Spiegel: Attacking the messengers:

[Luminous Animal]

Snowden Backlash: US Media Get Personal
By Marc Pitzke
As the mainstream American press goes after NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, the leakers' revelations are becoming an afterthought.

A recent Post editorial, that may as well have been written by the White House, argued that Snowden's leak harms "efforts to fight terrorism" and "legitimate intelligence operations." The leaks must immediately end, it argued -- a strange conclusion from the grandmother of leak journalism. Columnist Richard Cohen didn't hold back either: Snowden is "narcissistic," Greenwald is "vainglorious."

He wasn't alone. In the New York Times David Brooks accused Snowden of having "betrayed honesty and integrity." Roger Simon, chief political columnist at the website Politico, referred to Snowden as "the slacker who came in from the cold." Jeffrey Toobin, a New Yorker essayist, called him a "narcissist who deserves to be in prison." And Melissa Harris-Perry, from the otherwise progressive cable channel MSNBC, critized Snowden's behavior as "compromising national security."

In The Huffington Post, media critic Jeff Cohen called MSNBC the "official network of the Obama White House" -- a White House which, under president Obama, has famously declared war on whistleblowers.

Guardian's American Triumph

There's another reason for the united media front: The Guardian is becoming a competitive threat for American media outlets. The first Snowden video interview received almost seven million clicks on the newspaper's US website. "They set the US news agenda today," Associated Press star reporter Matt Apuzzo tweeted enviously.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/nsa-spying-scandal-focus-on-edward-snowden-by-us-media-a-911185.html

[hlthe2b]

1. Yup... Regardless of our feelings towards Snowden or Greenwald, we are the problem when we allow

debate on the issue at hand to be lost. Surveillance policy ought to be as strongly debated, regardless of which administration is in office, as whether or not Snowden/Greenwald are "good or bad"....

It seems we've forgotten that the MSM was long ago infiltrated by those tasked with disinformation or at least propaganda. Am I the only one who recalls the revelations that CIA had specifically targeted every major news agency with planted staff in the recent past? That wasn't "rumor", it was confirmed.

That every story I've read in recent weeks focused on these two players in this whole episode and not the wider debate regarding the scope of the program and protections/expectations of privacy, tell me that that this particular agenda has definitely won the day--and nowhere more than on DU.

[marmar]

2. k/r

[temmer]

3. this ist the English version of what I posted here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023260841

Actually, the German headline is much more vitriolic. It says "Fall Snowden und die US-Medien: Gleichschritt der Mitläufer".

I translated the latter half-sentence to "hanger-ons in lockstep", don't know if hanger-on is the best choice for Mitläufer.

[Luminous Animal]

4. Media Continues to Focus on Snowden Rather Than the Information He's Revealed

https://pressfreedomfoundation.org/blog/2013/07/media-continues-focus-snowden-rather-information-hes-revealed

Outside of the US, media coverage seems much more interested in the substance rather than the style. The German press, for example, has focused much its attention on the complicity of German intelligence with the NSA, while in India, the revelations have prompted a broad dialogue about that country’s own spying apparatus. The same goes for Brazil. In Egypt, press have looked at the NSA in the greater context of the police state. The press in these countries doesn’t seem to hinge holding the US government accountable for privacy abuses based on Snowden’s temporary location.

....

Pundits and commentators have instead chosen to focus on Snowden at the expense of the information he exposed, and unfortunately, pundits often drive news in this country as much as, or more than, straight reporting in newspapers. Harris-Perry is far from alone. The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank claims to believe that Snowden was justified in leaking information about the NSA’s spying, but spends more time accusing him of undermining his own cause than he does supporting that cause. The Post’s Jonathan Capehart has spent nearly 2,500 words vilifying Snowden, but next to none on the information that Snowden revealed. This list goes on.

As Kevin Gosztola wrote last week, it is these disingenuous arguments that distract from the real issue. If Harris-Perry, Milbank, or Capehart want to turn the focus from Snowden to the illegal and unconstitutional spying conducted by the NSA, they should use their considerably prominent platforms to do so. No one is stopping them.