FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation.
Sometimes iconoclastic Washington pundit E. J. Dionne Jr. comes up with a winner (Washington Post, 2/2/09) in this description of the crucial media role in political chicanery on the national level: If achieving bipartisanship takes priority over the actual content of policy, Republicans are handed a powerful weapon. In theory, they can keep moving the […]
Blogger Brad Jacobson gives play-by-play (MediaBloodhound, 1/28/09) for an epic attempt by MSNBC‘s Chris Matthews to live down his one-time confession to having “felt this thrill going up my leg” during a Barack Obama speech. Matthews’ reparation strategy: “How about facilitating a discussion about Obama’s proposed stimulus plan with two lawmakers from the same party, […]
Far from holding the feet of the powerful to the fire, “liberal” Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen is the very model of the establishment-protecting beltway hack. Glenn Greenwald walks us through Cohen’s history of cheering for the capital’s criminal class, with a focus on the columnist’s latest call to sweep torture under the rug.
Sometimes you don’t need to read more than a headline. Take today’s Washington Post: Senate Gets Reacquainted With McCain the Maverick OK, let’s read just a bit: Two and a half months removed from his defeat in the race for the presidency, colleagues say, McCain bears more resemblance to the unpredictable and frequently bipartisan lawmaker […]
Writing on Washington Monthly‘s Political Animal blog (1/21/09), Steve Benen quotes Jim VandeHei and John F. Harris of Politico rueing the lack of “evidence that [Barack Obama] is willing to challenge Democratic special interest groups“: “There are few examples of him making decisions during the campaign or the transition that offended his own party’s constituencies…. […]
Excerpting a David Ignatius column (Washington Post, 1/15/09) that characterizes a strict Obama administration “focus on… getting things right in the future” as “the kind of realism that will disappoint liberal score-settlers,” Glenn Greenwald’s Salon commentary (1/15/09, ad-viewing required) describes how “the word ‘liberal’ has undergone a remarkable transformation over the last eight years”–at least […]
I don’t know whether George W. Bush will issue a slew of pardons in his last weekend in the White House, but I would expect such pardons to receive less scrutiny than those issued by his predecessor. And if he attempts to pardon those who committed crimes on his behalf, you can count on large […]
What’s the Matter With Kansas Author Thomas Frank tells (Wall Street Journal, 1/14/09) exactly why he thinks “centrism finds an enthusiastic audience in Washington”: because it appeals naturally to the Beltway journalistic mindset, with its professional prohibition against coming down solidly on one side or the other of any question. Splitting the difference is a […]
National Public Radio watchdog Mytwords describes his horror (NPR Check, 1/11/09) at listening while “NPR struggles mightily to convince listeners that there is some grand, noble ‘legacy’ that will exist when the Bush administration leaves the White House”: Today was a shameless homage to George W. Bush as the “normal, regular guy.” Yeah, Bush is […]
It is a hallmark of a sane and moderate society that when it changes leaders and regimes, those left behind should be abandoned to the judgment of history. It is in savage societies that the defeat of a ruling faction entails its humiliation, exile and murder. –Charles Fried, New York Times op-ed page (10/11/09) <!–preview-break–> […]
Newsweek‘s cover story (1/19/09) is a look at the Cheney/Bush national security policies that will Barack Obama will soon inherit. In his editor’s note, Jon Meacham advises that the piece is definitely NOT a look backwards: .. to rehash the case against Cheney at this late hour in the life of the Bush administration would […]
Today’s Washington Post (1/12/09) brings news that will probably surprise very few readers: President Bush has presided over the weakest eight-year span for the U.S. economy in decades, according to an analysis of key data, and economists across the ideological spectrum increasingly view his two terms as a time of little progress on the nation’s […]
Another problem with getting your surgeon general pick from corporate media is that they’re likely to have corporate media’s typical biases against marijuana.
One might not expect much from a USA Today editorial headlined “How to Turn Obama’s Success Into Gains for Black Boys,” but it’s hard to get past the first two graphs without feelingill: You can see the message on brick wall murals in inner cities: Yes we can. You can hear it in the music […]
With the recent release of a tape recorded President Lyndon Johnson concerned that Richard Nixon’s people had avoided Vietnam peace negotiations for domestic political purposes, Paul Jay (Real News, 12/20/08)interviewsConsortium News‘s Robert Parry on “evidence of Nixon’s treasonous legacy and the media’s choice to ignore it”: PJ: So you would think this should be a… […]
By way of suggesting that corporate media should make even more aggressive efforts to tie President-elect Barack Obama to a politician who called him a “motherfucker” for refusing to try to bribe him, MSNBC‘s Contessa Brewer remarks: I know that there are journalists who are taking a lot of heat for not being aggressive and […]
A just-released FAIR advisory documents the media’s lopsided debate in the lead-up to Obama’s Education secretary selection today. Across a wide range of national media outlets, FAIR provides evidence that only one side has for the most part been allowed to do the talking, marginalizing the most progressive candidate in the running for the post […]
After comparing how “establishment news outlets… have praised the president-elect’s cautious Cabinet choices” with the similar reaction after Bill Clinton’s first election, Bob Parry writes (Consortium News, 12/15/08) that the reality for those “who resisted the corrupt Bush years–is that we cannot rest on our successes”: You might have thought there would have been a […]
Newsweek‘s Mark Hosenball writes (12/22/08): The head of Obama’s intel transition team, John Brennan, was the leading candidate for CIA chief until he was slammed by liberal bloggers for not doing enough while serving as a top CIA and anti-terror official to oppose Bush. Actually, “liberal bloggers” hadn’t “slammed” Brennan for “not doing enough…to oppose […]
Sam Dillon’s New York Times piece (12/14/08) is much better than most of the coverage of President-elect Barack Obama’s search for an Education secretary nominee. It’s even got some on-target media criticism: Editorials and opinion articles in the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times have described the debate as pitting […]
