What This Country Does Best

So the bloated, murderous US military juggernaut celebrates war-making with a college basketball game on board the aircraft carrier, USS Vinson.  Does NPR offer any counter-narrative to this worship of militarism?  Not at all, on Weekend Edition Saturday, NPR's Tom Goldman explains that

"Oh yeah. The college basketball season - last night in Coronado, California, it was a great grand confluence of sports and patriotism, what this country does best. North Carolina played Michigan State on Veteran's Day on the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson, the ship from which Osama bin Laden was buried at sea. President Obama sat courtside. The players had USA on the backs of their jerseys instead of their names. It was indeed a spectacle." 

Ooh rah!

[correction] I initially mistook "indeed a spectacle" Tom Goldman for NPR drone Tom Bowman.

NPR Pitches a Shut Out

The day after Brazil's Presidential election I got an email from a fellow NPR critic in Wisconsin who noted:

"My, my! Yesterday, Brazil just elected its first female president with 56% of the votes and nary a word about it on National Public Radio... nor any mention of it on Wisconsin Public Radio.

Brazil is not Palau: it is larger than the continental United States and is the 8th largest economy on earth.

Nothing on News on the Hour. Nothing on Morning Edition.

Well done, Skippy!"

Ok, I thought - surely NPR is just a working on a more in-depth story on the Brazil election. As the AP reportage on the election points out, not only is Brazil the 8th largest economy, it's predicted to be the 5th largest economy by 2016. But here it is Tuesday evening and - guess what? - NPR has done nothing - ZILCH - on air regarding the Brazilian election. Compare this to the coverage the World Series has garnered on NPR. What gives?

I'm not here to trash sports, I watched the World Series and enjoyed the pitching dominance of the Giants. And speaking of pitching, there was definitely news to cover: Game 3 featured a war criminal, admitted felon and torturer throwing out the ceremonial first pitch - oops, never heard that on NPR. Hmmm, maybe NPR's discomfort with naming torture torture, might explain its shutout of Brazil's presidential election. After all, Brazil's president elect Rousseff was a victim of the US-backed torture regime that ruled Brazil in the 1960s and 1970s. One can see that for NPR it might be hard to talk about Rousseff without mentioning the fact that torture ( I mean enhanced interrogation ) and its export from the US to South America has a long tradition.

NPR's blackout on the seamy role of US foreign policy and global predatory capitalism in South America may also explain why the death of Nestor Kirchner of Argentina also merited such in-depth coverage.

Yanked - Fatsis Hits One Out of the Park

If you haven't yet heard, Yankee Stadium will be gone after this week, and a new Yankee Stadium will take its place next week. On Friday's ATC NPR's favorite sports yakker Stefan Fatsis, who NPR again and again reminds us has "written on sports and the business of sports for the Wall Street Journal." With a pedigree like that you can guess that there was nothing at all about the scam of taxpayers forking out hundreds of millions so that sports franchises can get rich, and nothing about the likely fraud involved in this particular sports stadium ripoff. No all Fatsis can do is salivate over it's opulence:

"...you get to the actual new stadium, which is going to be just a monument to modern sports capitalism. It should be a money printing machine if Wall Street and the riches of New York don't totally vanish in the next few months. And it should make the Yankees an even greater economic power in baseball than they currently are. Luxury suites selling for up to 800,000 dollars a season."

Yeah, a money printing machine. That is rich.

Deuce's Last Dance

If you are one of the white boys who dressed up as the fan-beloved mock-Indian, NPR wants to talk to you! As they did a few days ago, this morning, in one of the hourly news round-ups, NPR completely ignored the anti-racist activists who have been fighting for the removal of the UI mascot and against the stereotyping of Indians at the UI for years and instead covered the "chief" controversy at the UI by talking to the white boy who dresses up as "Chief Illiniwek." Last night was the last official dance of this faux-Indian mascot, and all NPR can do is talk to the white boy who was known as "Deuce" and "Ass" before he became the latest "dramatic and dignified" mascot performer for the UI.

Mocking Native Americans

I live in Champaign-Urbana. Home of the University of Illinois. Today the University took the pathetic, small step of announcing the end to public performances at athletic halftime events of a white boy dressed up as an Indian doing clownish pretend Indian dance. NPR was all over this one (They have a thing about Indian mascots--see previous post).

Instead of covering the long struggle against this mock-Indian vaudeville halftime show, NPR decided to interview one of the former white guys who was dressed up as the mascot, "chief illiniwek." That's the only person they spoke to! And then they ended the story with the equally offensive Illinois marching band let's-play-Indian song.

It's sad that they didn't see fit to call up the brave Charlene Teters, one of the first organizers against the University mascot. They also might have taken a look at the American Indian Movement website against mascots. I'd recommend that Michelle Norris and the producers of the show take a look at the Tolerance.org site on Native American mascots.

Lastly, if you can stand it and want to see what the mascot looks like this is a site of photos.

Close to Home

On yesterday's ATC Robert Siegel had a "cheery" story about the use of Indian names and mascots for colleges and universities. McMurray University of Abeliene, Texas faced sanctions from the NCAA, lost an appeal to keep the name "Indians," and so decided to opt for no nickname at all. Siegel described McMurray as "not so lucky" compared to schools like Florida State University who won their appeals. He also smartly informs us that "the Indian spirit is alive and well on campus."

This story hits close to home. Back in the early 90s I took my sons to a women’s basketball game at our local Univeristy (UIUC) and was aghast at the halftime show put on by "Chief Illiniwek" the University's mascot. What I saw was a young barefooted white guy dressed up in mock-chief regalia and war paint who pranced, high-stepped, strutted, and gestured across the basketball court. Then he stopped for a somber "prayerful" pose as the Alma Mater was sung. It was utterly shameless and embarassing.

The "Chief Illiniwek" controversy reveals some deep and distrurbing truths that Siegel’s news-lite doesn’t even approach. He could have called American Indian Charlene Teters to talk about her experience of witnessing the "Chief’s" dance with her children, of organizing to have the "Chief" dropped, and of dealing with hateful reactions of white fans. He might have talked to the Peoria Indians of Oklahoma. He might have talked to the NCAA about why they think Indian mascots create a "hostile" environment (we’ve had evidence of this here lately).

Siegel, broadcasting from the home city of the "Redskins," could have sought out informed commentary on the issue, but instead he opted for the lighthearted and mocking tone that belittles those who find racist mascots troubling.