If you relied on major media outlets for coverage of last November’s elections, you could be forgiven for thinking women were poised to rule the country in 2013. “From Congress to Halls of State... Women Rule,” the New York Times (1/1/13) trumpeted. “Big Gains for Women in 2012,” shouted CNN (11/7/12). “113th Congress Welcomes Benches Full of Women,” PBS (11/16/12) declared. Salon (11/6/12) was confidently matter-of-fact—“Another Year of the Woman”—as was Mother Jones (11/6/12): “2012: The Year of the Woman Senator.” MSNBC (“Is 2012 the Year of the Woman?,” 3/15/12) and the Washington Post (“With Senate Wins for Elizabeth Warren [...]
Apr
01
2013
Joe Biden, Aesthetic Populist
A track record of screwing the little guy
Joe Biden’s popularity stems from his perception of “folksiness.” In reality, though, Biden’s record is anything but working class–friendly.
Jan
01
2013
The Hall of Fame of Bad Ideas
Why acting like you lost the election is the ‘serious’ thing to do
As usual when Democrats win elections, plenty of corporate media pundits advised them to act as though they lost.
Jan
01
2013
Talking About--but Not With--Latino Voters
Electoral power not matched by media presence
The Latino vote has been widely credited in the mainstream news media with playing a major role in securing Barack Obama’s re-election. According to the polling organization Latino Decisions, the president won 75 percent of the Latino vote, compared with 23 percent for Romney, a 3-to-1 margin (Foreign Affairs, 11/15/12). But while the stereotypical sleeping giant woke up, that does not mean that the mainstream media, especially television news shows, wanted to talk with the Latino electorate. They just wanted to talk about them. Extra! looked at hundreds of transcripts of post-election coverage and found that the majority of both [...]
Jan
01
2013
Dark Money Dominates Election
Campaign--and media coverage--still tainted by Citizens United decision
“Super PACs may be bad for America, but they’re very good for CBS.” CBS president Les Moonves’ candid comment at an entertainment law conference (Bloomberg, 3/10/12) was one of the few honest things said by someone so deeply involved in the post–Citizens United political ad frenzy. This past election season was dominated by a record amount of ads, including many that were alarmingly misleading, and which raked in record profits for the media corporations who covered the election. Moonves was celebrating what, according to Bloomberg (3/10/12), was a projected boost in profits “by $180 million this year from political advertising,” [...]
Dec
01
2012
Time Gives Up on Factchecking
Corporate media can't find a way to tell the truth
By Peter Hart
Reporters appear to be wedded to a set of “rules” that say they are not allowed to convey reality to their readers and viewers.
Dec
01
2012
The Moderators’ Agenda
Debate questions reveal limited scope
The establishment media figures who moderated the 2012 major-party candidate debates confined the discussion to a remarkably narrow range of topics, a FAIR analysis of debate questions finds. A wide variety of topics were never brought up in questions during the six total hours of debate. Among economic subjects, no questions were asked about poverty, income inequality, the housing crisis, labor unions, agriculture or the Federal Reserve. Social issues were similarly truncated, with no questions raised about race or racism, gay rights (including marriage equality), civil liberties, criminal justice or drug legalization. Despite the fact that four Supreme Court justices [...]
Nov
09
2012
Mark Weisbrot on election lessons, Wen Stephenson on climate change
Does fiscal panic make any sense? Mark Weisbrot of the Center for Economic and Policy Research will tell us what he saw as the lessons from the election. Also this week: The media’s approach on climate change is so inadequate as to be life-threatening.
