I'm sitting here watching the Chilean miner rescue on cable TV and I am consumed by a whipsaw of conflicting emotions. Who cannot be moved by this incredible human story, the miraculous rescue of 33 trapped miners from a half mile below the surface? As
pinhead MSNBC anchor,
Chris Jansing, gushed a few minutes ago: 'This is better than any reality show on TV."
No
scheiss, Sherlock. Of course, what she doesn't say is just how much BETTER a TV show this would be if the cable on the rescue car would snap and we could all watch some poor bastard hurl to his demise, live.
I don't know at what hour of the day CNN and MSNBC began their continuous coverage of the rescue, but I'm in my fourth hour with five guys rescued so far. Will this continue live for 35 more hours? What happened to the rest of the world?
No doubt that this story deserves front and center coverage. But continuous? Why? I suppose because it aggregates eyeballs -- the news value itself dissipates by the minute. Then again, CNN and MSNBC aren't in business primarily to propagate news, are they?
Earlier in the day, as I was getting ready to go to work around mid-day Tuesday, I saw about four or 5 reports from Copiapo (pronounced co-pee-ah-PO and not co-pee-AH-pu as the ignorant anchors continue to repeat) in which NBC correspondent Kerry Sanders had NOTHING to actually report --except that there were
1700 reporters on the scene.
Pretty good PR for Chile. That's more reporters than showed up for the recent earthquake there or for the monster quake in Haiti some months before. Which brings me to my main point tonight... a point as dead obvious, I am sorry to say, as was my post below from yesterday.
The ONLY way the Third World gets ANY MSM coverage, especially TV coverage, is to have a nice, big friggin' natural or man-made disaster. Period. Full stop.
I've been trying to find it for weeks, with no luck, but there was a great study published in the Columbia Journalism Review in the late 1980's analyzing U.S. network coverage of the Third World. The study found that something like 95% of such stories were reported through one of two frames: either as a "cold war national security story" (El Salvador, Nicaragua etc.) or as disaster story.
With the cold war now over, I guess that only leaves one way to get foreign and especially American reporters to your country: have an earthquake, a
tsunami or trap a bunch of miners alive.
Go ahead, fellow reporter, a pitch a story on just about anything else south of the border and watch the eyes of your editor roll back into their heads.
How many reports have we ever seen on mining conditions in Chile (which lives off mining?). How much coverage have we seen of El Salvador or Nicaragua since the U.S. military intervention in those places ceased nearly 20 years ago? They as much as disappeared from the map.
I know I am getting repetitive on this subject ... but...here's one more thing I will not miss with the coming demise of the MSM. I will not miss its omission of The World from daily coverage.
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October 13th, 2010 at 12:30 am
Right, like call me Word Police, but it’s pronounced co-pee-ah-PO..po.
October 13th, 2010 at 1:54 am
Why U mad?
October 13th, 2010 at 5:08 am
I’m wondering – even in context of that Journalism Review article cited – if there were actually more foreign correspondents when there was less aggregate “news” (but the business model of “msm” was more solid.) Not that it bought the news audience much that it wasn’t already primed for. Today the web offers huge windows into the world if folks seek them out. But my guess is that the business end of the news biz has crimped correspondents even more. Just a guess. The only counter-tendency – and it’s slight – has been that it seems Christine Amanpour is including more international coverage and guests on her version of This Week, which is welcome. It’s still 85% the same tired format, but her interview guests and even the round-table have been more “globally” diverse since she took over. (Of course, this may have something to do with the fact that she herself doesn’t speak English properly, but has an odd foreign accent like those people in Monty Python sketches.)
October 13th, 2010 at 6:13 am
Marc,
Have you read Mort Rosenblum’s book Coups and Earthquakes? It addresses this issue.
We have the benefit here at least in New York of having BBC on television and an even better channel in CNN International which such shows as Talk Asia, Inside the Middle East, Inside Africa, etc.
October 13th, 2010 at 7:21 am
A week or so ago I interrupted a thread with the link to report on the detailed account of how everything aspect of this rescue was being meticulously organized.
That is what is worth noting! Every last detail was considered and experts called in from all over the world.
I don’t give a shit if Pinera is meant to be a right wing billionaire taking advantage of political opportunity– the fact is the rescue operation was one of those scenarios where life imitates Hollywood– in this case — a good thing.
What the story is– is what its like when there is will to bring the best to bear on a terrible situation.
I kept thinking of Katrina/Haiti etc etc. BP.
Yeah, the coverage isnt even interesting– but the attention to detail and success and how the emotional connection between the miners their families and the community has lead to their coming out intact. The story is in the cultural underpinnings that keep these guys sane and then the extraordinary attention to detail that kept them sane once contact was made.
In Haiti, it was the Israeli team that showed everyone how things should be done. Its tragic that where emergency response protocols have been highly developed that the blueprints arent taken up by others.
And then there is the ugly truth that these disasters happen mostly because of corporate greed and non compliance to safety standards.
I’m not sure the wall to wall airing of this rescue mission is such a bad thing considering that it is showing everyone how something can be done right and may raise expectations.
October 13th, 2010 at 7:52 am
Nothing new…
“Stan Chambers’s career began shortly after KTLA became the first commercially-licensed TV station in the western United States. His April 1949 on-scene 27½-hour report of the unsuccessful attempt to rescue Kathy Fiscus from an abandoned well in San Marino, California prompted the sale of hundreds of TV sets in the Los Angeles area. His report has been recognized as the first live coverage of a breaking news story.”
October 13th, 2010 at 7:57 am
Ace in the Hole: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0043338/
October 13th, 2010 at 8:26 am
They actually had the exquisite taste to show this on 30-second delay, in case, you know, something happened.
October 13th, 2010 at 8:50 am
Good catch, Randy. Like I said life imitating Hollywood.
October 13th, 2010 at 9:54 am
Marc, as an African American with Nigerian fiancee, I can tell you that Africa gets even worse coverage. In the mind of most Americans (and Westerners in general), Africa is a giant land mass of AIDS, faminine, warlords and gazelles — and little else.
And don’t get me started on Haiti. Frankly, I’m sick of seeing rich Westerners (Wyclef’s dumb ass included) flying off to Port-Du-Prince to save the people. Even lefty standard bearers like your ‘old pal’, Amy Goodman, still cover Haiti as a country of illiterate former slaves waiting for some white man to save them. Yes, Haiti has problems (many we caused) but there’s more to Haiti than poverty and mudslides.
Its sad, but as a member of the Diaspora with connections to the global south – I can honestly say that its not shocking at all the coverage of Chile. Pathetic, but not shocking.
October 13th, 2010 at 10:15 am
UPDATE 12:45 p.m. April 16
U.S. Senate Passes Upper Big Branch Resolution
Members of the U.S. Senate Thursday evening unanimously approved a resolution honoring the 29 miners who were killed in an April 5 explosion at the Upper Big Branch Mine in Raleigh County, according to a news release from Sen. Robert C. Byrd and Jay Rockefeller, both D-W.Va.
———————————————————
After 9 years:
First Read – Despite GOP opposition, 9/11 health bill passes
Sep 29, 2010 … The House has approved a bill to give up to $7.4 billion to workers … The bill would provide free health care and compensation to
I am sure many of those who passed the resolution got fat off contributions by the very special interests they served to make sure they would not be accountable…
October 13th, 2010 at 10:38 am
Precedent for the 24/7 video coverage, Marc:
http://tinyurl.com/29kamde
October 13th, 2010 at 10:44 am
Oh, damn, and then I read Whopper’s post. I retire to the sidelines.
October 13th, 2010 at 11:43 am
“life imitating Hollywood”
Except Wilder was writing/directiing his take on the Kathy Fiscus rescue-carnival, as well as the failed atempt to rescue Floyd Collins back in the ’20s, which also drew large crowds, along with print and early radio reporrters. That one’s in my Wilder “top 4″ – great, underrated film.
October 13th, 2010 at 12:17 pm
Not to forget:
Six Months After Upper Big Branch, Republicans Still Obstructing Progress
Posted on October 5, 2010 by dsalaborblogmoderator
by Jake Blumgart and Peter Dreier
Six months ago, on April 5th, 29 miners were killed by an immense explosion at the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia. They didn’t have to die. Mine owners, government officials, and union safety experts have known how to prevent such explosions for decades. Some operators take the necessary steps to prevent such occurrences, but others are willing to put short-term profits above worker safety.
Massey Energy Company, owner of the doomed mine, falls into the latter category. In fact, the company has one of the worst safety records in the nation. In 2009, the Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) tried to fine Massey $12.9 million, but the company appealed a stunning 75 percent of the violations, putting off payment indefinitely. Upper Big Branch alone was cited over 3,000 times since 1995, and received 53 new safety violations in March, including specific citation of the mine’s ventilation system, meant to disperse potentially explosive methane gas. Frequent inspections did little to hinder the operator’s unscrupulous practices, partly because the non-union workers feared retaliation if they expressed their concerns to inspectors.
Meanwhile, Massey’s CEO, Don Blankenship, insists that the industry is capable of regulating itself. “Washington and state politicians have no idea how to improve miner safety,” Blankenship declared at a 2009 anti-union rally. “The very idea that they care more about coal miner safety than we do is as silly as global warming.” Since April, two more miners have died at Massey sites.
Massey isn’t the only bad actor on the American scene. In a worldwide worker safety survey of 39 companies, provided by financial risk analysts at the RiskMetrics Group, Massey, Patriot Coal, Peabody and CONSOL all received a “CCC” rating, the worst possible outcome. No other surveyed company received such a low rating. This is partly accounted for by the fact that Appalachia’s underground mining is riskier than the machine-dominated surface mining in the Western states. Even so, there is no excuse for the industry’s sporadically inflated death toll in recent years. 44 miners have died so far this year, nearly matching 2006?s grim high of 47.
According to Blankenship, the problem is government overreach, not company negligence. “The feeling of the industry is that we’re regulated too much and not too little,” Blankenship told Bloomberg T.V.’s Margaret Brennan in July, a day after the Robert C. Byrd Mine Safety Act passed the House Labor and Education Committee on a party line vote. In August, the West Virginia Coal Association’s senior vice president, Chris Hamilton, indiscriminately blasted all government regulation in a pro-mountain top removal press release. “We plan to…call on lawmakers and administration officials to discontinue efforts to regulate the coal industry–and the hundreds of thousands of jobs it provides–out of business.”
These hang-wringing comments echo the views that the industry and its allies have espoused for decades. . “Rigid, inflexible, thoughtless regulation…can have a plainly detrimental effect on achieving a safe, efficient, and productive coal industry,” Ralph Bailey, chairman of the Consolidation Coal Company, protested during the 1977 hearings to update the Coal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1969–the first meaningful piece of safety legislation. “It’s the overregulation and enforcement of the Act as an end in itself that has caused the coal industry most of its problems…”
Lawmakers ignored Bailey’s false warnings and passed the Federal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977. During the 1980s and 1990s, the industry prospered and productivity increased.
Contrary to the contentions of Blankenship and his cohorts, Congress’ fresh attempts to reform mine safety laws aren’t anymore likely to disrupt the coal industry than the 1977 act did. And the laws badly need updating. The safety laws were last amended in 2006, in the wake of the Sago, West Virginia mine disaster, where 12 miners died in an explosion. The resultant MINER Act was almost purely reactive–providing for more oxygen reserves, fast response rescue teams–basically strengthening safety measures for workers after a disaster took place but establishing few preventive standards. Many experts agreed that stronger, preventative legislation was needed, but when Rep. George Miller (D-CA) tried in 2008, President Bush threatened to veto the legislation. The bill died in the Senate.
The Upper Big Branch tragedy renewed Congressional interest in mine safety In response, Democratic lawmakers, led by Rep. Miller and Sen.Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), crafted the Byrd Act. The Act greatly expands whistleblower protections, granting all miners the “express right” to refuse to work in unsafe conditions and ensuring that miners receive full pay if their section of the mine is closed for safety reasons. To ensure government accountability in the event of an accident involving the death of three or more workers, the act mandates a panel of independent experts to review the actions of the operator and MSHA. Among many other much needed reforms, the act would give MSHA investigators subpoena power, update the agency’s underused “pattern of violations” authority, and increase both criminal and civil penalties while requiring operators to pay their fines within 180 days, on pain of a shut down.
In an attempt to justify their opposition to the Byrd Act, business lobbies have latched onto one addendum to the bill, which expands some of the legislation’s provisions to all private workplaces. (Proposed alterations include increased whistleblower rights and heightened criminal penalties.) Business groups, including the Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers, have fiercely denounced this aspect of the Byrd Act. “The proposed changes will impose substantial costs on businesses–particularly small businesses–which are struggling to create and retain jobs,” reads a list of objections issued by industry front-group Coalition for Workplace Safety.
The Republicans have gleefully taken up this excuse. Before voting against the House Labor Committee’s version of the bill, ranking Republican John Kline (R-MN) complained: “[The Act will] drive up costs and litigation for employers, all of which — all of which would make it more difficult to create jobs at a time when our economy needs them the most.” On September 28, Sen. Rockefeller (D-WV) tried to bring the Miner Safety and Health Act to the floor for a vote, a move that requires unanimous consent from the Senate. Wyoming Republican Sen. Mike Enzi (R-WY) objected, accusing the Democrats of using the bill for partisan gain, and prevented the vote. (Wyoming produces around 40 percent of the nation’s coal, and Enzi’s largest donor for the years 2005-2010 is Foundation Coal, one of the largest operators in the country.)
In fact, numerous studies document that safety regulations don’t result in the job killing apocalypse that business groups and their political allies always predict. A 2004 study commissioned by the Public Citizen Foundation shows that the cost of compliance with every environmental, safety, and health regulation studied have “never [risen] to the levels estimated by private sector industry”. A 2005 report by OMB Watch lists numerous regulations, many concerning worker safety: industry objected to every one with dire predictions of job loss, skyrocketing costs, and business failure. In every case, their predictions were proven wrong.
All the rhetoric and excuses from Massey, the business lobbies, and Congressional Republicans are part of the game plan: Delay until November. The Byrd Act’s chances look bleak if the Republicans win a majority in one or both chambers in November. Rockefeller told The Hill last week that the bill “has less of a chance [in 2011 because] there’s going to be even more of the ideology factor plus the party discipline factor.” If the bill survives, it is likely to be substantially weaker than the current iteration.
But activists aren’t giving up the fight. “I don’t think it’s dead, and let’s not forget what might happen in a session after Election Day,” said Phil Smith, director of communications for the United Mine Workers, referring to the lame duck session after an election but before the next Congress opens.
If the Republicans and their industry allies are successful in sinking the Byrd Act, another option for reform won’t present itself again soon, or at least until the next mine explodes.
Jake Blumgart is a researcher with the San Diego-based Center on Policy Initiatives’ Cry Wolf Project funded by the Ford Foundation and the Public Welfare Foundation. Peter Dreier teaches politics and chairs the Urban & Environmental Policy program at Occidental College, and co-coordinates the “Cry Wolf Project,” a foundation-funded research project to examine the accuracy of warnings about the impact of liberal and progressive policies. This article originally appeared on Huffington Post and is reprinted here with the authors’ permission.
October 13th, 2010 at 6:42 pm
Michael Moore just raised the spectre of safety issues in mines and the above disaster– Larry King says yeah but its a risky business! Disgusting.
I wonder if MSNBC, while covering the mine rescue, had on talking heads talking about the culpability of industry that refuses to comply with safety standards.
Even Pinera in his speech after the last miner was brought out copped to the need to have more respect for the worker and reform needed to be made in all industries.
We shall see…
October 13th, 2010 at 7:53 pm
Where the Sun Never Shines…
Christmas 1997 we spent the holiday at my father-in-law’s farm in Araçuaí, Minas Gerais, Brazil. the day after Christmas, my brother-in-law invited several of us to visit a friend of his who managed a lithium mine. We took a a……
October 13th, 2010 at 8:44 pm
Pinera asks the last rescuer pulled out what his thoughts were as he left. He boldly states that this never happens again and things will be done right. Pinera states again the new protections for ALL workers will be put in place.
Now that was a pretty fucking heavy exchange said in front of a gazillion people.
October 13th, 2010 at 8:47 pm
Oh lord A Cooper and a US miner commenting on this and actually saying better protections are in place in the US and other countries. What fucking hooey!
October 14th, 2010 at 1:01 am
Can we send our politicans to Chile, they can be used to fill the hole used to rescue the miners. This will us all to join in the jubilation.
October 14th, 2010 at 6:56 am
Commentary by Ariel Dorfman:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/oct/13/chile-miners-rescue-ariel-dorfman?intcmp=239
Makes the bold exchange by the last rescuer out of the hole even more significant.
October 15th, 2010 at 6:35 am
For 5000 years, underground mining has been one of the most dangerous jobs one can imagine (except perhaps standing between reg and his computer). Seriously, it is a job that I could not do. When a coal company, or other mine owner doesn’t put safety at the very top of their job lists and a miner gets hurt, the powers that be should slam them with prison sentences that pass all others.
As a state/country we have failed the many miners killed because of shoddy safety practices. When I see miners rescued, I rejoice as I am saddened when they aren’t. But either way, I am furious at the companies that have a history of “violations” (a euphemism for murder when it results in miners deaths) and have been allowed to skate by the agency supposed to protect those miners.
1 rule, no mining until a safety is resolved. Period!
October 15th, 2010 at 6:36 am
correction: 1 rule, no mining until a safety issue is resolved.
October 15th, 2010 at 6:19 pm
Ah, Roper strikes a blow for humankind.
What a fucking hypocrite…