Journalistic Ethics
January 26, 2005 7:34 AM   Subscribe

"If a scholar or expert gets paid to do some work for the government, should he or she disclose that if he writes a paper, essay or op-ed on the same or similar subject? If this is the ethical standard, it is an entirely new standard." So says syndicated columnist Maggie Gallagher, defending against revelations and accusations by Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post (warning: reg required) that she neglected to disclose that she was paid by the Administration for Children and Families Home Page (part of the Department of Health and Human Services) for consulting work inteded to promote the Administration's "pro-marriage" policies in 2002. Gallagher took a pro-Administration stance repeatedly in her column that same year. Gallagher ultimately cops out with, "I should have disclosed a government contract when I later wrote about the Bush marriage initiative. I would have, if I had remembered it." After Armstrong Willaims got caught with his pants down, is "honesty" old and busted, and "I don't remember" the new hotness? (via tp)
posted by mkultra (40 comments total)
 
Josh Marshall has a good point on TPM:

Were they really worried that Gallagher would come out for free love without the cash incentive? Neither she nor Williams is really known for their independent streak. In Gallagher's case -- and to some degree in Williams' too -- this seems less like a matter of payola than a Bush administration make-work program for third-tier GOP pundits.
posted by allan at 7:38 AM on January 26, 2005


Surely you jest. We all know that Republicans are the party of moral values!
posted by bardic at 7:43 AM on January 26, 2005


Government Shill----Take 2..
posted by Balisong at 7:49 AM on January 26, 2005


"If this is the ethical standard, it is an entirely new standard.

it all depends on what is is eh maggie?
posted by three blind mice at 7:52 AM on January 26, 2005


She's defending herself. Incredible.

That's the thing about these Bushites. They're not content to slink around under various rocks, doing things that a reasonably bright 16-year-old would know viscerally are icky. They then have to get on their soapboxes and fulminate about how they're "protecting marriage" or "spreading freedom" or proudly living up to some ethical standard, all the while pointing moralizing fingers.

They're like the alcoholic father who abuses his kids and then complains that their crying is so annoying, it drives him to drink.
posted by digaman at 7:59 AM on January 26, 2005


Maggie Gallagher is easily my least favorite columnist. Couldn't have happened to a nicer person. I hope people come down HARD on her for this. "oh, oops, I forgot to tell my readers I was a shill. I shouldn't have to apologize sincerely, even, though."
posted by u.n. owen at 8:01 AM on January 26, 2005


is "honesty" old and busted, and "I don't remember" the new hotness?

I don't recall.
posted by shawnj at 8:08 AM on January 26, 2005


Has been at least since Regan. It was his defense
posted by edgeways at 8:11 AM on January 26, 2005


make-work program for third-tier GOP pundits.

It's Pundit-fare! Personally, I'm tired of seeing these people get checks from the Government, then blowing it on Grey Goose vodka.
posted by octobersurprise at 8:12 AM on January 26, 2005


Let's get RIGHT to the point here. In her columns, Maggie Gallagher is not some bland "marriage expert" reasonably suggesting that married people are happier than non-married people. She was one of the loudest and most strident voices preaching against gay marriage and gay civil unions, and framing that issue just as Bush, Rove and Company wanted it framed for maximum Republican gain at the polls -- as a threat to the institution of marriage and to the safety of children:

All of the time-honored assumptions of marriage -- bride and groom, husband and wife, mother and father -- must be rewritten to accommodate a tiny fraction of the population who wants to form alternative families. When I suggested in a recent exchange with gay civil rights advocate Evan Wolfson that marriage was about affirming the ideal that both mothers and fathers matter to children, he denounced the idea as an "offensive proposition."

People who believe they are on the civil rights crusade of the century have little tolerance for reasoned debate; they show little concern over the larger impact that radically redefining marriage could have on the next generation, directly and indirectly. "How could this affect you and your family?" a Human Rights Campaign spokesman practically screamed at me on ABC's "Nightline," as I began to explain how marriage will change if we let this happen. But that's just the point. Sometimes, someone has to stand up for the common good.


----

"When the sexual desires of adults clash with the interests of children, which carries more weight, socially and legally?"

----

"Just a year after a successful drive to pass a state constitutional amendment defining marriage as a union of a man and a woman, the California legislature adopted a comprehensive civil unions package that apes marriage statutes, right down to calling the relationship between the partners spousal. Many who fought hard to defend the age-old definition of marriage in California feel cheated and betrayed."
posted by digaman at 8:16 AM on January 26, 2005


IOKIYAR.

Slurping at the public trough while denouncing big government.
Government out of the boardroom and into the bedroom is all goodness for the corporatist whores.

And quit calling these idiots "conservatives" as it gives real conservatives a bad name.

Don't forget your latest White House talking point while we're here:
Its no longer "private accounts" but "personal accounts."
Get in line all you media whores and repeat it after me!

Heh. Some folks make even FAUX News look respectable.
posted by nofundy at 8:24 AM on January 26, 2005


Her defense -- like Williams's -- is laughable, but its moreso on the basis of simple credibility than on any ill-defined code of journalistic ethics. We don't need some sort of special understanding of what a journalist's ethical obligations are to recognize the fundamental deceit here. If a food writer in a magazine lavished praise on a restaurant, and then it was revealed that she was paid by that restaurant, would anyone believe her reviews again? (I'm not saying that "journalistic ethics" don't or shouldn't exist -- just that it's silly to argue that you'd need them to be articulated in order to parse a basic issue of honesty.)

But I'm unsurprised by the perfidy of any given hack pundit: the real issue is the extent to which public money is going to subsidize the careers of junior-league GOP shills (a la Marshall's on-point observation). Doesn't the RNC have plenty of money with which to do that?

On preview -- thanks for the links, digaman.
posted by BT at 8:24 AM on January 26, 2005


I blame the liberal media elite.

If there was a scandal in the '80s over a $19,000 hammer, then there damn well should be a scandal over a $21,000 newspaper column.
posted by Arch Stanton at 8:24 AM on January 26, 2005


and "I don't remember" the new hotness?

Worked for Ollie North.
posted by rushmc at 8:24 AM on January 26, 2005


By republican standards, infertile heteros shouldn't be able to marry either, since it's only about having children.
posted by Devils Rancher at 8:27 AM on January 26, 2005


What I want to know is how is this legal? Under what law or stricture is any section of the government allowed to pay for publicity? My guess is that this is an unpleasant extension of the same powers that allow for Social Security television ads, Smokey the Bear spots, and so on.
posted by Vaska at 8:30 AM on January 26, 2005


Vaska- they're not explicitly paying for publicity. Her consulting services occured outside her duties as a journalist. To me, that's almost more troubling than the conflict of interest- that our government is paying for the "expert opinion" of a yes-(wo)man.
posted by mkultra at 8:44 AM on January 26, 2005


Ask the CIA or Richard Clarke about that one.
posted by digaman at 8:45 AM on January 26, 2005


The new hotness is not "I don't remember" -- the new hotness seems to be more "Yeah, I did it. What are you going to do about it, you pathetic liberal?"
posted by adamrice at 9:09 AM on January 26, 2005


Mkultra - So she took government money to write a report, then wrote a column later extolling the virtues of a policy she basically propped up in her column. Lovely. If she references her report at all, she should be required by law to reveal all the funders of it.
posted by Vaska at 9:11 AM on January 26, 2005


I just sent her a nice email of support.
posted by bardic at 9:14 AM on January 26, 2005


At the risk of conflating correlation with causation myself, I would say that it is oddly appropriate that the two initiatives that the Bush Administration paid pundits to shill for (that we know of) are both built on foundations of fallacious Cum Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc reasoning.

"No Child Left Behind" sees children in private schools achieving more than those in public schools and turns this correlation in to causation. The "Healthy Marriage Initiative" sees children in two parent households as achieving more than those in single parent and turns this correlation into causation.
posted by Cassford at 9:18 AM on January 26, 2005


Maggie Gallagher is easily my least favorite columnist.

Please don't forget Ann Coulter. I dislike Maggie Gallagher as much as anyone, but, IMHO, Coulter is definitely the worst columnist.
posted by Penks at 9:24 AM on January 26, 2005


Has been at least since Regan. It was his defense

What does the former Secretary of the Treasury under Ronald Reagan have to do with this? ;)
posted by eriko at 9:24 AM on January 26, 2005


Vaska, I'm not disagreeing with you in principle, but are you saying that there is a current law she's breaking? If so, what is it? If you're advocating that it should be a law, I'm not so sure I even agree with that. She ought to disclose out of a sense of journalistic ethics, but I don't necessarily think that the government ought to be legislating the behavior of journalists.
posted by mkultra at 9:25 AM on January 26, 2005


Please don't forget Ann Coulter. I dislike Maggie Gallagher as much as anyone, but, IMHO, Coulter is definitely the worst columnist.

Or Michael Savage. Yeah, as annoying as Gallagher is, she's sadly not the lowest rung of that ladder.
posted by mkultra at 9:26 AM on January 26, 2005


Great point, Cassford.

I don't necessarily think that the government ought to be legislating the behavior of journalists.

"Necessarily?" The fact that this thought comes to you as a kind of revelation does not speak well for the current state of the Union.
posted by digaman at 9:30 AM on January 26, 2005


Maggie Gallagher is worse because people take her seriously - sometimes even people who aren't way far to the right. If you're listening to the shrillness of Michael Savage or Ann Coulter, you're already gone. Maggie Gallagher, though, sometimes gets the moderates, which makes her more dangerous and bad.
posted by u.n. owen at 9:43 AM on January 26, 2005


If a scholar or expert gets paid to do some work for the government, should he or she disclose that if he writes a paper, essay or op-ed on the same or similar subject?

Actually, it's been the standard in scholarly writing to reference your funders (both for disclosure and for grateful acknowledgement) for a long, long time. Heck, I worked on a non-peer-reviewed poster presentation on a proposed research project, and we included a reference to our funding. (emphasis meant to indicate how incredibly low on the totem of scholarly publishing this was, and yet we still referenced our funders)

So why does she mention scholars? Is to give herself more credibility as an "expert"? Or is it a way of discrediting scholarly writing without seeming to, by aligning it with media punditry?
posted by carmen at 9:47 AM on January 26, 2005


The Terrororists Hate Our Freedom, Part II: The United States, in an effort to appease the terrorists, continues the march toward fascism with government sponsored propoganda.


Seriously, I'm looking forward to the FOIA requests outing more and more partisan hacks for what they are. This doesn't vindicate Dan Rather, but it certainly gives his overtly republican critics a big warm mug of shut the fuck up.
posted by mullingitover at 9:53 AM on January 26, 2005


this thought comes to you as a kind of revelation

Uh, it doesn't, but thanks for the unwarranted dig anyway, dig. Jeez...
posted by mkultra at 9:53 AM on January 26, 2005


After reading the Teachout debacle and how strenuously the GOP tried to spin that into the same level of misdeed as Bush paying Armstrong Williams out of the public funds to push his shitty agenda, I've gotta say, anyone taking money to propel any standpoint should be upfront about it.

Anything else is deciet by omission.

Part of the reason I don't go to Fark anymore is because they were seeding paid advertising into the regular links without noting it. Sorry but that's unacceptable behaviour to me.

Anyone claiming to have any ethical code of conduct should note their affiliations. Anyone not doing so is either intentionally or unintentionally misleading readers and, as such, is unworthy of attention.

Re: Ann Coulter as the worst journalist. She hasn't been a journalist in years, she's a shrill mouthpiece of the GOP. She has absolutely no integrity or credibility and anyone who actually listens to her for "news" is kidding themselves.
posted by fenriq at 9:58 AM on January 26, 2005


Sorry, MKULTRA. Reading a bunch of Gallagher's columns put me on edge.
posted by digaman at 10:00 AM on January 26, 2005


Yeah, but when she smashes the watermelon, it's HILARIOUS!
posted by mkultra at 10:12 AM on January 26, 2005


Mkulta - I know of no law currently that forces a columnist to list contributes, but I think it would be a good idea. It's like when CNN discusses business movements by TimeWarner, and have to say 'CNN is a subsidiary of TimeWarner'. It is at the very least disingenuous to quote numbers and stats in your column which come from a study that was government funded that you worked in.

Columnists seem to get the best of both worlds in that they claim to be either journalists or columnists whenever the law comes around to question them. We cannot allow journalists to be funded by corporations or the government, as that undermines a free press. Personally I think columnists are useless at best, but if papers carry them there should be a full disclosure if they talk on a subject they're involved in. I.e. a column by Bob Smith extolling nuclear power should explain that Bob works for a nuclear waste facility.
posted by Vaska at 11:16 AM on January 26, 2005


but are you saying that there is a current law she's breaking? If so, what is it?

According to the Government Accountability Office, it is standard for the annual appropriations bill to say:

"No part of any appropriation contained in this or any other Act shall be used for publicity or propaganda purposes within the United States not heretofore authorized by the Congress."

So, you can make your own call if that applies in this case, but it seems to me to pretty clearly apply to the Armstrong Williams case and the fake video news releases which are the subject of the GAO link above (and in fact that is the conclusion reached by the GAO in that case).

Of course, it is the government that has broken this law, not Gallagher/Williams/etc.
posted by jlub at 11:47 AM on January 26, 2005




"We didn't know about this in the White House," said the President, from the article linked above.

They didn't know about the WMDs.
They didn't know about the torture at Abu Ghraib.
Now they didn't know about this.

Wow, I wish I was the President -- life would be so full of surprises.
posted by digaman at 1:01 PM on January 26, 2005


Via Joey Michael's link:

"Our agenda ought to be able to stand on its own two feet." - GWB

Sadly, it often can't, and therein lies the rub...
posted by mkultra at 2:13 PM on January 26, 2005


The syndicate better drop her, or else they're condoning this. (or are they protecting bigger fish?--Novak maybe?)
posted by amberglow at 4:13 PM on January 26, 2005


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