In recent months, stories have arisen about journalists and mediafolk who have been unmasked as having been on the payroll of government agencies. It was bad enough to be worrying about paid reviewers of products being touted on TV shows as objective individuals, but when we find that the government is involved, too, it’s too much to take.
It’s probably not a new occurrence, this journalist-taking-funds situation. Those who’d like to pin this on the Bush administration solely are missing the big picture - kind of like people who think that the U.S. would never be involved with “undercover” operations on foreign soil, because “We’re not like that.” The fact of the matter is that it is happening, and the third time’s a charm. How deep does this go? How many objective journalists are going to show up with good articles that might speak favorably about government programs and have their work reviewed like they were already guilty, even when they’re not?
The news from USA Today’s Mark Memmott about a freelancer who took almost $10,000 from the Agriculture Department a few years ago and then proceeded to write articles that were published by magazines is just another wake up call. Except in this case, the freelance writer, Dave Smith, says that he “clearly spelled out to [the publications]” what the situation was - but apparently, neither magazine mentioned in any way, shape, or form that this was an article by someone on the federal payroll, freelance or otherwise. So who’s to blame? Not for nothing, the government has enough PR pros who do this kind of thing all day, probably even sending letters to the editor on a regular basis. But there’s a transparency there that isn’t seen here - and the magazines might be the one who bite the bullet, if they really did know the deal.
