FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation.
In his latest Salon blog entry (5/1/09, ad-viewing required), Glenn Greenwald displays his find of “a perfect illustration of how severely our political spectrum has shifted in the last two decades and how depraved and extremist our political and media classes have become”–one quote of the Washington Post‘s Charles Krauthammer rebutting those who “believe you […]
The New York Times‘ Travel section featured a February 8 piece by Ned Martel headlined, “In Grenada, Leaving the Past Behind,” where the reporter refers to the 1983 U.S. invasion of the tiny Caribbean nation. A more accurate headline might have read, “Leaving the Facts Behind.” Here’s how Martel summed up the invasion story: In […]
Like many prominent pundits, Newsweek columnist Fareed Zakaria has of late expressed his frustration with the foreign policy of George W. Bush. In the magazine’s March 19 issue, Zakaria lamented that the Bush administration “began intervening directly in the domestic affairs” of Latin American countries, a move he presented as a break from the recent […]
[Note: This piece is a sidebar to “The Power of Conservative Spinning.”] There was “a significant increase of understanding by conservatives on how to deal with media” with the rise of Ronald Reagan, explains Morton C. Blackwell, founder and president of the conservative Leadership Institute. “There was very little to distinguish Barry Goldwater from Ronald […]
By a twist of political fate, the Oct. 28 deadline for special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald to take action on the Plamegate matter is exactly 25 years after the only debate of the presidential race between Ronald Reagan and incumbent Jimmy Carter. How the major media outlets choose to handle the current explosive scandal in the […]
George W. Bush’s February 17 nomination of John Negroponte to the newly created job of director of intelligence was the subject of a flurry of media coverage. But little attention was paid to Negroponte’s role in the brutal and illegal Contra war against the Sandinista government of Nicaragua in the mid-1980s. From 1981 to 1985, […]
In 1996, journalist Gary Webb wrote a series of articles that forced a long-overdue investigation of a very dark chapter of recent U.S. foreign policy—the Reagan/Bush administration’s protection of cocaine traffickers who operated under the cover of the Nicaraguan Contra war in the 1980s. For his brave reporting at the San Jose Mercury News, Webb […]
George W. Bush’s February 17 nomination of John Negroponte to the newly created job of director of intelligence was the subject of a flurry of media coverage. But one part of Negroponte’s resume was given little attention: his role in the brutal and illegal Contra war against the Sandinista government of Nicaragua in the mid-1980s. […]
A license permits broadcasting, but the licensee has no constitutional right to be the one who holds the license or to monopolize a…frequency to the exclusion of his fellow citizens. There is nothing in the First Amendment which prevents the Government from requiring a licensee to share his frequency with others…. It is the right […]
How has media misrepresented Reagan, both during his presidency and currently?
As the media spend the week memorializing Ronald Reagan, journalists are redefining the former president’s life and accomplishments with a stream of hagiographies that frequently skew the facts and gloss over scandal and criticism. Reagan’s Popularity “Ronald Reagan was the most popular president ever to leave office,” explained ABC anchor Elizabeth Vargas (6/6/04). “His […]
Early summer has brought a flurry of public discussion about a topic previously confined to political margins — the possibility of impeaching President George W. Bush. The idea is still far from the national media echo chamber, but some rumblings are now audible as people begin to think about the almost unthinkable. A few generations […]
The power to depict history is entangled with the power to create it. George Orwell observed long ago: “Who controls the past controls the future; who controls the present controls the past.” And so it is in 2001, as American media outlets draw conclusions about the presidencies of Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. For conservative […]
The signing of the Central America peace accord in Guatemala City set off a U.S. media reaction that showed once again the extent to which White House assumptions are shared by the national press corps. While some reporters have questioned whether President Reagan sincerely supports the Arias plan, virtually all mainstream media accept the administration’s […]
On media coverage of the Iran/Contra hearings: “Those media that reported the government’s lies as facts are obliged to assign someone to scrutinize the conflicting evidence and correct their previous misstatements.”
FAIR: How would you compare Watergate and Contragate, and the role of the media in each scandal? HERSH: If you consider Nixon’s first term, there’s an obvious analogy with the first six years of the Reagan administration. Nixon was able to bomb Cambodia relentlessly for 14 months. He wiretapped 17 American citizens, including Marvin Kalb, […]
