Making “up” the news

Making “up” the news 

Although the subject of my blog One Truth Be Told is focused on the collective assurance that the U.S. Army communicates effectively and truthfully to the American public, significant events in other government sectors, in this case FEMA, are worth examining less my Army falls subject to the same egregious errors in judgment.  An important lesson should be learned from FEMA’s latest folly.  “Those who don’t know history are destined to repeat it,” (Edmund Burke, 18^th century political theorist and philosopher)

            In today’s global information environment (GIE) featuring instant and disposable news, October’s FEMA faux-pas has already been relegated to ‘history’ even before the true facts of this travesty have come to light.  FEMA is counting on the public’s inability to retain an issue in their frontal lobe so they can quietly let this event slip below the surface of the public’s consciousness.

            In case you missed it or has already faded from short term memory, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, ravenous to capitalize on their reasonably competent response to the California wild fires, called a press conference Oct. 23 to tout their improvements over their debacle of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.  Only problem was, no media attended the press conference.  No media, no problem.  FEMA Deputy Administrator Harvey Johnson kicked off the press conference on time and FEMA staffers role-played journalists asking Harvey questions during the Q&A.  This ruse duped both the media industry and the American public for the better part of 48 hours until reporters and news agencies started asking each other, if we didn’t make it to the press conference on time, who did?  

 

                                                          FEMA Cast of Characters

You will always get caught

Journalists are appropriately likened to pack animals.  So long as everyone gets access to a story, the “pack” retains its social order, but no one likes to be left out.  After the FEMA press conference was aired by several TV news outlets and print articles were published by reporters only allowed to listen in on a one-way phone line, the “pack” jealously began asking around to find out just who was deft enough to make it to the press conference in person.  By Oct. 25 it was apparent that nobody had actually attended the press conference and the news reports published by the media had actually been spoon fed, one way messaging by FEMA staff.  When a foreign government issues one sided, government controlled messages, it’s most often categorized as propaganda.  Hmmm.   Once FEMA was ‘outed’ by the press,  the excuses began flooding the air waves, all of which were caveat with ‘there was no intention to deceive the public’.  Unacceptable!  Deception permeated the press conference itself and continued through the failure to correct the media’s misperception of the news coverage until FEMA got caught.

            Although the dissection of this train wreck has not yet been (and may never be) released, the explanations of what went wrong are so amateurish that I simply cannot fathom all those FEMA public affairs staffers involved didn’t see the error of their ways in time to stop it.

            The media advisory was emailed or posted only 17 minutes before the press conference was to begin.  This short notice announcement made it virtually impossible for reporters to get to FEMA headquarters before the start of the press conference.    

 

Please pardon my ignorance

Excuse:  John Philbin, Director of External Affairs and in charge of the press conference said he “thought” the advisory had gone out early enough.  You were in the room John!  It was obvious no reporters were present and the reporters’ seats were filled with your own public affairs staff!

Excuse:  “I should have cancelled it quickly. I did not have good situational awareness of what was happening,” Philbin said.  John, it doesn’t matter if you walked in at the last minute.  Your staff was there during the set up and knew no reporters were present.  FEMA Press Secretary Aaron Walker went through the ground rules and introduced Johnson following the standard script to reporters preceding the start of a press conference when he knew the only people in attendance were FEMA staff.

Excuse:  Deputy Johnson didn’t realize he was addressing staffers and not reporters according to Philbin.  Johnson called on at least one staff member by name and seemed to acknowledge knowing several others.  Philbin himself asked a “reporter” question off camera that Johnson responded to. 

 

Excuse? “No Excuse”!

Doesn’t matter how FEMA got to the fork in the road, the decision to take the path they did and perpetrate a phony press conference and pass it off as legitimate is plainly un-American.  There were several other courses they could have taken. 

Delay the start until news media could arrive.

Disclose to the live camera feed and those journalists that were allowed to listen, but not ask questions on an open phone line, that since no journalists were present, Deputy Johnson would give a brief statement but take questions

Cancel thing entirely because the public affairs staff screwed up the planning. 

Any of these courses could have been taken to make thing right, but weren’t.  Somebody in that room knew what was about to happen before it happened and they didn’t stop it.  No excuse!  FEMA staff clearly misrepresented themselves as reporters by sitting in those chairs (PA Staff never sit with journalists, they hover in the back) and participating in Q&A like a reporter.  By allowing the news industry to carry and subsequently report on the press conference without disclosing that staffers stood in for journalists, they perpetrated and extended the lie until they were discovered. 

There is no place in American society for any government agency to knowingly lie to the media or falsify an event with the intention or knowledge that those events will be falsely published by the media.  Unfortunately, truth be told, our armed forces have been party to similar conduct. 

           Marine lieutenant Lyle Gilbert appeared on CNN Oct. 14, 2004 to discuss “significant”  combat operations in Fallujah, Iraq, which were reported by CNN and other news outlets, as the beginning of the long awaited major offensive to take back the city from insurgents.  The media soon accused the military of duping them in serving as a surrogate to a physiological operation since the real offensive would not start for another three weeks.  Gilbert and the Marine Corps have since contended that they were in fact announcing a smaller operation as a precursor to the offensive on Fallujah, but remained vague on specifics sighting operational security.   Was it a ruse or merely an unfortunate, unintended consequence that for several news cycles the media falsely reported a major operation not only to a friendly audience, but to the enemy as well?  Regardless of the intent, the result was erroneous reporting of tactical benefit to the military by deceiving the enemy.   

I don’t fault Lt. Gilbert, although an 18 year enlisted veteran of the Marine Corps, his junior rank left him susceptible to potential corruption by senior leadership.  To his command, Gilbert could be perceived as expendable pawn.  The fall guy if things didn’t work out.  I have not met Lt. Gilbert, but these events are used as a case study here at the Defense Information School, where military Public Affairs Officers are trained.  He has addressed the case study and has always contended that the media’s perception of a major attack on Fallujah was unintentional.  I take the man for his word.  I believe he did not knowingly participate in a deception campaign, however if the command did hope to use the media to push the enemy into a reaction, I do fault the officer(s) who would concoct such a truly un-American scheme.  Gilbert now serves the Marine Corps in a recruiting command.  His 18 year career as a PAO, over.  If there was truly an intent to deceive the media, the real perpetrators are likely enjoying promotion and upward mobility.  One could be a future Commandant of the Marine Corps or Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.  The thought should make George Washington tremble in the grave.

The take-away is that FEMA’s latest debacle was intolerable, but unfortunately not an isolated incident.  The responsibility of a government to be truthful and accountable to its public cannot be sidelined for convenience or expediency.  Pressures to sway public opinion for short term goals threaten to erode the foundation of trust and confidence a people have in their leadership.  Those of us in uniform must recognize the missteps of others and refuse the temptation to repeat them.  Truth be told, it all boils down to one simple conviction, “do the right thing.”