Media Watch: September 1995
Table of Contents:
- Media Watch: September 1995
- So Much for "Corporate Conservatives"
- NewsBites: Eleanor's Address
- Revolving Door: A Liberal Acquisition
- "Moderates" vs. "Flamethrowers"
- To CBS: "Republican" Starr...
- Free the Cabbies
- Who's Protecting Newt?
- Janet Cooke Award: Hager's Early Campaign Commercial
Janet Cooke Award: Hager's Early Campaign Commercial
Can seven complex environmental issues be thoroughly explained in a two-minute story? On August 8, NBC Nightly News reporter Robert Hager didn't even try, listing seven areas where Republicans would threaten public health and safety, which earned him the Janet Cooke Award.
To address the claims made by NBC with almost no rebuttal, we review NBC's claims, countered by an open letter sent to NBC by House Republican Whip Tom DeLay.
Hager began: "The purity of the water we drink, the air we breathe, the food we eat. For two decades the Environmental Protection Agency has led the cleanup, but at a cost of $7 billion a year to government, billions more to business. The newly elected Republican controlled House believed it had a mandate to put the brakes on that. Programs to further crack down on industrial pollution of water, such as the Chesapeake Bay shown here. Another 15 million tons of dumping was to be outlawed next year but the House voted to cut out funds to stop that dumping." [NBC ran a large yellow graphic on the screen: "CUT OUT FUNDS TO STOP DUMPING."]
DeLay responded: "The appropriations provision this claim appears to refer to actually states that the EPA may not expend funds in Fiscal Year 1996 to develop new standards of water quality until the Clean Water Act is reauthorized. Current standards are unaffected."
Hager: "A particular program to rid the Great Lakes of dioxin and PCBs -- the lakes provide drinking water for 23 million, but now dioxin and PCB cleanup would be delayed by the House." [Over a visual of a dead fish, the graphic: "DELAY GREAT LAKES CLEANUP."]
DeLay: "The House provision actually allows the Great Lakes states to come up with more effective, innovative ways to meet EPA's water quality standards and restricts EPA from penalizing states for doing so. Up to now, EPA has been enforcing the guidelines it is required by law to provide as if they were strict regulations. In fact, they are only guidelines...the bottom line is that states and industries must comply with current law and continue to meet every water quality requirement that is now on the books."
Hager: "Programs to keep dirty storm water and overflow sewage from draining into rivers and lakes. The House would stop enforcement of such cleanup." [Graphic: "STOP ENFORCEMENT."]
DeLay: "It is widely agreed upon that the current centralized stormwater permitting program is broken.
The permit application alone costs over $600,000 and compliance costs number in the billions....last May's Clean Water Amendments asked states to come up with their own more effective plans for meeting EPA's standards."
Hager: "Protection of wetlands, which prevent flooding and permit wildfowl to breed. Money to stop developers from filling in wetlands would be cut off." [Graphic: "MONEY CUT OUT."]
DeLay: "The appropriations wetland provision will not destroy any wetlands, it simply restricts EPA's role in enforcing the wetlands program. EPA is not the primary agency responsible for the wetlands program -- the Army Corps of Engineers is, and its role is not diminished in any way....EPA will be restricted from issuing 11th hour vetoes and contributing to the bureaucratic tangles that result from having more than one agency involved in administering a program."
Hager: "Air pollution by heavy industry. A single loophole would be created to allow oil refineries to avoid installing the best cleanup equipment." [Graphic: "LOOPHOLE CREATED FOR OIL REFINERIES."]
DeLay: "Industry has been working with EPA for two years to develop a regulation that provides public health benefits in the most cost-effective manner....EPA has insisted on using data that is 15 years old, when accurate data on industry equipment leaks exists from 1993....Clinton's own Deputy Secretary of Energy recommended to EPA that this proposal be withdrawn...because the costs were so great and the benefits so small."
Hager: "Pollution by nearly 200 industrial incinerators, which burn hazardous waste for fuel. New EPA rules would have cut way back on that, but the House voted to ease the new rules, permit burning of waste to continue." [Graphic: "EASE NEW RULES FOR INCINERATORS."]
DeLay: "This provision...simply requires the EPA to implement existing laws by following its own procedures which allow for public comment and development of an adequate factual record in setting standards that affect the waste treatment industry. EPA is violating the Administrative Procedure Act by trying to circumvent existing procedural requirements."
Hager: "To clean up smog, efforts to force tougher auto emissions tests. The House would stop tougher tests." [Graphic: "STOP TOUGHER AUTO TESTS."]
DeLay: "EPA insists that a centralized emissions testing program is better than a decentralized program...The Rand Corporation found that `a well-safeguarded decentralized system, with rigorous state supervision, can be highly effective.' This rider simply allows states flexibility to design emissions testing programs that will best address their pollution problems."
Hager: "The setting of safe levels for pesticides permitted on food. The House would restrict EPA's ability to further crack down on such levels." [Over a visual of a child eating fruit, the graphic: "RESTRICT SETTING LEVELS FOR PESTICIDE."]
DeLay: "EPA is currently considering canceling [70] pesticides, which have been proven to be safe, under the flawed notion that any pesticide residue on food must pose a zero risk of cancer....the Director of EPA's Office of Pesticide Programs has stated that revoking tolerances on these pesticides is `stupid....a nonsensical waste of the taxpayer dollar.'"
When asked about the lack of rebuttal, Hager told MediaWatch: "That was something that bugged me that day. I was hunting desperately for some Republican voice. First, we tried [Rep.] Tom Bliley. He blew us off. Then we tried [Rep.] Jack Fields. He wouldn't do it. We ran out of time. We sent a crew to Senator Craig's office, but they changed their mind. I grabbed Senator Gramm." Gramm only was allowed to tell NBC viewers that voters wanted lower taxes and less regulation, which didn't refute anything in the report. Hager admitted to MediaWatch: "The text does a number [on Republicans] on the environmental issue."
Hager didn't need GOP talking heads to add balance to his story, which looked like a two-minute liberal attack ad. The balance presented here, of Hager's Democratic charges and DeLay's Republican rebuttals, would have been a much better news story -- if NBC reporters would at least pretend to be referees instead of liberal advocates.
