Friday, March 27, 2009

A new low for the Miami Herald?.. McClatchy paper publishes, word for word, propaganda from Cuban government

Henry Gomez at Herald Watch has news showing The Miami Herald may have just hit a new low in journalism.

Yesterday the Miami Herald published a piece describing Cuban dictator Raul Castro presiding over an event in Cuba. Above is a screen shot from the Herald's web site. (See the article here.)

Turns out somebody at the Herald lifted the article from the Cuban News Agency, a propaganda arm of the Cuban government, and printed it word for word. Below is a screen shot from the Cuba News Agency web site.


Who at the Herald is responsible for parroting Cuban propaganda? Was it a classically trained j-school grad at the Herald, wanting to educate the rubes in South Florida about the enlightened Cuban government? Or was it somebody in India just randomly grabbing news feeds for the Herald's web site. Whatever the case, it's beyond embarrassing for the Herald to print press releases from a communist government.
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19 comments:

Anonymous said...

What page of the print edition did that appear on? Because anybody can slap shit up on the Internet ... as this blog so amply demonstrates.

JAT said...

Oh, OK 9:21, I'll play.

So then you think that official MNI filings and statements to effect online eyeballs and related ads will prove to be an important source of revenue to be wholly false and misguided?

To whom at your paper have you communicated these doubts? If you have not, why not? Which online efforts have you opposed in company meetings using your "shit up" standard?

I thought so....

Henry Louis Gomez said...

Anon,

The Herald.com website is a component of The Miami Herald Media Company which is wholly owned by McClatchy.

The link for the Herald.com item is here.

The link for the same exact item on an official Cuban "news" web site is here.

Herald.com acknowledges the source as ACN. There is no doubt as to ACN's status as a government operated outlet.

Any other questions smart guy?

Anonymous said...

Any other questions smart guy?





Yep, what time do you get off?

Anonymous said...

I don't think this represents an new low. It's just a continuation of the same old low. Most everyone knows that the Herald and McClatchy has made a conscious decision to become a mouthpiece for any communist/socialist cause that comes their way.

As for Gomez, everyone knows his spots. Copy/Paste and writing fiction is his forte.

Anonymous said...

Please strike last two sentences. I have a comedian looking over my shoulder.

Anonymous said...

My God. I never thought I'd see the day (No joke)

You MNI FU&^S are farther gone than I ever imagined.

My you lose all you assets when you go bankrupt and move to Cuba where you all belong.

Anonymous said...

Don't forget folks. Delete your cookies and do not register with these people. They will sell your name.

Anonymous said...

Mi niña se fue a la mar,

a contar olas y chinas,

pero se encontró, de pronto,

con el río de Sevilla.

Entre adelfas y campanas

cinco barcos se mecían,

con los remos en el agua

y las velas en la brisa.

¿Quién miro dentro la torre

enjaezada, de Sevilla?

Cinco voces contestaban

redondas como sortijas.

El cielo monta gallardo

al río, de orilla a orilla.

En el aire sonrosado,

cinco anillos se mecían.

Anonymous said...

"Most everyone knows that the Herald and McClatchy has made a conscious decision to become a mouthpiece for any communist/socialist cause that comes their way."

Um, that's really not how it works folks. You can believe it all you want, but you'd be wrong. And by saying it, you are merely adding noise.

Someone f'd up, there's no question, in running that ANC material online. It's lazy and without thought and it would be very interesting to find out who slapped it up there.

But any notion of it being part of a larger conspiracy is plain stupid.

Journalism/newspapers don't work that way, as mostly anyone who's spend hours in budget meetings or has had to pitch stories to editors.

You need to worry more whether or not there's special treatment given to advertisers. That's where it gets problematic.

There's also a gigantic fear of getting sued. Most every reporter knows a great story that merits the investigative reporting treatment but doesn't get touched because leadership at papers tend to be very risk adverse.

Anonymous said...

Um, that's really not how it works folks. You can believe it all you want, but you'd be wrong. And by saying it, you are merely adding noise.



Yes, that is exactly how it works. You can deny it all you want, but how many times does it take before your denials ring empty. How many times does the head of your DC bureau have to announce in speeches that their success is tied directly to siding with our enemies?

I'm sorry as hell, but you make a conscious decision to load your staff with nothing but leftists, leftist propaganda is what you get.

Anonymous said...

Henry Gomez is a cool dude.
I don’t agree at all with your “Copy/Paste and writing fiction” statement if you are writing about Herald Watch. Many blogs are news aggregates with added comments from the blog master. I will be glad when more news aggregates are from bloggers, and less from unreliable, and biased MSM news sources. As the MSM bites the dust, I guess my wish will eventually be granted. It is too bad Henry Gomez doesn’t have more time to blog. Henry, if you stop back, I think Miami needs you.

Anonymous said...

"How many times does the head of your DC bureau have to announce in speeches that their success is tied directly to siding with our enemies?

I'm sorry as hell, but you make a conscious decision to load your staff with nothing but leftists, leftist propaganda is what you get."

Huh? What the heavens are you talking about?

It might be time to put the Cuban coffee down and switch to decaf. While I do love my little plastic cups of the stuff, too much can make you poco loco.

There's no conspiracy. That would require organization and planning.

Instead, the question is: what idiot posted that crap online and what the hell were they thinking?

Anonymous said...

What were they thinking?

They probably didn't have time to think, and they were too busy to read the entire thing before posting it. It was ready-made text and no one has enough people to write every bit of copy anymore, so . . .

A really dumb mistake. But a conspiracy? C'mon. Of course no matter how many times this is pointed out, the rightwing wacko(s) on this blog comes right back at ya.

Hoo boy. Bend over. Here it comes again.

Anonymous said...

“Ready-made text” sounds boring. Is that just grabbing the guts from another article to say the same thing again?
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Anon. wrote, “It was ready-made text and no one has enough people to write every bit of copy anymore“

Anonymous said...

Oh yeah, it's just a mistake. Media Matters, Move on, AFP, Code Pink, send us a press release and we'll post it. Then we'll tell you in the very next breath that we're ethical keepers of the truth, full of integrity and guardians of the public trust...Blah, Blah, Blah.

Comeuppance said...

How can geting caught doing the same thing the NYT has done for decades be a "new" anything?

Anonymous said...

What if the "ready-made text" is not true? Who is checking on that? I would not believe anything from the NYT.

Anonymous said...

They probably didn't have time to think, and they were too busy to read the entire thing before posting it.

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What a nice try. By now you know they've uncovered massive numbers of this very same thing. What's your excuse now?