In the dark.

Happy Holidays and New Year from me to you. 

I've been following the Vince Cable fiasco that threatens to bring down the the coalition government in Britain where Cable, Business Secretary and senior Lib Dem politician, gave embarrassing details about the governing coalition to two women whom he thought were constituents visiting his office. The women were instead two reporters from a British newspaper pretending to be constituents who published the details of the conversation even though Cable told them the conversation was confidential. 

Among the details Cable revealed to the women were policy fights, candid views about controversial issues and his own role in the government including the ability to, in his words, "bring down the government." Subsequent to the publication of the details, Cable had to give up a major portion of his portfolio, review of the News Corp. attempted takeover of BSkyB, a subscription cable service in the UK, and has otherwise been seemingly marginalized within the cabinet.

Personally, I've found this entire episode problematic in terms of what it says about media and open society. Governments need the ability to keep secrets in order to keep their citizens safe and execute their domestic and foreign policy objectives but what Cable revealed seemed less to me of a wikileaks scenario than more of a politician being honest with his constituents. 

There seems to be a strong need for deception and misinformation across our societies. The level of deception is, of course, less pervasive in the west than it is in, say, an autocratic regime like North Korea but it still is pervasive.

In politics, the biggest reason for this is the insatiable appetite of the media and media consumers (of which this blog is one). There's a constant need to "make news" by corporate media driven by profits and ratings and there is a correlating phobia by policymakers to avoid embarrassing headlines. In this never-ending news cycle, pundits, commentators, editorial boards react without contemplating and public opinion moves without criticism.

Thus, Vince Cable can't tell us what is really going on behind Number 10 although common sense tells us such a disparate coalition must involve tension and heated policy debates. Before the cameras, he must smile and stand hand in hand with his conservative brethren and pretend everything is OK.

Not only does this insult our intelligence, it provides no real service. We should be able to weigh in and contribute on the coalition strife. Both sides should be able to get input and feedback from their constituents, which is why what Cable did was so admirable. He laid bare frictions and sought feedback from people he served but was punished by an insatiable press.

I think we all as media consumers should think more critically about what we see and hear and demand more of media providers. On the right there already seems to be a move to think about mainstream media critically but I fear that many of these critics aren't thinking about media in a new way other than going to different sources.

The ethics of what the Telegraph did aside, something is really wrong with our society when policymakers have to lie to us to get anything accomplished.

Interesting reading:
The Online Threat, Seymour M. Hirsh, The New Yorker.
Germany's 'Frau Nein' calls the shots, Eric Reguly, The Globe and Mail.
Obama's Other War, Joe Bavier, Foreign Policy.