Well, good morning, everyone and thank you for coming here to csis. Im glad to see theres also a large group of students in the room. Want to raise your hands wax thats great. Wow. Im deborah mccarthy, executive director of a new program we have here at csis to bring Diverse Voices and diverse perspectives to discussions of foreign affairs. Its a result of the partnership between the International CareerAdvancement Program alumni association. And csis. We have some amazing donors were committed to this effort and we want to thank. The panel we have today is fantastic. It will challenge you, bring your thoughts and provoke new questions. Our moderator, beverly kirk, is well known to many of you as a Program Manager of smart womens march power plus four other incarnations yet csis. Shes also a member of tranone to icapaa and getting so Program Going so please enjoy. Thank you so much and thank you everyone for joining us here and online and ten views on cspan. As deborah mention im beverly kirk, a fellow at csis in the International Student program and i managed the smart womens march power initiative. Full disclosure, i spent more than two decades as the journalist. In fact, most of that time with you in washington and ive worked with three of the four people who were sitting on the stage. And so let me introduce them to you. To my immediate left is jeff ballou, the 100 tenth president of the National Press club. The first africanamerican man and the first representative of the International Meteor organization. Jeff is the newsletter at Aljazeera Media Network and is part of a global editorial leadership team. He helped to establish the English Channel back in 2006. He is a Dupont Peabody Merle and Emmy Awardwinning journalist. He praises work at cspan npr and local d. C. Stations. Next to him as diana marrero, the director of the hill looking and a new media platform that she helped to launch that is focus on latina public affairs. Before shifting to the business side of the media she was an awardwinning journalist beginning her career at the miami herald which is part of a team that covered the Elian GonzalezInternational Custody battle, and she also served as the acting Washington Bureau chief for the milwaukee journal settle for her work has appeared in the Washington Post, usa today and the south Florida Sunset approaches abound and past president of the washington, d. C. , chapter of the National Association of hispanic journalists. So welcome, diana. Next to her is roslyn jordan, the United Nations correspondent for aljazeera and sh shes priy covered the state department and the pentagon for aljazeera. Previously she covered the white house for nbc news as well as broadcastinbroadcast missions nr an emmy for work on nbcs 2004 president ial Election Night coverage in she want original Associated Press award for her reporting on the u. S. Immigration debate. I work with threat in bc. Next to her is eric ham, a political analyst for the bbc, sirius xm, the hill and is also contributed to cnn. He has been senior contributor and a former hill staffer. He was a key advisor to senator bill nelson and the Senate Armed Services committee. Its also the the author of the book called the gop civil war, inside of the battle for the fall of the republican party. And also want to give a special shout out to eric because this is a homecoming for turkey was previously director of Congressional Affairs here at csis. So welcome home. Thank you. We have a saying here, you never really leave. Its kind of like the hotel california. So lets get started with the Geopolitical Impact of the Fourth Estate and want to start with the issue of trust. That is an issue that is certainly ever present and want to know to think about what happens when people feel like the information that they are getting their questioning whether they can believe it, particularly as that concerns global issues, global hotspots. I think trust is paramount because once you lose trust, you cant trust the information. As it relates to the Fourth Estate, as you can tell in the current arena, theres a lot of challenges to the profession, a lot of people engaging in twitter trolling and a whole range of interesting behavior. Ill put it nicely, characterize it. Pg tv. But when it gets down to is this. If you have the leader of the free world spending months, weeks, days, weeks, months, for 18 months leading into the presidency denouncing the press, which is an intricate part of the constitution itself, youre not only undermining trust in the Fourth Estate, your undermining trust in the constitution itself. And when you do that, that undermines trust in the other institutions in a country dirt and if we are supposed come if the United States is supposed to be a beacon for democracy and Free Expression and freedom of the press, then other despots elsewhere in the world say see, the president of the United States can do it, we can do it, too. And they do. And so, therefore, its a scary situation in the sense that it not only puts journalist in danger, it puts your information in a place where it can be created by people who dont have their peoples best interest at hand in countries that are not up to snuff in terms of having stable environment, having safe streets, having anything that resembles a sense of safety and security to move about, and even feel that they can question their representatives. And if they cant do it here, then youre left to your own devices, and thats chaos. That could lead to chaos. I come at this from a political standpoint. I work for a political newspaper, and its interesting to see how that is divided among partisan lines as well. Theres been surveys that show that democrats versus republicans, republicans are actually less likely to trust news sources than democrats are. So its a really interesting dynamic that happening. The columbia journalism review put out a study around the time of the election looking at the folks who were retreating tweets from clinton versus trump and then what media sources they were using in retweeting pencils. They put out a fantastic bubble chart the looks that, basically was a proxy for democrats, republicans have much to the trust certain media institutions. Youll see places like the Washington Post, New York Times, cnn, all organizations that should be trusted that are mainstream that are credible really discarded by half the population. It was really striking to see that. And then on the other end at places like Breitbart News being trusted and we tweeted by the right but obviously not by the left or what i feel good about is being at the hill, i work at a place that is very nonpartisan. That comes from a very straightforward perspective. We were excited to see, we were right in the middle. So we were this big green spot in the middle, we with the most trusted news source by both the democrats and the republicans. One of the thing i will say about trust is that this is acrosstheboard come its not just a good news phenomenon. If we look at surveys is a lack of trust in institutions globally. The church, government. You could go down the line. Companies here people are just not trust the major institutions that for many, many years had held that trust of consumers in the public. Rosiland, you are out in the field reporting on issues. How do you make sure that people trust what youre telling them . Well, i keep in mind that from the very beginning of the United States [phone ringing] theres like the suspicion of a free press. Lets not forget we once had the alien sedition act in which criticizing political figures for the baby could land you in prison. And it was bipartisan. Politicians dont like to be held to account. So i keep that in mind when im trying to do my work. What i say to people try to challenge my work is look at my sourcing, look at how i characterize the information. Was a accurate . Was a fair . Did i give all sides the credence . Did i present a skeptical view where it was necessary . One of the things that we have to remember about working in the media is that its the two way street. We collect information. We present the information. We analyze the information. But it is incumbent upon the public, the readers, listeners, the viewers, the people who engage with us on social media to actually think about what they are seeing and hearing and reading. Use your critical faculties. Be skeptical. Ask your own questions. Dont just take what aljazeera put out and what the bbc puts out a what cnn puts out, or what any number of newspapers, because newspapers are still very much a vibrant part of our political culture. Dont just take what is being published as the gospel truth. Ask your own questions. Ask whether the people presenting information have a track record of actually showing you whats happening. Or if they have a record of trying to pull a fast one on you. You cant be a passive consumer. I hate that word because its such a business word but you cant be a passive consumer of the news. This is my personal view. Being an informed person is being a good citizen, particularly in the United States which has the first amendment. And so when people say well, what about this . I will say, take a look at these stories. I will say, take a look at what i said. Tony what you really objecting to. Then we can have a conversation. Thats usually how i defuse it. I end up taking it right back to the person and saying, okay, you took the time to actually reach out to me and say i have an issue with that you reported. Lets talk about it. Do you have insight that made i overlooked . In for me. Thats my job. I get paid to learn something every day and sent to share it with everyone else. But you have to do it every single day. Theres a story or theres a line youre only as good as your last story. In this climate youre only as good as your body of work. And if you make a mistake, people hold you accountable. I challenge journalists to hold our readers and listeners and viewers accountable as well. Are you engaging with us in good faith, or are you simply looking for someone to reflect your personal opinion . Im not here for that. You can call your mom. [laughing] eric, you come at this from a different spin. You do analysis. You make sure people trust your analysis. Thats a really interesting point, because what i try, i try to stay away from the partisanship because so many people are looking for that. A lot of people want to know whos up, whos down. And always asked are you a republican, a democrat . I tried to tell them that we tried to stay away from that and were just looking at what the impact is of the action, the policy we are addressing right now, and what that will mean for multiple audiences in different groups. And also when we look at the Fourth Estate, if i could just go into this, coming from the standpoint of having worked in one of the three branches of government, in congress, which i was there we saw the Fourth Estate as sacrosanct. It was an independent body, if repressed but it was something we felt was important to how democracy works. And it was also a tool that we could use, not in terms of actual propaganda or anything like that but actually getting out the message in terms of what the work is were doing, what issue we are focusing on, what legislation were trying to pass, what were trying to do particularly in terms of funding for at the time when i was in congress the iraq war was at an alltime high and we really engaged in that so we were focusing on trying to make sure that people knew about how we were trying to provide for our troops, how were trying to engage in the war. We want to try to get that message out. And also one thing i can say as a contributor for the hill in terms of writing, what i have found is when i write about stories of international interest, unfortunately i dont get as many eyeballs. I dont get as many comments or much feedback on those types of stories here in two scenes that, i guess maybe its because were living in such a heightened political environment right now. But when you write about the whos up, whos down come in terms of the politics, thats when people really seem to get engaged. I think its incumbent on all of us in the media to really try to break through that and really focus on trying to educate and tried to bring our audience alone. What we want to do is we want to try to i think take them to Higher Ground and not reached to the lowest common denominator. You raise an interesting point about international views and our attention and appetite for that and we were talking back in the green room about how things are covered here in the u. S. Versus how international bead organizations, which all of you have experience with, cover that. So we will jump to that topic. How are International News outlets affecting or impacting coverage here in the u. S. . I asked this not necessary from a political perspective on a know when i watch bbc or when i watch aljazeera or when i watch others, the story line up and issues that are covered are often very different than what i see when i watch cnn, msnbc, fox news, abc, nbc, cbs. If you guys could talk about the differences there. I would say probably not nearly as much of an impact as we would hope. We were talking before about the political crisis in venezuela. You know, when one of our senior correspondence, our latin american editor can get in and can get a visa, she will go into report. But if the venezuelan government doesnt give our cruise visas, they have to sit on the border and colombia and watch people come across, and basically scavenged to keep himself and the families alive while the political crisis plays itself out. And you would think u. S. Networks would want to be there. This is human suffering. This is political crisis. All of the elements of the drama, tension, and a political figure who, for better or worse, is considered the bogeyman here in washington, cant break through. The story cant break through. Cynically, i think, if we take the mass casualties, people losing their lives before the u. S. Media with actually invest time and people, and people are expensive to actually cover the political crisis in venezuela. Yemen, no one can get in. Its an active war zone. The saudi israeli control the access. The u. N. Does not have the ability to take reporters in with the righ brightness weve already asked because of ongoing cholera epidemic. So we have two cover around the edges. But again because of the u. S. Is not actively directly involved in the conflict, it is supporting the saudis, but because the u. S. Is not leading this war, very little presence, certainly on the airwaves. Youll see story in the times and in the post, but if you want better reporting then youre going to have to start reading the guardian, the independence, start reading middle east newspapers but you will not find it whole skill in a typical u. S. Newspaper. Right. And also just with that qatar crisis com, and actually speakin that issue on error practically every day on air. I do for bbc or sky news. I dont see any u. S. Media Companies Action really engaging and speaking about it but its something that its an ongoing issue and its something that many audiences outside of the u. S. Are deeply engaged and concerned about. Theyre such a huge demand with bbc and sky news to really not only address it and talk about it, but they want to know what is the u. S. Role in the crisis and whats the u. S. Policy, whats the u. S. Position, what is donald trump, what is the president going to do to try to address this issue. And so it something that theyre covering en masse but its also something that theyre desperately looking for the United States and the United States engagement and what is the u. S. Position on these issues. Any International Issue that ongoing, you have any think may be one of the advantages to being an american, i shouldnt say that. That sounds pretty bad, right . But anyway, what i think passport is a good thing. Theres a huge demand, a hue thirst and appetite for International Media outlets looking for that u. S. Voice and looking for someone who can speak coherently to what the u. S. Role is and explain it and break it down to those audiences, those particular audiences. And i think thats so key right now. And we dont see i think american Media Outlets addressing the issues and speaking to traditional american audiences about whats going on in the rest of the world. To your point, id want to add to your point, i just came back from two weeks in the middle east covering the diplomatic crisis. I didnt see any of my fellow american reporters until Rex Tillerson left the presidency trip in europe and flew to kuwait city for a week of diplomacy. Because of the secretary of state is in carrying a big media contingent as previous secretary said that, people had to fly in domestically and were holed up in random motels around the city and would be get access to meet because theyre all closed doors, but that was a one moment you saw the Washington Post and the New York Times and the tv netwo