Boston Globe reporter used blogs to attack Kerry, support Bush during '04

[TahitiNut]

Boston Globe reporter used blogs to attack Kerry, support Bush during '04 campaign

While reporting on the 2004 presidential campaign for The Boston Globe, technology reporter Hiawatha Bray apparently wrote posts for several weblogs in which he declared his support for President Bush, attacked Sen. John Kerry, and bolstered discredited allegations by the anti-Kerry group Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (now Swift Vets and POWs for Truth).

Bray reported on technological aspects of the 2004 presidential campaigns for the Globe. In an August 11, 2004, article, Bray chronicled an incident in which hackers altered the websites of online bookstores featuring the anti-Kerry book Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry (Regnery, August 2004), co-authored by Swift Boat Veterans for Truth co-founder John E. O'Neill. Bray reported that "computer vandals altered an online bookstore's website that was selling a popular new book harshly critical" of Kerry. He added: "The website attacks, at Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.com, underscore the passions unleashed by the new book, 'Unfit For Command.'"

In an August 19, 2004, article, Bray reported on political computer games, including a game on former Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean's website that encouraged support for Dean's candidacy and several games featured on the Republican National Committee's website "mostly devoted to mockery of John Kerry."

In a July 22, 2004, article, Bray reported that the Fleet Center in Boston, site of the Democratic National Convention, was potentially vulnerable to hackers using laptop computers with wireless Internet capabilities.

<more>

[roguevalley]

1. and he keeps his job?

[Demit]

3. article says, in regard to the ethics of that:

The Boston Globe is owned by The New York Times Company, whose ethics handbook, Ethical Journalism: A Handbook of Values and Practices for the News and Editorial Departments, lays out specific guidelines for the political behavior of its journalists, such as: "Journalists have no place on the playing fields of politics. Staff members are entitled to vote, but they must do nothing that might raise questions about their professional neutrality or that of The Times. In particular, they may not campaign for, demonstrate for, or endorse candidates, ballot causes or efforts to enact legislation."


(A shame the guy's a slime. Hiawatha Bray is such a great name. :( )

[EFerrari]

4. Real name? Sounds more fake than "Gannon" n/t

[Demit]

6. Hm. A guy choosing to be called Hiawatha? Anything's possible, I guess!

[SpiralHawk]

8. The name Hiawatha is a corruption of the

Haudenasenee (Iroquois) name Ay-on-a-watha. The first man to bear that name was ally and companion to the Peacemaker, and he did enormous good throughout his life. Check it out.

Longfellow later borrowed the name, and changed it a bit to Hiawatha to write his fictional and tedious poem.

In my view, Bray is pretty good reporter on computer and other technological matters. But his political ethics appear twisted.
Just one more case in the Overall Climate of BushCo Propaganda.

[EFerrari]

10. Sorry, SprialHawk. My trust in the fat eaters is close to nil. n/t

[EFerrari]

5. Email the Globe (& a question)

[e-mail]


And, by the way, how many of these slimeballs have been outed now? I'm losing track: Armstrong, Gukert, Bray, the Medicaid tapes. Who was that woman who was agitating for denfense of "marriage"?

I want to keep an updated listed in my email footer.

[Demit]

7. here--

1. drug abuse fake news stories (Mike Morris)
2. Medicare Bill fake news stories (Karen Ryan)
3. NCLB fake news stories (Armstrong Williams) Dept of Education, $250K
4. marriage initiative article in Natl Review (Maggie Gallagher) HHS, $21.5K
5. marriage initiative syndicated columns on "Ethics & Religion" (Michael McManus) HHS
6. Jeff Gannon (James (J.D.) Guckert) pseudo-reporter


--I started a list myself!

[EFerrari]

9. Thank YOU! LOL! I used to have "all the president's

whistleblowers" in my footer. People actually started sending me additions! Whatever works :hi:

[Career Prole]

27. I e-mailed the Globe ombudsman and got a reply today asking

permission to use my name...

I take your point. What Hiawatha did was inappropriate, and I may address it in my next column. If so, may I quote you by name from your email?

Thanks.

Sincerely,

Chris Chinlund


Ombudsman's Office
Boston Globe
P.O. Box 55819
Boston, MA 02205-5819

It wasn't an especially spectacular rant so I believe the request to quote was probably a test to see if my heart was in it or I was just writing because Media Matters posted the address.
I told Chris that'd be just fine, and loosed another salvo at Hiawatha.

[aquart]

2. He's a propagandist. Not a reporter.

[deacon]

12. that sums it up n/t

[NVMojo]

11. When I was a reporter for a newspaper, we were not allowed to openly

support any candidate for office, our votes were to be kept private. And this was when I was working for a local newspaper that was owned by the staunchest Republicans. Reporters were not supposed to make the news back in the good old days, they were supposed to report on it.

[deacon]

13. This is hitting crisis level, news organizations need to reel in the

progagadist and start firing them.

[EFerrari]

15. Early this week, "media manipulation" was put out by the Dems

or, so it seemed listening to the cable splutterers. We have to watch the tube news for our job. It was exciting to see this phrase repeated a few times.

If it is a Dem talking point, we need to do a better job, though. It tried to take off but I haven't heard it today.

[Octafish]

14. Wouldn't bet that he's alone.

Presstitutes are really something. They're selling out the country for a paycheck. And it's not just the obvious ones, like the turd Novakula, but the ones who act so "professional," like Mr. Bray.

[EFerrari]

16. Mostly soccer Moms & Dads under new management?

I've a dear friend that I met when he did a story about our family. He's covered homeless issues more thoroughly than anyone in the country. Spent time on the street, the whole real deal. And he seems to just not be able to deal, at some level, with the state of the media.

He's got a wife, two kids, a mortgage.

The media p!sses me off royally. No, supra royally. But most of them are like my friend. I can only imagine going to work every day and knowing your management is dead set against you doing your job -- or worse, pretending to back you while they undermine your assignments, your budget, your access at every turn.

[Cattledog]

17. Email him

and tell him what you think.


[e-mail]

[EFerrari]

19. I do, every month. I write a political comedy column here and cc him

every month.

Reporters -- unless they're not reporters but "celebrities" -- are imo NOT the problem. Management. Management. Management.

[hannah]

18. CARLYLE

Didn't the carlyle group buy into the New York Times?

[cosmicdot]

25. a Carlyle man is on the NYTimes Board of Directors

William E. Kennard
a managing director in Carlyle's global telecommunications and media group

he, also, sits on the board of directors of Nextel Communications, Inc., DexMedia, Inc., and eAccess, Ltd., a Tokyo company.
http://www.nytco.com/company-directors-wekennard.html

conflict of interest is X-treme in this country

[Octafish]

23. You got it, sfexpat2000. Exactly correct.

In the early 90s, I was a reporter at a daily. The work was great, the people better, the assignments relatively interesting.

Several of us were formed into an investigative team and set to go after a corrupt S&L. We found that the crooks got a guy with a clean record to head the new, post deregulation "commercial loans" desk.

The bad guy was brought in to hand out multi-million dollar loans to mobsters, politician's family members and seemingly clean business folk who promised to create a new business.

Funny thing. Nothing got built and they all welched on their loans, claiming bankruptcy. By the time the Feds closed down the institution, all the money was overseas.

Sure, the Feds caught one or two crooks and put them behind bars for six months. But, hey, with a million or two waiting, I could do that time standing on my head.

What made us really angry was the Feds never went after the Big Time crooks, like those who OKd the rule changes that benefited the likes of Neil "Silverado" Bush.

What's worse is that it's the folks who follow the law -- you, me and the rest of the mopes they call taxpayers -- who today still foot the bill for the S&L bailout.

What happened to us: We won some awards for our reporting. There's nothing like success. The publisher didn't like that we had rocked the boat. Most of us got put on lousy shifts and crummy beats and eventually quit journalism.

[EFerrari]

29. That's a great and really difficult story.

And it surely was all our loss that you and your colleagues left journalism. Somehow, we have to hijack the FCC from the hijackers. And, it's going to be a struggle ongoing.

I worked for ATT for about a year when a shrimp and a new mom. Did well, got promoted out of the operator pool to management.

My job was to do nothing busily all day, as an assistant to three mid-level managers who also did nothing. No kidding. Thinking back on how shocked I was when I figured this out, it's sort of funny.

The new job came with a desk and a parking space and a raise and benefits and all that. I HATED IT and as I couldn't demote myself back to the cr@ppy ill paid horrible shifts job with a purpose, lol, just left "to spend time with the family". Never been back to Corporate World, never want to go back.

[CBHagman]

22. Pressitutes! I hadn't heard that one.

Excellent term, and so evocative.

[Octafish]

24. Hey, CBHagman! If ya liked that one...

... you might enjoy Corporate McPravda. It sort of expresses who pays the press corpse.

[Blue_Tires]

20. yeesh...i'd expect nothing less from the globe

[zulchzulu]

21. No friggin' way! The media was against Kerry? No...way.....

Imagine a media that let the Swift Boat Liars for Bush keep getting interviews and media coverage LONG AFTER they were discredited and debunked by many sources...

This story is just a blip in the loud noise of anti-Kerry static on the 2004 radar screen.

[cosmicdot]

26. has he scrubbed his Kerry posts?

I found a link* to Hiawatha Bray's Blog ... 'Monitortan - The mental meanderings of Hiawatha Bray, technology reporter for the Boston Globe'

... and, searched
"Kerry"

http://www.monitortan.com/mt/mt-search.cgi?IncludeBlogs=6&search=kerry

4 posts are there ... all of them lead to "The page cannot be found"

http://www.monitortan.com/



* a Google led to http://smokey.rhs.com/web/blog/rhs.nsf/stories/DNC57VarietiesOfDemocraticNationalConventionCoverage where "other bloggers" are listed

[ticapnews]

28. Patricia Smith...Mike Barnicle...Hiawatha Bray... (edit)

Toss in Bob Ryan saying how much he'd like to slap around Jason Kidd's wife, and you've got quite a little paper down there in Beantown. A heritage of which to be proud!

(edit)
Here's my letter to the editor. DemItAllAnyway, I hope you don't mind, I used the list you provided in Post #7.


Silly me. I thought the Globe had cleaned up its act. After the Patricia Smith and Mike Barnicle fiascos, I believed the Globe was back on track. Now it comes out that a reporter at your paper took part in partisan, slanderous attacks against a presidential candidate. And the reporter is still employed. What a proud day for the Boston Globe. Congratulations. I am sure the president and the GOP are grateful for your support...although not entirely pleased that it has come to light. Especially on the heels of the series of journalists-turned-propagandists that have been outed recently. And then there's Jeff Guckert, or James Gannon, or whatever he is calling himself today.

1. Mike Morris - drug abuse fake news stories
2. Karen Ryan - Medicare Bill fake news stories
3. Armstrong Williams - NCLB fake news stories - Dept of Education, $250K
4. Maggie Gallagher - marriage initiative article in Natl Review HHS, $21.5K
5. Michael McManus - marriage initiative syndicated columns on "Ethics & Religion" HHS
6. Jeff Gannon (James (J.D.) Guckert) pseudo-reporter
7. Hiawatha Bray (Boston Globe)

This is quite a disturbing trend. It's a shame you are now part of the problem.

What are the odds you'll be part of the solution?

[Warren Stupidity]

30. my first reaction was 'the bastard'

but as I think about it, I actually don't have a problem with this. Bray writes a dopey pc tech column for the globe's weekly tech and science section, I care about his personal political views for exactly what reason?

[TahitiNut]

32. (Hmmm.) Perhaps because of Diebold and ES&S?

[Warren Stupidity]

34. uh no

Bray reports on pcs and gadgets. He does not cover anything as technical as electronic voting. He writes a consumer-oriented personal computer technology column.

Journalists have opinions. I don't have a problem with that or even with their exercise of their 1st amendment rights to express those opinions. When they do so within what is presented as a news article rather than an editorial column, then I have objections. If The Globe has a policy forbidding Bray's activities and it just isn't being applied to Bray, that is a problem. Otherwise, what the heck is the big deal?

[texanshatingbush]

31. 21st century journalism = blogging

Unfortunately, I believe the current astonishing state of affairs in much of journalism is a result of the "corporatization" of the media.

I retired from a large corporation (not media-related). Loved my job, and thought my corporation always tried to wear The White Hat in its business dealings. As I matured it became obvious to me that most corporations had begun to take the short-term view, living from the all-important quarterly earnings report to the next quarterly earnings report. This was the inevitable result of corporate darwinism, I believe. Like any organism, the corporation is in a fierce competition to survive, and globalization has only made the struggle more acute, since it's difficult to compete with businesses which pay their workers so little.

As part of this trend, corporate journalism appears to be in a life-or-death struggle for ratings. Strategy: Don't go too far to right or left, or you may alienate viewers/readers, and the quarterly earnings report won't look so good. Alternate Strategy: public opinion polls (and the electorate, for that matter) seem to indicate that conservatives are in the driver's seat, so support the Right and ignore or denigrate the Left, and the quarterly earnings report will be good. Both of these strategies result in a sort of censorship.

21st century reality: one of the perhaps-unexpected results of the "internet highway" which now circles the globe is the developing importance of blogging. I think I heard someone refer to blogging as "The Fifth Estate". Perhaps bloggers are the new journalists of the 21st century. No corporate censorship. Each blogger has the option of allowing personal integrity to guide his/her investigative work and reporting. The realities of modern life can be reported, people can share their thoughts about those realities, and "movements" can develop if the story has "legs". People also must apply critical analysis to blog news to ensure that it represents Truth.

So......I think bloggers are the current locus of "freedom of the press", but the price of that freedom is eternal vigilance to identify true from false blogs.

Whaddya think?

[bywho4who]

33. The wicked ones

will learn all they can from you & turn it on you. watch how you move here!