FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation.
The Monday broadcast of CBS Evening News (12/19/11) began with big news, with anchor Scott Pelley announcing: The secretary of Defense says tonight that the United States will not allow Iran to develop a nuclear weapon. In an interview with CBS News, Leon Panetta says that despite efforts to disrupt their nuclear program, the Iranians […]
On Sunday (12/18/11), ABC‘s This Week presented an installment of what it’s calling “The Great American Debates.” What it really was, though, was a perfect example of how corporate media adopt right-wing assumptions when framing a discussion. In this case, it was a debate over Big Government. The show’s opening sounded like a Tea Party […]
Today New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman (12/21/11) gives readers a sense of what the Iraq War was all about: Iraq was always a war of choice. As I never bought the argument that Saddam had nukes that had to be taken out, the decision to go to war stemmed, for me, from a different […]
The Sunday New York Times (12/18/11) featured a powerful investigation of civilian casualties resulting from the NATO war in Libya–casualties that, to hear NATO officials tell it, maybe don’t even exist. The Times‘ C.J. Chivers and Eric Schmitt report: But an on-the-ground examination by The New York Times of airstrike sites across Libya–including interviews with […]
New York Times reporter David Carr (12/19/11) takes a look at comedian Louis C.K.’s recent decision to webcast his own comedy special: A scabrous and successful champion of the everyman, Louis C. K. decided last week to go direct with his fans: no cable special, no middleman, just a simple download for $5 on his […]
Last night (12/15/11), MSNBC hosts Rachel Maddow and Chris Hayes were impressed by a new Pew poll–flagged by Washington Post blogger Greg Sargent–showing that a vast majority of the public believes that corporations and the wealthy have too much power. The picture one gets from the poll is pretty dramatic: The question that seemed most […]
The fact that Time magazine named “The Protester” its Person of the Year was maybe a little surprising. Totally unsurprising, though, was the choice of a runners-up: Republican Rep. Paul Ryan, a hero to many in the corporate media for his bold calls to slash government spending on the poor. It’s hard to know where […]
The Washington Post‘s Scott Wilson has a piece (12/13/11) looking back on the Iraq War, where he writes of the “arc of the American experience in Iraq” being “from hope to barbarity, from swaggering invasion to quiet departure.” When it comes to the rationale for the entire war, things get a bit fuzzy. Like we […]
The Washington Post‘s series of candidate profiles continues. Today it’s Ron Paul’s turn. In Joel Achenbach’s main piece (12/15/11), readers learn, in the lead paragraph, that Paul is not the standard presidential candidate–he lacks the factory-built appearance of Mitt Romney or Rick Perry. He’s thin, bony, a bantam rooster. Thankfully, the rest of the piece […]
The Winter Garden is one of New York City’s largest and most beautiful indoor public spaces. Graced by giant palm trees that would look impressive on Sunset Boulevard and a vast skylight that provides year-round balmy sunlight, this crossroads of Manhattan’s Battery Park City became a symbol of Downtown’s rebirth when it was reconstructed after […]
Of course Newt Gingrich (you know, the “big thinker” in the Republican campaign) made a lot of news by declaring that the Palestinians are an “invented” people. As As’ad AbuKhalill–aka Angry Arab—pointed out, the New York Times ran a piece on this controversy on December 10 quoting exactly two sources: former U.S. ambassador to Israel […]
In today’s Washington Post (12/13/11), Jerry Markon reports on the news that the White House “will wade into the increasingly divisive national debate over new voting laws.” But the article’s explanation of the concept of “voter fraud”–the ostensible rationale for these Republican efforts to restrict voting–leaves a lot to be desired. Markon writes that liberal […]
Three moments, actually: —NBC‘s Chuck Todd yesterday on Meet the Press (12/10/11), commenting on Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich: Well, first of all, those are a couple of nimble debaters. They are pretty good. I think we have seen it. This is the final two. I’m old enough to remember when Todd had the campaign […]
The Washington Post launched a series of Republican presidential candidate profiles on Sunday (12/11/11). First up was Mitt Romney, and right away you sense there’s something a little off here. Here’s the headline and subhead: The Problem Solver Mitt Romney doesn’t want to talk about feeling voters’ pain. He just wants to get to work […]
Fox News host Bill O’Reilly claims he was accosted by a “screaming” man “armed with a cell phone camera” on December 7 while walking to a media party at the White House in Washington, D.C. On his show the next night (O’Reilly Factor, 12/8/11), O’Reilly explained, I told the guy to get lost, but he […]
We know by now that Newt Gingrich thinks he’s smart. And we know there are plenty of people in the corporate media who believe the same thing. How do they show their love for the brainy Republican presidential candidate? Time‘s Joe Klein shows the way in this week’s issue (12/19/11) of the magazine. He doesn’t […]
“Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.”– A.J. Liebling Rob Davis of VoiceofSanDiego.org reports on the new owner of his local daily: Doug Manchester, the new owner and publisher of the San Diego Union-Tribune, wants his new media outlet to be a booster. The newspaper’s new CEO, John Lynch, made […]
Over on Twitter, Glenn Greenwald recommended this USA Today profile of Boston University historian Andrew Bacevich, who has been one of the most prolific and incisive critics of U.S. foreign policy in recent years. Greenwald called it “surprisingly good,” which is right. But one thing about the piece really bothered me–how it dealt with the […]
Dean Baker (12/9/11) flagged this NPR Morning Edition report today (12/9/11), and it’s well worth a positivity. In the debate over the payroll tax cut, Democrats want to pay for extending the tax break with a surtax on the wealthy. Republicans claim–usually without being challenged by reporters–that a surtax on millionaires would be an attack […]
PBS has a website called MediaShift, billed as “Your Guide to the Digital Media Revolution.” Based on an alarming post this week headlined “Tear Down the Wall Between Business and Editorial!” (12/7/11), the revolution looks rather revolting. The piece is written by Dorian Benkoil, who “handles marketing and sales strategies for MediaShift, and is the […]
