Where's the Web 2.0 Freedom of Information (and Al Gore) for the Journalists Captured in North Korea?

I know we're enmeshed in the drama of newspaper necropsy lately, with friends who are also valuable professional contributors to the fabric of society walking out the door of newsrooms. But we must have at least enough gumption left over for some collective journalistic interest, concern and howling over the two Al Gore-TV reporters snatched by North Korea.

When the Chronicle's BALCO watchdogs, Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada, were facing 18 months in jail each for refusing to hand over confidential sources to the government, the paper's owner, Hearst, spent two years and I'm guessing around a million dollars, both to keep them out of the slammer and fight the larger battle between the press and the ravenous, prying Bush Justice Department over our ability to do our job.

And that was home town hard time involved, not the prospect of dungeons in one of the most dysfunctional, isolated and irrational places on earth.

Internationally, when reporter Jill Carroll was kidnapped in Iraq a few years ago, not only her employer, the Christian Science Monitor, but her family and just about everyone else participated in a campaign for her release. Before she did ultimately get freed, there were giant posters of her on Rome's city hall, white balloons released in Paris, 25 organizations calling for her to be let go and front page newspaper banners in Baghdad saying, "She loves Iraq. Now she needs your help."

In between spasms of international adoption and rescuing the rest of the world, even some celebrities gave their time to the cause.

So where's the love for U.S. citizens Laura Ling and Euna Lee, arrested two weeks ago by North Korea? Except for a few short, fact-sparse stories in the media about the Current TV correspondents, there's been barely a ripple. Even after officials in Pyongyang announced the women would be tried for "hostile acts." That's 10 years, hard labor.

I take it back. Gawker wrote a piece saying they sure wouldn't want the former Vice President or his "everybody report now" TV operation covering their asses if they were in a similar situation (which will never happen, no matter how sassy they are.)

And State Department spokesman, Gordon Duguid, did say authoritatively that "of course we would like to see our citizens released and returned home." Wow. I'm not sure what good that's going to do, Mr. Duguid, master of the obvious.

I know in the nine years I covered conflicts in other countries, we all understood that if we got in trouble doing journalism, it was like "Mission Impossible": hope for a hand but don't count on being acknowledged for your good intentions, never mind rescued. It was a lonely feeling then but, in today's world of video decapitations, it has to be terrifying.

Where is Mr. Gore, Nobel winner and formerly the second most powerful person in the world in all this? How about anything from SF-based Current TV, say maybe even just a public expression of concern? At the moment I wrote this, the big story on their web site is, "Top 10 Sexting Acronyms For Adults." A call to their chief flack, Brent Marcus, went unreturned. What Current VC2 "pod" does this one fit into?

That silence has raised the notion that perhaps old liberals just sit back and let the young impressionables do their dirty work. Prison is hard.

Seeking out the story, SF Weekly glimpsed the security guard hired by Current TV to keep the media out, and Gawker is still on the case. Bless their snide, slapping, snappy sense of style, which gave them another opening. They came back after that first post and seem to have busted Current for actually censoring stories about the incident. The blackout of information has not gone unnoticed.

But all that still leaves the women out on their own.

Is this what happens when information becomes more democratic? No one's willing to step up? If you work for a viewer-supplied TV cable network, does that mean no one has your back?

This does not help the argument that the value of large news organizations is dwindling to nothing in favor of small entrepreneurs. There's no encouragement for 2.0 reporting when its practitioners can disappear into the gulag with no one to fight for them.

Maybe there are furious back door efforts going on and these two reporters aren't just pawns in the overarching political drama of North Korea's imminent launch of a long-range missile. CNN, where Wikipedia says Ms. Ling's sister works as a reporter, and other news outlets report that a Swedish diplomat is hot on the case.

But that shouldn't stop some public uproar. Do we have to ask Google to go in there and flex a little muscle on behalf of the free flow of information?

Comments

[Snowball]

How do you know Gore isn't busy working on this right now? That's right, you don't. Perhaps the "silence" is in order to assure the safety of these reporters while negotiating with the North Koreans. You think public protests in the US are going to do anything helpful, or just enrage the N. Koreans?

[writerjohnny]

Seriously - Al Gore is the bad guy in this? Send in the troops and if anyone interferes it is at their own risk including friends and family of the captors. If the North Koreans kill these women in the rescue attempt turn North Korea into a parking lot. And oh by the way, do it right now.

[av2ts]

I really hate to say this, but I think it needs to be said. These 2 journos were in fact breaking North Korean law, which requires (like any other country) that journalists be admitted to the country legally on journalist visas. They tried sneaking in. Maybe they felt they had no other choice in order to "get the story" but they should have also known there were considerable risks to such actions. I hope they are promptly released, but I don't think that making it into a diplomatic international issue is going to solve anything. Koreans have never responded well to pressure or making a public spat.

[Question Othority]

Forget about Gore doing anything. Where's the US govt. in all this? It is obvious that the Norks are using these reporters as pawns to prevent the U.S. from interferring with the planned launch of their new ballistic missile. The Norks will offer to return the reporters after they get promises from the US that there will be no inteferrence with the launch, and that the US will cease efforts to get them to dismantly their nuclear program. After observing our President ( the Iran apology, the proposed concession to Russia, etc.) they detect weakness and are testing his will to defend U.S. citezens abroad. Biden was right, the international community is testing our un-tried president. And the President is failing those tests.

[cynicalgirl]

NBC reported that the Dept of State asked them to downplay this because raising the profile of the victims would make them more valuable to their captures.

Personally, I am outraged by this and I can't imagine any other reason for it to be ignored.

[Javani]

"NBC reported that the Dept of State asked them to downplay this because raising the profile of the victims would make them more valuable to their captures."

Sounds right. They might be negotiating the ransom price.

[Question Othority]

I would suggest just the opposite. raising the profile of the reporters, their condition and treatment would give the Norks pause before attempting Soviet style show trials or subjecting them to abuse. The Soviets were more careful with dissidents like Sahkarov and Sharansky (not that they didn't suffer abuse) than they were with the thousands of dissidents who were anonymous in the West. This story should be on every news network, in every news magazine and newspaper, and the State Dept. should have already been making a major stink at the U.N. Keeping quiet is doing just the opposite of what the State Dept. says it wants.

[steamboat]

Stock in carbon credits and making Global Warming films and doing seminars is very, very, very beneficial to Al's bank account.....The lives of 2 ladies kidnapped in NKorea isn't.

[GardenerNorCal]

My sentiments exactly!

[GreatNews27]

Are you saying that just because they don't look like you and me we should forget about them? Oh, right, sorry, that's what Newt said.

[WilliePilgrim]

Has a Nobel Peace Prize ever been revoked? Thanks for bringing this to our attention, Phil. If love of freedom doesn't do it, maybe shame will.