Peter Sussman is an expert in the ethics of journalism. He literally wrote the book. A concerned citizen contacted him to ask him about whether it was proper for the Los Angeles Times to accept money for education coverage from Eli Broad, since his activities in education are covered by the newspaper. The editorials in the Times have been very enthusiastic about Eli’s plan to open 260 new charters for half the students in the Los Angeles public schools. The Times is careful to note that its education coverage is subsidized by a gaggle of wealthy people, including Eli Broad’s foundation.
This is not a small question. How can we have freedom of the press if billionaires buy the media and/or subsidize the coverage that directly affects their interests?
Peter Sussman responded:
Was I tagged because this is such a tough ethical issue to parse? It is not. With this kind of entanglement with the subject of its news stories, the Times has given up the right to expect any trust or credibility for its journalism on education. They are trapped in a massive conflict of interest, and no amount of pro forma disclosure will fix that. It’s so sad to see what has happened to that once-great publication.
You can add to the comment that trust and credibility are the life’s blood of journalism, and without it, a “news” organization is no different than any other partisan in public disputes, with the added problem that there is no major paper to hold it accountable, although in this case a blogger has apparently stepped into the breach. People have jeopardized and lost their jobs for defending their editorial independence and standing up to such conflicts of interest. I haven’t read the background on the issue you’ve highlighted, but if all your information is accurate, the Times’ problem extends beyond opinions to reporting, however well-intentioned their education reporters are.
–Peter Sussman, a retired longtime San Francisco Chronicle editor who is a past co-author of the Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics. (He was co-author of the 1996 version.)
Diane Ravitch's blog 
“It is not.”
Oh, good for him. Blunt 🙂
But I suppose it’s okay since the articles at least carry their indebtedness to the Broad virus. But what about the editorials.
Joan et al…even last Sunday’s editorial had the Broad disclaimer.
This oligarchic virus has infected the entire LA Times and is not confined to just Education news. This is no longer journalism, but rather it is an advertisement for charter schools run by the privatizers.
If we cannot believe the biased education information at the LA Times, why should readers believe anything they print?
To survive financially, the Los Angeles Times stopped practicing real journalism years ago and became a propaganda rag for whoever pays the most.
Each page of the LA Times is now either 75% or 100% advertising. And now the articles we see are also just another form of advertising paid for by the billionaire deformers.
I need to find out if Sinquefield, billionaire from Missouri, does anything along these lines which affects the disgracefully narrow coverage of education by the St. Louis Post Dispatch. You have to check the sources diligently to find how frequently they come from his various organizations……he is good at it.
Good idea joe. One of the best things about this blog community is that our sharing of our stories informs others far and wide. The tactics the shysters are using are the same everywhere–and many of the shysters themselves are the same!
Follow the money
The price paid for unethical behavior is not always immediately obvious.
Just consider the following.
The LATIMES education reporters are no fools. The entirely predictable and long-term unfolding iPad and MISIS fiascos [among others] should have resulted—in a parallel universe where the LATIMES doesn’t muzzle its own staff—in Pulitzer Prizes (and other honors galore) for exemplars of civic- and high-minded journalism.
For those more inclined to a literary presentation consider the following:
[start excerpt]
The curious incident of the dog in the nighttime: what doesn’t happen matters as much as what does
It is precisely on this distinction that Holmes bases his insight in “Silver Blaze.” When Inspector Gregory asks, “Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?” Holmes responds, “To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.” But, protests the inspector, “The dog did nothing in the night-time.” To which Holmes delivers the punch line: “That was the curious incident.”
For Holmes, the absence of barking is the turning point of the case: the dog must have known the intruder. Otherwise, he would have made a fuss.
For us, the absence of barking is something that is all too easy to forget. We don’t even dismiss things that aren’t there; we don’t remark on them to begin with. But often, they are just as telling and just as important—and would make just as much difference to our decisions—as their present counterparts.
[end excerpt]
Link:http://bigthink.com/artful-choice/lessons-from-sherlock-holmes-pti-paying-attention-to-what-isnt-there
😎
Um, well, Bill Gates gives money to NPR for funding education coverage — many of us think this is why NPR is so dismissive of those of us opposed to Common Core….
YES. I was thinking the same thing as I read this blog entry. It is outrageous that the “news” is so heavily influenced… but what about grants to universities as well. At least NPR presented both sides of the argument when they discussed the pros and cons of GMOS in a recent segment….However, in the segment, the rep from the Cornell Alliance for Science was using such strong “reform” language ( e.g “robust, rigor, outcomes…” that I knew that I was listening to a Gates inspired agenda. Turns out that the Alliance for Science is funded largely by a Gates Grant…..hmmmmm.
It IS the reason, no question. They too should be called out at every opportunity.
“Read between the radio waves”
“Read between the radio waves”
To fathom NPR
Gates Foundation pays their ways
And keeps them in a jar
The Los Angeles Times has degenerated from a newspaper into a promotional Broadside.
@scisne: lol!
The Washington Post’s media reporter has said the same thing. https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/2015/10/29/fd03d240-79cc-11e5-b9c1-f03c48c96ac2_story.html
To many billionaires buying a newspaper or media outlet is just the cost of doing business.
How better to influence people and forward your agenda while making money? They don’t see it as a conflict; they see it as opportunity. What is worse is that they are also buying legislators and influencing policy with politicized garbage, and policymakers step aside as they usurp democracy. That also is a breach of ethics IMHO.
Conflict of interest, ethic violations don’t compute here in California. It’s as if by ignoring these, they don’t exist. We could compile lists but nothing would be done. The case of the San Diego super will go no place since everyone here, esp those in the education business, s involved in this type of activity. LAUSD leads the way Along with the EliTimes.
It’s mind-blowing that the LA TIMES insists that who donates to its coffers doesn’t “influence” its coverage and editorial policy.
The writer(s) of the LA TIMES Editorials go to their edit meetings with their editorial and everyone in that room has to pretend that what they are doing is ethical and never bring up the source of the money that funds their coverage. They read the criticism of their “arrangement” and feel that they are entitled and justified in their advocacy.
The LA TIMES lives in this alternative universe where they determine what is ethical for their own actions on public policy. They endorsed Broad’s plan very quickly, just days after it was leaked to the public. It was horrendous in its arrogance and grandiosity of obliterating public input.
The LA TIMES thinks that readers suffer from some collective amnesia and don’t remember what their championing of John Deasy for so many years. Every new edit pretends that they are now “enlightened” and reasonable, without ever mentioning their previous positions that have disappeared into the ether.
The LA TIMES embrace of Eli Broad is a culmination of a neo-liberal economic and education policy that seeks to redefine what is the proper definition of “public”.
But don’t question the LA TIMES integrity because–well, they so.
Eli Broad wrote that identical book and that check.
This is just like here in Nevada. The Las Vegas Review Journal, always a far right (of even Attila the Hun) publication has been purchased through a shadow straw purchase by Sheldon Adelson. He has a private school in Las Vegas and utterly detests anything public. There will be little honest reporting of facts here…The press has lost it’s pride and the reason for the first amendment, they are a lap dog and no longer a watchdog. They eat up the muck, we have no more Sinclair Lewis’ in the press.
Sadly the quality of the product called: Journalistic Integrity does not seem to matter to the mass market. If it did, papers would actually be competing to tell the truth.
Teachers, administrators and parents aware of the issues need to cancel their subscriptions to the papers that are controlled by these “white collar gangsters”. Stop fueling the fire. Same with Walmart.
Long ago, the US wealthy met in Arden House (Harriman compound in NY, the property of Columbia U since 1952) determined to ‘do something’ about the negative press. They agreed to buy up or burn out every newspaper in the USA, and largely did. The beginning of all the newspaper ‘chains’. Look at the acquisition of all the media today by the wealthy. Same thing.
The only way real reporting gets done is via either competing news outlets, or independents. Journalistic integrity does not exist if a journalists words never see publication.
“Take a Memo”
Broadly speaking, “journalist”
Is one who takes dictation
Truth and fact are simply dissed
With focus on sensation
It’s all about the money. EliTime’s Howard Blume has known about teacher abuse and jail since the beginning but has published next to nothing about it. Curiously he protects United Teachers Los Angeles also.