to her content. But they can’t
admit that–the censorship has to be transformed into her being troublesome and
failing to obey supposedly reasonable orders by her boss Steve Yasko.
One
of the most amusing rationalizations for her harassment and censorship can be
read in KPFK station manager Mark Schubb’s recent letter to Saul Landau
answering Amy Goodman’s grievance list (and my article on "Endgame at
Pacifica?"). Schubb was one of the management enforcers at the September 14
meeting with Goodman in Washington, where she was told to shape up on content as
well as style. In his letter to Landau, Schubb pretends that when he and Yasko
were telling Amy to cool it on some of her favorite issues like Lori Berenson
and East Timor, this was just friendly advice among colleagues trying to be
helpful and collegial! This is staggering misrepresentation. Yasko had shown
intense hostility to Goodman, encroaching on her autonomy as a programmer,
threatening her and shouting at her that she must recognize who is boss.
Schubb
also has long been highly critical of Goodman, and it is likely that he
continues to run Democracy Now! on KPFK, not because of any appreciation of its
quality, but rather because of its high ratings. So the meeting of September 14
was coercive, threatening, tense, and in no sense whatever collegial. It
therefore constituted a clear further case of attempted censorship, although it
was probably recognized that Amy could only be effectively censored by
termination or driving her out by harassment and the imposition of onerous work
conditions. Schubb was one of the prime censors at that meeting, as he has been
for years as manager of KPFK. (For example, he ousted award-winning reporter
Robin Urevich from the station in response to her August 1999 article on
internal issues at KPFK, published in a local activist newspaper
[http://www.radio4all.org/fp/0824robin_urevich.htm]).
The
coercive and censoring meeting of September 14 was followed one month later by
another call to a meeting that, instead of being the expected one of discussion
looking toward compromise, was arranged by the management only to serve Amy
Goodman with a harsh letter of instructions and threat of termination. The
commissars in Washington and at the Washington-allied stations are on the
attack. Defending Pacifica, and recovering it from the censors, will depend on
the effective organization and mobilization of the resources of the progressive
community that created and supported Pacifica for the past fifty years.