During the last week of March, I spent several days at the University of Maryland commiserating with the Organization of News Ombudsmen– my too-few colleagues who write regular columns such as this one on matters of accuracy and fairness in the media.
Note the “ONO” acronym for the group, and you may sense why I say “commiserating” only half in jest. Since we go to bat when readers think something is amiss in our newspapers– and may say the reader’s right — there’s a natural, although healthy tension between us and the paper’s staff. So we appreciate the chance to consult with colleagues who also are always in the middle. And we are too few. Of all the newspapers in the world, only 52 have an ombudsman. Of that number, 34 serve under various titles in the United States and seven in Canada. Others work at papers from Brazil to Israel to Japan.
In future columns, I plan to write more about ONO’s sessions on matters ranging from politics and the press to journalism ethics to minorities in the news to the limits of humor. Among the most interesting and timely speakers this year, however, was one of our own members, Phil Record, who raised serious concerns in his talk on “The Media and the Cult: Update on Waco, Texas.” He questioned the media’s conduct– and timidity– in covering the assault on the Branch Davidians.
Mr. Record, a past president of the national Society of Professional Journalists, was ideally qualified to comment. Not only is he special assistant to the publisher and ombudsman at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, but he’s one of seven members of the society’s task force on the media’s performance in the standoff 90 miles away from him near Waco.
While many people are going to challenge the government’s role in the siege that began Feb. 28, and those investigations will go on for years, he said, “it was about time that some of us looked at the charges and allegations made against the press.” He suggested a task force do that and report to the public and to the profession.
That task force is generating many ethical questions. Have some reporters, for instance, erred in taking part in the Waco negotiations? Has “herd journalism” contributed to the Waco problem? Did the media’s early presence warn the Davidians? Officials of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, Mr. Record said, “have admitted that they tipped off some members of the media the night before the raid to be ready for a big story.”
Also, the day before the raid, the Waco Tribune-Herald (which is owned by Cox Enterprises Inc., parent company of The Palm Beach Post) began publishing a seven-part series on the Davidians that had been held back for weeks. Among the most serious charges– by a wounded federal agent who is suing the paper — is that a reporter from the paper phoned to alert the compound that the feds were coming.
Beside the ethical issues, Mr. Record said, the press in Texas has been too silent about some “bothersome freedom-of-information questions.” Since the search warrant for the Davidian compound is still sealed, “we don’t know what they were going down there after.” The magistrate hearings for the Davidians in custody were closed until a Dallas paper sent a lawyer to town. “The press is really being shut out down there,” he said. “We’re so far back that we really don’t know what’s going on. We’re having to just take government handouts. It really concerns me that what should be the neutral eyes and ears down there have been silenced.”
“This is the first time I’ve kind of turned half-media critic,” Mr. Record told ONO. “I’ve always as the ombudsman confined myself to the Star-Telegram. But nobody else is crying out.” He promised to keep us informed about the task force’s work. I’ll report on that when he does.
