CBS 60 Minutes Hangs Tough On
CBS 60 Minutes Hangs Tough On
Date: Monday, March 17, 2003 7:23 PM
H-1B and JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER
www.ZaZona.com
If I had one question for Lesley Stahl I would ask her if that red
leather skirt of hers earned her a spot in the IIT frat house.
http://www.vdare.com/guzzardi/hangs_tough.htm
March 15, 2003
CBS 60 Minutes Hangs Tough On Dispossessing Americans
By Joe Guzzardi
My January 13 VDARE.COM column CBS 60 Minutes Fires First Shot in
New H-1B Battle set off a barrage of e-mail.
The 60 Minutes show, Imported from India, was hosted by an adoring
Lesley Stahl (lesleystahl@cbsnews.com). She fell hook, line and sinker
for the PR pap advanced by the Indian Institute of Technology and its
shills.
In what was essentially an infomercial, [transcript] nary a word was
spoken on behalf of American engineers, American universities or
American workers who have been and will continue to be displaced by IIT
graduates and other H-1B visa holders. Immigration reformer Rob
Sanchez, publisher of H1BNews and www.zazona.com referred to Stahl in
his newsletter as an IIT frat girl.
After VDARE.COM posted my highly critical essay, irate IIT graduates
sent me arrogant, self-congratulatory notes. Some mail was nasty. The
subject line in one e-mail read, The middle finger from an IITian.
Several accused me of xenophobic hostility.
Later that week, just as the flurry died down, Rome Hartman, the
producer of Imported from India emailed me. Hartman, who acknowledged
getting swamped with mail wanted to set the record straight.
Referring to my harsh assessment in VDARE.COM, Hartman insisted that 60
Minutes had done a professional story.
Hartman wrote:
We did our homework on this story. We were not somehow snowed
into doing a puff piece, as some comments have suggested. IIT is
a distinctive educational institution, by any measure, and its
graduates have accomplished much, in India and abroad. Its worthy of
note, and we took note of it. It isfar more selective than the most
selective U.S. universities; it does occupy a lofty position in the
Indian imagination. IIT graduates have made important and creative
contributions to the U.S. tech sector, and to our economy. These are
facts. We did not diss American universities, students, or
professionals simply because we recognized the excellence of an
institution halfway around the world, and of its graduates. To level
that charge at us betrays a narrow view of the world, and a broad-brush
resentment that is neither constructive nor attractive.
I asked Hartman if I could have Professor Norm Matloff of the
University of California at Davis respond. Matloff, a computer
scientist, has been described by Peter Brimelow as one of the
leading figures in the immigration reform movement.
In his reply to Hartman, Matloff introduced himself as a liberal
Democrat and an immigrants rights advocate. He further identified
himself as one who has recruited students from IIT.
Then Matloff stated that the IIT curriculum and faculty are good rather
than great. And he challenged Hartmans often-repeated statement that
IIT H-1Bs are paid at market rates.
To conclude, Matloff charged that CBS was guilty of journalistic
irresponsibility. Where, asked Matloff, were the dissenting voices?
And Matloff strongly urged that, with H-1B visa legislation scheduled
to sunset this year, 60 Minutes do a story on the impact of 195,000
H-1B visas issued annually in an economy when American programmers have
been fired.
This is a very serious problem, one that it is high time for 60 Minutes
to revisit, wrote Matloff, referring to the quite good 1993 60 Minutes
H-1B segment North of the Border. (Hartman: We did that story.)
Matloff sent his e-mail on January 25th. 60 Minutes rebroadcast
Imported from India, on March 2. I sent the message a second time.
Finally, on March 11th, I received a reply. In short, 60 Minutes
isnt budging.
Reiterated Hartman, 60 Minutes is proud of the story, was not
influenced by any public relations campaign, did not disrespect
American students or universities - but only recognized the
extraordinary place that IIT occupies in Indian society and imagination
Hartmans response didnt acknowledge of the lack of balance and
held out no promise of a story from the U.S. workers perspective.
Worse, his note did not indicate the least interest in pursuing the
other side.
All of this is disappointing but not surprising. Once again, concerned
Americans with reasonable and valid views are ignored. This is how our
foes in the media elite deal with us: they ignore us.
Instead of going toe to toe on the facts, or at least being fair and
balanced, the media proceeds as though it holds the high ground and
dismisses criticism without further ado.
Is it any wonder that the public holds the media in such disdain?
Joe Guzzardi [email him], an instructor in English at the Lodi Adult
School, has been writing a weekly newspaper column since 1988. This
column is exclusive to VDARE.COM.
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