FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation.
The New York Post headline “Greek Tragedy: Nation Commits Economic Suicide” was only yelling what was spoken elsewhere: that Greek voters invited ruin with their “No” vote on an austerity referendum.
When do journalists choose to unleash the weaponized language of “terrorism”—and what effect does that have on public opinion and policy? University of Illinois professor Travis Dixon has researched media patterns on the issue.
Fox News Channel pander to xenophobic white conservatives with fear-mongering about Latino immigrants, while Fox News Latino brings Latinos to the Republican Party with feel-good coverage of Latino conservatives.
According to right-wing media outlets, the latest immigration threat comes in the form of a “flood” of asylum seekers at the US/Mexico border.
If Tom Friedman wants to slam Republicans’ anti-immigrant policies, he probably shouldn’t be summoning the ghost of Winston Churchill.
When Extra! analyzed immigration reform coverage, the majority of sources from all networks were white male politicians born in the United States without personal ties to immigration. The voices of immigrants or activists were mostly absent.
The Associated Press announced a change in their style guide: The wire service will no longer refer to “illegal immigrants,” except in direct quotes. The change is a victory for activists who have called for years for journalists to stop using the term.
[mp3-jplayer tracks=”CounterSpin June 29 2012 @https://eadn-wc04-3257648.nxedge.io/audio/counterspin/CounterSpin062912.mp3″] This week on CounterSpin: Media seemed unable to decide if the Supreme Court’s ruling on Arizona’s controversial immigration law was good news for the law’s supporters or its opponents. Was the ruling that murky, or do journalists just not see it so clearly? We’ll hear from VivirLatino blogger and […]
[mp3-jplayer tracks=”CounterSpin062212 Sara Khorsid and Mohammad Abdollahi @https://eadn-wc04-3257648.nxedge.io/audio/counterspin/CounterSpin062212.mp3″] Download MP3 This week on CounterSpin: In the wake of the Egyptian military and courts dissolving that country’s parliament, and suspending an announcement of the winner in the presidential election, US politicians and journalist have begun to talk about $1.3 billion in military aid the U.S. gives […]
[mp3-jplayer tracks=”CounterSpin072911 Devin Burghart and Julianna Escobedo Shepherd @https://eadn-wc04-3257648.nxedge.io/audio/counterspin/CounterSpin072911.mp3″] Download MP3 This week on CounterSpin: The US media narrative equating terrorism with Islam was on embarrassing display last week following the Norwegian terror attacks, a story which raised issues about right-wing extremism, and the links between violent speech and violent actions. We’ll speak with Devin […]
The Federation for American Immigration Reform (not to be confused with the media watch group FAIR), recently held its fourth “Hold Their Feet to the Fire” event in Washington, D.C. The April 5-7 gathering saw the cozy confluence of freshman lawmakers, veteran creatures of the Hill such as journalist/speechwriter Patrick Buchanan and Sen. Olympia Snowe […]
The April 17 New York Times ran a long front-page piece on the racism of John Tanton, founder of the anti-immigration organizations Federation for American Immigration Reform and Center for Immigration Studies (CIS). Reporter Jason DeParle included a good deal of damning information about Tanton (long documented here at FAIR—1/1/93—and by groups like the Southern […]
In March 2010, prominent European-American rancher Robert Krentz was murdered in a remote area of his sprawling property near Douglas, Arizona. Details of the crime remain murky. Early media reports cited authorities claiming to have tracked footprints from the murder scene 20 miles south to the Mexican border (New York Times, 4/4/10). A month after […]
On the first day of the new Congress, Rep. Steve King (R.-Iowa) introduced legislation to end the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of birthright citizenship—or, as he termed it, “closing the ‘anchor baby’ loophole.” King claimed on CNN (1/7/11) that “as many as a million” of these “anchor babies” would flood the country in 2011. At the […]
Fox News host Bill O’Reilly has repeatedly cited one reason to support Arizona’s harsh new anti-immigrant law: the state’s exploding crime rate. As FAIR documented in a May 17 Action Alert, there is no such crime wave in the state. What’s more, most research shows that immigrants tend to commit less crime than the population […]
Fox News Channel host Bill O’Reilly has repeatedly singled out one reason to support Arizona’s draconian new immigration law: the state’s exploding crime rate. But there is no documented crime wave in Arizona, and O’Reilly’s attempt to link immigrants to crime is equally unfounded. O’Reilly’s record of overheated rhetoric is clear: —May 3: “Arizona had […]
Download MP3 This week on CounterSpin: Arizona’s new immigration law has sparked national protests and a renewed political discussion about something usually called “comprehensive reform.” What that means is unclear, but the discussion about immigration seems to have moved to the right in some fundamental ways. Gabriel Arana from the American Prospect will join us […]
Ross Douthat has a New York Times column today (5/3/10) criticizing those who are “impugning the motives” of the new Arizona immigration law, which has been denounced as a “Nazi” or “near-fascist” law, a “police state” intervention, an imitation of “apartheid,” a “Juan Crow” regime that only a bigot could possibly support. Really, says Douthat, […]
Download MP3 This week on CounterSpin: April 29 headlines suggest the oil spill from the explosion of a Deepwater Horizon oil rig may be as much as 5 times larger than originally predicted. But according to some media observers, TV news anyway, has kept the focus on the disaster story, and the human story, but […]
George Will, defending Arizona’s draconian new immigration law, concludes his column (Washington Post, 4/28/10) with this today: Arizonans should not be judged disdainfully and from a distance by people whose closest contacts with Hispanics are with fine men and women who trim their lawns and put plates in front of them at restaurants, not with […]
