Three Cups of Tea veracity questioned

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/18/business/media/18mortenson.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&hp

CBS is questioning how he came upon the village.

Brian

It was an interesting 60 Minutes piece last night on this... a little one sided I thought but then again, there are a few things to that seem off.

One thing that was brought out in the "60 Minutes" report but not the the NYTimes article is that even if the book are a bit loose with the truth and the Central Asia Institute hasn't kept good track of its funds, Mortenson has certainly done a lot of good in the area.

Doug

My mother who lived in Afghanistan for 2 years was not impressed with Mortenson, she saw him as a scam victim from the locals who were happy to have him build schools, bridges, or anything else. Perhaps there is somebody at this end stealing money and he hasn't caught on, or maybe the locals are redirecting it to a more important purpose as with the bridge. As for the donors, dumping the money somewhere in the 3rd world economy may be better than one more latte or BMW.

For anyone who missed the 14-minute episode on 60 Minutes this past weekend, here is a link, followed by one with a partial reply posted on the Central Asia Institute website. As a donor to the Central Asia Institute, I received an email letter today stating that Greg will be undergoing heart surgery soon to correct a serious medical problem, so will not be able to reply further until he recovers.

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7363068n

http://www.ikat.org/wp-includes/documents/gmresponse.pdf

FWIW, Jon Krakauer's piece on Mortenson can be downloaded for free until 4/20 (today). http://byliner.com/

Mortenson's response to the charges as reported in an Outside Magazine article can be found here: http://outsideonline.com/adventure/travel-ga-greg-mortenson-interview-sidwcmdev_155690.html

I started reading those two pieces, but stopped. It's all rather depressing/distressing.

Am reasonably certain in due time it will sort itself out, and Mortenson will either be exonerated or excoriated, or somewhere in between.

Yes, it's too bad. Many people have been entranced by the book, and support CAI. Controversy is always attracted to visible causes, and always complicates things.

To me the botom line is as Doug Paul said. Mortensen may be sloppy with some facts or some cash, but he's out there doing something good. Many of his critics (not Krakauer, but many of the press shills) are armchair complainers, trying to enrich themselves by latching onto this controversy, and they haven't ever done anything for anyone but themselves. Instead of b**ching, they should go out and do it better, if they're so smart.

TCD said:

Instead of b**ching, they should go out and do it better, if they're so smart.

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And should those people who criticize the work of journalists go out and do their job better?

What do you think is an appropriate way for the press to approach this situation? Not report on it at all?

Press loves to pile on at any hint of dirt, lilke chickens pecking a blood spot. I'll bet there are a thousand times more reports on Mortensen in the press this week than there were 1 month ago. Much more important to sell papers based on the little things that are wrong than to keep us informed of all the good that's been done over a long period of time.

In answer to your question, how should the press report; it's their overall lack of perspective that bothers me. All the while Mortensen's been building schools, the press has been busy with Lindsay Lohan. Now that there's a spec of blood on him, they're all over him. So regarding Mortensen, it's probably too late for the press to go back and create any kind of perspective in their overall reporting.

There are probably many other people also doing great work, but we'll never hear about them either until they screw up. Maybe some of these "investigative reporters" could go out and report on some of the other good work that is being done.

TCD said:

PAll the while Mortensen's been building schools, the press has been busy with Lindsay Lohan.

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This is why I've been turning to BBC and Al Jazeera more and more for my news.

Accounting

I find it frustrating to see institutions across the spectrum of the government that are dispensing huge amounts of money with very little accounting for where the $$$ go.

The technology to make these money requests part of the public domain (web) certainly exists. (with detailed amounts and locations where apparent 'good deeds are happening' )

This goes too for 'foreign aid' where millions of dollars go to countries only to be snatched by local bureaucrats and nothing trickling to the actual people.

While we get busy looking at the big picture of Republican vs Democrat slingfests we should instead demand specific improvements in accounting and transparency.

Mod Note
We're giving this thread a bit of leeway, but please refrain from political discussion.

David Metsky said:

Mod Note
We're giving this thread a bit of leeway, but please refrain from political discussion.

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Now having viewed the 60-minutes piece twice, read carefully Jon Krakauer's By-line piece, and digested Greg Mortenson's interview, along with all of the comments posted through this morning in Outside Magazine's on-line site, I am totally bummed out.

Greg has been one of my heroes, but I have great respect for Jon as a mountaineer, author, and journalist (Jon was a contributing editor who wrote pieces for 12 straight issues of Outside Magazine when he was getting started in journalism, long before the 1996 Everest debacle made him famous and rich; these pieces later became most of the chapters for his book Eiger Dreams).

I am going to take some time off from this issue, and perhaps go back and catch up with some reading on Funky Freddy's mountain lions thread.

Scott Darsney Questions the Accuracy and Fairness of "Three Cups of Deceit" http://outsideonline.com/adventure/...-deceit-response-sidwcmdev_155822.html?page=3

I heard a rumor the whole thing only involved two cups of tea.

Greg Mortenson and CAI roll out a defense. Outside Magazine

http://outside-blog.away.com/blog/2011/05/greg-mortenson-and-central-asia-institute-respond.html

Kraken

Unfortunately after reading Into Thin Air I have put Krakauer on my $@@t list. I won't read his stuff. In a dispute I will side with the opposite party.