FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation.
I read this in the New York Times a few days ago (2/19/11): The images from Wisconsin–with its protests, shutdown of some public services and missing Democratic senators, who fled the state to block a vote–evoked the Middle East more than the Midwest. There’s a labor movement in this country? And in theMidwest, even!?
This is how ABC This Week host Christiane Amanpourintroduced the roundtable pundit line-up on Sunday’s show: With pitched battles going on right now here in Washington and in statehouses from Florida to Wisconsin to California, with me now, our roundtable: George Will, Congressman Steve Southerland, a Republican freshman from Florida– he was elected to public […]
Sometimes the premise of an article is just all wrong. Like this from Monday‘s New York Times (see bold): As Republicans See a Mandate on Budget Cuts, Others See Risk By ADAM NAGOURNEY and DAVID M. HERSZENHORN WASHINGTON — In Congress and in statehouses, Republican lawmakers and governors are claiming a broad mandate from last […]
Yesterday the Guardian reported that Raymond Davis, the American held in Pakistan on charges of killing two men last month in Lahore, was working for the CIA. The Davis case has received sustained coverage in the U.S. media and is the subject of intense U.S lobbying. All the while U.S. officials referred to Davis as […]
The New York Times has a curious reference today concerning the White House’s strategy on a United Nations Security Council resolution critical of Israeli settlements: The new White House press secretary, Jay Carney, said Thursday that he would not say whether the United States would invoke its rarely used veto power in the Council. The […]
The Guardian published a piece yesterday (2/15/11) based on an interview with “Curveball,” the Iraqi exile whose fraudulent claims about Iraq’s WMDs helped the Bush administration sell the Iraq War. “I had the chance to fabricate something to topple the regime,” he explained. The piece is pretty revealing–as Curveball watched Colin Powell’s UN address in […]
The New York Times stuck it to the former Defense secretary in a Sunday magazine interview: People sometimes call you a war criminal. Does that bother you? For the record, Rumsfeld did seem slightly bothered, because it’s “totally untrue. And life goes on.”
From the Washington Post piece today (2/15/11) about TARP inspector general Neil Barofsky’s resignation: “We’re fine with critics,” said one Treasury official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in order to speak more candidly. “[But] he’s been consistently wrong about a lot of big things.” That’s a prettyserious charge to level atsomeone–which is probablywhy you’d […]
A New York Times op-ed today (2/15/11) by Scott Turow, Paul Aiken and James Shapiro (“Would the Bard Have Survived the Web?”) uses William Shakespeare as exhibit A in their case for copyright, noting that theater flourished in 16th century England because playwrights were able to make money by charging people to enter their theaters. […]
The subhead sums up the point of USA Today‘s lead story today (2/14/11) about Barack Obama’s budget proposal: Obama Proposes Cuts to Trim Deficit; GOP, Others Want More The piece by Richard Wolf and Mimi Hall begins, “President Obama will send Congress a 2012 budget today that would trim the budget deficit by $1.1 trillion […]
From his Meetthe Press interview withHouse Speaker John Boehner (2/13/11): On entitlements, like Social Security, you said the retirement age should be raised, but you said you don’t want to get into negotiating how that happens just now until the problem is better defined. Again, when it comes to leadership, when it comes to the […]
The Washington Post yesterday (2/13/11): Mubarak Resignation Throws Into Question U.S./Egyptian Counterterrorism Work By Mary Beth Sheridan and Joby Warrick Washington Post Staff Writers Sunday, February 13, 2011; A01 For decades, Egypt’s government has been a critical partner for U.S. intelligence agencies, sharing information on extremist groups such as al-Qaeda and working hand in glove […]
It might be hard for you to imagine covering the democratic uprising in Egypt as a way to reflect upon all the wise things you’ve written in the past. But you’re not Tom Friedman. He wrote today (New York Times, 2/11/11): I spent part of the morning in the square watching and photographing a group […]
According to this post at Media Bistro (2/10/11), CNN is adding three new contributors. Two are right-wingers: Dana Loesch, a Tea Party radio host and editor of Andrew Breitbart‘s Big Journalism website. Will Cain is a commentator at the National Review website. And the “left”? His name is Cornell Belcher, a pollster and advertising/messaging consultant […]
It was certainly surprising to see former Haitian dictator Jean-Claude Duvalier return to the country on January 16. To say he hasblood on his hands is an understatement–the Duvalier regimes were responsible for tens of thousands of deaths and widespread abuse, and stole millions of dollars from the country. Soon thereafter, former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide […]
The owner of the Washington Redskins football team, Dan Snyder, is suing the local City Paper for publishing an unflattering cover image of him–namely, a photo doctored to include devil horns. That imagewasaccompanied by an article about Snyder’sbusiness practices. Rob Capriccioso of Indian Country Today points out (2/1/11) thatthe suit alleges the cover art is […]
The L.A. Times‘ controversial investigation last year that rated Los Angeles schoolteachers’ effectiveness based on a value-addedresearch methodhasfaced a storm of criticism. (See Wayne Au’s recent Rethinking Schools piece.) Now the National Education Policy Center has weighed in, finding that the research “was demonstrably inadequate to support the published rankings.” The NEPC was covered in […]
OnFebruary 5 theAssociated Press ran a story about a case in Cuba: Prosecutors are charging jailed U.S. contractor Alan Gross with “acts against the integrity and independence” of Cuba and requesting a 20-year prison term, state news media reported Friday, dimming hopes he would be allowed to go home soon. Further down, as one would […]
In yesterday’s Washington Post (2/6/11), David Broder likened the U.S. position on Egypt to being a fan of the hapless Chicago Cubs: Big things are happening all around you, but you have noway to do anything about it. That is the reality that confronts President Obama today. His hands are tied while Egypt erupts. At […]
There have been some interesting, informative TV coverage of Egypt. And then there was last night’s Charlie Rose (2/3/11), with special guests Tom Friedman and Henry Kissinger.
