New at CJR: A guide to responsible birther coverage

My new column at CJR is a visually annotated guide for journalists of how to provide responsible birther coverage without reenforcing the myth. Here's how it begins:

In a series of media interviews conducted before a Las Vegas fundraiser with presumptive GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney, Donald Trump singlehandedly put the debunked birther movement back in the news. The resulting coverage is unlikely to change the outcome of the race, but it could help fuel the resurgence of false beliefs about President Obama’s birthplace.

Read the whole thing for more.

Comments

[David in Cal]

Cook and Lewandowsky claim that 31,000 scientists disagree with the scientific consensus on global warming. Actually, there is no direct contradiction between the two positions. C&L say that scientific consensus is:

Humans are causing global warming.

The petition signed by 31,000 scientists says:

We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December, 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind.

There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.

These two statements are not in conflict. Saying that humans are causing global warming does NOT say

-- how much of the warming is caused by humans vs. other causes.
-- how certain one is that humans are causing GW.
-- humans are causing catastrophic GW.
-- Kyoto and other similar agreements are sufficient to protect us from catastrophic GW.
-- Kyoto and other similar agreements are cost-effective programs.
-- GW has no beneficial effects.

In short, even if human beings are causing some GW, the amount caused by humans might not be catastrophic, and, in any event, Kyoto-type programs may be a poor way to deal with GW.

[David in Cal]

I don't agree with Brendan that,

Romney’s unwillingness to disavow Trump has seemingly legitimized further coverage of the birther issue.

Consider two alternative comments relating to false statements by Obama supporters:

1. Obama's unwillingness to disavow "truthers" who claim that the Bush Administration was complicit in the 9/11 attack has seemingly legitimized further coverage of the truther issue.

2. Obama's unwillingness to disavow Al Sharpton's claim that Republicans want to commit genocide against blacks seemingly legitimized further coverage of Sharpton's contention.

IMHO those two alternative comments are ridiculous. Our President has more important things to do than to actively disavow false statements made by his supporters. I think the same is true of Mitt Romney as regards Donald Trump's false birther contentions.

IMHO the media are doing a fine job with the birthers and Sharpton by simply not giving coverage to their nutty comments. I wish they'd do the same with Trump and his nutty birtherism.

[daniel rotter]

Oh, for pete's sake, David, way to miss the point to invent a supposed double standard. Trump isn't just a everyday Romney "supporter." The former HELD A FUNDRAISER for the latter...even AFTER Trump reiterated his birtherism. Is Sharpton, post-"genocide" comments about the GOP, holding a fundraiser for Obama? Can you find one example, I mean literally one example, of someone who held a fundraiser for Obama who was known to be a "truther" prior to the event (Also, why do you automatically view all "truthers" as Obama supporters? There are "truthers" out there, like Alex Jones and Phillip Berg, who are definitely NOT planning to vote for our current POTUS this November)?

[David in Cal]

Yes, daniel, plenty of truthers are not Obama supporters. However, I think the double standard is real. E.g., I think Jim Corzine and Bill Maher deserve repudiating at least as much as Donald Trump does.

Corzine apparently stole $1 billion dollars from investors in his fund MF Global. He misused that much client money to bail out bad trades his firm had made. Nevertheless, last November, Huffington Post called Corzine, "Barack Obama's Top Wall Street Fundraiser."

According to Bloomberg, Obama did return $70,000 in donations from Corzine late last year. OTOH an Obama Campaign list includes Corzine among those who helped raise more than $500,000 during the first quarter of 2012. (He was likewise named a bundler in January, when the Obama campaign last released the names of their money men.)

Bill Maher was almost non-renewed by ABC, because shortly after 9/11 he said, "We have been the cowards. Lobbing cruise missiles from two thousand miles away. That's cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building. Say what you want about it. Not cowardly."

Maher has called Palin a “dumb twat” and dropped the C-word in describing the former Alaska governor. He called Palin and Congresswoman Bachmann “boobs” and “two bimbos.” He said of the former vice-presidential candidate, “She is not a mean girl. She is a crazy girl with mean ideas.” He recently made a joke about Rick Santorum’s wife using a vibrator.

President Obama hasn't returned the $1 million that Maher donated, nor AFAIK has he specifically repudiated Maher.

Note also that while Al Sharpton hasn't conducted Obama fund-raisers, he has a national TV show, which he uses shamelessly to boost Obama. Consider a hypothetical reverse situation. Suppose Rush Limbaugh said that Obama wanted to commit genocide against white people. Would you think Romney would have a duty to repudiate Limbaugh?

Aside from the double standard, this repudiation issue is insignificant IMHO. Romney might be a disaster as President or he might be great. However, IMHO Romney's decision of whether or not to specifically repudiate Trump tells me nothing about Romney's likely success or failure in office. This repudiation issue is just a trivial campaign tactic issue.

[David in Cal]

BTW here's a nice clear explanation of the background to the supposed 98% of climate experts who support the consensus view.

IMHO Cook and Lewandowsky are too cavalier about the numbers. First of all, they don't tell their readers just how few climate scientists were polled to reach that 97% figure. IMHO, if C&L had merely argued that the opinions of 79 climate scientists should outweigh 31,000 non-climate-expert scientists, they might have a point. However, C&L claim that the 79 climate scientists prove a "consensus." I think huge number of signers for the Global Warming Petition Project (usually referred to as the Oregon Petition) tells us that there's no real scientific consensus. E.g., you couldn't get 31,000 scientists to sign a petition disputing Einstein's discovery that mass can be converted into energy at a rate of e = mc^2, not even if you allowed scientists without expertise in relativity to sign that petition.

Wikipedia offers a partial excuse for the misrepresentation of what the Oregon Petition says:

The text of the petition is often misrepresented. For example, until recently the petition's website stated that the petition's signatories "declare that global warming is a lie with no scientific basis whatsoever" and the British newspaper Daily Telegraph reported that the petition "denies that man is responsible for global warming."

Nevertheless, by reproducing Cook and Lewandowsky's chart, Brendan has misled readers of Columbia Journalism Review and of his blog as to the actual statement of the Oregon Petition. I think Brendan ought to put a correction into these two publications, but I don't think he will.