More Low Expectations from The Media

This story makes it even plainer that the media has no concept of what black people are like. You could sense it when news reports kept referring to how black the city seemed, like it was some kind of shock to them to even see so many in one place.

Now the excuses for the horrifying coverage point out even more problems for the media and New Orleans officials.

Times-Picayune Editor Jim Amoss cited telephone breakdowns as a primary cause of reporting errors, but said the fact that most evacuees were poor African Americans also played a part.

"If the dome and Convention Center had harbored large numbers of middle class white people," Amoss said, "it would not have been a fertile ground for this kind of rumor-mongering."

Some of the hesitation that journalists might have had about using the more sordid reports from the evacuation centers probably fell away when New Orleans' top officials seemed to confirm the accounts.

Nagin and Police Chief Eddie Compass appeared on "Oprah" a few days after trouble at the Superdome had peaked.

Compass told of "the little babies getting raped" at the Superdome. And Nagin made his claim about hooligans raping and killing.

First, "telephone breakdowns"? How does that make reporting less accurate? "Hey, I couldn't get anybody on the phone, I'll just make something up. Pedophile rapes? Sounds true enough."

Second, I guess somehow the fact that the flood victims were black made it fertile ground for rumor-mongering? How could this be, amongst our enlightened media? Upper, middle, lower, black, white, any color, I don't normally expect people to rape, murder, or cannibalize others. Is Amoss saying it's generally assumed black peole are savages in the media?

Third, Nagin and Compass used Oprah to make unfounded statements and accusations about their people? That's sick, and I think they should have already both resigned for fanning the flames of hysteria, but it's even more so that these things were just parroted on every channel.

It seems like even in the midst of covering the bad coverage, there's a little thread of "well, it's understandable, you know, with all those black people around, that we'd have thought that."

This whole thing truly is turning into a global embarassment. Maybe our journalists and Compass and Nagin need to spend some more time around regular New Orleans folks before they report on them next time.