Mario Valdes does not want to add Democracy Now to the KRCC line-up because “advocacy journalism has no place at KRCC.” Is Democracy Now really “advocacy journalism?” How does Mario come to that conclusion?

Sort of like saying the Pope wouldn’t make a good arbiter of world peace because, you know, “the Pope’s Catholic.” Think so Sherlock?!

Mario isn’t passing some informed judgment upon Democracy Now. He’s accusing them of “advocacy journalism” but it’s what they proclaim themselves to be! And it’s only half the story! Democracy Now argues that all the US media has become advocacy journalism. What is advocacy journalism? News reported with a bias, reflecting who’s doing the telling. This bias is emphatically denied by corporate media, however blatantly it reveals itself. Corporate media speaks for its sponsors, likewise public radio is beholden to its underwriters. Few stories appear which portray large multinationals, agribusiness or oil companies in a bad light. Perhaps you are under the impression that Monsanto, Archer Daniels and Exxon Mobile are perfectly respectable corporate citizens.

In fact most stories come out of press releases advanced by public relations firms for the release of new products. Is NPR exploring a quaint little harbor in Nova Scotia? Think the tourism board had something to do with setting that up? How about a story about public excitement about the latest X-box game. Who do you think might have put together the sample interviewees? There’s hardly a story that does not have to do with consuming something.

Hard news is similarly guided by government agenda. We call them spin doctors without considering what that means.

There used to be a time when the news was reported and the public was left to decide how to take it. Not anymore. Even news reporters are made to recite the news with emotional expressiveness. It’s an exaggerated expressiveness usually reserved for reading stories aloud to children at the library. Listen to Deutchwelle or the BBC to hear the difference. Europeans do not tolerate being spoken to as if they were children.

So Democracy Now asserts that corporate media is biased. Corporate media ignores issues which might hinder the corporate pursuit of exploiting workers, consumers, and the environment. Maybe rightly so. If a company owns the mouthpiece, its own stockholders could sue it for not maximizing their profit dividends. That scenario has got to change, but until then there is Democracy Now to advocate for the unrepresented interests of everyone who is not a large corporate power.

Is Mario saying he only wants KRCC to speak for Archer Daniels, Dow and Mobil? That’s a little too much advocacy don’t you think?