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Message to Broadcasting Board of Governors: Yes, some of us are cowards and we are ashamed
“to call me, and other contributors to this site cowards is an outrage” — Anonymous Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) journalist in a message to an unnamed Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) member.
BBG Watch Commentary
“Message to Broadcasting Board of Governors – Yes, some of us are cowards and we are ashamed,” but “to call me, and other contributors to this site cowards is an outrage” came to BBG Watch from an anonymous journalist working at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Prague.
The message was in response to one of our earlier news commentaries, in which sources quoted an unnamed member of the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG) as telling other members of the BBG that anonymous employees who provide information about mismanagement and contribute to our website are “cowards.” This BBG member reportedly urged the BBG take some kind of unspecified action to counter BBG Watch. We have no reports that other Board members responded positively to this request.
U.S. taxpayers fund the Broadcasting Board of Governors. The BBG’s budget is proposed by the Administration and approved by the U.S. Congress. BBG members are nominated by the President of the United States and confirmed by the U.S. Senate. The BBG is bipartisan and usually has four Democrats and four Republicans. The U.S. Secretary of State, currently Hillary Clinton, serves as an ex officio BBG member.
The Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty journalist, who uses the pen name Jan Palach after a Czech student who set himself on fire and died to protest against the “demoralization” of Czechoslovakian citizens caused by the Soviet occupation in 1968, revealed that he came from a country ruled by a totalitarian regime. He writes:
“I do not feel that I can speak my mind without reprisal. I feel that I am once again living under totalitarian rule, I fear that there will soon be informers reporting back to our senior managers, and the blackbird will start coming to people’s desks and escorting them out of the building to the gulag of unemployment.”
“I wish I were as brave as I was in my youth, when I came to RFE/RL,” the anonymous employee wrote. He added:
“Now I find myself unwilling to speak out against what I perceive as mismanagement and misinformation occurring at the a place whose stated mission is providing responsible discussion and open debate.”
At the core of the controversy seems to be the management style of the new Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty president Steven Korn. The outgoing Broadcasting Board of Governors chairman Walter Isaacson, the author of the best selling biography of Steve Jobs, praised Korn’s leadership in his departing message to senior staff. Both Isaacson and Korn were formerly top executives at CNN.
Korn made a number of controversial personnel changes at RFE/RL, some of which were reportedly quietly reversed by the BBG after Korn referred to a few of his senior managers in an email to a BBG member as “old white guys” and defended his decision to promote two female executives, calling them the two smartest people in the company. After learning of Korn’s “old white guys” comment, BBG members reportedly passed a resolution against discrimination in the workplace.
Some RFE/RL employees report to BBG Watch that employee morale is extremely low after a number of experienced journalists and other professionals were either pushed out or their positions changed, while some of the new executives put in charge lack journalistic credentials.
In memos to BBG members, Korn defends his actions. According to our sources, Korn told them that the organizational changes he wanted to make were shared by “many of our folks.” He also said that he was surprised by the degree people were direct and explicit how RFE/RL should be reorganized. He assured BBG members that he became increasingly convinced that the changes he needed to make and the people to promote were the right ones. He also reassured the Board that the management changes made in October 2011 were “broadly endorsed” by the company and became the springboard for everything the new management under his leadership is doing at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
Korn is also known for his public joke after watching a video narrated by a young woman that he intends to hire “a young high school intern” at RFE/RL. Some, particularly women, were offended by that remark, but the outgoing BBG chairman Isaacson and some others were observed laughing at Korn’s comment during an open Board meeting. Some BBG employees told BBG Watch that these kinds of comments and their endorsement by laughter contribute to the perception that the BBG is not a workplace where rank-and-file workers feel respected and can safely voice their opinions and express disagreement with management decisions.
BBG member most concern about employee morale and transparency issues is senior Republican Victor Ashe, a former mayor of Knoxville and former U.S. Ambassador to Poland. Ashe is one of the few BBG members who regularly meets with rank-and-file employees, listens to their complaints and urges other members to take remedial actions. Sources tell us that Ashe is very concerned about employee morale at RFE/RL and throughout all BBG broadcasting entities and other offices. Sources also told us that he has received some support from outgoing Chairman Isaacson, especially on transparency issues, but is sometimes opposed even by some Republican members.
The anonymous RFE/RL employee wrote:
“Unfortunately for me, I have much more to lose these days, and I choose to keep my head down, only writing on this site in the hopes that my posts will be read and those in charge will remember the reason we are here and refocus on doing what is best for the Radio, and not just just what is good for themselves. So yes, to my mind I am a coward, and I sometimes feel ashamed.”
But the RFE/RL employee is not giving in completely to intimidation. “As for the unnamed Governor’s word, for him to call me, and other contributors to this site cowards is an outrage,” the employee wrote.
The anonymous Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty journalist continues his message to a Broadcasting Board of Governors member with this challenge:
“I invite him/her to come to Prague and call me and my colleagues cowards to our faces. Explain to us how we are the cowards. We, who have left our homelands, sometimes with no hope of returning. We, who have left our families in peril. We, who have risked our lives all for the one goal of reporting the truth about what is happening.”
RFE/RL journalist then suggests what a Broadcasting Board of Governors member should do to reform management, address some of the issues, and improve morale:
“Or maybe he/she can apologize, read whatever grievances we collectively may have, work to fix those the Board can, and explain the reasons why others cannot be fixed. This would be significantly more productive than insulting us.”
BBG Watch has pointed out on this site, quoting from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, that “anonymous communications have an important place in our political and social discourse.”
The EFF stresses that the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled repeatedly that the right to anonymous free speech is protected by the First Amendment. A much-cited 1995 Supreme Court ruling in McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Commission reads:
“Protections for anonymous speech are vital to democratic discourse. Allowing dissenters to shield their identities frees them to express critical minority views . . . Anonymity is a shield from the tyranny of the majority. . . . It thus exemplifies the purpose behind the Bill of Rights and of the First Amendment in particular: to protect unpopular individuals from retaliation . . . at the hand of an intolerant society.”
According to the official Broadcasting Board of Governors website, the BBG’s mission is:
Our Mission
To inform, engage and connect people around the world in support of freedom and democracy.
BBG Watch is an independent and unofficial website edited by former and current Broadcasting Board of Governors employees and other volunteers. Contributors and those who want to comment on anything that is published by BBG Watch do not have to use their names or email addresses. We strongly advise current BBG employees and contractors as well as employees of the entities supervised by the BBG to NOT USE government computers and any other work-issued electronic devices to communicate with BBG Watch.
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From the official Broadcasting Board of Governors website:
“The Broadcasting Board of Governors is both the name of the independent federal government Agency that oversees all U.S. civilian international broadcasting, and the name of the Board that governs those broadcasts.
The broadcast organizations include the Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Europe/ Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), Office of Cuba Broadcasting (OCB), Radio Free Asia (RFA), Middle East Broadcasting Networks (MBN) and the International Broadcasting Bureau (IBB).
The Board is composed of nine members with expertise in the fields of mass communications, broadcast media, or international affairs. Eight members (4 Democrats and 4 Republicans) are appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate. The ninth, the Secretary of State, serves ex officio. The Secretary is represented on the Board by the Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs.
The BBG became an independent federal government agency on October 1, 1999.”
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Message to Broadcasting Board of Governors – Yes, some of us are cowards and we are ashamed
by Jan Palach (pen name of an anonymous RFE/RL employee)
An unnamed member of the Broadcasting Board of Governors has called out contributors to this website as cowards, which at first look is correct, and I have thought the same of myself since my last post.
I wish I were as brave as I was in my youth, when I came to RFE/RL. Then I, and my colleagues left our respective homelands to stand up to terror and totalitarianism. Now I find myself unwilling to speak out against what I perceive as mismanagement and misinformation occurring at the a place whose stated mission is providing responsible discussion and open debate.
I do not feel that I can speak my mind without reprisal. I feel that I am once again living under totalitarian rule, I fear that there will soon be informers reporting back to our senior managers, and the blackbird will start coming to people’s desks and escorting them out of the building to the gulag of unemployment.
Unfortunately for me, I have much more to lose these days, and I choose to keep my head down, only writing on this site in the hopes that my posts will be read and those in charge will remember the reason we are here and refocus on doing what is best for the Radio, and not just just what is good for themselves. So yes, to my mind I am a coward, and I sometimes feel ashamed.
As for the unnamed Governor’s word, for him to call me, and other contributors to this site cowards is an outrage.
I invite him/her to come to Prague and call me and my colleagues cowards to our faces. Explain to us how we are the cowards. We, who have left our homelands, sometimes with no hope of returning. We, who have left our families in peril. We, who have risked our lives all for the one goal of reporting the truth about what is happening.
Better yet, why not tell the family of slain VOA journalist Mukarram Khan Atif, who made the ultimate sacrifice in supporting the mission of U.S. International Broadcasting.
Or maybe he/she can apologize, read whatever grievances we collectively may have, work to fix those the Board can, and explain the reasons why others cannot be fixed. This would be significantly more productive than insulting us.
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I was fired from my job at BBG, after speaking out against a male coworker that made sexually harrassing comments. Now, I face unemployment after being forced out of my career that I was my passion and life. My male coworker and supervisor constantly humiliated and belittled me.
There is a senior manager (who is actually female) that heard me defend myself against the harasser. A coward is a male who is afraid of successful and independent women. Those who speak out are not cowards. Those who speak out are the bravest people that I know.
I am completely appalled by the treatment of the contractor/journalists at BBG who risk their lives for our country and the complete apathy from those responsible for not paying their salaries on time. Its disgusting and despicable that the people who are making the decisions for those that are risking their lives are safely lounging in their offices, in Washington, DC.
The laughter of Broadcasting Board of Governors members and other BBG officials (mostly males) in the room at Mr. Korn’s “young high school intern” comment after everyone saw a very capable and talented young woman narrate a Radio and TV Marti video should be a WARNIG to all young women, high school and college students who might think about applying for an internship or a job with the Broadcasting Board of Governors, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and other BBG-managed offices.
DO NOT APPLY to BBG, RFE/RL, etc. because you are likely to be treated not as a capable human being but as a SEX OBJECT.
Chairman Walter Isaacson, the entire Broadcasting Board of Governors, and especially Mr. Korn should publicly apologize to the young woman who narrated the video.
I think BBG members are cowards for not condemning this remark and not apologizing publicly to this wonderful woman. She deserves everybody’s respect. She does not deserve to be treated as a sex object.
What an appalling public diplomacy message from a U.S. federal agency charged with presenting America and American values to the world and promoting free speech and free press abroad.
Can you imagine what the Broadcasting Board of Governors would look like if Waler Isaacson and Steven Korn, two former CNN buddies, were permitted to turn this important national security and media freedom U.S. Government Agency into their own corporate CNN-like entity financed but not controlled by American taxpayers and Congress, in essence, to de-federalize and privatize for themselves these public diplomacy and journalistic institutions that should rightly belong to the American people? They still want us to pay their salaries.
Isaacson and Korn should apologize to “old white guys” as well. They are the ones plus many capable women as well, those who have worked at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and the Voice of America, who helped us win the Cold War and who know how to deal with authoritarian regimes in countries like China and Russia.
I say thank God that we still have at the BBG a few of those “old white guys,” “old non-white guys,” “old white women,” and “old non-white women” and a few younger ones of all races and both genders who understand what is needed to fight these regimes with uncensored news and information.
They should not be intimidated. They should be allowed to speak out without the fear of being called names and demoted or fired.
Congress should investigate and demand reforms. Congress should not approve their restructuring/strategic plan.
If anything is clear, the BBG is now AT WAR WITH ITS OWN EMPLOYEES. What a fantastic story for some enterprising news organization. A federal agency, with a private board that still largely does what it wants while remaining out of the spotlight of media scrutiny or accountability, calls its own employees, forced to speak out through an independent web site, cowards. Hopefully, the BBG’s new public relations official just hired from the State Department, after years with Congress, doesn’t think this is normal, or healthy and may be able to talk some sense into board members and IBB officials.
We can write to our senators and to members of Congress. If they receive enough complaints and information about the mismanagement at BBG, maybe they will do something about it….or at least send the government agencies that are responsible for oversight in to take a look at what is going on there. There are also other members of the media that can be contacted as well. If people really want a change, they can make it happen.
[...] Read another commentary by Jan Palach: Message to Broadcasting Board of Governors: Yes, some of us are cowards and we are ashamed. [...]