FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation.
In his editor’s note in the current edition of Newsweek, Jon Meacham surveys the failures of the past decade or so and comes to a completely unsurprising conclusion: the right and leftbothfailed. From the financial sector to the Roman Catholic Church, it has been a bad couple of years for–to borrow a phrase from a […]
It is commendable to hold misleading politicians to account. Our question is how universal this concern is at the New York Times.
The Washington Post has a story today (5/19/10) that leads with this: With voters up in arms over the mounting federal debt, congressional Democrats are growing increasingly queasy about adding to the nation’s tab,with some arguing that additional spending to prop up the economy and help the unemployed should be paid for or abandoned. The […]
Applebaum seems, like many journalists, to believe that the Tea Party protesters are pretty much like Perot voters.
The cover of Newsweek (4/26/10) proclaims: “Don’t Mess With Texas: What Governor Rick Perry’s Hard-Right Creed Tells Us About America.” I can’t say I learned much about America, but I guess I learned something about Newsweek: They really like Rick Perry. The story, by Evan Thomas and Arian Campo-Flores, beginswith the observation, “The myth of […]
The New York Times’ Jackie Calmes has a report today (4/15/10) about the brewing fight over the Bush tax cuts, which were passed for limited time period and will phase out if Congress does not pass legislation to extend them. The Obama White House will ask lawmakers to renew most of the tax cuts, but […]
New York Times media reporter David Carr wrote the other day (4/5/10) about Sarah Palin’s wide-ranging appeal: Ms. Palin still gets a session in the media spanking machine every time she does anything, but the disapproval seems to further cement the support of her loyalists. Ms. Palin may or may not be qualified to represent […]
FAIR has a new action alert out about the New York Times‘ snubbing the U.S. Senate candidate Jonathan Tasini. While the paper has given intensive coverage to numerous New Yorkers who thought about challenging appointed incumbent Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand–but in the end decided not to run–the Times has ignored Gillibrand’s most prominent actual rival in […]
FAIR’s Jim Naureckas appeared on GritTV yesterday to discuss media coverage of ACORN:
Washington Post columnists Dana Milbank and David Broder are both committed guardians of the establishment center, but they don’t always interpret their role in the same way. Milbank led the cheers for White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel as chief dragger to the right (FAIR Blog, 3/2/10), whereas Broder saw his blame-the-boss disloyalty as […]
New York Times public editor Clark Hoyt has not had a chance yet to respond to questions about his commentary on the ACORN hoax (FAIR Action Alert, 3/11/10), instead devoting his Sunday column (3/14/10) to a discussion of political labeling. It included this question: Why is the American Enterprise Institute almost always called “conservative” in […]
The Los Angeles Times reports(3/12/10)on a new study of local news from theUSC Annenberg School for Communications and Journalism’s Norman Lear Center. The findings are hardly surprising: There is almost no local political coverage on TV news. As the Times notes, “An average half-hour newscast devoted just 22 seconds to government issues, including city budgets, […]
Yesterday (3/10/10) there was a House floor debate on Rep. Dennis Kucinich‘s push to withdraw troops from Afghanistan. Kucinich’s bill–which is based on the War Powers Act–was defeated, but it sparked hours of rare discussion of the White House’s war policy (in spite of the Washington Post‘s efforts to minimize the discussion as left-wing “venting”). […]
If you’re a politics buff, you probably remember the way National Journal‘s ratings were used in the 2004 and 2008 elections to establish that the Democratic candidate was the “most liberal voting record in the Senate”–first John Kerry (Extra! Update, 6/04), then Barack Obama (CounterSpin, 3/28/08). FAIR pointed out the flawed methodology that the magazine […]
White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has always been a controversial figure—famously profane and short-tempered, and politically speaking a center-right Clinton Democrat. As of late, though, there’s been a strange effort—particularly in the Washington Post—to present Emanuel as the confidant whose political advice Barack Obama has too often ignored and who offers a clear […]
Sasha Issenberg reports in the Boston Globe (3/2/10) that Fortune magazine Washington bureau chief and Fox News pundit Nina Easton advised Republican Mitt Romneyon his recent book No Apology. Easton told the Globe that she “offered some writer’s advice on things like structure and how to better tease out themes in his writing.” This isn’t […]
A headline over an Evan Thomas story in this week’s Newsweek (3/8/10) tells us: “We the Problem: Washington Is Working Just Fine. It’s Us That’s Broken.” Thomas blames, among other things, “our ‘got mine’ culture of entitlement,” adding: Politicians, never known for their bravery, precisely represent the people. Our leaders are paralyzed by the very […]
In his Washington Post column today (2/25/10), George Will writes in defense of the filibuster, arguing that Democrats’ talk of using budget reconciliation rules to pass ahealthcare bill demonstrates their contempt for the Constitution. He has been perfectly consistent on the question of minority rule–it depends on who the minority is.Back when Republicans filibustered a […]
Why are liberals and Democrats losing on issues like healthcare? Columnist E.J. Dionne (Washington Post, 2/18/10) rightly points out that congressional Democrats have caved on almost every big issue: “Single-payer was out at the start. The public option died. A Medicare buy-in died.” He wonders: While liberals were arguing about public plans and this or […]
Yesterday Sheryl Gay Stolberg of the New York Times (2/18/10) turned in a piece on the one-year anniversary of the stimulus plan—a favorite target of Republican lawmakers (when they’re not happily enjoying the federal funds in their states and/or districts, that is). The piece tells us that there’s a rather bitter partisan dispute over the […]
