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- Oct 17, 2011
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Pentagon wants a ‘refocus,’ but Stripes hasn’t wavered from its true mission
Stars and Stripes, the legendary newspaper for the U.S. military community, is in peril of losing its editorial independence and becoming nothing more than a public relations arm of the Pentagon.
Your help is urgently needed to keep Stars and Stripes operating as an independent news source that adheres to journalistic principles and ethics.
Here is what is happening, why and what you can do about it. My alarm is not exaggerated.
On Jan. 15, Sean Parnell, who is the chief Pentagon spokesman for Department of Defense/War Secretary Pete Hegseth, posted on the social media site X four paragraphs announcing a refocus for Stripes. That was the first anyone at Stripes had heard of the Pentagon leadership’s intent. “The Department of War is returning Stars & Stripes to its original mission: reporting for our warfighters,” Parnell wrote. Actually, Stripes never deviated from that mission, though you don’t usually see the word “warfighters” used in place of soldiers, Marines, airmen and sailors in news stories.
Parnell wrote that the department would “refocus its content away from woke distractions that syphon morale.” As the ombudsman, I read the newspaper carefully, cover to cover, the website and newsletters and I cannot tell you what any “woke distractions” might be nor “repurposed DC gossip columns.”
The stories in Stripes do not lean right or left or support any particular ideology. From bases around the world, Stripes journalists provide news that is “objective, credible, and editorially independent of the military chain of command and military public affairs activities,” as required by the Code of Federal Regulations provision governing Stars and Stripes.
On the same day that Parnell posted on X, the department summarily and illegally shut down the complex review process for the regulation and removed the current regulation on the basis it was “unnecessary.”
I believe that service members are smart. They do not need to be spoon-fed good news from the Department of Defense/War. Give them the full and fair picture and let them think for themselves. This is respecting those who serve.
Write to your U.S. senators and representative and tell them of the value of maintaining an unfettered news source for the military. Ask them to take action.
The Stars and Stripes ombudsman, in a role created in 1991 by the House Armed Services Committee, is tasked with reporting to Congress on any threats to the organization’s mission of providing independent news to U.S. service members and the military community.
Stars and Stripes, the legendary newspaper for the U.S. military community, is in peril of losing its editorial independence and becoming nothing more than a public relations arm of the Pentagon.
Your help is urgently needed to keep Stars and Stripes operating as an independent news source that adheres to journalistic principles and ethics.
Here is what is happening, why and what you can do about it. My alarm is not exaggerated.
On Jan. 15, Sean Parnell, who is the chief Pentagon spokesman for Department of Defense/War Secretary Pete Hegseth, posted on the social media site X four paragraphs announcing a refocus for Stripes. That was the first anyone at Stripes had heard of the Pentagon leadership’s intent. “The Department of War is returning Stars & Stripes to its original mission: reporting for our warfighters,” Parnell wrote. Actually, Stripes never deviated from that mission, though you don’t usually see the word “warfighters” used in place of soldiers, Marines, airmen and sailors in news stories.
Parnell wrote that the department would “refocus its content away from woke distractions that syphon morale.” As the ombudsman, I read the newspaper carefully, cover to cover, the website and newsletters and I cannot tell you what any “woke distractions” might be nor “repurposed DC gossip columns.”
The stories in Stripes do not lean right or left or support any particular ideology. From bases around the world, Stripes journalists provide news that is “objective, credible, and editorially independent of the military chain of command and military public affairs activities,” as required by the Code of Federal Regulations provision governing Stars and Stripes.
On the same day that Parnell posted on X, the department summarily and illegally shut down the complex review process for the regulation and removed the current regulation on the basis it was “unnecessary.”
I believe that service members are smart. They do not need to be spoon-fed good news from the Department of Defense/War. Give them the full and fair picture and let them think for themselves. This is respecting those who serve.
Write to your U.S. senators and representative and tell them of the value of maintaining an unfettered news source for the military. Ask them to take action.
The Stars and Stripes ombudsman, in a role created in 1991 by the House Armed Services Committee, is tasked with reporting to Congress on any threats to the organization’s mission of providing independent news to U.S. service members and the military community.
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