Boston Marathon Bombing Anniversary: A WhoWhatWhy Retrospective
- Submitted by: Love Knowledge
- Category: Politics
The post Boston Marathon Bombing Anniversary: A WhoWhatWhy Retrospective appeared first on WhoWhatWhy.
Editor’s Note:
Dear Reader:
I started WhoWhatWhy because throughout my career, I often broke stories that were so far from the mainstream reporting consensus that they were either ignored or ridiculed — until they no longer were. Once everyone else caught up, it became a point of pride for them to simply act like my reporting had not existed. With WhoWhatWhy, that pattern continues.
Fortunately, however, we are growing as an independent voice with our own distribution networks, not dependent on the rest of the media for approval or amplification.
Here’s yet another story where we were very early — and were variously ignored or ridiculed — where it turned out that we were onto something. We were virtually alone among news organizations in our skepticism about the quickly assembled official explanation of the Boston Marathon Bombing, the speed with which the authorities wrapped up their “investigation,” and the sheeplike nature of the media in embracing the preferred narrative, while disparaging anyone who continued to dig.
We did dig — producing scores of articles and podcasts.You will find selected stories from our coverage below.
Now that Michele McPhee, a journalist with long experience in the traditional media, is out with a book from a top-tier publisher raising serious doubts about what the public was told, we have reason to feel good about what we do. Some revelations from her book are being embraced and repeated by other media, albeit with no context and no acknowledgment of the important work that came before.
Our independent spirit and determination to follow each story wherever it leads is what makes WhoWhatWhy different. We hope you agree, and that you will join us and support us as we continue to grow, to take on more and more topics, and to reach a larger and larger audience.
Russ Baker
Editor-in-Chief
***
The Marathon Bombing: What the Media Didn’t Warn You About (04/19/2013)
Monday’s bombing at the Boston Marathon provides a perfect example of the defects of conventional news reportage — and proof that we urgently need something better. We got “scoops”, “experts”, “updates,” and post-tragedy kumbaya, but at the end of those days of saturation coverage, we were none the wiser. It’s like what studies find about television news: the more you watch, the worse you perform on knowledge exams. We ought to care more about the narrative we’re getting, about the texture of what saturates us. The way in which a story is handled shapes our emotions and perceptions, determines priorities, and influences seemingly unrelated outcomes that affect us in profound ways, sometimes transforming our society.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev Photo credit: Dave Newman / Flickr (CC BY 2.0)
Boston MIT Cover-Up (05/23/2013)
Russ Baker tries to understand what happened to MIT police officer Sean Coller: “With crazed terrorist bombers on the loose, why was this officer sitting where he was? I hoped to clear this up with Chief DiFava. Especially since DiFava is not just MIT’s police chief, but also the chief of MIT “facilities operations.” Thus, he had oversight of facilities including the many sensitive research facilities scattered around the campus, some close to where Collier died. At the campus police station, I was first told that he was… in Guatemala. Why Guatemala? Why go so far away to a foreign country at the very time that everyone most wanted to talk to him? In any case, I was soon informed that he had been in Guatemala, but just returned. But he had left again. Now he was in Washington. Why Washington? Something to do with the case? But again I was told he was back, but out on business off campus. Then I was told that maybe he was not off campus…
Was Tamerlan Tsarnaev a Double Agent Recruited by the FBI (06/23/2013)
Amid the swirl of mysteries surrounding the alleged Boston bombers, one fact, barely touched upon in the mainstream US media, stands out: There is a strong possibility that Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the older of the two brothers, was a double agent, perhaps recruited by the FBI. If Tsarnaev was a double agent, he would be just one of thousands of young people coerced by the FBI, as the price for settling a minor legal problem, into a dangerous career as an informant.
Boston Marathon Bombing: US Rep. Keating Demands Answers From New FBI Director (08/01/2013)
In a scathing letter, Massachusetts Congressman William Keating has demanded “forthright information” about the Boston Marathon bombing from the newly confirmed director of the FBI, James Comey.
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