At a time when more women than ever before are serving in Congress, we still rarely see examples of female leaders holding positions of prestige and power in popular movies and TV shows.
Search Results for: Mark Cook
Feb
01
2013
GENDER FOCUS: Few Roles for Female Role Models
Fictional women leaders lag real world
By Megan Tady
Sep
14
2012
Brought to You by...Big Oil?
Washington Post hides industry sponsorship of energy debate
The Washington Post had a two-page spread in its September 11 edition devoted to a "debate" on energy policy. But industry critics were missing from the picture. Why? Perhaps because the oil industry, undisclosed to Post readers, was sponsoring the discussion.
Aug
01
2012
Putting Consumers Back in Their Place
After ‘pink slime’ victory, reminders that corporations do know best
Corporate news media paid what looked like sympathetic attention to consumer activism that, within weeks, saw the ingredient known as “pink slime” removed from ground beef sold in major supermarkets and fast food chains and provided to public schoolchildren in their lunch. Reporters seemed as compelled and repelled as many consumers by the realization that trimmings “made from cattle parts once considered too contaminated for human consumption” (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 3/20/12) can now be found in some 70 percent of beef sold in the U.S.—that is, after “slow cooking, a trip through a centrifuge and an ammonia hydroxide spray to kill [...]
Jun
01
2010
Reporting Israeli Assault Through Israel's Eyes
Attack on humanitarian flotilla prompts little media skepticism
On May 31, the Israeli military attacked a flotilla of boats full of civilians attempting to deliver humanitarian supplies to the Gaza Strip. Reports indicate that at least nine and as many as 16 of the activists on board were killed, though details remain sketchy due to Israel's censorious limitations on media coverage. Much of the U.S. media coverage has been remarkably unskeptical of Israel's account of events and their context, and has paid little regard to international law. The New York Times (6/1/10) glossed over the facts of the devastating Israeli siege of Gaza, where 1.5 million people live [...]
Jun
01
2010
Who Ate the Dessert?
Deficit mania ignores growth of income gap
By Neil deMause
No sooner had the unemployment rate dipped from its January high of 10 percent than the media drumbeat began: What will the Obama administration do about looming deficits? The danger, it was made clear, was both imminent and mammoth: The federal deficit, warned the New York Times (2/2/10), was on pace by 2020 to “equal 77 percent of the gross domestic product, the highest level since 1950.” The Times (1/26/10) even alluded to “perceptions that government spending is out of control” as a cause of Obama’s falling poll ratings among independents. The “out-of-control spending” theme, in fact, dominated news coverage [...]
May
01
2010
Big Media and State Lawmakers, Unite!
ALEC fights to keep broadband in private hands
By Beau Hodai
As the functions of media, commerce and communication rapidly shift into the digital world, more and more cities are viewing broadband Internet access as a necessary resource to stay economically viable in the 21st century. While these communities have been working to expand access, another group, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), has been working to ensure that control of the information superhighway remains in the hands of a few very powerful corporations. ALEC is a group that unites state lawmakers—it claims 2,000, or a full third of the nation’s state legislators, as members—with an impressive roster of the nation’s [...]
Apr
23
2010
Andrew Cockburn on Wall Street, Heather Rogers on Green Gone Wrong
Download MP3 This week on CounterSpin: Barack Obama is in New York City to wag a finger at Wall Street, but do the details of financial reform legislation really look like they'll make serious change in an industry where Goldman Sachs, for example, can rack up earnings double those of last year's first quarter while facing charges of fraud from the SEC? We'll talk about the state of play with Andrew Cockburn, co-producer with Leslie Cockburn of last year's feature documentary American Casino. Also on CounterSpin today, it's Earth Day season, which in much of the media means feel-good corporate [...]
