Armstrong Williams is “the premiere Black political whore in America,” wrote
Black Commentator Co-Publishers Glen Ford and Peter Gamble in
our December 12, 2002 issue. In the interest of full disclosure,
we
revealed our particular grievance: that Williams had hopelessly
polluted America’s Black Forum (ABF), the first nationally
syndicated Black news interview program on commercial television,
created by Ford and Gamble in 1977. “Since the mid-Nineties,” we
wrote, “ABF has devolved into a menagerie of professional Black
propagandists in service of the most vicious elements of the Republican
Party. It is a bizarre experience.” ABF had become “America’s
Black Right-wing Forum” – the title of our Cover Story.
For a time, white rightwing columnist Pat Buchanan
was a regular guest on ABF. So it came as little surprise that
the program, which once generated weekly, worldwide headlines
on the scale of Meet
the Press, Issues and Answers, and Face the Nation,
finally became just another brothel in Armstrong Williams’ political
red light district – a quickies venue for paying customers like
Bush Education Secretary, Rod Paige.
Armstrong Williams’ services were procured by written contract – an
innovation in the political payola trade – which stipulated that "Mr. Williams shall utilize his long-term
working relationships with 'America's Black Forum'…to encourage
the producers to periodically address the No Child Left Behind
Act [NCLB]," according to the New York Times. In return
for $240,000 in public funds, laundered as “advertising” fees,
the contract required Williams to “regularly comment on NCLB during
the course of his broadcasts" on his own TV show, The Right
Side, and that "Secretary Paige and other department officials
shall have the option of appearing from time to time as studio
guests." Williams had no trouble arranging for Paige to appear
on America’s Black Forum, as well – a freebie for the big-spending
Bush crew.
Williams’ public promiscuity cost him dearly,
causing Tribune Media Services to terminate syndication of his
column to 50 newspapers,
including USA Today, which broke the
story on January 7. The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility
and Ethics in Washington (CREW)
charges that the Department of Education contract with Williams “is
in violation of the Publicity and Propaganda clause included in
annual appropriations bills for decades.” Congressional Democrats
wrote a letter to President Bush. “Covert propaganda to influence public opinion is unethical
and dangerous," they said.
The National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ)
called on the White House to “rebuke those in the Department of
Education who used taxpayer dollars to pay off conservative commentator
Armstrong Williams in an attempt to influence public opinion on
administration policy.”
“He’s tainted fruit,” said NABJ vice
president for broadcast, Barbara Ciara. “And he’s unfairly indicted
all commentators who have their own independent opinion, don’t
need a script from the administration and don’t need to be paid
off.”
But of course, Armstrong
Williams has never been a journalist, nor has he ever uttered
or written a
word that could qualify as straightforward political commentary.
Since 1979, when the 20-year-old signed on with his “mentor,” South
Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond and, later, as an aide to Clarence
Thomas, then chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission,
Williams has been a rightwing political operative for hire – a
specialty he turned into a lucrative business. As we reported
back in 2002: “Williams' public relations
firm, the Graham Williams Group, co-founded with Oprah boyfriend
Stedman Graham,
specializes in serving ‘public policy organizations’ – the institutional
Right. He is the Hardest Working Man in Ho' Business.”
Although the white Right is Williams’ principal client, powerful
Blacks are also to blame for inflicting him on the citizenry. Cathy
Hughes, owner of 69-station-strong Radio One, gave Williams his
first broadcast commentator slot in the mid-Eighties, back when
her holdings consisted of just two stations, in Washington and
Baltimore. In effect, Hughes credentialized Williams as a broadcast “journalist” two
decades ago. Until last week’s furor, Hughes’ TV One cable operation
carried Williams’ program, On Point, where Rod Paige appeared,
last year. TV One CEO Johnathon
Rodgers told the Washington Post he’s pulled the show
pending an “investigation,” and that he knew nothing about Williams’ contract
with Paige’s department. Williams claims he informed TV One about
the deal.
To be of value to the white Right, Black mercenaries must appear
to have some standing in the African American community. The Uniworld
Group, the current producers of America’s Black Forum,
gave Williams such a weekly platform. It is clear that Uniworld
made a “strategic” decision in 1996 to position the program on
the right. Armstrong Williams’ presence on the show is a product – not
the cause – of ABF’s rightward turn. In the ABF environment created
by Uniworld, Williams had no difficulty fulfilling his “contract.”
A much larger crime
Although Williams richly deserves public excoriation,
self-righteous journalists of all ethnicities and persuasions
are missing the
big story. Rod Paige’s $240,000 propaganda payment to Williams
is puny compared to the tons of cash the Department of Education
lavishes on organizations pushing school vouchers and privatization – more
than $75 million by the end of 2003, according to a report by
People for the American Way. (See , “Bush’s
Phony ‘Grassroots’ Voucher ‘Movement,’” December
4, 2003.) More than a year later, that figure has almost certainly
passed the $100 million mark in grants and “contracts” to groups
whose mission is “to discredit the very concept of public education.” Much
of the work is pure propaganda, euphemistically dubbed “public
education” on the “school choice” aspects of No Child Left Behind – the
same mission Williams was contracted to perform. Among the multi-million
dollar recipients is the Black Alliance for Educational Options
(BAEO), the voucher front group created by the arch-reactionary
Bradley and Walton Family Foundations and now feeding at the public
trough. Williams was a founding director of BAEO, as reported
in our inaugural issue Cover Story, “Fruit of the Poisoned Tree,” April
5, 2002. Williams’ $240,000 contract was his cut from the Bush
voucher bagman, Rod Paige. No wonder he has no intention
of giving the money back.
In pillorying Williams, corporate media ignore their own culpability.
Our colleagues at the NorthStar
Network get it mostly right:
We differ with NorthStar only on the matter
of ratings. Any focus group could inform corporate media that
Armstrong Williams
is among the most despised personalities in Black America – right
up there with his old friend and boss, Clarence Thomas. That
couldn’t be good for ratings among the important Black demographic – and
Williams is so generally obnoxious we doubt that he’s a big draw
among whites, either. No, corporate media boosted Williams because
he reflects the worldview of corporate executives, the people
who really run the show. USA Today broke the Armstrong
Williams scandal, but they previously ran his journalistically
worthless column, week after week. He was speaking their language.
In broadcasting especially, “journalism” is rapidly ceasing
to exist. The Williams affair presents us with the spectacle
of irate “journalists” who daily package propaganda in service
to the powerful, bristling with indignation over a propagandist
who gets paid directly by those same powers.
“News” has devolved to a corporate product.
Armstrong Williams is also a corporate product. He may still
have some shelf life
left.