A promise made

Oklahoma’s paper of record follows new editorial policy all the way to the right

It’s not like they didn’t warn us. Back in 2013, when BH Media Group bought the Tulsa World from the Lorton Family and Bill Masterson was named its new publisher, the paper made two announcements. The first had to do with its new policy of no longer accepting online comments from people who used pseudonyms. Although this received most of the attention, it was important only to those who wanted to continue spewing their global warming-denying, gun-loving, Obama-hating, grammatically-challenged venom in anonymity. It was Masterson’s second point, however, that was (and is) of greater concern.

The paper’s shift right. 

He explained it this way:

I received a few notes asking for clarification when I mentioned in my first column that the editorial position was going to reflect the community in which it serves. My reason for that statement was the result of taking a hard look at the data we develop about our readers and our community. It clearly shows that the community perceives (right or wrong) that our editorial position is too far to the left and is not reflective of what is consistent with Tulsa and Oklahoman’s values.

Whoa, hoss. “Right or wrong” is a parenthetical to you?

Perception is reality and it is our job to fix that.

To the first part, no, it’s not; to the second, Ken Neal, who spent his professional life at the paper—including 12 years as its editorial pages editor (1994-2006)—said there was nothing to fix.

​“Newspapers should help shape public opinion, not follow it. Some Tulsa World readers (including our U.S. Senator) reject science, are racist, reject any religion other than Christianity, hate public education, refuse adequate healthcare and reject help for the poor. Should an editorial writer ‘reflect’ those views?” 

Bam!

Perception in this case wasn’t only not reality, it was manufactured and distorted, for the only Tulsa World readers who thought its editorial page too liberal were those who got their news from Michael DelGiorno and crazy relatives who forwarded discredited Drudge links. 

“Only in Oklahoma would we have been considered ‘liberal,’” Neal said. “Jim Inhofe built a career on calling us (Tulsa World) liberal. I guess because we wanted enough taxes to keep the schoolhouse door open, or perhaps because we opposed religion in the public schools, or maybe because we wanted to raise the pay of teachers or keep social security for old people. I wonder if those who called us liberal knew the World has not endorsed a Democrat for president since 1936.”

This is not some bitter, aging liberal talking, either. 

“I personally wrote the endorsements for Bush 43.”

Speaking of doing the (lowercase) right thing, Neal did away with the daily Bible quote (often from the New Testament) on the editorial page and put words from Jeremiah on the masthead—words that now appear in the vestibule of the World building, words adopted by Eugene Lorton, World owner from its early years until 1949—“Publish and set up a standard; publish and conceal not.” Neal said, “I don’t think the old man was so interested in quoting the Bible; just thought it fit a newspaper.”

Commie pinko!

Let’s continue. 

The point here—from the paper’s subsequent bromance with Rep. Markwayne Mullin, to its both-sides-do-it defense of Rep. Jim Bridenstine puffily standing by while a constituent said the president “should be executed as an enemy combatant,” to its begrudging pouting over the SCOTUS ruling to allow same-sex unions—the World righted a ship that was never left and then, for good measure, redoubled its efforts to coddle right-wing politicians who act like ignoramuses. 

Which brings us to this.

Bad blood between Congress and President Barack Obama spilled onto an international stage Monday when 47 Republican senators wrote to Iranian leaders to warn them an anti-nuclear proliferation agreement being negotiated by the administration might not be binding after 2016 without Senate approval.

The letter is inappropriate, partisan and undercuts the president in his constitutionally mandated duty to negotiate foreign agreements.

That said, Obama shares some culpability. 

Couldn’t help yourself, could you? Had to throw some red meat to the dogs. 

He’s never learned the art of working with Congress. Some of his foreign policy decisions have alienated allies such as Israel. Members of Congress understandably are frustrated at being left out the process.

Oh, for the love of causality, this is yet another example of World Editorial Pages Editor Wayne Greene taking moral equivalency out for a walk and getting lost on the way home. Show me one instance where Democrats ever did something so similarly and unilaterally petty because a Republican president had bad communication skills. Further, show me why Israel’s unhappiness should dictate U.S. foreign policy. Show me when Congress isn’t frustrated when a president pushes an agenda. And show me how this has fuck-all to do with how senators comport themselves in world affairs and with world leaders, especially the onerous ones. For the World to suggest that 47 Republican U.S. senators (and what is it with the GOP and that number?) were justified in penning a letter to Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei because President Obama didn’t genuflect in their direction was fatuous. 

More disturbing than the banality of its prose—“The president needs to understand, however, that he must negotiate with the Iranians from a position of strength” (No kidding, really?)—the editorial never gets around to mentioning that our two U.S. senators, Jim Inhofe and James Lankford, signed the letter. 

Now, unless you’re too lazy to Google the letter’s signatories or afraid of angering (and/or carrying water for) your new base, how does this happen? Oklahoma’s two freedom-loving, patriotic senators sign a letter to The Leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran discounting the President of the United States and—what—nobody brought this up at the staff meeting? Imagine the banner headline, the hand-wringing, though, had Senators Reid and Schumer and 45 fellow Democrats written Saddam Hussein during the Gulf War to alert him that he would get a better deal with a subsequent administration? The editorial staff would have been verklempt and never once commiserated with the plight of Democrats “left out of the process” or explained how President Bush shared some culpability for such a seditious letter.

What our two senators did in signing this piece of dreck was equal parts petulant, disrespectful, dangerous, and borderline treasonous—which at the moment (believe it or not) is not the point. This is: The state’s leading newspaper—even in its new perceived reality—had, at the very least, the journalistic obligation to tell you they did. If Wayne Greene and Bill Masterson need to be reminded why, it’s right there on the wall when they come into work.