It’s hardly necessary for a critic to argue that the country’s major daily newspapers, the New York Times and Washington Post, routinely ignore their stated principles on anonymous sources (however vague such standards may be to begin with), the outlets make the case so vividly themselves. The New York Times rules state, for instance, that anonymity is “reserved for situations in which the newspaper could not otherwise print information it considers reliable and newsworthy,” and “should not be invoked for a trivial comment, or to make an unremarkable comment appear portentous” (“Confidential News Sources Policy,” NYTCo.com). Times readers, nonetheless, regularly [...]
Search Results for: Ben Bagdikian
Oct
01
2011
Media Monopoly Revisited
The 20 corporations that dominate our information and ideas
The introduction of the original 1983 edition of The Media Monopoly, Ben Bagdikian’s classic investigation of media consolidation, concluded: “When 50 men and women, chiefs of their corporations, control more than half the information and ideas that reach 220 million Americans, it is time for Americans to examine the institutions from which they receive their daily picture of the world.” When the second edition was released in 1987, the number of people controlling half the media was down to 26. By 1993, as the last edition went to print, the number had fallen to 20. To arrive at these alarming [...]
Jun
12
2009
Phyllis Bennis on Obama's Cairo speech, Jonathan Tasini on the Boston Globe/GM
Download MP3 This week on CounterSpin: Barack Obama has either been currying favor with Muslims or extending an olive branch in the Middle East depending on which media you consume. We'll talk with Phyllis Bennis of the Institute for Policy Studies about Obama's major speech in Cairo, and the size of the gap between words and actions. Also on the show: The Boston Globe says it will impose a 23 percent wage cut on its employees on June 14. This is needed, says the Globe’s parent New York Times Company, because that paper is losing money. But is there more [...]
Jun
01
2006
Update
[Note: This piece is a sidebar to ‘Wall Street Does Not Like Newspapers’.] Since CounterSpin’s interview with Ben Bagdikian, McClatchy has announced a pending deal that will turn over four of the former Knight Ridder papers—the St. Paul Pioneer Press, San Jose Mercury News, Contra Costa Times and Monterey County Herald—to the Denver-based MediaNews Group. With the addition of the three Northern California dailies, MediaNews, which already owns the Oakland Tribune, San Mateo Times and Marin Independent Journal, among other local publications, is poised to become a powerful regional media force. The San Jose Newspaper Guild, a union representing workers [...]
Jun
01
2006
'Wall Street Does Not Like Newspapers'
CounterSpin Interview with Ben Bagdikian
In the latest media concentration story, the McClatchy newspaper chain, which currently owns 12 dailies, is buying out the larger Knight Ridder chain and its 32 newspapers. McClatchy has announced that it will immediately resell 12 of the Knight Ridder dailies, including such venerated newspapers as the Philadelphia Inquirer and the San Jose Mercury News. For a look at what the McClatchy/Knight Ridder story means for journalism and the media business, CounterSpin turned to Ben Bagdikian, dean emeritus of the UC Berkeley School of Journalism and author of the landmark book The Media Monopoly, now in its seventh edition. CounterSpin: [...]
Mar
17
2006
Jack Fairweather on 'Heroes in Error,' Ben Bagdikian on Knight-Ridder sale
Download MP3 This week on CounterSpin: The McClatchy newspaper chain is buying the larger Knight Ridder chain. What does this latest episode of corporate media concentration mean for journalism? We'll hear from Ben Bagdikian, author of the landmark book, The Media Monopoly, and former UC Berkeley Journalism School dean. Also this week: It's well-established that Ahmad Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress fed all kinds of bogus stories to the US media to help make the case for the Iraq War. With the invasion's three-year anniversary looming, the new issue of Mother Jones exposes yet another INC tall tale. We'll talk to [...]
Feb
01
2006
The Secret Origins of FAIR
How police spies and media moles helped launch a movement
In 1997, the Soviet Union detonated thermonuclear weapons in the sky over the United States, shutting down the Pentagon’s computer systems and leaving the nation vulnerable to invasion and occupation. The U.N., dominated by East Bloc Communists, became the U.S.’s de facto government, forcing schoolchildren to pledge allegiance to the U.N. flag. The year 1997 never fit this profile in reality, but it did in Amerika, the 12-episode miniseries broadcast by ABC in 1987. To this day, Jeff Cohen won’t reveal the identity of the person who sent him an advance script of Amerika. But that anonymous person made Cohen [...]
Dec
08
2005
Rumsfeld's Handshake Deal With Saddam
History Out of Media Bounds
Christmas came 11 days early for Donald Rumsfeld two years ago when the news broke that American forces had pulled Saddam Hussein from a spidery hole. During interviews about the capture, on CBS and ABC, the Pentagon’s top man was upbeat. And he didn’t have to deal with a question that Lesley Stahl or Peter Jennings could have logically chosen to ask: “Secretary Rumsfeld, you met with Saddam almost exactly 20 years ago and shook his hand. What kind of guy was he?” Now, Saddam Hussein has gone on trial, but such questions remain unasked by mainstream U.S. journalists. Rumsfeld [...]
