FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation.
By now, it’s a media ritual. Whenever the U.S. government raises the alert level for terrorism — as when officials announced the orange code for "high risk" on May 20 — local, regional and national news stories assess the dangers and report on what’s being done to protect us. We’re kept well-informed about how worried […]
Media outlets are the lifeblood of the body politic. Extensive circulation of ideas, information, analysis and debate must exist — not just once in a while, but all the time — or the consequences are severe, even catastrophic. You can gauge our society’s political and social health by checking some vital media signs: Scrutinize the […]
A new poll tells us that — by a two-to-one margin — Americans “use clearly positive words in their descriptions of the president.” The Pew Research Center, releasing a nationwide survey on May 7, declared “there is little doubt … that the war in Iraq has improved the president’s image” in the United States. Such […]
Eighteen months from now, citizens will vote for president. If the 2004 campaign is anything like the last one, the election returns will mark the culmination of a depressing media spectacle. For news watchers, the candidates and the coverage can be hard to take. Appearances on television are apt to become tedious, nauseating or worse. […]
Hans Blix, Dennis Kucinich and the Dixie Chicks are in very different lines of work — but they’re in the same line of fire from big media for the sin of strongly challenging the president’s war agenda. Let’s start with Blix, who can get respectful coverage in American media — unless he’s criticizing the U.S. […]
The day after America’s tax deadline, President Bush signed a $79 billion spending bill to cover military actions in Iraq. Then he visited a Boeing factory in St. Louis, where employees make Super Hornet F/A-18s. While some union leaders, Democratic politicians and pundits took the opportunity to complain that Bush had opposed extending unemployment benefits […]
In times of war, journalists can serve as vital witnesses for the people of the world. So it’s especially sinister when governments take aim at reporters and photographers. A few weeks ago, when I was talking with a CNN cameraman, he recalled an overseas stint to cover events in the West Bank. Anger was evident […]
Minutes after the dawn spread daylight across the Iraqi desert, "embedded" CNN correspondent Walter Rodgers was on the air with a live report. Another employee at the network, former U.S. Gen. Wesley Clark — on the job in a TV studio back home — asked his colleague a question. When Rodgers responded, he addressed Clark […]
Two months ago, when I wandered through a large market near the center of Baghdad, the day seemed like any other and no other. A vibrant pulse of humanity throbbed in the shops and on the streets. Meanwhile, a fuse was burning; lit in Washington, it would explode here. Now, with American troops near Baghdad, […]
The national media echo chamber is not receptive to conscience. On television, the voices are usually loud and facile. People often seem to be shouting. In contrast, the human conscience is close to a whisper. Easily unheard. Now, the biggest media outlets are in a frenzy. The networks are at war. Every cable news channel […]
As the possibility of a U.S. invasion turns into the reality of massive carnage, the war on Iraq cannot avoid confronting Americans with a tacit expectation that rarely gets media scrutiny. In a word: obedience. When a country — particularly "a democracy" — goes to war, the passive consent of the governed lubricates the machinery […]
Three days after a British newspaper revealed a memo about U.S. spying on U.N. Security Council delegations, I asked Daniel Ellsberg to assess the importance of the story. “This leak,” he replied, “is more timely and potentially more important than the Pentagon Papers.” The key word is “timely.” Publication of the secret Pentagon Papers in […]
Media critics often say that visual images trump words. The claim makes some sense: Pictures have major impacts on how we see the world. And we’re apt to pay less attention to photo captions or the voice-overs that accompany news footage on TV screens. But when images meet the eye, our reactions depend on our […]
You gotta hand it to America’s mass media: When war hangs in the balance, they sure know how to bury a story. After devoting thousands of network hours and oceans of ink to stories about "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq, major U.S. news outlets did little but yawn in the days after the latest […]
One of the big media buzzwords to emerge in recent years is “globalization.” By now, we’re likely to know what it means. That’s unfortunate — because at this point the word is so ambiguous that it doesn’t really mean much of anything. News outlets have reported that key international pacts like NAFTA and the World […]
These days, it’s a crucial ace up Uncle Sam’s sleeve. “Terrorism” is George W. Bush’s magic card. For 17 months now, the word has worked like a political charm for the Bush administration. Ever since the terrible crime against humanity known as 9/11, the White House has exploited the specter of terrorism to move the […]
There’s no doubt about it: Colin Powell is a great performer, as he showed yet again at the U.N. Security Council the other day. On television, he exudes confidence and authoritative judgment. But Powell owes much of his touted credibility to the fact that he’s functioning inside a media bubble that protects him from direct […]
A dozen years after the Gulf War, public perceptions of it are now very helpful to the White House. That’s part of a timeworn pattern: Illusions about previous wars make the next one seem acceptable. As George Orwell observed in 1984: “Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past.” […]
To: Washington’s most powerful people OK, let’s review the main points. A basic PR problem remains. While you’re in a hurry to launch an all-out war on Iraq, the main obstacle is that a large majority of Americans don’t feel the rush. Uncle Sam’s usual carrots and sticks have a long way to go at […]
A special issue of Time, the nation’s biggest newsmagazine, was filled with health information in mid-January, offering plenty of encouragement under the rubric of medical science with an ethereal twist: "How Your Mind Can Heal Your Body." The spread on "The Power of Mood" begins with this teaser: "Lifting your spirits can be potent medicine. […]
