不是所有的新闻都能相信文章原标题：核实是最好的办法

chrisxsy · 发表于 2010-12-10 20:19:25

　　安德森·库珀（Anderson Cooper）在11月4日为国家做了件好事，他在其主持的CN*节目里从专业角度解析并拆穿了一则近日风传的谣言，这则谣言宣称奥巴马总统的亚洲之行每日花费高达两亿美元。这是一则具有重大意义的报道，它证明马克·吐温的确拥有超出他所处时代的远见卓识：还在互联网盛行之前一个世纪，他就道出了这句富有前瞻性的话语--“当真理还在穿鞋的时候，谎言已经走遍了半个世界”。不过，它也同样展示了医治恶意不实新闻的解药只能是客观、真实的好新闻。
　　让我们来回顾一下这则报道，以免你错过其中精彩。在奥巴马总统展开亚洲之行前夕，这则报道便开始在网上散播，声称这次访问每天将花掉美国纳税人两亿美元，整个行程将耗费20亿美元。库珀说这则消息如此耸人听闻，他不得不去核实。因为在此前的一个晚上，库珀邀请来自明尼苏达州的众议员米歇尔·巴克曼（Michele Bachmann，一位共和党人及“茶党”宠儿）在他的节目做嘉宾，向其询问共和党究竟打算将如何消减预算。
　　巴克曼不仅没有透露具体情况，反而借用节目时间向主流媒体曝出了一条虚假的消息。她回答说：“我想各位都知道，就在这一两天之内，合众国的总统将会去印度访问，预计每天要花掉纳税人两亿美元。他将携带2000名随行人员，还将在印度租用超过870间客房，而这些都是泰姬陵五星级大酒店里面的客房，这简直就是一种浪费。”
　　次日晚间，库珀解释说自己不得不去对这则消息追根溯源，因为有人利用他的节目四处散布巴克曼的言论。经过一番调查发现，这则消息最初引述自“印度马哈拉施特拉邦一名所谓的省级官员”的话，报道来源为印度通讯社。库珀说：“我之所以称之为'所谓的'省级官员，是因为我们对这个人的身份一无所知，甚至连名字都不知道。”
　　从一名马哈拉施特拉邦的印度高级官员口中道出美国总统亚洲之行所产生的费用数目，这种说法的真实性实在是苍白无力。
　　“这是数字来自一个不愿透露姓名的印度官员，印度某些记者写文章时引用了这个数字。没有提供任何证据，也没有进行任何后续报道。”库珀介绍说，“现在你可能会想，如果一位国会议员打算用这个数字作为事实依据，那么她准会对数字的真实性十拿九稳，是不是？但是各界对于这则来自印度的消息没有任何跟进报道。文章被”德拉吉报道“（The Drudge Report，美国著名政治八卦网站）和其他网站转载，很快就在保守派谈话类广播节目中传播开来。”
　　然后，库珀在节目中展示了以下片段：拉什·林波（Rush Limbaugh，美国著名保守派广播节目主持人，号称拥有听众2千万）在讨论奥巴马亚洲之旅时宣称：“两天之后，他将会在印度，每天花掉两亿美元。”紧接着，格伦·贝克（Glenn Beck，美国福克斯电视台和广播节目主持人，茶党在媒体的主要支持人）在他的电台脱口秀中斥责：“你们见过这样的总统吗？见过总统去度假需要动用34艘军舰吗？20亿美元，整整20亿美元，34艘军舰。而且还有三千人陪同他旅行。”在贝克的演绎版本中，总统对印度的正式国事访问变成了一次动用美国海军十分之一军力保驾护航的“度假”。与前面几位趋同，保守派广播脱口秀主持人迈克尔·萨维奇（Michael Savage）讥讽道：“两亿美元？每天花两亿美元浪费在安保上以及这次让人难以置信的君主式访问的其他方面；三千随行人员，其中还包括特勤处特工。”
　　库珀随后补充说：“似乎又一次没有人真正在乎去核实情况。出于安全保密的原因，白宫一般不对总统出访的后勤保障作出评论，但是这次破例进行了回应。” 库珀引述了一段白宫新闻秘书罗伯特·吉布斯（Robert Gibbs）的原话--“我不会告诉你总统出访要花多少钱，但与克林顿总统和布什总统在任时的出访情况相比，此次旅程每天花费不会达到两亿美元。”五角大楼的新闻发言人杰夫·莫雷尔（Geoff Morrell）则说：“这次我将冒昧地驳回这一荒谬绝伦的说法。无论如何，我们也不可能为了保护总统的亚洲之行而部署十分之一的海军军力和34艘军舰以及一艘航空母舰。这种说法实在可笑，与我们实际的部署大相径庭。”
　　库珀同时指出，根据国会预算办公室的数据，阿富汗战争每天大概需要花费1.9亿美元；而克林顿1998年的非洲之行总共携带了1300名随行人员，出访时间和资金花费与此次出访相差无几，政府问责办公室在扣除通胀因素后得出的数据大约是每天花费520万美元。
　　每当受到普遍关注的公众人物随意开口而不对所说内容加以核实，我们就有麻烦了。一个民主政体不可能对重大问题都做到周全考虑，比如减少赤字、医疗保健、税收、能源和气候等问题，更不用说对它们都能产生影响了。事实、观点和谎言相互交织在一起。然而，如今在公众争论中占据优势地位的喧闹者并没有离开舞台的意愿，互联网当然也不会选择退场。你所能期待的就是更多的人能像库珀那样：当下一个疯狂的谎言传遍世界时，人们的第一直觉应该是怀疑它，而不是重复它。
英文原文：
Too Good to Check （NY Times，November 16, 2010）
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
　　On Nov. 4, Anderson Cooper did the country a favor. He expertly deconstructed on his CN* show the bogus rumor that President Obama's trip to Asia would cost $200 million a day. This was an important “story.” It underscored just how far ahead of his time Mark Twain was when he said a century before the Internet, “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” But it also showed that there is an antidote to malicious journalism - and that's good journalism.
　　In case you missed it, a story circulated around the Web on the eve of President Obama's trip that it would cost U.S. taxpayers $200 million a day - about $2 billion for the entire trip. Cooper said he felt impelled to check it out because the evening before he had had Representative Michele Bachmann of Minnesota, a Republican and Tea Party favorite, on his show and had asked her where exactly Republicans will cut the budget.
　　Instead of giving specifics, Bachmann used her airtime to inject a phony story into the mainstream. She answered: “I think we know that just within a day or so the president of the United States will be taking a trip over to India that is expected to cost the taxpayers $200 million a day. He's taking 2,000 people with him. He'll be renting over 870 rooms in India, and these are five-star hotel rooms at the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. This is the kind of over-the-top spending.”
　　The next night, Cooper explained that he felt compelled to trace that story back to its source, since someone had used his show to circulate it. His research, he said, found that it had originated from a quote by “an alleged Indian provincial official,” from the Indian state of Maharashtra, “reported by India's Press Trust, their equivalent of our A.P. or Reuters. I say 'alleged,' provincial official,” Cooper added, “because we have no idea who this person is, no name was given.”
　　It is hard to get any more flimsy than a senior unnamed Indian official from Maharashtra talking about the cost of an Asian trip by the American president.
　　“It was an anonymous quote,” said Cooper. “Some reporter in India wrote this article with this figure in it. No proof was given; no follow-up reporting was done. Now you'd think if a member of Congress was going to use this figure as a fact, she would want to be pretty darn sure it was accurate, right? But there hasn't been any follow-up reporting on this Indian story. The Indian article was picked up by The Drudge Report and other sites online, and it quickly made its way into conservative talk radio.”
　　Cooper then showed the following snippets: Rush Limbaugh talking about Obama's trip: “In two days from now, he'll be in India at $200 million a day.” Then Glenn Beck, on his radio show, saying: “Have you ever seen the president, ever seen the president go over for a vacation where you needed 34 warships, $2 billion - $2 billion, 34 warships. We are sending - he's traveling with 3,000 people.” In Beck's rendition, the president's official state visit to India became “a vacation” accompanied by one-tenth of the U.S. Navy. Ditto the conservative radio talk-show host Michael Savage. He said, “$200 million? $200 million each day on security and other aspects of this incredible royalist visit; 3,000 people, including Secret Service agents.”
　　Cooper then added: “Again, no one really seemed to care to check the facts. For security reasons, the White House doesn't comment on logistics of presidential trips, but they have made an exception this time. He then quoted Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, as saying, “I am not going to go into how much it costs to protect the president, [but this trip] is comparable to when President Clinton and when President Bush traveled abroad. This trip doesn't cost $200 million a day.” Geoff Morrell, the Pentagon press secretary, said: “I will take the liberty this time of dismissing as absolutely absurd, this notion that somehow we were deploying 10 percent of the Navy and some 34 ships and an aircraft carrier in support of the president's trip to Asia. That's just comical. Nothing close to that is being done.”

　　Cooper also pointed out that, according to the Congressional Budget Office, the entire war effort in Afghanistan was costing about $190 million a day and that President Bill Clinton's 1998 trip to Africa - with 1,300 people and of roughly similar duration, cost, according to the Government Accountability Office and adjusted for inflation, “about $5.2 million a day.”
　　When widely followed public figures feel free to say anything, without any fact-checking, we have a problem. It becomes impossible for a democracy to think intelligently about big issues - deficit reduction, health care, taxes, energy/climate - let alone act on them. Facts, opinions and fabrications just blend together. But the carnival barkers that so dominate our public debate today are not going away - and neither is the Internet. All you can hope is that more people will do what Cooper did - so when the next crazy lie races around the world, people's first instinct will be to doubt it, not repeat it.
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