All Entries in the "Media" Category
Fox News Audience Just 1.38% Black
…..Majority Are the ‘Absolute Oldest’ Viewers on Cable
Fox News may be the undisputed ratings champion in cable news, but not among black viewers.
The New York Times’ Brian Stelter tweeted that, according to Nielsen Media Research, Fox News has averaged just 29,000 black viewers in primetime so far this television season (9/09-7/10). That represents just 1.38% of its 2.102 million total viewer audience.
CNN and MSNBC, meanwhile, both have far more black viewers, both in absolute terms and as a proportion of their overall audiences.
MSNBC has averaged 145,000 black viewers, representing 19.3% of its 751,000 total viewer audience.
CNN has averaged 134,000 black viewers, representing 20.7% of its 648,000 total viewer audience.
Full Story: Fox News Audience Just 1.38% Black.
O’Reilly Responds to Maddow’s Race-Baiting Charge Against Fox News: But We Get Bigger Ratings
On her MSNBC show on July 20, Rachel Maddow lambasted Fox News over its race baiting campaigns, including its current attack on USDA staffer, Shirley Sherrod, who was fired, in part, because Fox aired video that had been deceptively edited to appear to depict Sherrod admitting she discriminated against white people. (See Maddow’s detailed indictment against Fox’s racist coverage in the video above and transcript below — and note that we had published a similar charge against Fox earlier that day, even before the truth about the Sherrod video had come out.)
Last night Bill O’Reilly offered a tepid apology to Sherrod, admitting that he should have listened to her entire speech before judging her to be a racist — he couldn’t resist adding a caveat, of course. “If a white public servant referenced ‘his own kind’ or ‘one of his own’ when speaking about an African American,” O’Reilly claimed, “that white person would be fired on the spot.”
O’Reilly went on to answer Maddow’s attack on his network’s racist editorial policies — first he played a segment of her show in which she said: “Just like the fake ACORN controversy, Fox News knows it has a role in this dance. That’s not new. That’s not even interesting about this scandal. Fox does what Fox does.”
Full Story: Pensito Review » O’Reilly Responds to Maddow’s Race-Baiting Charge Against Fox News: But We Get Bigger Ratings.
NY Times columnist: Fox News ‘exploited’ New Black Panther Party case
Fox News has gone too far in hyping 2008 case of alleged voter intimidation, according to one New York Times columnist.
The conservative news network has recently produced a flurry of reports about a case where a member of the New Black Panther Party is accused of wielding a billy club outside of a polling place in Philadelphia. Appearing on MSNBC Monday, The New York Times’ Charles Blow called out the network for exploiting the case.
“I think that the media, depending on what you call the media, some parts of the media, I think have exploited this to a degree that the president of the New Black Panther Party is on Fox on a regular basis now, it seems,” Blow told MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski.
Full Story: NY Times columnist: Fox News ‘exploited’ New Black Panther Party case | Raw Story.
The Day The Controversy Over The New Black Panther Case Fell Apart.
So, a number of things have happened in the past few hours that should really discredit the entire conservative conspiracy theory behind the New Black Panther Party case.
Earlier today, I reported that J. Christian Adams, in his testimony to the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, said that there was no indication of pressure from outside the Civil Rights Division to dismiss the civil complaint against the other two plaintiffs named in the original complaint–meaning that even Adams admits there’s no evidence Barack Obama or Eric Holder had anything to do with deciding to narrow the case.
Ben Smith reported this evening that Abigail Thernstrom, a conservative voting rights expert and one of George W. Bush’s appointees to the commission, says that the conservative bloc explicitly discussed a “wild notion they could bring Eric Holder down and really damage the president.” This was clear from the beginning, but it’s the first time anyone on the commission has said with first hand knowledge that the conservatives on the commission had deliberately decided to do this to damage the administration.
Full Story: Adam Serwer Archive | The American Prospect.
Keith Olbermann Nominated For Emmy Award
New York, N.Y. – July 15, 2010 – Nominations for the 31st Annual News and Documentary Emmy® Awards were announced today by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS). The News & Documentary Emmy® Awards will be presented on Monday, September 27 at a ceremony at Frederick P. Rose Hall, Home of Jazz at Lincoln Center, located in the Time Warner Center in New York City. The event will be attended by more than 1,000 television and news media industry executives, news and documentary producers and journalists. Emmy® Awards will be presented in 41 categories, including Breaking News, Investigative Reporting, Outstanding Interview, and Best Documentary, among others.
“From the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, to the struggling American economy, to the inauguration of Barack Obama, 2009 was a significant year for major news stories,” said Bill Small, Chairman of the News & Documentary Emmy® Awards. “The journalists and documentary filmmakers nominated this year have educated viewers in understanding some of the most compelling issues of our time, and we salute them for their efforts.”
The Emmy Awards – - 31st Annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards nominations.
Dylan Ratigan Rips GOP Congressman Kevin Brady Over Wall Street Greed
Rep. Kevin Brady (R-Texas) looked uncomfortable when MSNBC host Dylan Ratigan introduced him Tuesday afternoon to talk about unemployment benefits and Wall Street greed. Brady’s discomfort proved well-founded.
Ratigan tore into the Texas Republican, who voted against the extension of unemployment benefits but for the Wall Street bailout known as the Troubled Asset Relief Program. Brady repeatedly attempted to deflect Ratigan’s harsh line of questioning on the nature of Wall Street by arguing that potential — not actual — tax increases are stifling capital investment and thus job creation, but the MSNBC host didn’t let up.
“I know you have an issue with the government, but I’ve got an issue with a private industry that’s using the government to rape my country of its money, and I’d like to try to put a stop to that,” Ratigan said.
Full Story: Dylan Ratigan Rips GOP Congressman Kevin Brady Over Wall Street Greed.
Megyn Kelly Flips Out At Fox Contributor In Effort To Push Faux Scandal About New Black Panther Party
Today on Fox News’ America Live, host Megyn Kelly discussed the manufactured right-wing “scandal” surrounding the New Black Panther Party, and whether the Department of Justice is being insufficiently tough against black defendants. As Media Matters has documented, the “scandal” surfaced on Fox News and has slowly migrated to more mainstream networks. (Read background on the issue here.)
This afternoon, Kelly invited New York Post columnist — and regular Fox contributor — Kirsten Powers to debate the importance of this story. Kelly bemoaned that “no one seems to give a darn” about the allegations promulgated by former Bush DoJ lawyer J. Christian Adams. The conservative activist claims that the Obama Justice Department dropped voter intimidation charges against the New Black Panther Party due to racial considerations. Contrary to the claims, the Obama DoJ has issued an injunction against the member of the NBPP who was seen engaging in voter intimidation tactics, prohibiting him “from displaying a weapon within 100 feet of any Philadelphia polling place through 2012.”
Powers effectively dismantled the faux scandal for what it is, telling Kelly, “You can put me in the same category of people who don’t really give a darn.” “You don’t seem to know what you’re talking about,” Kelly immediately responded, growing more enraged as the two wrestled, jabbed, and bickered over the facts:
Fox legal analyst: Bush should have been indicted
Fox News’ senior judicial analyst made some surprising remarks Saturday that may go against the grain at his conservative network.
In a interview with Ralph Nader on C-SPAN’s Book TV to promote his book Lies the Government Told You, Judge Andrew Napolitano said that President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney should have been indicted for “torturing, for spying, for arresting without warrant.”
The judge believes that it is a fallacy to say that the US treats suspects as innocent until proven guilty. “The government acts as if a defendant is guilty merely on the basis of an accusation,” said Napolitano.
Full Story: Fox legal analyst: Bush should have been indicted | Raw Story.
Fox News promoted Tea Party town halls because they made ‘better television.’
Bill Hemmer, a co-anchor of Fox News’ “America’s Newsroom” program, revealed in a profile of him published today why his network decided to highlight last August’s violent, tumultuous congressional town halls. In an interview with Washington Post media critic Howard Kurtz, Hemmer discussed how his show’s ratings have grown over the past year and suggested that the program’s decision to promote Tea Party town hall antics was based on attracting viewers:
A turning point, in Hemmer’s view, came during the health care debate in the summer of 2009: “We covered those town hall meetings with greater vigor than our competition, and we were rewarded with viewers. It was better television.”
Another view is that Fox seized upon the footage of angry constituents shouting at Democratic members of Congress because it undermined the president’s push for health care reform. Hemmer begs to differ. “I don’t think it was anger toward the Obama administration,” he says. “It was an honest insecurity on the part of average Americans.”
Full Story: Think Progress » Fox News promoted Tea Party town halls because they made ‘better television.’.
A White God Freakout
Matt Taibi:
Thanks to Jonathan Schwarz of TinyRevolution.com for passing along this hilarious exchange between Time reporter Alex Perry and Julie Hollar of FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting). It’s one of the best case studies in the dangers of Google that I’ve ever seen.
The thing about Googling yourself — look, everyone’s done it. In the most literal sense, it’s like jacking off, and find me the grown man who’ll deny that he does that. But part of the growing up process is learning that playing with oneself, if not shameful and sordid exactly, it’s certainly something to be done at all times in private. Not even your average eight year old will go charging bug-eyed into a room full of grownups frantically pulling on his Johnson. Time reporter Alex Perry turns out to be a different story, however.
Background: last week, the press watchdogs at FAIR did a review of Perry’s scare piece about how the Chinese are taking over Africa (China’s New Focus on Africa, June 24th). The Perry piece used the standard Western-correspondent formula for covering the third world, a formula I’m very familiar with from my Russia days. In it, the moral of every story you write has to be that the backward subject country cannot survive without the indulgence, political protection, and gigantic brain-power of the superior Western societies. At the eXile we used to call this “White God” reporting.
Full Story: A White God Freakout — RollingStone.com.
CNBC host slams right wing’s false Jones Act meme as ‘offensive to intelligence.’
Since BP’s oil gusher in the Gulf of Mexico began, a common right wing refrain has been that the Jones Act — a 1920 law stipulating that commerce between U.S. ports needs to occur on U.S. ships — has been hindering the cleanup effort by forcing the federal government to reject aid from foreign nations. Conservative lawmakers and pundits have been claiming that the Obama administration is refusing to waive the Jones Act out of deference to the will of labor unions. Earlier this month, McClatchy demolished this meme, but that hasn’t stopped the drumbeat, with Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) going so far as to say that aid from 17 countries has been rejected because of the Jones Act. Yesterday, on CNBC, Hans Bader of the Competitive Enterprise Institute repeated the talking point, but he ran into a host who had done his homework. CNBC’s Mark Haines noted that 68 different offers of foreign cleanup help have been accepted, and then challenged Bader to cite examples of the Jones Act causing a problem:
HAINES: How many rejections under the Jones Act?
BADER: I don’t know how many.
HAINES: Excuse me, Senator McCarthy, you can’t tell us how many there are? I want the facts, give us hard facts, give us evidence, not innuendo, not baseless accusations, okay? It’s offensive to intelligence. The fact is sir, you have told us there are examples of rejections and you can not name a single one.
Watch it:
Full Story: Think Progress » CNBC host slams right wing’s false Jones Act meme as ‘offensive to intelligence.’.
CNN Caves To Right Wing Neocons By Firing Its Mideast Reporter Octavia Nasr
On Sunday, Octavia Nasr — CNN’s Senior Editor of Mideast Affairs — acknowledged the death of Lebanon’s Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah by tweeting:
Sad to hear of the passing of Sayyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah.. One of Hezbollah’s giants I respect a lot..
Fadlallah was well known for a number of relatively liberal views, such as his support for women’s rights and fatwas against the brutal practices of female circumcision and honor killings. But Nasr’s comment was enough to spark fierce outrage from the various precincts of the neocon blog/twittersphere, who went after Nasr for her egregious failure to reduce Fadlallah to an anti-Israel, anti-American terrorist bogeyman.
Responding to the uproar, Nasr wrote, “It was an error of judgment for me to write such a simplistic comment and I’m sorry because it conveyed that I supported Fadlallah’s life’s work. That’s not the case at all”:
Full Story: Think Progress » CNN Caves To Right Wing Neocons By Firing Its Mideast Reporter Octavia Nasr.
Utah radio station drops Hannity from its lineup, possibly for being uncivil.
This past week, Utah’s KSL Radio announced that it will be dropping Fox News host and radio personality Sean Hannity from its regular programming lineup. Although the company was tight-lipped about why it chose to end its relationship with Hannity, Utah’s ABC-4 speculates that Hannity’s uncivil behavior on air was behind the move:
SALT LAKE CITY (ABC 4 News) – KSL Radio announced that they will no longer air Sean Hannity’s syndicated national talk show.
The last KSL broadcast of the Sean Hannity show will air on October 1, 2010. The announcement comes after speculation that Hannity’s on-air style was not in line with Deseret Media Company’s mission statement that calls for civility and other ethical stances.
Deseret Media Companies (DMC) is a for-profit arm of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and manages KSL radio and other media outlets.The DMC “Mission Statement” calls for the dissemination of “light and knowledge” along with the promotion of “integrity, civility, morality, and respect for all people.”
Full Story: Think Progress » Utah radio station drops Hannity from its lineup, possibly for being uncivil..
New study documents media’s servitude to government
- Glenn Greenwald -
A newly released study from students at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government provides the latest evidence of how thoroughly devoted the American establishment media is to amplifying and serving (rather than checking) government officials. This new study examines how waterboarding has been discussed by America’s four largest newspapers over the past 100 years, and finds that the technique, almost invariably, was unequivocally referred to as “torture” — until the U.S. Government began openly using it and insisting that it was not torture, at which time these newspapers obediently ceased describing it that way:
Similarly, American newspapers are highly inclined to refer to waterboarding as “torture” when practiced by other nations, but will suddenly refuse to use the term when it’s the U.S. employing that technique:
Full Story: New study documents media’s servitude to government – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com.
OPEN MIC CATCHES REPORTERS TELLING THE TRUTH..
Former half-term Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) spoke at a California university fundraiser last week, which generated some controversy due to her excessive speaking fees. Now, it appears the event has become controversial for an entirely different reason.
The local Fox affiliate overheard a variety of journalists reflecting on Palin’s remarks on a live mic, with reporters unaware that they were being recorded. The result was some unexpected candor.
“I feel like I just got off a roller coaster, going round and round,” one reporter is heard saying on audio captured by Fox40 News. “S— flying out everywhere.”
“She didn’t finish a statement,” another reporter says.
“Did she make a statement?” another asks, drawing laughs.
“I don’t know how we’re gonna make a story out of that,” a voice is heard saying.
“Now I know that dumbness doesn’t come from just sound bites,” yet another reporter
Full Story: The Washington Monthly.
Brian Kilmeade Provides Fox News Entertainment By Embarrassing Himself
Fox News’ Brian Kilmeade has been embarrassing himself more than usual over the last few days on Fox & Friends. Yesterday, after news broke that the cap BP placed on its leaking oil well had to be removed because one of its robots bumped the well’s venting system, Kilmeade had some harsh words for the robot. “I’d love to talk to that robot that knocked…the top off the cap that was in the bottom of the Gulf yesterday,” Kilmeade said. “What was that robot thinking?” he asked in disgust.
Then today, as Media Matters notes, the Fox co-host had had this dim-witted question for President Obama:
KILMEADE: The President took a matter of hours to pick a commander in Afghanistan so why is it taking months to plug the leaking oil?
Full Story: Think Progress » Brian Kilmeade Provides Fox News Entertainment By Embarrassing Himself.
Lawrence O’Donnell To Host MSNBC 10PM Show
Lawrence O’Donnell will host the 10PM hour on MSNBC, the network announced Tuesday.
O’Donnell will develop a show to round-out the network’s primetime lineup; currently, a repeat of the 8PM show, “Countdown with Keith Olbermann,” airs in the 10PM timeslot, after “The Rachel Maddow Show.”
“Lawrence O’Donnell is an incredible talent, who our audience has gotten to know throughout the years, most recently as Keith Olbermann’s principal guest host on ‘Countdown,’” MSNBC President Phil Griffin said in the announcement. “It’s great to have another anchor of his caliber on the network,” said Griffin. “This makes us a bigger and better network.”
“I’ve had a part-time job at MSNBC for 14 years,” O’Donnell, who has been an MSNBC political analyst since the network launched in 1996, added. “Now that the network and I have gotten to know each other, I’m thrilled to be going full time.”
Full Story: Lawrence O’Donnell To Host MSNBC 10PM Show.
After Years Claiming He’s ‘Not A Journalist,’ Beck Calls Himself A ‘Journalist’ Without ‘Formal Training’
In a recent interview with USA Today, Fox News host Glenn Beck was asked to define what he does. “I’m a little of everything,” replied Beck, saying that included being a “‘concerned dad,’ ‘faith-based guy,’ ‘businessman,’ ‘entertainer’ and, after a long pause, ‘journalist.’” “I don’t have formal training as a journalist, but I think that works to my advantage,” said Beck.
Though not shocking, Beck’s claim to be “a journalist” is surprising, given how often he has rhetorically shielded himself by saying, “I’m not a journalist.” In fact, as recently as April 5, 20
Allen Has Ordered ‘Uninhibited Access’ to Oil Spill Operations
Admiral Thad Allen told me he has ordered that oil spill operations be open to the media. The National Incident Commander for the oil spill efforts said in my “This Week” interview, “I put out a written directive and I can provide it for the record that says the media will have uninhibited access anywhere we’re doing operations, except for two things, if it’s a security or safety problem. That is my policy. I’m the national incident commander.”
When I was in Louisiana over the weekend, I experienced stony silence from government workers and private contractors working for BP who were told not to talk about the work they are doing. Allen pledged to make sure word about his directive gets out to workers.
TAPPER: Lastly, I saw firsthand when I was down in Louisiana over
the weekend, all the workers there, whether they work for the governor
or for BP or for private contractors who work for BP, they’ve all been
told not to talk to the press, not to talk to the public about their
work. Shouldn’t they be allowed to share with the public the work that
they’re doing?
Full Story: Allen Has Ordered ‘Uninhibited Access’ to Oil Spill Operations – Political Punch.
Federal Communications Commission to debate Comcast-NBC merger
Debate over Comcast’s $30 billion bid for NBC Universal heads to Chicago next month, where the Federal Communications Commission plans to hold its first field hearing on the proposed mega-merger.
The FCC will announce the July 13 public forum as soon as Thursday afternoon, an agency official told POLITICO. Regulators selected Chicago in part because Comcast and NBC maintain equal footing in the city, which is well regarded for its diversity.
The announcement arrives as the House Judiciary Committee revs up its own regulatory engine ahead of a scheduled Monday field hearing in Los Angeles. That forum comes at the insistence of Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), who long implored the FCC to incorporate community reaction in its review of a merger that would combine the country’s largest cable and broadband provider with one of the nation’s top broadcast stations.
Full Story: Federal Communications Commission to debate Comcast-NBC merger – Tony Romm – POLITICO.com.
Media Watchdog FAIR Slams ABC, Stephanopoulos for Repeating NYT’s False ACORN ‘Pimp’ Coverage
Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), the decades-old media watchdog group whose condemnation of the NYTimes mis-reporting on the ACORN Pimp Hoax picked up on our detailed exposé here, and ultimately helped force the “paper of record” into a begrudging partial correction, has now picked up on our coverage earlier this week of ABC News’ Good Morning America host George Stephanopoulos’ and his near-verbatim use of the Times discredited reporting in his introduction to an interview with Rightwing hoaxsters James O’Keefe and Andrew Breitbart on Tuesday…
From FAIR’s Peter Hart last night:
Full Story: The BRAD BLOG : Media Watchdog FAIR Slams ABC, Stephanopoulos for Repeating NYT’s False ACORN ‘Pimp’ Coverage.
Van Susteren runs opinion poll on her intelligence — and loses
Fox News host Greta Van Susteren was so upset by a recent viewer email calling her stupid that she put up an opinion poll asking followers to rate who’s smarter — Van Susteren or her detractor, “Brian.”
“Who is dumber?” the poll asks. “Greta? Or Brian for spending his time watching someone he thinks is dumb?”
So far, Brian is winning. As of May 29, 78 percent of poll respondents agreed that Van Susteren is dumber than Brian.
Of course, Internet polls aren’t scientific and are often hijacked by particular groups to make a particular point. But it seems, at the very least, that Van Susteren’s fans didn’t show up in enough numbers to defend her.
Full Story: Van Susteren runs opinion poll on her intelligence — and loses | Raw Story.
FoxNews.com edits out applause during Obama’s West Point speech.
In his commencement address to graduating West Point cadets on Saturday, the President outlined his upcoming national security strategy that is focused on international cooperation to meet the nation’s security challenges. He also praised American troops for their performance in Iraq. “A lesser Army might have seen its spirit broken,” he said, adding that “through their competence and creativity and courage, we are poised to end our combat mission in Iraq this summer.” At that point, cadets and the audience applauded for at least 12 seconds (starting at roughly the 10:24 mark here). However, as Michael Moore observed, video from the speech on FoxNews.com edits out that applause entirely, making it appear as if Obama is bizarrely staring silently for a long period of time. The audio is cut (starting at the 0:44 mark) for the 12 seconds of applause, and then skips to another part of the speech. Watch it (the first clip is from FoxNews.com, the second clip is from WhiteHouse.gov):
Full Story: Think Progress » FoxNews.com edits out applause during Obama’s West Point speech..
Pirates take over small-town radio signal
Residents of San Mateo County, California are hearing an unusual sound on the 89.3 frequency of their FM radios these days. Commercial-free radio programmed by real, local people.
San Francisco-based Pirate Cat Radio has put KPDO on the air full-time. The station’s new home, nestled among coastal farmlands, is about an hour south from the studio cafe in San Francisco’s Mission District.
Pirate Cat Radio founder Daniel Roberts and his crew took over the radio frequency May 8, after years of defying the Federal Communications Commission by broadcasting without a license. Roberts was recently fined by the FCC for just that, as Jennifer Waits writes in Spinning Indie.
Full Story: Pirates take over small-town radio signal | Raw Story.
Rand Paul Cancels His Meet The Press Interview
Kentucky Republican Senate nominee Rand Paul has been lampooned in recent days for his radical anti-government views. First, he expressed opposition to parts of the Civil Rights Act and the Americans With Disabilities Act. Today, he attacked President Obama’s criticism of BP as “un-American,” and refused to say whether or not the minimum wage is legal. MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell joked that Paul is the “gift that keeps on giving.”
But he is giving no more. He “simply does not want to answer direct questions about the proper role of the Federal government in regulating the private sector,” the Washington Post’s Greg Sargent noted. “He visibly bristles when asked to clarify his views on these matters,” Sargent added.
After his upset victory Tuesday night, Paul agreed to appear on NBC’s Meet The Press Sunday for what would surely be wide ranging interview that would delve into these issues:
Full Story: Think Progress » Rand Paul Cancels His Meet The Press Interview.
Morning Joe Crew Rip Gingrich For His ‘Sick,’ ‘Shameful,’ ‘Pure Wingnuttery’ Nazi Comparison
As ThinkProgress has noted, Newt Gingrich’s latest book, To Save America, argues repeatedly that the Obama administration and Democrats in Congress are a “secular-socialist machine” that “represents as great a threat to America as Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union.” Gingrich has defended his assertion in recent media appearances, saying that “it’s a question of finality” and “if the secular socialist machine wins, we are going to be in a country which no longer resembles America.”
Gingrich’s comments have already elicited outrage from those outside the conservative echo chamber. On Monday, former GOP congresswoman Susan Molinari called his Nazi comparison “outrageous” and “crazy.” On Morning Joe today, former GOP congressman Joe Scarborough and his guests unleashed on Gingrich for making the “sick” and “shameful” comparison:
– “That’s sick. I hope you sell books. I hope you apologize for that shameful remark,” said Scarborough.
– “This is pure wingnuttery. It’s the worst thing about it is you know that Gingrich is extremely scholarly, highly educated historian. So it’s even more lamentable if he starts to revert to this kind of rhetoric,” said The Daily Beast’s Tina Brown.
Full Story: Think Progress » Morning Joe Crew Rip Gingrich For His ‘Sick,’ ‘Shameful,’ ‘Pure Wingnuttery’ Nazi Comparison.
Glenn Beck Hits 2010 Ratings LOW
Glenn Beck has hit a new low for the year — literally.
Beck’s Fox News program saw its worst ratings of 2010 Friday, averaging just 1.776 million total viewers. Of course, that’s more than his competitors — MSNBC’s “Hardball” (528,000), CNN’s “Situation Room” (481,000) and HLN’s “Showbiz Tonight” (197,000) — combined, but it represents a continuation of a trend that began last month.
For the month of April, Glenn Beck suffered his first year-over-year decline since joining Fox News in January 2009, declining 7% in total viewers and 6% in the demo compared to April 2009. Moreover, Beck shed 28% of his audience between January and April in both total viewers and the demo.
Friday’s program was Beck’s fifth worst since joining Fox News.
Politicususa’s Jason Easley notes that Friday’s total was “50% off of [Beck's] peak audience of 3.4 million” total viewers.
Beasley also writes that Beck is losing viewers because he sees himself as a political force more than an entertainer:
Full Story: Glenn Beck Hits 2010 Ratings LOW.
Rep. Anthony Weiner Wants FTC and SEC Action for Goldline, Beck and the FOX Gold-Shilling Narrative
Critics have reprimanded Glenn Beck before for his advertising-turned-conservative-talking-point shilling for Goldline in the past, but never quite on the level that Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) demands now.
Beck has long held a close relationship with the gold seller, including advertisements throughout his radio career with spots on his show and ads placed openly on his website. The conflict arises from the fact that Beck’s content, full of blatant fear mongering about the potential decline of society and of paper money, appears to fit too perfectly with Goldline’s advertising agenda. In effect, Beck’s content seems driven by his advertising, and since Beck’s rhetoric tends toward the extreme, it presents a noticeable danger to the public.
Weiner has served notice that he has had enough of Beck’s crass shilling for the gold industry. Weiner has taken note of the conservative strategy to promote gold as a safe bet in the current political and economic climate. Though consumers would need gold to exceed record highs to reach a return on their investment, while the hosts promoting the gold reap the benefits in simply selling to those consumers now. Consequently, commentators like Beck, who have invested in the gold they advertise and thus have a vested interest in its doing well, can push the narrative of the decaying U.S. to benefit themselves, regardless of its distance from reality.
Full Story: Rep. Anthony Weiner Wants FTC and SEC Action for Goldline, Beck and the FOX Gold-Shilling Narrative | BuzzFlash.org.
Shep Smith SCOLDS BP CEO: ‘At Least Act Like You Care’ (VIDEO)
Fox News anchor (and Mississippi native) Shep Smith ripped the BP CEO over his comments on the Gulf oil spill Friday on his Fox News show.
BP CEO Tony Hayward told a British newspaper that the oil spill was a relatively small leak in the scheme of the Gulf of Mexico, and that he expected many frivolous lawsuits over the spill.
Smith’s full comments (via):
Mr. Hayward, that Gulf is the source of life for millions upon million of people, and plants, and other creatures on this earth. Jobs are lost, beaches and birds are tarred, fisheries are closed, tourists are canceling, economies are threatened, and people from Florida to Texas are in some cases concerned for their very livelihoods, and you speak of ‘comparative volume’?
Mr. Hayward, British Petroleum has caused the proud people of the Gulf Region great pain. If you think your statements on this subject are helping your company’s cause — you are wrong. And if you think the people of the Gulf Region and the rest of America will take lying down without a fight a poorly handled aftermath of what your company has done to our Gulf and our people – you are horribly mistaken.
Full Story: Shep Smith SCOLDS BP CEO: ‘At Least Act Like You Care’ (VIDEO).
Brit Hume: Where Is The Oil? (VIDEO)
As I was taking in the Sestak-versus-Specteriana on CNN’s State Of The Union yesterday morning, I missed Fox News Sunday’s typically entertaining panel discussion. But this segment shouldn’t go unnoted, seeing as how former newsman Brit Hume was wondering if the BP oil slick was so awesomely terrifying, why couldn’t he see any of the oil? Seriously! This happened!
WATCH:
Full Story: Brit Hume: Where Is The Oil? (VIDEO).
Bill Maher New Rules 05 14 2010
More truth about Obama, Capers, Oil Spills, Our Country, Our Monetary Change System And Steve Jobs.
Lewis Black: “Glenn Beck Has Nazi Tourette’s” (VIDEO)
Glenn Beck’s antics have always proved to be great fodder for the “Daily Show.” Lewis Black took it a step further with an entire segment mocking the Fox News host for his tendency to make everything Nazi-related.
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Back in Black – Glenn Beck’s Nazi Tourette’s | ||||
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Full Story: Lewis Black: “Glenn Beck Has Nazi Tourette’s” (VIDEO).
Stewart Hammers Conservatives For Hypocritical Obama-Bush Comparisons (VIDEO)
When Jon Stewart’s on his game, it’s a thing of beauty. And considering he’s always on his game, last night’s opening segment was flat-out gorgeous, as he ripped hypocritical conservatives for constantly comparing Obama to Bush – but only terms of missteps.
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Release the Kagan | ||||
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Comcast CEO: We Won’t Interfere With NBC News
The chief executive of Comcast says he won’t interfere with the editorial decisions of NBC’s news programs.
Brian Roberts said Tuesday at a cable industry trade convention in Los Angeles that NBC News is an “awesome asset” that needs to be protected. He also called “Meet the Press” an “incredibly important institution in this country.”
Roberts said he won’t interfere in NBC’s editorial decisions.
“Let it have its own voice,” he said.
Full Story: Comcast CEO: We Won’t Interfere With NBC News.
OPS: Wanta bet?
Donna Brazile: Let’s Get Rid Of The Pundits!
The Washington Post apparently asked various luminaries to name one thing the world should just get rid of (sadly, none said “jeggings”) and Donna Brazile offered a suggestion that would afford her considerably more free time: let's get rid of the pundits!
If a single move could restore civility to politics, that is it. Get rid of the left-vs.-right commentators who are just out scoring points for their team. This sort of opinion-mongering is not only boring and predictable, it is destructive of the truth. If your only credentials are “GOP shill” or “Democratic hack,” you've no business cluttering up the airwaves or the op-ed pages. My momma always told me that if you don't know what you're talking about, it's best to keep your mouth shut. That's good advice.
Whom do we put in their place? I say replace the pundits with people who have genuine expertise — whether from their academic work, professional life or personal experience — on the key issues of the day. Instead of partisan talking heads or mad hatters from the “tea party” preaching their views on, say, health care and taxes, let's hear from doctors and insurance professionals, or the number-crunchers from the Congressional Budget Office. They're much better equipped to help viewers, listeners and readers wade through the facts, arguments and data.
Full Story: Donna Brazile: Let’s Get Rid Of The Pundits!.
They Don’t Report. You Don’t Have to Decide.
Frank Rich :
“DESPITE the major environmental disaster unfolding in the Gulf and the attempted terror attack on New York’s Times Square, President Obama spent his Saturday night laughing it up at the White House Correspondents Dinner,” griped Sean Hannity of Fox News last week. His complaint is not inaccurate. But it’s hardly the whole story. Also laughing it up at that dinner were many of the country’s television news potentates, including some of Hannity’s own colleagues. And unlike the president, they were caught napping on a night that could have been 9/11 redux.
Here’s the time line from last Saturday. At 6:30 p.m. the abandoned Nissan Pathfinder was found smoking in Times Square. Relevant public officials marooned at the correspondents dinner in Washington quickly got word. Over the next hour and a half, several news organizations spread it as well while Times Square was evacuated. To clear the Broadway theater district at curtain time on Saturday night isn’t like emptying a high school; it’s a virtual military operation. By 8 p.m., the crossroads of the world looked like a ghost town, yet if you tuned in to a cable news network, it wasn’t news. No one seemed to know or to care. On MSNBC, which I was watching, it didn’t even merit a mention on a crawl.
MSNBC was instead busy covering the correspondents dinner itself, so we could feast on journalists schmoozing with mostly B-list show business folk — and sometimes C-list, as in Kim Kardashian. (Another NBC employee, Jay Leno, was the evening’s mirthless comic headliner.) This annual Beltway fete, once safely quarantined on C-Span, has now mutated into a poor man’s Golden Globes on all three cable news networks. On MSNBC, this meant red-carpet arrivals, in-depth historical analysis of past dinners, and morning-after post-mortems by network news stars wearing sunglasses on camera (just like Hollywood!).
Full Story: Op-Ed Columnist – They Don’t Report. You Don’t Have to Decide. – NYTimes.com.
Papantonio: BP – Shills, Shills, and More Shills
Video:
Even with more than 200,000 gallons of oil being pumped directly into the Gulf of Mexico everyday (thanks to BP's negligence on the Deepwater Horizon well,) right wing wackos are still clinging to their “drill baby, drill” mantra. We're being told that yes, this is an atrocity, but we still need that oil at the bottom of the sea floor. Mike Papantonio appears on MSNBC's The Ed Show to take on the offshore drilling cheerleaders, as well as explain the basics of his class action suit against BP.
Donald Sutherland: Get Rid of Morning Joe
Are the programmers at MSNBC nuts? They give us refreshing afternoons with Chris and Ed, put us to bed with the clarifying sensibilities of Rachel and Keith and then, idiotically, wake us up with Mr. Small Mouth.
Who is this idiot? Why is he there? He can’t even listen. He doesn’t conduct a decent conversation. He runs over everyone else’s words with a landslide of diarrhea. I saw him on Friday, stomping around the stage like a posturing rooster, calling Paul Krugman a political hack. Paul Krugman’s a political hack? Surely they put make-up on Mr. Small Mouth. Doesn’t he look in the mirror? That’s where he’d see what a political hack looks like.
For god’s sake, MSNBC, get rid of him, he’s beneath you. This guy makes Pat Buchanan look embarrassed. Go out and get the television equivalent of David Brooks to chair your program. He’d be worth listening to. He’d give conservative opinion a rational voice. That person would be calmly articulate, and that’d make for worthwhile conversation. Reminiscent of William Safire or, better still, William F. Buckley. That’d be fair and balanced broadcasting!
Full Story: Donald Sutherland: Get Rid of Morning Joe.
CBS News and CNN Are Back in Partnership Negotiations
CBS News and CNN are in advanced negotiations about signing a news-gathering partnership, according to executives familiar with the discussions. The talks revolve around how the two news divisions can combine operations in a bid to cut costs and expand audiences on both sides. While such conversations have occurred over the last decade, the current news-business climate — plummeting CNN ratings, ever-shrinking evening-news audiences, major layoffs at ABC — make a deal more logical than ever before. The talks are still fluid, which means that executives would speak only on condition of anonymity, but CNN and CBS began negotiations some time ago. “It’s been going on for a couple of months,” one person with knowledge of the matter said. “They’re in deep talks.”
The discussions resume years of on-and-off flirtation between CBS News and CNN. In the past, talks have broken down over issues like how marquee talent at each network would be shared across the combined entity or which channel would retain control of editorial decisions. “There were huge structural issues, like who would be on the air,” one executive explained. CBS and Time Warner remain on friendly terms, and the talks are happening soon after CBS Sports and Time Warner signed a $10.8 billion deal to broadcast the NCAA basketball championship for the next fourteen years.
For CBS CEO Les Moonves, a deal with CNN makes sense at this difficult moment for network news. Late last month, ABC News completed a brutal round of layoffs that gutted its news division by 25 percent. CBS, like ABC, lacks a cable channel that could help shelter the costs of staffing a news division. Rival NBC has been increasingly steering its highly paid network talent, from Andrea Mitchell to Tom Brokaw, to its MSNBC cable outlet. Both CBS and ABC have long thought CNN might make an attractive partner. At one point several years ago, ABC News and CNN got into advanced talks that even involved Time Warner’s board of directors, one executive with knowledge of those talks said. But again, a final deal fell apart.
Full Story: CBS News and CNN Are Back in Partnership Negotiations — Daily Intel.
Ed Schultz & Papantonio Go After BP
Things are heating up on the Gulf Coast as oil from the Deep Horizon rig explosion is now washing up on shore. Over the weekend, BP attempted to get Gulf Coast citizens to sign away their right to sue the company for a mere $5,000, but they’ve since been reprimanded for doing so. Mike Papantonio appears on Ed Schultz’s radio program to talk about the latest developments in the case.
MSNBC boss Phil Griffin compares his channel to Fox
Phil Griffin says he learned a valuable lesson from Roger Ailes, creator of Fox News Channel: Viewers will stand behind a news outlet that stands for something
MSNBC boss Phil Griffin looks at what Roger Ailes created at Fox News Channel with no small amount of awe.
“He’s changed media. Everybody does news differently because Roger’s changed the world,” Griffin said over coffee on a visit to Chicago the other day. He was taking a break from making a case for his own cable network to ad buyers here to make the case for changes in the media landscape to a reporter. “Roger early on figured it out and was brilliant.”
With so much news coming from so many places, so often in much the same way, a leader distinguishes itself by anticipating what its audience wants and needs beyond the immediate headlines. In doing so, the most successful — and in cable, that’s Ailes’ FNC — will establish its own identity.
The critical lesson Griffin took from Ailes was that a news outlet that stands for something is one that consumers can stand behind and rally around.
Full Story: MSNBC: MSNBC boss Phil Griffin compares his channel to Fox – chicagotribune.com.
Hume Acknowledges Oil Spill Disaster ‘Verifies’ The Concern Of Environmentalists
Today’s Sunday morning news shows were dedicated, in large part, to the unfolding oil spill disaster in the Gulf Coast, as efforts continue to contain the 210,000 gallons of oil a day that are still leaking. The leak has reignited debate over offshore oil drilling, with the Obama administration saying that “further commitments for offshore drilling must await an investigation of the causes of the rig explosion and leak.” Even conservative darling and drilling proponent Marco Rubio said that the spill should make us “rethink” our drilling technologies.
Today, on Fox News Sunday, Fox’s Brit Hume said that, while his pro-drilling stance has not been changed by the disaster, the spill validates the concern of environmentalists who warned that such a disaster was inevitable:
Think about what the environmentalists have always said about this. Is it’s not a matter of if there’ll be a disaster of this kind resulting in this kind of offshore drilling, it’s only a matter of when. This verifies that argument, and becomes a powerful factor in the debate over what to do next. I don’t see any way around the political reality that this will set back the cause of offshore drilling in the United States.
Watch it:
Full Story: Think Progress » Hume Acknowledges Oil Spill Disaster ‘Verifies’ The Concern Of Environmentalists.
Hume Acknowledges Oil Spill Disaster ‘Verifies’ The Concern Of Environmentalists
Today’s Sunday morning news shows were dedicated, in large part, to the unfolding oil spill disaster in the Gulf Coast, as efforts continue to contain the 210,000 gallons of oil a day that are still leaking. The leak has reignited debate over offshore oil drilling, with the Obama administration saying that “further commitments for offshore drilling must await an investigation of the causes of the rig explosion and leak.” Even conservative darling and drilling proponent Marco Rubio said that the spill should make us “rethink” our drilling technologies.
Today, on Fox News Sunday, Fox’s Brit Hume said that, while his pro-drilling stance has not been changed by the disaster, the spill validates the concern of environmentalists who warned that such a disaster was inevitable:
Think about what the environmentalists have always said about this. Is it’s not a matter of if there’ll be a disaster of this kind resulting in this kind of offshore drilling, it’s only a matter of when. This verifies that argument, and becomes a powerful factor in the debate over what to do next. I don’t see any way around the political reality that this will set back the cause of offshore drilling in the United States.
Watch it:
Full Story: Think Progress » Hume Acknowledges Oil Spill Disaster ‘Verifies’ The Concern Of Environmentalists.
Fox And Friends Pushes ‘Conspiracy Theory’ That Massive Oil Spill Was ‘Deliberate’ ‘Sabotage’
As the scale of the disaster caused by the explosion at an oil rig off the coast of Louisiana became more apparent last week, right-wing radio talker Rush Limbaugh unleashed a conspiracy theory suggesting that someone intentionally blew up the rig in order to “head off more oil drilling”:
LIMBAUGH: I want to get back to the timing of the blowing up, the explosion out there in the Gulf of Mexico of this oil rig….Now, lest we forget, ladies and gentlemen, the carbon tax bill, cap and trade that was scheduled to be announced on Earth Day. I remember that. And then it was postponed for a couple of days later after Earth Day, and then of course immigration has now moved in front of it. But this bill, the cap-and-trade bill, was strongly criticized by hardcore environmentalist wackos because it supposedly allowed more offshore drilling and nuclear plants, nuclear plant investment. So, since they’re sending SWAT teams down there, folks, since they’re sending SWAT teams to inspect the other rigs, what better way to head off more oil drilling, nuclear plants, than by blowing up a rig? I’m just noting the timing here.
As part of their inquiry into the explosion, federal investigators are not ruling out any possible causes, including the possibility of criminal acts or negligence. But other than Limbaugh’s rant last week, oil spill truther theories initially appeared only on fringe websites. That is…until today.
Full Story: Think Progress » Fox And Friends Pushes ‘Conspiracy Theory’ That Massive Oil Spill Was ‘Deliberate’ ‘Sabotage’.
Unification Church will put Washington Times up for sale
Washington Times executives are negotiating to sell the newspaper, after the Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s family cut off most of the annual subsidy of about $35 million that has kept the Unification Church-backed paper afloat, company officials said.
Nicholas Chiaia, a member of the paper’s two-man board of directors and president of the church-supported United Press International wire service, confirmed that the paper is actively on the market: “We recently entered into discussions with a number of parties interested in either purchasing or partnering with the Washington Times,” he said in a statement to The Washington Post
Full Story: Unification Church will put Washington Times up for sale.
Bill Moyers on Retiring from the JOURNAL
Thanks to all of you who wrote to express your disappointment and dismay at hearing me say last week that the JOURNAL will be coming to an end with the April 30th broadcast. My team and I were touched by your messages, but I want to disabuse those of you who fear that we are being pushed off the air by higher-ups at PBS pointing to the door and demanding that we go. Not so. PBS doesn’t fund the JOURNAL; our support comes from foundations and our sole corporate funder, Mutual of America. Together they’ve given me an independence rare for broadcast journalists. Our reporting and analysis trigger controversy from many quarters, as any strong journalism will, but not one – not one! – of my funders has ever mentioned to me the complaints directed their way. They would continue their support if I were to stick around.
I’m leaving for one reason alone: It’s time to go. I’ll be 76 in a few weeks, and while I don’t consider myself old (my father lived into his 80s, my mother into her 90s) there are some things left to do that the deadlines and demands of a weekly broadcast don’t permit. At 76, it’s now or never. I actually informed my friends at PBS of my decision over a year ago, and planned to leave at the end of last December. But they asked me to continue another four more months while they prepare a new series for Friday night broadcast. I agreed, but said at the time – April 30 and not a week longer.
It wasn’t easy deciding to close the JOURNAL. I like what I do, I cherish my colleagues, and my viewers remain loyal and engaged. I will miss the virtual community that has grown up around the broadcast – kindred spirits across the country whose unseen but felt presence reminds me of why I have kept at this work so long. But it has indeed been a long time (almost 40 years since I launched the original JOURNAL in 1971), and that’s why I can assure you that my departure is entirely voluntary. “Time brings everything,” an ancient wise man said. Including new beginnings.
Full Story: Bill Moyers Journal: Bill Moyers on Retiring from the JOURNAL.
OPS: A sad day for democracy, and , America
Bill Maher Slams Obama, Oil Companies After Gulf Coast Oil Spill (VIDEO)
Bill Maher slammed President Obama Friday for supporting a repeal of the moratorium on offshore oil drilling.
During the panel segment on “Real Time,” Maher pointed to the Gulf Coast oil spill and wondered why less than a month ago, President Obama proposed lifting the ban on offshore oil drilling along much of the East Coast.
While the president's proposal was part of a larger climate bill, for Maher, it was an unecessary concession to Republicans.
“I understand politics is the art of the compromise and all that,” Maher said. “But you know, when you compromise on something like that, that's a bridge too far to me, as a supporter.”
He went on to compare oil companies to banks that were too big to fail and suggested higher taxes for oil companies that will reflect the real cost of oil.
Full Story: Bill Maher Slams Obama, Oil Companies After Gulf Coast Oil Spill (VIDEO).
Glenn Beck has lost 1/3 of its TV audience since January
Should we blame it on the Massa Moment?
Will that Hindenburg performance soon be seen as the turning point for Glenn Beck: the pivotal moment when the Fox News show began to permanently leak viewers?
Who can forget the March day that will live in cable news infamy, when Beck invited embattled Democratic Congressman Eric Massa onto his show, for an entire hour, to blow the whistle on Democratic Party corruption? Or so Beck thought. Instead, Massa went on and on about tickle fights, and Beck became a laughing stock — the butt of endless Geraldo-opens-Al-Capone’s-vault jokes.
Prior to the Massa Moment, Glenn Beck was averaging 2.6 million viewers each week, and the show was still flying high. And in the short term, the wildly hyped Massa episode produced ratings gold, generating 3.4 million viewers that night, thank you very much. Long-term though, the effects have proven to be disastrous.
Full Story: Glenn Beck has lost 1/3 of its TV audience since January | Media Matters for America.
Washington Times Publisher Jonathan Slevin OUSTED
The president and publisher of conservative newspaper The Washington Times has been ousted after a clash with the editor.
Politico’s Patrick Gavin reported that Slevin would step down on Friday, a claim the newspaper initially denied; it has since confirmed that Slevin’s contract will expire at the end of the month and will not be renewed.
“I can now confirm that Jonathan Slevin’s contract with the Washington Times will be allowed to expire effective April 30, and that the Times is actively seeking a replacement,” TWT spokesman Don Meyer told Gavin Sunday.
In Slevin’s memo announcing his departure, he took several shots at the newspaper’s board and its new editor, Sam Dealey, who he blames for leaking the news of his exit.
Full Story: Washington Times Publisher Jonathan Slevin OUSTED.
Bill Maher BECOMES a Teabagger
Real Time with Bill Maher: New Rules from April 23, 2010 in which Bill Maher puts on his teabagger hat and tells it like it is.
You’re Embarrassing Caucasians In This Country!
Ed Schultz -
Sad Day for America: Moyers down to 2 final shows on PBS
Bill Moyers Journal: Simon Johnson and James Kwak on Real Financial Reform
Sadly, Bill Moyers Journal is going off the air at the end of the month. This was one of Moyers’ better segments to finish off his return to PBS after some time in exile, which started with his documentary that is a must see from back in April of 2007, Buying the War. If you’ve never seen it, go watch it on line at Moyers’ site here.
Bill sat down with Simon Johnson and James Kwak to talk about Wall Street and their dirty dealings that have yet to be reformed, why we need to get rid of “too big to fail”, whether the reforms being considered by the Congress now are strong enough and what we need to do to keep from having another collapse of our financial system.
Sadly there’s a huge hole that is about to be left in what’s left of real journalism in our country with Moyers leaving the airways. Mr. Moyers, you will be missed. He did say that he’s not going away all together thankfully.
Full Story: Bill Moyers Journal: Simon Johnson and James Kwak on Real Financial Reform | Video Cafe.
Journalism’s Parasites
David Sirota -
No matter how much this week’s Pulitzer Prize triumphalism hides it, the fact remains that journalism these days is “a disaster,” as Ted Koppel said recently. And unfortunately, retrospection dominates the news industry’s self-analysis. Like dazed tornado victims, most media experts focus on what happened and why, oh lord, why?
The queries are important, though just as critical are two prospective questions: 1) If, to butcher a Chinese aphorism, every crisis is an opportunity, then who is making an opportunity out of journalism’s current crisis and 2) are those opportunity-maximizers actually parasites destroying journalism for the long haul?
The answer to the initial question is three groups, starting with the Access Traders. These are reporters like The New Yorker’s Ryan Lizza, Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter and NBC’s Chuck Todd, who, while covering politics for major media, are also signing separate contracts to write books chronicling White House gossip. Facing a crisis in audience share, these correspondents’ employers encourage the double-dip opportunities, hoping book exposure will result in residual attention. But the simultaneity is problematic: As the Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz notes, hard-hitting stories in these reporters’ day jobs “might alienate potential (book) sources and flattering ones might loosen The dynamic’s deleterious effect on journalism is obvious.
Full Story: t r u t h o u t | Journalism’s Parasites.
Clinton: Media, Politicians Shouldn’t Fuel ‘Hatriot’ Groups With Anti-Government Rhetoric That Inspired McVeigh
Fifteen years ago, a deranged anti-government extremist named Timothy McVeigh set off a truck bomb below the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people, including 19 children under the age of six. In a speech delivered at the Center for American Progress Action Fund today, President Clinton drew eerily parallels between that incident and the current atmosphere of right-wing, anti-government hatred.
He specifically pointed to the influence of right-wing media in the 90s, saying that those hate radio hosts “understood clearly that emotion was more powerful than reason most of the time, and it happened that they got much bigger listenership, and more advertisers, and more commercial success, if they kept people in the white heat.” People like Timothy McVeigh were “highly vulnerable to the suggestions and implications of the most militant rhetoric of the time.” Both media and politicians therefore need to be responsible in their rhetoric since it falls on the “serious and the delirious alike”:
Corrupt Practices Accelerating the Decline of American Journalism
We have people posturing as journalists on TV who get paid as business spokespeople, financial reporters who retire to work for Goldman Sachs — media parasites.
No matter how much this week’s Pulitzer Prize triumphalism hides it, the fact remains that journalism these days is “a disaster,” as Ted Koppel said recently. And unfortunately, retrospection dominates the news industry’s self-analysis. Like dazed tornado victims, most media experts focus on what happened and why, oh lord, why?
The queries are important, though just as critical are two prospective questions: 1) If, to butcher a Chinese aphorism, every crisis is an opportunity, then who is making an opportunity out of journalism’s current crisis and 2) are those opportunity-maximizers actually parasites destroying journalism for the long haul?
The answer to the initial question is three groups, starting with the Access Traders. These are reporters like The New Yorker’s Ryan Lizza, Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter and NBC’s Chuck Todd, who, while covering politics for major media, are also signing separate contracts to write books chronicling White House gossip. Facing a crisis in audience share, these correspondents’ employers encourage the double-dip opportunities, hoping book exposure will result in residual attention. But the simultaneity is problematic: As the Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz notes, hard-hitting stories in these reporters’ day jobs “might alienate potential (book) sources and flattering ones might loosen tongues.”
Full Story: Corrupt Practices Accelerating the Decline of American Journalism | Media and Culture | AlterNet.
O’Reilly Sanctimoniously Denies GOP Senator’s Charge That Fox Disinformed Viewers with Claim Medical Uninsured Will Go to Prison – Cue Video of 20-Plus Instances of Fox Propagandists, Including O’Reilly, Making That Exact Claim
It’s hard to find someone to root for in this one. Bill O’Reilly, the leading right-wing propagandist on Fox before they hired Glenn Beck versus Sen. Tom Coburn, R-0kla., who is a member of the Family a powerful Christian cult in Washington, who lives in the infamous house on C Street on Capitol Hill. Coburn is a physician and yet was a stalwart opponent of expanding health-care coverage to the 45 million Americans who couldn’t afford it.
O’Reilly is a notorious liar — Al Franken, now a senator from Minnesota, wrote a book that documented, in part, O’Reilly’s lies that he titled, “Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right” — but he has rarely been caught so red-handed looking at the camera and lying about something that was so readily proven to be a lie.
This episode shows the perfection of the right-wing propaganda apparatus. First, they convinced their base to mistrust corporate media, in part by framing it as the “liberal media.” Now right-wing propagandists like O’Reilly can be proven to be lying, as Huffington Post did here — but his viewers will never see the proof because, as noted, they have been trained to avoid legitimate news outlets.
O’Reilly vs. Coburn: The Video Evidence (VIDEO)
On Tuesday night’s installment of “The O’Reilly Factor”, Fox News host Bill O’Reilly went after Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) for a comment Coburn made at a town hall meeting in Oklahoma earlier in the month. Coburn shot down speculation that imprisonment was one of the consequences for those who chose not to purchase health insurance, telling the crowd: “The intention is not to put anybody in jail. That makes for good TV news on FOX but that isn’t the intention.”
O’Reilly didn’t take too kindly to that sort of criticism of his employer, especially coming from a conservative like Coburn. So O’Reilly defied Coburn to name a single person on Fox News who had ever said such a thing. And then O’Reilly dropped the gauntlet, saying, “We researched to find out if anybody on Fox News had ever said you’re going to jail if you don’t buy health insurance. Nobody’s ever said it.”
Full Story: O’Reilly vs. Coburn: The Video Evidence (VIDEO).
FOX Getting Too Vitriolic, Even for Life-Long Republicans
With the willful partisan distortions of FOX Fraudcasting, the network has consistently endured progressive and nonpartisan criticism for the way it approaches the “news.” FOX and its personalities have taken those kinds of derisions and mocked them in turn as the slanted work of the “lamestream media.” Further emboldened by the successful viewer draw it has amassed, FOX has continued to allow unsubstantiated conspiracy theories and blatant falsehoods to run on the air, sentiments that have grown so outrageous that even stalwart Republicans have grown wary of the caricatures.
Part of the growing conservative concerns about FOX's rhetoric became apparent when David Frum spoke about the network recently. Unsurprisingly, Frum soon afterward found himself fired from the American Heritage Institute for faulting the GOP on healthcare reform and placing at least part of the blame on FOX. Nonetheless, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), a major opponent of healthcare reform, made news for correcting a constituent at a town-hall meeting about the prospect of the government jailing her as part of the passed reform. “The intention is not to put anyone in jail,” said Coburn. “That makes for good TV on FOX, but that isn't the intention.”
Sen. Coburn would go further, defending Speaker Nancy Pelosi as a “nice lady” and that constituents should not “catch yourself being biased by FOX News that somebody is no good.” As someone who boasts a sterling record as a conservative, Coburn certainly had no intention of supporting progressive issues in criticizing FOX. Rather, he recognized how the baseless accusations perpetuated on the network manipulated the political climate into incredibly difficult working conditions.
Full Story: FOX Getting Too Vitriolic, Even for Life-Long Republicans | BuzzFlash.org.
Uninformed Limbaugh Wonders ‘Where Was The Union’ At Non-Union Mine Disaster
Last Friday, Rush Limbaugh asked why a coal miner union didn’t protect the 29 miners who were killed when Massey Energy’s Upper Big Branch Mine in Montcoal, WV, exploded under unsafe conditions:
Was there no union responsibility for improving mine safety? Where was the union here? Where was the union? The union is generally holding these companies up demanding all kinds of safety. Why were these miners continuing to work in what apparently was an unsafe atmosphere?
Listen here
Full Story: Think Progress » Uninformed Limbaugh Wonders ‘Where Was The Union’ At Non-Union Mine Disaster.
How Financial Reporters Create Illusion to Cover Up Wall Street’s Scams | Economy | AlterNet
The corporate media’s job is to sell confidence on Wall Street’s numbers, rather than tempered or even depressed expectations, no matter how realistic they may be.
Is Charles Dickens reminded us in his classic novel Great Expectations, the line between crime and cash is a continually blurry one. And it’s easily manipulated by language and narrow self-interest.
For example, let’s just consider the overly extensive use of one term: “Unexpectedly.” It is especially ubiquitous in finance journalism, where it is repeatedly used to console a rightfully nervous readership that, while good news is a great expectation, bad news just seems to comes out of nowhere. Although I’ve been informally following this clumsy usage for years now since diving into the hazy, crazy world of finance, I’ve never run out of daily examples. Just plug the term “unexpectedly” into Google News on any given day, and neither will you.
Here’s a few that Google coughed up during this writing: “U.S. Home Sales Fall Unexpectedly in Feb.,”ABC News reported. “French Consumer Confidence Unexpectedly Falls On Job Concern,” Bloomberg News reported. “South Africa Unexpectedly Cuts Rates to 6.5%,” the Wall Street Journal reported.
Full Story: How Financial Reporters Create Illusion to Cover Up Wall Street’s Scams | Economy | AlterNet.
Fact-checking Kyl and Gates from ABC’s ‘This Week’
We’re fact-checking several claims made on today’s edition of This Week.
• With the retirement of Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, nomination hearings were a major topic on the Sunday shows. Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., said he thought a filibuster was unlikely, but he wasn’t ruling it out entirely, either. “President Obama himself attempted to filibuster Justice Alito, who now sits on the Supreme Court,” Kyl said.
We looked at the record and found Obama did join a Democratic filibuster that ultimately failed. Interestingly, Obama still had some critical words on the filibuster; read our full report. We rated Kyl’s statement True.
• Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton discussed the Obama administration’s Nuclear Posture Review. Gates, who served in the same job under President Bush, said the policy objectives of the two administrations are not that different. “The policy of the Bush administration was also not to add new nuclear capabilities.”
Full Story: PolitiFact | Fact-checking Kyl and Gates from ABC’s ‘This Week’.
Colbert: GOP trapped between a rock and a black face – video
“So here we are folks, the Republicans hired this strong, competent leader not because he is black,” Colbert emphasized, “but now they can’t fire this weak incompetent leader because he is black.”
| The Colbert Report | Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c | |||
| The Word – Affirmative Inaction | ||||
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Exclusive: Reuters Chief Spikes Story on Killing of His Own Staffers In Baghdad – Reuters – Gawker
David Schlesinger, the editor in chief of Reuters, declined to run a story by one of his own reporters containing claims that the 2007 killings of two Reuters staffers in Baghdad by U.S. troops may have been war crimes.
Reuters staffers Namir Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh were killed by U.S. helicopter gunships in Baghdad in 2007. Video of the attack, which shows the journalists standing next to unidentified armed men on a Baghdad street and records the destruction of a van attempting to retrieve a wounded Chmagh, was published this week by Wikileaks.
The video has launched a debate about the legality of the attack, which also wounded two children (you can read our take here). Yesterday, Reuters’ deputy Brussels bureau chief Luke Baker filed a muscular story repeating allegations from several human rights and international law experts that the killings may have constituted war crimes. But Reuters chief David Schlesinger, a tipster says, spiked the story because “it needed more comment from the Pentagon and U.S. lawyers.” It never ran, but you can read it in full below.
Full Story: Exclusive: Reuters Chief Spikes Story on Killing of His Own Staffers In Baghdad – Reuters – Gawker.
Newspaper chain astroturfs its ‘right-wing’ editorials | Raw Story
When you read an editorial in your local newspaper, your natural assumption is that it expresses the views of that paper’s staff and reflects local concerns. This, however, does not appear to be the case with the many small-town papers owned by Ogden Newspapers, Inc.
On March 31, an editorial headed “ACORN can’t distract public from the truth” appeared in the Fairmont Sentinel, published in Fairmont, MN. It was bylined by Gary Andersen and Lee Smith, the paper’s publisher and editor, and it slammed ACORN as a “front for liberal politicians” that has been involved in “illegal actions.”
That original publication seems legitimate enough. But over the next few days, the same editorial started popping up elsewhere, with no byline and under a variety of headings. On April 3, for example, it appeared in the Minot Daily News of Minot, ND under the heading, “Good riddance to ACORN.”
Full Story: Newspaper chain astroturfs its ‘right-wing’ editorials | Raw Story.
Mother of man arrested for threatening Pelosi blames ‘really radical’ Fox News.
Yesterday in San Fransisco, federal agents arrested 48 year-old Gregory Giusti for allegedly threatening House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA). Giusti “allegedly made dozens of calls to Pelosi’s homes in California and Washington, D.C., as well as her husband’s business office. He allegedly recited her home address and warned that she should not support the healthcare overhaul bill that was recently signed into law if she wanted to see her home again.” Yesterday on San Fransisco’s local ABC affiliate, Giusti’s mother blamed Fox News:
ELEANOR GIUSTI: Greg has — frequently gets in with a group of people that have really radical ideas and that are not consistent with myself or the rest of the family and — which gets him into problems. And apparently I would say this must be another one that somehow he’s gotten onto either by — I’d say Fox News or all of those that are really radical, and he — that’s where he comes from.
Watch it:
Full Story: Think Progress » Mother of man arrested for threatening Pelosi blames ‘really radical’ Fox News..
NYT Erases Progressive Senate Candidate
Tasini campaign not ‘fit to print’?
Over the course of the past year, the New York Times has provided ample coverage to a series of potential U.S. Senate candidates from New York–none of whom are actually running for office. Meanwhile, a candidate who is in fact challenging incumbent Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand in the September 2010 primary has been all but erased from the picture.
That progressive activist Jonathan Tasini is running against Gillibrand, who was appointed to the seat in 2009, is known to Times readers who happened to catch a single January 27, 2010, story by N.R. Kleinfeld, headlined “An Underdog Who Isn’t Daunted by a New Try for the Senate”–the only mention to date in the paper of record of Tasini’s candidacy, which was launched in June 2009.
Meanwhile, the Times has treated possible high-profile candidacies as if they were real news. Former Democratic Rep. Harold Ford from Tennessee, for example, contemplated a run, which elicited substantial coverage (1/6/10, 2/15/10, 2/19/10, 2/24/10) before Ford decided against the idea. His formal decision to not run garnered him a news story and an op-ed piece on the same day (3/2/10), with a piece the next day (3/3/10) that re-capped the non-campaign. The Times has devoted at least nine articles to other Democrats who thought about but in the end decided not to run against Gillibrand.
Full Story: NYT Erases Progressive Senate Candidate.
FOX and Their Convenient Moral Relativism
A major problem with FOX’s general coverage of the news stems from its preconceived narrative filled so saliently far to the political right that its personalities will willfully ignore and manipulate facts to fit the narrative. Part of that philosophy lends itself to couching debates in binaries and ignoring the shades of gray in between, but the substantial criticism of Tea Party protesters has recently forced hosts to reconsider fair reporting — but only when it proves convenient.
One recent example of a FOX host’s inability to look at an issue in a nuanced way came from Sean Hannity. Hannity proved incredulous when discussing President Obama’s push to limit any future use of nuclear weapons by the U.S. as if the idea of moving away from nuclear armaments would suddenly welcome attack. As Bob Beckel pointed out, Hannity’s hero President Reagan worked toward nuclear disarmament, as well, but Hannity still implied President Obama was naive in his move toward that goal “because evil does exist,” a sentiment he kept repeating as his argument. Put another way, Hannity essentially argued that he disliked President Obama’s move away from using nuclear weapons because the president refused to look at the issue with the “good versus evil” binary Hannity and FOX would prefer.
Full Story: FOX and Their Convenient Moral Relativism | BuzzFlash.org.
Murdoch: ‘I Don’t Think’ Fox News ‘Should Be Supporting The Tea Party’
As ThinkProgress and others have documented, for over a year now, Fox News has promoted and celebrated the anti-Obama Tea Party movement. But at a forum for the public affairs TV series, The Kalb Report, last night, Rupert Murdoch, the CEO of Fox’s parent company, said that the network should not be “supporting” the movement:
The mogul was peppered with a host of questions related to his media empire’s political leanings, and in each case fought the perception that he’s made his fortune by catering to the conservative audience. Asked by an official at the progressive watchdog group, Media Matters, whether it was ethical for officials at Fox to promote the Tea Party movement (as has been documented on some occasion) he replied without hesitation.
“No. I don’t think we should be supporting the Tea Party or any other party. But I’d like to investigate what you are saying before condemning anyone.”
Full Story: Think Progress » Murdoch: ‘I Don’t Think’ Fox News ‘Should Be Supporting The Tea Party’.
The Lie That Is FOX News
Rachel Maddow Shows How Faux Coconspired With O’Keefe & Giles To Fabricate The Acorn “Scandal”
Part 2
Jon Stewart Takes On McCain And His “Worthless” Soul (VIDEO)
As Jon Stewart pointed out last night, McCain has a track record of backtracking – like his stances on DADT and tolerance – for political gain. It’s well documented territory for Stewart. A topic he’s often covered with ease.
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Full Story: Jon Stewart Takes On McCain And His “Worthless” Soul (VIDEO).
Post-Hutaree: How Glenn Beck and Fox News spread the militia message
Reading last week’s disturbing news accounts about the Midwestern arrest of nine alleged members of a Christian militia known as the Hutaree, a group whose members were reportedly planning to kill cops in order to spark a wider, armed revolt against the U.S. government, I noticed this nugget [emphasis added]:
FBI agents moved quickly against Hutaree because its members were planning an attack sometime in April, prosecutors said.
My hunch is the self-described “warriors” of the Hutaree probably circled April 19 on their calendars for any cop-killing fantasy they might have planned to pull off. Why April 19? That was the day, 17 years ago, when the FBI staged its final failed assault on cult leader David Koresh’s heavily armed compound in Waco, Texas. It was on April 19, 1993, following a 51-day siege, that Koresh’s fanatical followers, rather than surrendering to authorities, staged mass suicides (and, in some cases, executions) as the compound burned to the ground.
Full Story: Post-Hutaree: How Glenn Beck and Fox News spread the militia message | Media Matters for America.
Tea Party Outraged Over Rep. Steve Cohen TYT Interview
This interview has outraged some Tea Party leaders, accoridng to this AP story. More interviews with members of Congress and others (including Michael Moore, Jesse Ventura and the managing editor of Time Magazine) can be found on our TYT Interviews Channel. Cenk Uygur and Michael Shure interviewed Rep. Steve Cohen about Tea Party craziness and if any Republican will step up to move the party in a sane direction.
David Shuster ‘Ripped A New One,’ May Be Off MSNBC Indefinitely
David Shuster may be about to find out what “punished appropriately” feels like.
When news broke that the MSNBC anchor had filmed a CNN pilot, the network did not immediately comment; spokesman Jeremy Gaines would later say that, if the report turned out to be true, Shuster would be “punished appropriately.”
After not appearing on-air Friday, Shuster may be off-air indefinitely, according to TVNewser’s Gail Shister.
Shister reports that MSNBC President Phil Griffin “ripped Shuster a new one over the phone” and that “a repeat performance is expected [Monday] in the office.” She adds that Shuster will not appear on-air Monday and may not appear on the network again. His contract reportedly expires this year.
Full Story: David Shuster ‘Ripped A New One,’ May Be Off MSNBC Indefinitely.
Will Fox News Destroy the Republican Party?
Fox news realizes that the best way to defend right-wing victories is to keep American politics in a state of chaos, with tea parties and fresh social outrages at every turn.
Over the past week or so, stories about conservative hypocrisies have been popping up in mainstream media like cute kitten videos on the internets. There was the Vatican blaming the news media for the pedophilia practiced by priests; the Republicans blaming the violence against Democrats on the Democrats themselves; Sarah Palin, intoning that “violence isn’t the answer,” studding a map with gunsights to target the Dems who should be gotten rid of come November; and, of course, fundraisers for the family values party trying to expense-account their visit to that faux-lesbian, bondage-themed nightclub in West Hollywood. It almost made you think the conservative movement was about to collapse under the weight of its own delusions.
But then the cable ratings came out and showed that Fox News had had its best quarter ever, and that it’s the second most-watched cable channel in prime time, right after USA Network.
And that made me think of another recent story, the purge of former Bush speechwriter David Frum from the American Enterprise Institute, largely for delivering quotes like this: “The Republicans originally thought that Fox works for us, and now we’re discovering we work for Fox. The balance here has been completely reversed, and the thing that sustains a strong Fox network is the thing that undermines a strong Republican Party.”
Full Story: Will Fox News Destroy the Republican Party? | | AlterNet.
U.S. Admits Role in February Killing of Afghan Women – NYTimes.com
After initially denying involvement or any cover-up in the deaths of three Afghan women during a badly bungled American Special Operations assault in February, the American-led military command in Kabul admitted late on Sunday that its forces had, in fact, killed the
The admission immediately raised questions about what really happened during the Feb. 12 operation — and what falsehoods followed — including a new report that Special Operations forces dug bullets out of the bodies of the women to hide the true nature of their deaths.
A NATO official also said Sunday in an interview that an Afghan-led team of investigators had found signs of evidence tampering at the scene, including the removal of bullets from walls near where the women were killed. A senior NATO official later denied on Monday that any evidence tampering occurred.
women during the nighttime raid.
Full Story: U.S. Admits Role in February Killing of Afghan Women – NYTimes.com.
Ten Things You Can Do to Help Progressive Journalism
Wha’s wrong with this picture? Air America vanishes into the ether, while Glenn Beck indoctrinates 2.7 million daily viewers with his histrionic brand of right-wing lunacy. Independent news agencies must continuously solicit donations from readers to stay afloat, while hate-filled shock jock Rush Limbaugh makes $50 million a year.
On the other hand, there’s still a lot of great progressive media on the airwaves, including Democracy Now!, which airs on more than 800 TV and radio stations worldwide, along with radio shows by Ed Schultz and Stephanie Miller. The Nation and TheNation.com are part of a progressive journalistic community that is challenging the right in every medium. ZP Heller, a writer (HuffPo, OpenLeft, AlterNet) who is working on a novel lampooning corporate media, lists ten steps you can take to help keep progressive journalism alive
- Check it. Media Matters and Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) have been dogged in holding Fox News accountable for spewing gross misinformation on a near daily basis. Get the facts about how Fox’s right-wing agenda still oozes on the air, even when Beck, O’Reilly and Hannity aren’t on-screen. Go to mediamatters.org and fair.org.
Full Story: Ten Things You Can Do to Help Progressive Journalism.
Fox Business’ Stuart Varney Shoots Down Former Bush Labor Secretary Elaine Chao’s Negative Jobs Report Spin
Earlier today, the Labor Department released its employment report for March 2010, which found that “employment in the U.S. increased in March by the most in three years.” In the report, the Bureau of Labor Statistics also revised its January total from
-26,000 to +14,000, and February’s from -36,000 to -14,000. President Obama called the report “encouraging” while his economic adviser Christina Romer said it “shows continued signs of gradual labor market healing.” Paul Krugman described the job numbers as meaning that “the patient is in stable condition.”
As ThinkProgress noted earlier today, conservatives have sought to rain on Obama’s parade, falsely claiming that the numbers are a “disappointment” because they were “mostly” due to hiring Census workers. On Fox Business today, former Bush labor secretary Elaine Chao attempted to spin the numbers negatively. But host Stuart Varney, who has been cynical about the administration’s economic policies, wouldn’t buy her spin, telling her that “this is not a blip up on a one month basis, there is a trend”:
Fox News Caught In Massive Nielsen Ratings Fraud
This week saw the release of the quarterly ratings performance data for television programming. Much of the reporting on this story focused on the dominant position Fox News retains in the cable news sector. As has been the case for several years, Fox News smothered the competition and experienced rapid growth while other news programmers stagnated or declined.
While most industry insiders accept the routine pronouncements from the sole ratings provider, Nielsen Media Research, without question, some observers could not help but notice a certain incongruity in the results. How is it, they wonder, that Fox News can be so consistently in the lead despite their obvious niche programming focus on a narrow segment of the viewing audience. The decidedly right-of-center bias of Fox News corresponds to a rather small portion of the national electorate. Republican favorability has been hovering in the mid-twenties for years. So how does this negligible slice of the market translate into such a disproportionate ratings advantage?
The answer may be evident in new disclosures of business relationships that call into question the integrity of Nielsen’s data. With the rollout of its People Meter methodology in the early 2000’s, Nielsen entered the high-tech era of TV market research. It was heralded as a major advancement of data collection that would vastly improve the ability of producers, programmers and advertisers to evaluate the marketplace. But as with any upheaval in the status quo, there were skeptics and dissenters. Chief amongst them was Fox Broadcasting, who argued that the new system significantly under-counted African-Americans, a key component of their audience at the time. There was also a question as to the security of the new set-top boxes that would be recording viewer choices. With the introduction of technology comes the risk of miscalculations and tampering. But eventually the complaints receded or were resolved and the new service took its place as the signature survey product for television marketing.
Full Story: News Corpse » Fox News Caught In Massive Nielsen Ratings Fraud.
April Fools joke? I guess we’ll see
Toby Keith joins LL Cool J in shock at being used for Palin’s Fox News show.
Fox News has been promoting Sarah Palin’s first episode of “Real American Stories,” set to air on Thursday, with “In Their Own Words” segments featuring celebrities talking about their lives. Last night on Twitter, rapper LL Cool J objected to being included in the show, saying that Fox was “misrepresenting” one of his interviews from 2008 (which was not conducted by Palin). LL Cool J’s spokesperson said that the interview “was being repurposed without LL’s permission.” Fox ended up cutting LL Cool J’s interview out of Palin’s show. Now, country singer Toby Keith, another person featured in the “In Their Own Words” segments, is also upset at being caught off guard:
In a telephone interview on Wednesday, Elaine Schock, a publicist for Mr. Keith said: “I have no idea what interview they are using. Toby’s talked to Fox a number of times, and I had no idea that this was going to be on Sarah Palin’s special. Fox has never contacted me — not now, not when they were putting this together, not at all. I have no idea what they’re using.” [...]
In a subsequent email message, Ms. Schock said that the interview with Mr. Keith likely happened in early 2009. Asked if Mr. Keith was ever interviewed by Ms. Palin, Ms. Schock said, “Absolutely not.”
Full Story: Think Progress » Toby Keith joins LL Cool J in shock at being used for Palin’s Fox News show..
What if Fox News actually wants mob violence?
Conservative commentators were atwitter last week following news that Ann Coulter’s speech at the University of Ottawa was canceled in the face of protests. Of course, Coulter has the right to speak her mind on campuses. But in announcing the cancellation, her conservative Canadian sponsor, pundit Ezra Levant, put the blame on out-of-control liberals who had allegedly made it unsafe for Coulter to speak, breathlessly telling reporters that “the police and the security have advised that it would be physically dangerous for Ann Coulter to proceed with this event and for others to come in” and stressing the presence of an “unruly mob” outside.
Naturally, right-wing bloggers south of the Canadian border then went ballistic. Gateway Pundit claimed a menacing mob of 2,000, armed with “rocks and sticks,” had surrounded the Ottawa campus building where Coulter was to speak. And yes, a fire alarm was even pulled.
Oh, my!
Full Story: What if Fox News actually wants mob violence? | The Smirking Chimp.
Michael Calderone Leaving Politico, Latest In Mini-Exodus
Politico media blogger Michael Calderone is leaving the site for Yahoo.
According to sources, he is expected to leave Politico within a matter of weeks to join Yahoo News’ original content project, overseen by blogging editor Andrew Golis. Chris Lehmann and “Cajun Boy” Brett Michael Dykes also recently joined the project.
Calderone, who joined Politico from the New York Observer, has the rare distinction of being named both one of Keith Olbermann’s “Worst Persons in the World” and one of Bill O’Reilly’s “pinheads.”
Calderone had no comment when reached by the Huffington Post.
Full Story: Michael Calderone Leaving Politico, Latest In Mini-Exodus.
Bill Maher Brilliant Rant Regarding Democrats kicking Republican ass
This just aired 3/26/10 after the healthcare bill passed. In classic Bill Maher Fashion, he really rips into the Right, using Tiger Woods’ explicit publicized text message as an analogy. Hilarious, witty, and needed to be said!
Comcast and NBC’s Real Diversity Issues
At last month’s house hearing on the proposed Comcast-NBC takeover, execs from both companies shamefully acknowledged their diversity problems. Comcast CEO Brian Roberts sheepishly divulged that his company’s board of directors includes only one woman and one person of color, and NBC’s Jeff Zucker confessed that the network has no Black programming.
Watch the video:
Full Story: Megan Tady: Comcast and NBC’s Real Diversity Issues.
$10.5 million U.S. media project aimed at local news gap
The U.S. Corporation for Public Broadcasting launched a $10.5 million project on Thursday to increase regional reporting, filling a growing gap due to cutbacks in the news industry where profits have tumbled.
The nonprofit corporation created by Congress will provide $7.5 million from its current budget, with the rest provided by broadcast stations.
Seven “Local Journalism Centers” in different regions will band broadcast stations together to report on issues of particular interest to that area, such as health in Florida and manufacturing in the Upper Midwest.
The project is another example of an expansion in nonprofit news that has given rise to outlets such as ProPublica and the St. Louis Beacon.
Public broadcasters see an opportunity in the changing journalism environment where fewer people are relying on traditional media, there's increased use of social media, and many search for ways to make money in the online sphere.
Full Story: $10.5 million U.S. media project aimed at local news gap | Reuters.
Fox News, health care, and the right-wing nervous breakdown
Watching Fox News personalities recently come unglued as the realization set in that (surprise!) Democrats might actually have the votes to pass health care reform — and noting how extraordinarily loopy and dire both the attacks on the White House, and the proclamations for pending, apocalyptic doom were becoming — I was getting nervous that one of Fox News’ more unhinged hosts might finally just snap and pull a Rev. Jim Jones, beseeching viewers to make the ultimate sacrifice.
Honestly, unless you’ve been monitoring the ticking time bomb that is the far-right media in recent days, you probably don’t appreciate how frighteningly possible that cultish scenario has become, as the GOP Noise Machine, led by Fox News, publicly suffers a nervous breakdown. It’s a mental and emotional collapse that’s been advertised in recent days as cablers, radio talkers, and right-wing bloggers have reached for increasingly hysterical, often blood-curdling rhetoric to describe the irreversible atrocity — an incurable, metastasizing malignancy!! — that’s about to seize and destroy the United States in the form of a bill to expand health care coverage.
Listening to the calamitous warnings (i.e. “the end of America as we know it”), it’s not that unreasonable to think that at some point one of the media mob leaders is going to suggest that life itself just is no longer worth living.
Full Story: Fox News, health care, and the right-wing nervous breakdown | Media Matters for America.
The F Word: The New York Times’ Bias Killed ACORN
Laura Flanders -
So, the New York Times finally ran a correction. But after six weeks of “considering” the errors in its own reporting, the so called paper of record’s correction of its misleading ACORN story, came way, way, WAY to late.
The Times’ correction ran the same day that the anti-poverty group ACORN called it quits, after a year under attack — and a day after the paper’s public editor wrote that yes indeed, the paper has “mistakenly reinforced falsehoods” from right wing activists against the group.
When activists released videos appearing to show ACORN workers offering advice to people posing as a pimp and a prostitute, the Times fell for an editing trick. The videos gave the impression that two activists were dressed in outlandish costumes when they visited ACORN offices. They weren’t. Video transcripts also contradicted what the video makers claimed, namely that ACORN staffers appeared to endorse talk of using underage girls as prostitutes.
Full Story: The F Word: The New York Times’ Bias Killed ACORN | The Smirking Chimp.
Kudlow: ‘The Chamber Of Commerce Is A Very Negative Force,’ ‘Absolutely Negative And Absolutely Wrong’
Since the passage of the Affordable Care Act, Wall Street reform has “vaulted to the top” of President Obama’s agenda. Standing in the way, however, is the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which has spent $3 million on an advertising campaign opposing an independent consumer protection agency and has pledged to spend $100 million to “defend the free market system.”
Yesterday, Deputy Treasury Secretary Neal Wolin ventured into the lion’s den to deliver a tough message. Speaking to the Chamber of Commerce, Wolin ripped the business lobbying group for launching a “lavish, aggressive and misleading campaign” against the consumer protection agency. Wolin proceeded to document instance after instance of the Chamber’s lies. (Read the speech here.)
Bruce Josten, executive vice president of the Chamber, later issued a statement accusing Wolin of “political grandstanding and distortion of facts.” But the Chamber is on the defensive, losing allies on the right. Last night, CNBC host Larry Kudlow, a prominent conservative proponent of trickle-down economics and a lover of all things Ronald Reagan, sided with the Obama administration in its attacks on the Chamber:
“We’re At a Ground Zero Moment to Save Real Journalism”
Izzy Award Winner Jeremy Scahill:
independent media and this critical moment in journalism.
The winner of the second annual Izzy Award, named after muckraking journalist I.F. Stone, discusses independent media and this critical moment in journalism.
On March 24, 2010, the Park Center for Independent Media at Ithaca College, in Ithaca, NY announced that award-winning independent journalist Jeremy Scahill would receive the second annual “Izzy Award.” The Izzy, which is named after the legendary muckraker I.F. Stone, celebrates outstanding achievement in independent media. Last year’s winners were Amy Goodman of Democracy Now! and Glenn Greenwald of Salon.com.
Scahill is a two-time Polk Award winner, and a regular contributor to The Nation, Democracy Now! and AlterNet. His book, Blackwater: the Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army, is an international bestseller. In 2009, he published dozens of stories detailing Blackwater’s secret presence in Pakistan; its involvement in 2007′s Nisour Square massacre; and its CEO’s alleged complicity in murder.
“The judges chose Scahill for his relentless efforts in 2009 to push these issues into mainstream debate,” said Jeff Cohen, director of the Park Center for Independent Media. “We are awed by Scahill’s success, and also by the sheer number of outstanding candidates for the award this year; both reflect the growing importance of independent media in our country.”
Full Story: Izzy Award Winner Jeremy Scahill: “We’re At a Ground Zero Moment to Save Real Journalism” | World | AlterNet.
David Shuster Pleads With Congressmen: Stop The Incendiary Rhetoric! (VIDEO)
David Shuster issued a rare commentary Wednesday afternoon, calling on members of Congress — in particular Senator Tom Coburn — to cut the sort of incendiary rhetoric that could inspire violence.
In particular, Shuster reacted to Coburn’s statement that the health care reform legislation is
“the greatest assault on liberty this country has ever had.”
“Health care reform is a greater assault on liberty than slavery? Good grief!” Shuster said. “Coburn is a medical doctor, he’s not just some right-wing radio host or paid political provocateur….America’s greatest freedoms include the right to free speech, a right we are all blessed to enjoy. However, incendiary rhetoric from members of Congress, while intended to energize the base, can also have an unintended reaction. And that reaction could endanger members of our society, including the President of the United States.”
Full Story: David Shuster Pleads With Congressmen: Stop The Incendiary Rhetoric! (VIDEO).
Keith Olbermann Returns: ‘GOP Self-Destruction Imminent’
Special Comment:
“… he and his cronies and the manufactured outrage of the Tea Party failed to derail Health Care Reform. Failed Mr. Boehner. You lost. You blew it. … American political parties have disappeared before. They are never forced out by their rivals. They die by their own hands, because they did not know that the hatred or the myopia or the monomania they thought was still okay wasn’t okay, any more. … You are rapidly moving from ‘The Party of No,’ past ‘The Party Of No Conscience,’ towards ‘The Party of No Relevancy.’ You are behind the wheel of a political Toyota. And before the mid-terms, you will have been reduced to only bein this generation’s home for the nuts.” — Keith Olbermann’s special comment, Monday, March 22nd, 2010
While Giving Obsessive Coverage To The Tea Parties, Media Ignored Larger Anti-War Rally
As congressional debate on health care reform comes to a close and the House of Representatives is nearing a vote on the Senate’s health care legislation, one group that has been getting more than its fair share of media attention has been the far-right tea party. As a small number of protesters gathered on Capitol Hill yesterday to demonstrate against the passage of health care legislation, the major media outlets gave obsessive coverage to the group:
- In an article titled “Raucous Tea Partiers Protest Bill,” the Politico reported that “Thousands of Tea Party protesters filled Upper Senate park” to voice their opposition to Democrats’ health care plan. [3/20/10]
- Fox News.com trumpeted the protesters in a piece titled “Tea Party Activists Make Last Stand Against Health Care Vote,” where it even uncritically reported the claim of one activist that 25,000 demonstrators attended the event. [3/20/10]
- In an article titled “GOP Leaders, Tea Party Activists Pledge to Fight On” CQ Politics noted that “House Republican leaders received a rock star’s welcome” from tea partiers. [3/20/10]
Full Story: Think Progress » While Giving Obsessive Coverage To The Tea Parties, Media Ignored Larger Anti-War Rally.
Fox News coverage of health care protests
on day of health care vote
NYT Public Editor Finally Admits ACORN ‘PIMP’ HOAX REPORTING Failure:
‘Times Was WRONG, I Have Been WRONG Defending Paper’
Clark Hoyt says in Sunday column ‘editors considering correction’
Also concedes paper ‘should have’ covered former MA AG’s early-December report finding no criminality in ‘heavily edited’ sting videos
“The Times was wrong…and I have been wrong in defending the paper’s phrasing.”
Even as the New York Times once again misreported the ACORN “Pimp” Hoax on its pages in a report on the community organization’s possible declaration of bankruptcy in Saturday’s paper, their Public Editor (ombudsman) Clark Hoyt finally admits in his column tonight, for tomorrow’s paper, that both he and the paper were “wrong” in their reports about rightwing dirty trickster James O’Keefe’s “pimp” costume, adding that “editors say they are considering a correction.”
Considering?! What exactly would be the hold up?
Fox News commentator Geraldo Rivera criticizes Bret Baier’s Obama interview.
Yesterday on the radio program “Brian and the Judge,” Fox News commentator Geraldo Rivera criticized fellow network personality Bret Baier for not treating President Obama respectfully during his recent interview. Former Bush press secretary Dana Perino was also on the show and completely disagreed with Rivera, claiming that President Bush also received “aggressive” treatment:
RIVERA: At a certain point, you gotta recognize, in my opinion — and again, I’m not putting Bret down in any way shape or form — when the President seemed exasperated and frustrated and unable to complete a sentence, I thought at some point you got to make a difference between the guy who’s the Senate whip or the House whip, or the assemblyman, the leader of the state senate. He’s not a mayor, he’s the President.
PERINO: There’s not a single reporter who ever interviewed President Bush who would have done anything different. … I was there for 7.5 years, I watched them all. … They’re aggressive and they should be. [...]
Full Story: Think Progress » Fox News commentator Geraldo Rivera criticizes Bret Baier’s Obama interview..
Rachel Maddow – Reverend Dr. Welton Gaddy:
suspicious of Bart Stupak’s audacity
OPS: Stupak’s involvement in the Cult: C-Street ‘Family’ needs to be deeply investigated
Chris Matthews Blasts Americans For Prosperity President (video)
Matthews To Health Care Reform Opponent: What You’re Talking About Doesn’t Exist
Chris Matthews interviewed Tim Phillips, the president of Americans for Prosperity, Thursday about health care reform.
At the center of their discussion was disturbing footage from an Ohio protest that showed opponents of the health care overhaul legislation shouting down a health care supporter, a man with Parkinson’s Disease sitting before them.
One of the screaming men wore a pin for Americans for Prosperity. Phillips condemned the angry protester, but said that because of “the government takeover” he could imagine why the man was so angry.
Phillips told Matthews that the man with Parkinson’s should join his group and fight health care reform. Matthews scoffed at the claim
Full Story: Matthews To Health Care Reform Opponent: What You’re Talking About Doesn’t Exist.
Jon Stewart’s Spends Half His Show Skewering Glenn Beck
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Stenography As Journalism Classic:
Christian News Service Publishes Lies by Rep. Dreier (R-Closet) about ‘Slaughter Rule’ Without Balance or Rebuttal
Yesterday Rep. David Dreier, a Republican from Southern California, and the ranking member on the House Rules Committee, spoke with Matt Cover who writes for the Christian News Service (CNSNews.com) about the procedural issues involved in Democrats’ plans to pass health care reform, especially including the “Slaughter Rule,” named for the current Rules chair, Rep. Louise Slaughter of New York. As we noted earlier, Republicans are flogging away at the process, rather than the substance of the bill, because focusing on congressional procedures drives polling on reform down.
The content of what Dreier said to CNSNews ranged from disingenuous to outright lying — and CNSNews printed all of it without question, without bothering to fact check or present any sort of perspective from the pro-reform side.
That’s not journalism, it’s stenography — and, worse, propaganda.
Full Story: Pensito Review.
Christiane Amanpour To Host ‘This Week’ On ABC
Christiane Amanpour has been named the anchor of ABC’s Sunday morning public affairs program, “This Week.”
“I am delighted to announce that Christiane Amanpour will join ABC News as the new anchor of ‘This Week,’” ABC News president David Westin said in an e-mail to staff. “A highly respected journalist recognized around the world for her reporting, she brings to her new position a wealth of experience and knowledge, as well as a deep commitment to bringing news of the world to the American people. She will also appear on all other ABC News programs and platforms to provide international analysis of the important issues of the day. And, she will be anchoring primetime documentaries on international subjects.”
“I’m thrilled to be joining the incredible team at ABC News,” Amanpour said. “Being asked to anchor ‘This Week’ and the superb tradition started by David Brinkley, is a tremendous and rare honor and I look forward to discussing the great domestic and international issues of the day. I leave CNN with the utmost respect, love and admiration for the company and everyone who works here. This has been my family and shared endeavor for the past 27 years and I am forever grateful and proud of all that we have accomplished.”
Full Story: Christiane Amanpour To Host ‘This Week’ On ABC.
